Fixie's Shelf

Chickens for meat - plans for next year

I did this page in my journal to remind me what to do when next year rocks around and I raise another batch of chickens for meat.

I've been thinking and thinking about how I can streamline the process and the budget, now that I've got a bit of experience.  Raising the chicks was a lot of work, and the main thing that was a pain was catching every one of 17 chickens by hand, and carrying them into their box in the laundry, when I needed to bring them in.  I'd let them out for an hour or two when it was sunny, and then suddenly a cold wind would spring up.  They were only half-feathered at this stage and couldn't really cope with the cold weather.  So frantically we'd try to round them all up, one at a time.  Training them to come for food seemed impossible.  Then ten minutes later the sun would be out again, and I'd want to let them back into the yard, because they really didn't seem happy cooped up in their box.  You can see how it ended up being a lot of work.

I think next time I need to have a smaller fenced in yard specially for my little chickens, where they are protected from the big egg laying chickens.  And I need to set it up so that the chickens can access their home themselves, from the yard.  That way I can have their food and water in there at all times, and they should quickly learn to go in there as required.  Now I know how handy the broom is, I think with a set up like that, I could just about sweep the chickens through the door with the broom!

Their home would need to be very well insulated, so that the light bulb keeps them sufficiently warm.  I'm thinking a low, insulated wooden box, preferably lined with some kind of thermal mass such as bricks on the floor, to hold their heat.  The box would have two rooms - a small one for when they are tiny babies, and a bigger one for when they outgrow the little room and don't need as much heat.  I would then use the smaller room to sequester the chickens the night before dispatch (so they don't eat, and hence are cleaner to butcher).

The roof would open up, an insulated lid, so that I can easily change the water and food.  There should be a joist with hooks so that I can hang the waterer and feeder - hopefully their food and water will stay cleaner that way.  And ideally, the roof could be locked in a slightly open position, so that on hot nights they have good ventilation.

I did a page in my journal about my plans for next year.  I'm not sure if I will actually make this ideal chook house - I will probably find a way to do it though, because I plan for many years of chook raising now that I know I can do it.

Chickens for meat update

You might want to skip this post if you are vegetarian or squeamish. I did it - slaughtered my very first chicken for meat. I'm not going to go into all the how-to details here - leave a comment if u want to know more, and I'll email you.

The main thing for me has been the emotional journey. Could I really raise a flock of adorably cute chicks, fall in love with them, spend hours watching their antics while tending to them several times a day, and then somehow kill them and still enjoy eating the meat? I desperately wanted the answer to be yes, because it's a way to make sure the animals I eat have the best possible life.

I chose two of the biggest roosters, but not the biggest healthiest one because I'm still hoping there's a chance I can raise my own chicks from eggs. I spared the little 'doomed' chicken that follows me around. I sequestered them in a small cage overnight, so they'd miss dinner and breaky (cleaner to slaughter if their guts and crop are empty). I felt a bit mean, but Paula pointed out that the hunger was the least of their problems.

Roderick came over to show me what to do. I was all business and determination - I refused to allow sentimentality to get in the way. Roderick did the first one, pulling its neck. But when I tried that, mine didn't die. I tried a couple more times but no go. Roderick held him on the chopping block for me, and I cleavered off its head - fast, calm and decisive.

Blood went EVERYWHERE - very gory. But somehow I remained steely-nerved. I stayed detached right through plucking and butchering, both of which were easier than I'd expected. Once the chickens were processed, they looked just like the ones you see in the shops, and weighed 1.1kg (size 11), which is small, but pretty amazing I think, for a chook that was only reared for 6 weeks. Also, with my no waste policy, I kept a bag with giblets and feet, which I'll use in stock. We plucked the feathers into a pot of soapy water - they are now zipped into a pillowcase, ready to be turned into a coat for winter.

Roderick told me the livers would be good fried with herbs. After he left, I was still in such sturdy shape emotionally, that I decided to eat the livers for lunch! Paula fried them for me in butter, garlic, and herbs (all home produced) and they tasted STUNNING. I remembered eating a chicken liver salad in France, which tasted like this, but when I tried to reproduce it at home with liver frpm the market, it tasted awful. Now I know the secret! I've got plenty more chicken liver delights coming up. I wonder if thr meat will be as amazing, too? The chickens are in the freezer now. We'll try one in a week or so.

So, it seems I CAN do it, and I can't tell you how relieved I am. I think it helps that I've been practising killing things. First I watched a rabbit slaughter in Italy, 2 yeas ago. I felt ill afterwards - nauseous and horrified. The next day I watched s chicken slaughter. I was much better prepared, but it still made me feel pretty queasy. Fast forward to this year: I went yabby fishing and cooked up my catch. I couldn't enjoy eating them though - all I could see on my mind as I chewed was the image of them archig away from the boiling water, and clutching my tongs. Yikes. A few months later, I killed 3 fish. It might not sound like a big deal, but to me, fish are as alive as chickens, and I really had to steel myself to do it. But I did, and ate the fish on the same day. I managed to enjoy the meals, and mentally was able to separate the kill from the food. Now, it seems the practise has stood me in good stead.

I did head upstairs for a big lie down after I'd eaten the livers. And at the end of the day, when I was feeding my 12 remaining chickens, there really did seem to be fewer in my flock - I felt a real pang of sadness, and a sense that my babies were incomplete: an urge to go searching for them.

I'm deeply grateful to Roderick for showing me what to do. This journey has been years in the making, as I've worked up to this point. He made it possible, and it feels like a major milestone. I reckon I'm confident now to go it solo next time. Just gotta buy a cleaver and sharpen it by next Thursday.

Meat Chickens update

Here's my meat chickens at 3 and a half weeks of age...

 
 

Chickens for meat update

Here's my chicks when they were two weeks old:





I took these photos just after I moved them out of the cardboard box, and into the wire framed rabbit cage. They had suddenly grown fatter overnight and looked like they could hardly stand up. While in the first week they scratched at the dirt and did nice chicken behaviours, suddenly it seemed they couldn't even stand on one leg to scratch. Their walk turned into an awkward waddle. I thought they'd need a bigger cage to make sure they got exercise and learnt to manouver their fat bodies around.

Unfortunately though, I think I moved them to the wire cage too soon. Being larger, it is also colder, even with blankets draped over it. They huddled together so tightly that two of the chickens got injured and died - trampled to death? I quickly moved the chicks to a wooden box instead, a bit larger than their original cardboard box. Since then, no more deaths, thank god. But I noticed that they tended to sit all day. If they were eating, they'd be eating sitting down. They'd only waddle the minimum distance they had to and collapse onto their bellies. I decided it was time for them to go outside.
 



For their first trip to the great outdoors, I put down a mini fence that is normally garden bed edging, and made sure I gave them a spot with both sun and shade. They were absolutely thrilled. Instead of sitting down, they all got to it, pecking around, exploring, testing out the plants and generally fossicking around.

After a few days of this, I was lifting them into the box to carry them back to the bathroom, when they suddenly worked out how to flutter their way out of the box. Clearly I was using a box that was too shallow. They were so happy, freeranging, that I let them go free for a few hours.



Today, they are three weeks old, I've let them go free in the garden all day, and guess what? They are doing all the things chickens should: standing on one leg to scratch, fluttering from one place to another, dust bathing, and pecking at everything... hooray! They seem very healthy. I think they were so bored in their cardboard box that they had nothing to stand up for.

For now they are hanging out in the box overnight, and I'll free range them in the garden during the day when I'm home.

They eat so much food I'm in shock. They whipped through my 5kg bag of starter crumble in the first ten days. The amount they eat increases every day. I've now worked out how to make my own food for them. It's more expensive and more work than starter crumble, but I'm sure it's far, far more nutritious.

Homemade starter crumble recipe:

4 cups grain, coarsely ground - I use a mix of wheat, corn, barley, oat grain - whatever I've bought cheaply in bulk.
1/4 cup flax seeds - I don't grind these as they go rancid quickly, and they are small enough for the chicks to peck whole.
1/4 cup seaweed - I collect my own from the beach, dry it in the sun for a few days, and grind it to a coarse powder. This provides minerals.
3 tsp salt - since I had washed the salt off my seaweed. If using unwashed seaweed, maybe just 2 tsp? Use unrefined salt to provide minerals.
2 tbsp cod liver oil - to provide vitamins A and D, and for general good health. I bought a big bottle of animal grade oil from a feed shop.
2 tbsp fat - I use the tallow that we scrape off the top of stock when we cook it.
1 tbsp molasses - provides vitamins.
1 cup protein - eggs, fish, meat....

Mix everything together and feed to the chicks.

Apart from the protein, I only had to buy the cod liver oil and flax seeds specially. These are both optional - I include them because I want the chooks to have optimum nutrition, and hence to provide very nutritious meat for me to eat. I buy grains and salt cheaply in bulk for my family, so it's no drama to feed some of our supply to the chooks. The protein, however, has been a bit more challenging, since I want to get it for free. I got some fish carcasses from the market, ground up the meatier bits in my food processor, and then dried them in my dehydrator. The result crumbled into fine "pellets" that mixed well with the rest of the feed. When that ran out, I fed them scrambled eggs fried up with greens from the garden. The fish shop will have more free fish for me tomorrow, but in the meantime I'm not sure what to do for protein. I've got a bucket of snails that I picked off the garden last night - maybe I can crush them? There's also worms in my worm farm - maybe I can pick out a handful for the chooks?

So far, at 3 weeks, the chicks have eaten their way through a 5kg bag of starter crumble, and 5 batches of the above homemade recipe. Yikes! I can see why eating a lot of meat is not good for the environment - they go through SO MUCH grain!

 

Raising chickens for meat

Yesterday my chickens arrived! They are a special meat breed of bird which apparently fatten quickly and make delicious eating. I was vegetarian for 20 years, but in the last couple of years I've started to eat meat again for health reasons. I've never had anything against people eating meat, though I've always thought it would be most ethical to raise the animals yourself, and probably kill them too. Since I started eating meat, I've been trying to gird myself to actually live according to my principles, and raise my own meat.

There are other reasons why I believe it's good to raise our own meat. The meat industry can be pretty cruel. I only eat meat from local farms where I'm pretty satisfied that they raise their animals well and kill them humanely. But even so, surely I can give them a better life in a suburban backyard than when they are raised on a commercial scale. Afterall, our home-produced eggs are so much better than the most expensive organic free range eggs we can buy. Like the eggs, I'd expect the meat to be more nutritious - though who can really know. Also I am concerned about the amount of wastage that occurs. Despite repeated requests, I've never been able to obtain chicken heads or feet for soup. What happens to them all? Are they chucked out? Recently, watching a fisherman fillet a fish, and waste all but the very best bits of it, I realised that it's probably the same in the meat industry. We are in the habit of eating the muscle meat but not the organs (though they are very good for us), and in our society it's rare to make stock from bones these days.

I also want to really understand how much food I can produce in my backyard. I already produce 80% of my family's fruit and vegies. Could I produce a good portion of our meat onsite too? I'd like to find out.

I am probably in for quite a journey, emotionally. The chicks that arrived yesterday are adorable. They are so cute I've already sat for ages, watching and watching them. To think that one day I'm going to kill them, with my bare hands, is quite astonishing. Somehow I'm going to have to gird my loins, toughen my heart and do it. I'm curious to see how I emerge on the other side of this.



In case you would like to consider raising your own chickens for the table, here's the practicalities.

I bought the chickens from a hatchery in Queensland, Australia: Peak Poultry Supplies. They cost $2 per day old chick, plus $30 for shipping (up to 100 birds in a carton). I would have liked to buy them locally, but despite researching for two years I've been unable to find a farmer in Victoria who will sell me meat chicks. If you know of any avenues for me to research with this, please tell me! I'm still looking, for my next batch.

I bought starter crumble for their food, though I'm hoping once they are a little older I can mostly feed them worms, insects and greens from my garden. Ultimately I would like to make my own food for them from day one, but I haven't found enough information to do this yet. I also bought a small feeder and waterer. I picked these up from a stock feed shop, where they were a fraction of the price they go for in pet shops. In an op shop I found an adjustable lamp, and I bought a 60 watt globe from the hardware.

For now I'm keeping them in a cardboard box. I lined the bottom with several layers of newspaper and a bag of well rotted sawdust I had lying around. When the sawdust has run out, I'll put dirt on the bottom. I'll compost all the litter when it's too dirty for the chickens to use any more. As they grow, I'll move them to my rabbit cage, which is bigger, and then I hope to put them in with my egg-laying chooks.

I've put the lamp quite low over their box, and in the coming weeks I'll gradually raise it. If the chicks are too cold, they'll huddle tightly together under the lamp. If they're too hot they'll fan out away from it. I'll use their behaviour to tell me how high to put the lamp.

All up it's costing me $6.40 per bird, though if I do this again it will be much cheaper since I'll already have the lamp, waterer, feeder etc, and maybe by then I'll be able to make my own food too.

With meat breeds of birds, because they fatten so fast, when they get to a certain age (weight), their legs may be too weak to hold them up, and they could break. In the industry they are slaughtered just before this happens - its cruel to have a chook live with broken legs. Thus the birds need to be slaughtered promptly at 6-8 weeks of age. My friend Roderick, who is joining me on this mission, and will show me how to kill the birds, tells me that home-reared chooks are much healthier and less prone to this problem - hence you can wait longer before slaughtering.  

Other people I've mentioned this to say I should get a breed of birds that aren't specifically for meat, so that I don't participate in this cruelty. However, regular chickens can take 4 months to be fat enough for the table, which means you need to feed them a LOT more grain, a serious negative, both financially and for the environment. Because of my touring, I've decided to go with meat breeds so I can do it as a quick project. However, I'm hoping Roderick is right, because then I can start slaughtering at 6 weeks, doing two birds at a time (one for the table, one for the freezer), and really spread the killings over a longer period. That way we aren't clogging up our freezer, and we can plan on eating, say, a bird a week.

If the birds are healthy, maybe we can even raise a breeding pair to egg laying age, get some fertile eggs, and then I can raise my next batch without needing to order from Queensland. Fingers crossed. Though I'm not very optimistic about this plan - I think a rooster crowing at 5am might do permanent damage to our relationship with our neighbours.

Well.. I'll keep you posted. Wish me luck! And feel free to send me your favourite chicken recipes.