The killing of cockerel #2
Posted: Sunday 16 December, 2007
Back in September we killed a cockerel for the table for the first time. It wasn't exactly textbook (at least not according to Seymour) but we got there in the end.
This morning we were up early again to despatch another. We had been planning to kill all three of the surplus cockerels we had, but with the loss of Hobbes a few weeks ago and a friend wanting a cockerel to give as a Christmas present we were left with only one to spare.
Things went more smoothly this time and lots of new lessons were learned. I used an air rifle to kill the bird - we weren't totally comfortable with using the despatcher last time and had read that used properly the rifle guarantees an instant death: it certainly did this morning. Our knives still weren't sharp enough although we found good kitchen scissors to be a better option for most of the jobs.
The plucking was made much easier by dunking the dead bird in very hot water, but made much more uncomfortable by the sub-zero temperature outside!
We roasted the chicken for our dinner tonight, and he was a little on the tough side: unlike the cockerel back in September, which lived its life in an enclosed run, this boy had been free range for almost all his life - he had huge legs and little breasts, and almost no fat. Very tasty though, and what's left will go into a cream of chicken soup tomorrow made with stock from the carcass. The pets had a good feed too, and not a scrap was wasted.
We're never going to get this killing, plucking, cleaning and dressing lark down to a fine art doing it once every 3 months, but in the spring we'll be hatching a lot more chicks and inevitably having a lot more cockerels to spare. If we get competent enough we might even video the process...
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Comments
Dan
Chas is obviously a good hockey player! I found a good "how-to" for killing chickens at Musings from a Stonehead which is worth a read. His point about not being hesitant or squeamish is spot on - be decisive and make sure the thing's killed quickly, then the worst you have to deal with is some mess and not a suffering bird.
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Henrik
Tuesday 18 December, 2007 at 4:22pm
I just finished "More Scenes from a Smallholding" from Chas Griffin the other day and was surprised how he used to kill his cockerels: he used grain to lure one away and than used his old hockey stick.
In the end it's probably the same idea as with the air rifle - no fear, no pain. So, better sudden death than losing the life in a factory like a KZ chicken.
-Henrik