[Fleecewife]

We had a beautiful Scots Grey cross Pied Suffolk cockerel with lovely silver cape and hackles - until today.  I was hoping someone would want him as he was good at defending his hens and very handsome.  Then he spent this afternoon trying, very nearly successfully, to kill the boss purebred Scots Grey cock.  Now he's marinading in rose wine ready to be a casserole tomorrow    OH took the opportunity to bump off a couple of other young cockerels surplus to requirements so peace should return to the barnyard.  The laying hens really don't like it when there are adolescent males around as they are so disruptive.  We should have killed them earlier but I was waiting for them to be big enough for a meal for two.
Napoleon the boss made a quick recovery, from playing dead to crowing his imagined victory from a safe place 

[Rosemary]

I'm sure Napoleon feels he won a great victory. Which I suppose he has.

[Anke]

Yes we did all our surplus males in early December, as we were running low on food and not sure when we would be getting out again... Only one crowing atm, its really quitre peaceful...

[Fleecewife]

Ah, I was wondering when everyone else takes the plunge.  Today all is sweetness and calm out there.  We do have another cock (Duke) but he and Napoleon have sorted out a system, which was disrupted as the new ones grew up.  Hopefully the hens will be more relaxed now and start laying more than half a dozen eggs a day.  I don't think I've heard either cock crow today at all.   

[darkbrowneggs]

I finish of my last when the local game keeper is about to clean his plucker and put it to bed for the season.

At this time of year I always say to my aged mother - "Spring's coming - I must get in touch with the pheasant plucker soon ".

All the best
Sue

[knightquest]

He's not a pheasant plucker, he's a pheasant plucker's son and he's only plucking pheasants till the pheasant plucker comes.

To be repeated four times quickly preferrably after alcohol has been consumed. 

I might try to rear some meat birds next year....

Ian

[bigchicken]

I'm busy thinning out my cockerels not much on bantams but nobody ever wants them, not my favourite job as I like my chooks.

[Fleecewife]

Ian, I learnt that in my slightly posh girls school, when we were young enough that we shouldn't have known why we were all giggling 

We decided this evening that with most of the annoying young cockerels gone, we would try to persuade Napoleon and his 9 SG hens to move back into a hen house from the barn (OH being fed up with chicken s**t all over the lathe and workbenches).  What a disaster - we got Napoleon and two hens to sleep in the proper place, but six refused to go up there and had us running around like mad folk, trying to 'guide' them with 8' garden canes (it works when they are going where they want to but they just duck and weave when you want them to go somewhere else) and in the end we found that one hen is missing - hopefully she is hiding somwhere in the barn and I so hope the fox won't get her if she is outside.  We had just been thinking how smart the ten Scots Grey hens are looking.

[Sandy]

"Spring's coming - I must get in touch with the pheasant plucker soon ".   

, My daughter posted on Facebook that she was talking to her 10 year old about some hunters and did one of those slips of the tounge and swapped the H for a C and just hoped he did not notice

[Frieslandfilly]

I have a right ******* cockerel! He is next for the pot, when I pluck up courage to get him! We have taken to opening the door with a long stick and running, he has ripped my coat, pulled off my glove when I was opening the hatch in the morning, he has only got one hen in with him and even she gives him a wide berth! He is a very handsome Welsummer but he has got to go, just a case of when!! Unless of course anyone would like a FTGH Welsummer cock?

[Fleecewife]

It's difficult when they are so beautiful, isn't it.  Here, anything which goes for either of doesn't see another dawn, whether it's chooks or sheep, or dogs for that matter, although it's only been the occasional tup so far.  Get him when he's asleep and it should go smoothly 

[shrekfeet]

Fleecewife do you think cocks disrupt the laying? Might explain a few things. Also I find the young laying bird cocks are all leg and no breast, I did kill, hang, pluck and draw 2 once then wondered why I bothered. Do you go to that trouble or just skin them?

[Fleecewife]

I think that one or two cocks are helpful and seem to keep the peace amongst the hens.  However, what we had was several young cockerels coming on and reaching adolescence with all the accompanying testosterone    They were fighting over hens, constantly treading them, chasing them around and basically there was a whole lot of rape going on.  The hens hated this and it did seem to affect their laying. We'll see now if egg numbers improve.
When the cockerels are scrawny we just skin them - they are usually too old to roast anyway.  Being Scots Greys they take at least a year to reach a larg-ish size (they are the utility type, not show size).  The two we had in our casserole were quite strongly flavoured and dark, but very tender after long cooking and more than enough for three of us. They will never have the breast meat of a table bird, but we don't keep chickens for the table so only the occasional cockerel ends up there.

[scotelf]

Oh my, I know I really need to toughen up in time for dispatching birds and other animals. What I want to ask is, does it get easier after the first few times? I've read all the threads about not naming them and such, and I'm not a vegetarian or likely to become one. I'm just a little anxious about the first dispatch, how did you all manage?

[Fleecewife]

I totally disagree with the not naming them idea.  All our farm animals and poultry have names, whether they are for killing or not.  What really upsets me is the idea of eating some slab of meat from an animal which has had a horrible life and an anonymous death.  By naming them you are respecting their lives and appreciating that their death provides you with sustenance.  I only sell meat from our animals to people who accept that.  It would be difficult to follow that through if I were a commercial scale meat breeder I know but I'm not and I still think that every animal should be respected and not just be seen as meat.  Sorry - that's my hobby horse    So enjoy having your poultry, give them a good life and just recognise that at some point some will be killed and eaten.  When that time comes, give them a quick and stressless death.  Here it's my OH who kills any poultry to be eaten - I lack the strength and technique to do it properly.  I hate an animal being killed for nothing, which is why I try to get the cockerels up to size first.  Really I suppose they should be killed as soon as we can tell they are male.  So I don't think you need to toughen up, just carry on being sympathetic to your birds.  For the first time - get someone to demonstrate a good technique, so you know exactly how much strength to use and have them present when you do your first kill, in case you bungle it.  It can be a good idea to practice breaking the neck of a dead chicken, just to gauge what is required.  We take ours off the perch at night so they are asleep, and are dead before they have time to wake up.  Chickens don't like being chased around and think they are going to be murdered anyway, so spare them that if you can.