"Processing" Chickens

Here at the Eco-Ranch, our poultry serve three purposes. Of course we love to watch them and we collect, eat & sell the eggs...... but we also kill and eat the poultry. With so many people now keeping chickens, mostly hens, eating the birds is a decision that each owner makes, depending on their thoughts on "processing", butchering, the birds. I would never fault someone for keeping their poultry as pets and pet birds, at least hens, will not only provide you with hours of pleasure to watch, but tasty, nutritious eggs as well!

We will eat meat and since we will, we either try to raise what we will eat, or buy/trade others with the same feed ethics we have for their meat. This is what we did last Fall with three hogs that I butchered here and was able to have some 300 pounds of handmade sausage to sell to our friends locally.

Most Westerners are disconnected from their food source and have little idea of what is involved in butchering an animal. Most who have experience, have it from hunting deer and the overwhelming majority of these folks "butcher" the butchering!

Again, killing and butchering your livestock is a personal decision. However, we have found that the way we raise our poultry not only makes it an inexpensive way to obtain our protein, but the entire experience is a fun and rewarding one...... at least until the "moment" arrives... I hate killing anything!

Anyone who has watched any of my videos (http://youtube.com/ecoranchusa), has heard the incessant crowing in the background. We had far too many roosters for a while. I did this on purpose though, because you cannot tell the quality & temperament of a rooster or hen, until they are nearly a year old. Since we are hatching our own chicks now, it is important to have not only good looking & producing birds, but good TEMPERAMENTS as well!

I killed about 15 that were obviously not going to make the "cut" a while ago. Today, I set out to get rid of the rest, give the hens a break from the "gigolo parade", lower the Winter feed bill, put food in the freezer and most importantly select the best roosters to propagate our flock! We had counted nine that needed to go, particularly three that had developed the nasty habit of raping the duck hens (a fairly common thing). There are probably 3-4 more that can go as will, but these nine were the goal.

I was able to process just eight of them today. Debbie does not ever eat the chicken skin, so I don't bother to scald and pluck, unless I am smoking birds, or preparing a Holiday bird. One big problem with a mature bird, is that the skin does NOT want to come off easily! 6-10 week old Cornish Crosses will skin in seconds, but an 11 month old DARK Cornish peels like a coconut! That is why I could only process eight today.

However, from those eight, here is the breakdown of cost, versus amount of food provided. One note too, many people are not as fussy as we are regarding what the birds are fed and other things, so their cost of raising the birds will be a bit less than ours....... but I say the quality and quantity of the meat will be less too.

At any rate, the eight roosters laid no eggs of course, so they were a complete cost liability. The cost of feeding them for 11 months came to $14.00 each; some of the birds were hatched here and some cost us $2.75 each as day old chicks, so let's say this batch cost $15.50 per bird to raise. Each bird probably gave us at least three new chicks. That reduces the cost some, the same as culling a hen that is laying, is cost-reduced by the profit from the eggs she laid before culling...... but to keep it simple, let's say the roosters cost me the $14.00 each to raise.

I am retired, so my labor has no value subtracted, but if you were figuring the cost, allow 30 minutes per bird in total handling time, at whatever rate you assign yourself. Most chicken house employees earn around $8-10.00 an hour.

Each bird provides us with meals for two from the legs..... which are huge when the bird is this size, thighs.... same size, breast and the broth for soup is another entire meal. The wings are 1/4 meal and the breast tenderloin another 1/4 meal. So we get 4-1/2 meals from each rooster. That brings the cost per meal to $1.15 (for each of us) for the protein source for the meal. Additionally, there are NO steroids, antibiotics, hormones or 20% "broth" added to these birds. They are completely natural!

Now, we couldn't raise and sell THESE birds and make any profit, but that is not always the goal. You need to feed yourself first! These older birds are larger and far more flavorful. The age, coupled with the exercise they get, creates a very dense meat that you cannot eat as much of as you can a grocery store "frankenbird that has been shot full of "broth". You eat less and the bird goes further!

We can however, raise chicken that cost us less to bring to market size. For our system though, the per bird profit would be around $2-4. At my age, it is a lot of work for the money, so we primarily are feeding ourselves, selling the eggs and on rare occasions, chicken or duck sausage.

However, as more people start this "New Homesteading", many avenues open for bartering farm goods between farms. I have chickens, Joe has pigs, Sally has steers, Sam has vegetables and so on and we all swap foods and farm products around, eat better and save hard cash!

By the way, we don't eat any organ meats, but the hearts, gizzards, livers, lungs, testicles and meat removed from the bones of the soup broth all get cooked with rice, run through the grinder and each rooster will provide our 8 small dogs with a day's dog food for another $2.00 saving!

I am tired tonight, but quite happy knowing where my food comes from. Try it!