This past Sunday it was time to take the first group of
chickens to get processed. After I had done my best to recover from cutting
down the tree in the back yard, it was time to ready the truck. I put a load of
sawdust in the bed for padding and chicken wire was then stretched and secured
across the top.
Dusk, when all the birds settle in and are most relaxed is
the best time to move birds out of their coop. It’s the least stressful and
then they will be ready for first thing in the morning. If I was able to get
them processed here on the farm that would be ideal, however my only choice is
to take them to a processor who cares about the birds, is very quick, and
provides great service.
For the past few weeks I have been nervous as my regular
processor was not returning my calls. Thankfully I was told by other farmers at
the market about another one. He lives a little further away but has a great
reputation and he was able to take the birds on Sunday.
Moving the birds is always an experience. I had Anthony man
the coop door and Navarre helping out at the truck. Hopefully once the boys are
older they will be grabbing the chickens with me. The worst part is when they
flap their wings and it feels like they are breaking my knuckles. Painful. Our
birds are 9 weeks old, one week younger then I usually get them done but due to
heat and weights I thought this would be the best. My last batch had chickens
of 10lbs dressed weight. Not as many buyers for the really big ones, they
prefer a range of 5lbs to 7.5lbs.
After I got all the birds in the truck we moved it down to
the house and secured a tarp over the truck bed to keep them warm for the night
but more importantly to help protect from predators. All the birds settled in
except for my Barred Rock rooster who continued to make escape attempts most of
the night. This made a long night for me and I even went out to check on them
around 4am. I made the decision to have him processed when he did not do his
job in protecting his flock as a rooster’s supposed to. I did not want him to
be wasted so we will keep him for us. He turned out to be the lightest of them
all at 5.5lbs. He was all feathers.
As I’d said it was a longer trip than usual the next morning,
about 30 minutes. Removing the tarp we found the birds had handled it nicely
and were all settled down looking at us quizzically.
Our new processor has a wonderful set up. It’s all DIY and
fantastic. He even built his own plucker which works perfectly. He did 6 birds
at a time so I lowered the tailgate, untied and rolled up some chicken wire and
sat at the back passing him the chickens. I’m sure I made quite the image, nice
looking, young woman calming her flustered birds as she passes them out, all
the while fine with sitting in dirty sawdust (you can all guess what made it
dirty).
I was absolutely beaming
when I received fabulous compliments regarding the birds. He was quite
impressed with how clean and healthy they were. I take great pride in giving
our birds a good life. There were a few others chickens waiting for processing
after ours and I was saddened by their state. Very dirty, all the feathers
stained with poop and quite nervous. They were the complete opposite of ours
who were pristine white in comparison and relaxed.
It took about an hour to get them all done. As I talked with
the men, Anthony and Navarre enjoyed playing soccer and having a great time.
Once we got the birds home we cooled them off for a few hours
in ice water and then finished the minimal cleaning, bagged and weighed them.
This new processor is more expensive but I’m very happy with his work. I had set up a number of pre-orders and ended
up selling and then delivering 22 out of 24 to Halifax the next afternoon.
Our next raft of chickens will be in a month. Until then they
will be enjoying some sunshine, have a fan on them and cool water on hot days
plus the occasional grasshopper or crickets from the kids and scrapes from the
garden.
