lessons learned

We've come a long way with the equipment that we have for processing poultry:



We slaughtered all five Black Australorp roosters on Saturday. We were planning on keeping two of these to breed with the Black Australorp hens we bought. Three of them got HUGE and the other two were as big as the hens, who are bigger than any of our other chickens. We are hoping the hens will lay well for us through the winter, but are afraid that they'll eat more than they'll produce because they're so darn big! In the spring we want to buy a few Rhode Island Reds and White Leghorns, which are more efficient layers.



We decided that we will not be raising ducks for meat anymore. They are nice to have around for insect and weed control, as well as eggs; but you just don't get much meat for all the work that goes into butchering them. We butchered 4 Blue Swedes and are trying to sell the rest because, unfortunately, the feather plucker does not work as well on ducks as it does on chickens. If they don't sell, we'll butcher the remaining two Blue Swede drakes and Big Boy (the Rouen we hatched) so that we are only overwintering 3 drakes for 11 hens.