Meat Chickens

It has been over two months since I was last able to update my blog.   This is due to our crippling internet situation.   We finally were able to get a T-mobile mifi and we now consistently get between 1 and 3 mbps so I can actually upload photos..    T-Mobile will get us by until we get Starlink which is now projected to be available to our area in March of 2022.   Come on Elon Musk!

So, without further delay, let me travel back in time to report on our first chicken butchering!

First, let me just say that these meat chickens are NOT like normal chickens.   We got Cornish Cross chicks at Tractor Supply.  My mom happened to be there and saw that they were on sale for 25 cents apiece!   

She got all 20 that were available, one died the next day but we expected it would because something was wrong with its leg and it couldn’t get around very well. 

These chicks were nasty.   Poopy, smelly, ugly, gross little things that felt like hot, prickly, water balloons when we had to handle them.  

Their feathers took forever to come in and their rears were huge and round and bulbous.  They all looked like they were carrying a load in their pants.

Because of the Great Pyranees dogs, we were able to put them in the chicken tractor that my dad built and didn’t worry too much about predators. 

We found this possum near the tractor the first week they were out there.  What good dogs!

Every morning I would go out and drag the tractor to a patch of fresh grass. 

The chickens literally ate all day.   I couldn’t keep their food trays full.   They were so fat and lazy they would lie down to eat. (something that normal chickens never do)  

We took their food away at night so that they would not over eat.  They have been known to eat too much and have heart problems or leg problems due to fast and excessive weight gain.

The chickens’ weight ranged from 8 to 10 pounds alive.

Finally butchering day came.  In preparation,  I watched several butchering videos and was fairly confident in the process.

My Aunt Faith had given me the killing cone for my birthday.  I ordered a couple of knives and bags on Amazon but we had everything else we needed:  hose, propane camp stove, table, canopy.

Josh did 17 of the 19 throat slittings.  I did 2 just so that I knew I could do it.   I did not like to do it but it was fine. 

After the chicken bled out for about 3 minutes, we dunked the body in a pot of 150 degree water for about 1 minute or until the feathers came out easily.

The kids’ main job was plucking.  They preferred that the head and feet were cut off before they plucked.

Water boy.

After plucking, the body was hosed off and sent to the evisceration table.  

This was the hardest part of the process but honestly it was not bad at all.   The first chicken took me about 15 minutes to get cleaned out but by the last I was down to about 5 minutes – which is still slow in the homesteading butchering world.  

We decided that some of the chickens we would leave whole but the rest my mom cut up into “grocery store” cuts so that when we need chicken breast, we have just breast,  not a whole chicken.  Or when we make oven baked drumsticks, there they are, altogether in a bag.

Posing with the last chicken.

Finished and ready for the freezer the weights were between 6 and 7 lbs each.  We ended up with 126 lbs of meat that cost us $145 dollars to raise.

As seems to be common of Arkansas weather, the day started of misty and cool.  Then it got so hot and sunny that we set up the pop-up canopy to work under. By the end of the day,  it poured rain on us as we finished the last chicken.

The kids did so well with the whole process.  They were not grossed out or sad at all.   I am very proud of them for their hard work and no complaining.

We had a whole mess of chicken paws that Joy diligently helped me process and get ready for bone broth. 

 This is a picture of the first broth I’ve ever made with chicken feet.  It looked like we were boiling baby hands!

The next night we baked 2 of the whole chickens.   I was afraid it would taste weird but I tell you,  it was THE BEST chicken we all have ever had.   That was a special meal for us as everything we ate was home grown on our little homestead.

Right after we ate that chicken that was to die for, we all decided that raising meat chicken was definitely worth it,  not only for cost but also because it was fun, generally easy, and tasted SO good.  However, since then, we have eaten more of the chicken and it has not been as good.  I don’t know if it is because those first 2 were fresh and never frozen or what, but the frozen ones have not been nearly as tender - not bad but just your average chicken.

Come Spring we will decide whether or not we want to raise meat chickens again.   Regardless,  it was a very rewarding experience that I am so glad we did!  We felt like legit homesteaders and it made us more confident for our future endeavors.