Processing Your Chickens

I am not a vegetarian, but I am an animal lover. I do not believe those two things are mutually exclusive. My husband and I have several pets and we love each and every one of them and believe they deserve a loving home. I also believe that animals we eat should be treated humanely until that point where it's time for dinner. So, following this belief system, I thought having birds that we raise for meat would be something that would be fine. I love the idea of really knowing where my food comes from and being a chicken person now, I thought, I eat chicken, so I can kill a chicken. But the reality in my head turned out to be much different than the reality of having chickens in my backyard. 

I have, after much research, googling, and an acceptance of my heebie-jeebies, am finally owning that I will not ever have meat chickens that I kill or eat myself. My chickens will always have names and lives as long as they would like in my backyard. The local grocery co-op sells birds that are packaged by a local Amish farm that are both affordable and delicious, so that's what I'll be going with when I want some good chicken.

In doing research on this topic, one thing I discovered is that it's not really easy to find people who will process small numbers of birds for you and this is important if you are not able or willing to do it yourself. There is this Directory provided by the Kentucky Department of Agriculture, but it appears that not all places are listed. So, for the rest of you (I'm a little jealous), here's a list of additional places in Kentucky that I have seen recommended for processing birds.

1. David Miller at Hamilton Valley Poultry Processing on Hamilton Valley Rd in Garrard County. (859) 925-9871 From Lancaster take 52 towards Paint Lick ..look for hwy 954 turn on to it go about 3 miles you will pass a blue bldg as soon as you pass it make a right turn and follow that road you will come to a Y turn left and follow that road for about 4 miles or so you will see a sign that says Hamilton Valley Poultry Processing on your left. They charge 3.50 per chicken. FDA inspected.  leave him a message and he is really good at calling back. They process on Tuesday's and Thursday's.

2. The Meat Shop - (606) 365-3800 - 95 White Oak Rd., Lancaster, KY - http://www.themeatshopinc.com/ We can process you home grown beef or hog. For those Deer Hunters process deer, make summer sausage and jerky. We also sell retail meat.

3. Taylorsville Butcher's Block - (502) 354-0168 - 226 Taylorsville Rd, Taylorsville, KY. http://www.faulknermeats.com/ We at Taylorsville Butcher Block thrive on customer satisfaction! We will do anything to make the customer happy! We offer custom and USDA processing, along with retail sales to the public! All of our Meat is fresh never frozen, and top quality. We also offer deer processing! If we dont have something in stock, we will do our best to find it for you and offer it in our store!

This is just a few so far. Please, if you know of any others that are not in the KYAgr directory or above, let me know!

The Heebie Jeebies

I have had a variety of pets over my lifetime; my Elly, various cats, fish, mice(blech), hermit crabs, a snake, a gecko, fish...and now my chickens. It's mostly very entertaining and wonderful to love something that adores you back, much like your kids used to before they realized you are imperfect. One thing having pets provide you is grossness. I don't mean threw-up-on-the-floor gross. I raised two kids who are very prone to car sickness, puke is a breeze. I'm talking about having a dead bird brought in as a gift or trying to keep the dog from eating the chicken poop or (and this is my favorite) a cat that pees where She thinks is best, regularly, no matter what you do to convince her otherwise. Never would I have imagined that I would have to change my clothes (more than once, folks) because I realized I smelled of cat pee. 

Having chickens has escalated me into another realm entirely; taking care of dead pets. In my head, I knew this would happen more often with chickens as they can be tough and very fragile, at the same time. Their life spans tend to be shorter and if I'm going to hatch, I'm going to be dealing with babies with issues. I'm also not a vegetarian and had this idea that maybe getting chickens we would use as meat would be great. So, in my head, this was fine and I was going to take a deep breath and take care of business. I wasn't going to call my husband and ask him to handle all the dead things. 

I can do this! Roar!

Ok, so the first loss was Rufus, my sweet Jersey Giant cockerel, at about three months. I came home and he was obviously sick and keeping away from everyone. I climbed into the coop and sat with him, trying to figure things out. I isolated him and did some healthcare type things, but it was too late. 

So, the next morning, I go out to the coop to check on him and the very second I realized he was dead, my sweet Rufus that I carried around and adored, became a dead chicken. It was the heebie jeebies, big time. I'm sure many of you know what I'm talking about. That feeling that comes over you and you want to run in circles while desperately shaking your hands and the rest of you like something is attached to your skin and you are desperate to get it off. Just, get it off! Yeah, that was me. I wasn't feeling sad at that second, I felt grossed out, which immediately fed into the guilt I already had wondering how I had lost him. 

I ran inside and asked my 17-year-old son if he could help. He's been hunting with his dad and is a guy (yes, I unabashedly played the gender card here), so this should be a cinch. He said, "absolutely, mom" and got up and went outside. He's a good kid. But the second he stuck his head in the coop, it was the heebie jeebies for him too. We looked at each other and knew immediately we had to wait for my husband and he would have to take care of Rufus for me. He did this willingly and with ease, then we buried him (Rufus, not my husband) in the back of the yard with a sweet moment, while I stood back from the dead chicken.

I was kind of ashamed, but at the same time, we agreed that I would continue to take care of the puke and my husband would do dead things. 

At the same time we got Rufus, we also were given a chick that I thought was a white Plymouth Rock and we named her Amelia. Amelia turned out to be a meat bird, a Cornish X. By the time we realized it, we had named her and found her interesting, so when people asked why we had a 15 pound chicken waddling around, that was my excuse; we'd named her. Truthfully though, I just couldn't do it. I googled putting down chickens, read all the ways I could do this, but I truly just couldn't. She grew to seven months old and was in the summer heat when I realized that she wasn't just big, she was struggling to breath. I had given her a quality of life and she'd been a hoot to have around, but keeping her alive at this point was cruel. 

I once again turned to Google for ways I could put Amelia down myself, but I knew deep down there was no way it was happening. So I called a neighbor that I knew sometimes bought live chickens for dinner and gave her to them. I know she was killed quickly and used as dinner, that is a good thing. 

So, in between these moments, I have lost a few chicks as well. The first one I  

asked my husband to do something with and he did. The second one I cared for until it died with me and found I had no issues with it at all. I carried it's little body to a bag and was able to dispose of it. It was sad, but it was rescued from poor care, so I suspected there would be a couple of losses. 

We've lost a chick to hen pecking once (that was a super sad lesson for me on integrating chicks with chickens) and I was able to actually put this one down. It was injured in a permanent and bad way and I was able to do it quickly with a hatchet. I felt so horrible for the pain it had to be in that I didn't struggle, but that was as far as I could go. The second it was down, the heebie jeebies kicked in and I ran for it while calling my husband to take care of the dead baby.

And we get to today. I went home for my lunch break and found an older chick of

mine dead with it's insides not inside it anymore. We can't quite figure out what happened, but I suspect a couple of cats that wander my neighborhood. They haven't bothered the chickens before, but this pullet was a bantam, very small and with a small injury already. I was able to use the shovel and put it in a plastic tub that was then set in the trash. I was very proud of myself and I managed it with minimum grossed out feeling, but I was sad.

So, the point of all these little stories is to share a couple of theories I have about the heebie jeebies:

1. There's nothing wrong with them. There are folks that don't have them and can pick up the dead whatever, scoop up the entrails and call it a day. That's fine for them, but I think Not being like that is a good thing. We're not yet in a zombie apocalypse, so until then, I choose acceptance over change.
2. I think the heebie jeebies help me grieve. Losing an animal (even a chicken for those of you who've never had one) can be profoundly sad and heartbreaking. Having a moment in that grief to be grossed out gives me a little emotional break, which I appreciate.

For me, taking care of a creature is something I take seriously and I want to do it well. My husband and I name every creature we have, including most of the fish. We find them all unique and interesting and if we lose one, for whatever reason, it just sucks. Because of this, instead of fighting the heebie jeebies, as of today, I've decided to be okay with them. I'm not going to feel ashamed that my chicken I hatched and babied is now a dead thing and I'm feeling all 'ew'. I'm going to be glad that I'm feeling that instead of overwhelmed by sadness that another creature has left my home. 

Chicken Learning Experience #1,387

**Warning: There are some Graphic Images below of my pecked chickens.

 So, the last couple of weeks has been an interesting learning experience in chicken keeping. I had my first heartbreak and it was completely my fault.

Of the chicks I inherited, I have four that are white. I mentioned before that I believed that they were leghorns, one female and three males (I now believe I white plymouth rocks, but that's another post). The males were getting mighty big and I'd had the chicks outside with my full grown orpingtons a few times and everyone seemed fine, so I made the huge mistake of putting the rocks in with the orpingtons in the run for a few hours and not watching them like I clearly should have been.

When I went back out the pecking had been brutal. All three of the rocks had been hit hard and the orpingtons were quickly shooed away. Two of them were hit on the back and wings and were walking about eating and drinking like normal, but the third one was seriously injured and did not survive.

So needless to say, I wrapped the two in towels and brought them into the house to be cared for and heal. I got some wound spray to help with the healing, added electrolytes to their water and started giving them medicated feed. I am unsure which worked well or if they really needed any of these, but they are doing just fine now and back in the run - properly and with protection from the orpingtons. 

This shows a portion of the current set up keeping the injured rocks from everyone, the remaining other chicks are in the setup under the coop, locked away and one of my orpingtons is in the walkway area, wondering why she can't get to them.

Below and to the left is what they looked like when I found them and got them inside. Seeing the blood was shocking for me, but they continued chowing down like normal and were drinking as well.

Below is a picture of them today. Their feathers are growing in nicely. Their behavior has not changed a bit. Excellent.

So, the point to my story is that this was quite a learning experience for me.

1. Apparently, even though I am not a vegetarian and I had considered harvesting these very chicks when they were older, I was devastated that they were picked on so badly and that one was picked to death. It bothered me tremendously knowing they were put in an environment where they were badly treated and I put them there.

2. Chickens are tough and despite looking quite plucked and smelling terrible with the injuries, they have healed quickly and nicely. They also didn't even slow down with eating and drinking.

3. 8 month old orpingtons can be jerks, but I love them. Even though I was irrationally mad at them for the evening, I am completely over it. The monsters.

4. Follow steps for introducing to your flock! This is so important! All of the chicks are in the run now, but kept from each other while they adjust to each others' presence. When the chicks get big enough, I'll start letting everyone take a closer look at each other - but with supervision.

5. I kept them in the house at first, while treating them, and that was fine for a small period of time. But as they are rocks, they are getting very large, fast, and I really wanted to get them out of the brooder, which would mean them being outside or wandering my home. So I looked into hen saddles and chicken diapers. After some sewing and trial and error, I have come to the conclusion that in this situation, they are not necessary. They have done just fine with the temperature outside and it did get down to 30 one night. The run is winterized and it's all good.

6. And as for chicken diapers - no. Just no.