Turkey progress report

Broad breasted bronze and white turkeys free ranging under cherry trees.

This year I decided to get both kinds of turkeys available: broad breasted white and broad breasted bronze. The white turkeys are your garden variety turkey that is in the stores at thanksgiving. The broad breasted bronze are direct descendants of a wild turkey and have not been tinkered with the way the whites have by humans. Consequently, they grow at a much slower rate than the white turkeys do and you can see the size differential in the photos. The garden variety turkey will be ready to butcher at least one month or more earlier than the broad breasted bronze turkeys.

Because my Cornish Cross chickens have not grown at the rate that the supplier (and the websites I read) said they would, I’ve not yet moved the turkeys from the ‘nursery barn’ to the meat bird barn. That is still occupied by the weight watching Cornish Crosses! I do plan to butcher some of the chickens this week and see what they are actually weighing in at. I am hoping they surprise me and are at four pounds. I would like to get the turkeys out of the nursery and into the meat raising coop as soon as possible. For one thing, the nursery is too small to take them to full size and not ventilated well enough and already it is on the too warm side at night.

The turkeys are enjoying themselves in spite of their warm quarters as they have free range access to the whole farm by day. Like me, one of their favourite things is cherries and I often find them under the cherry trees in search of windfall or tearing around the yard with the sumptuous red ball in their beak in search of a quiet place away from the others to saver it.  We are presently putting an addition on to the house to accommodate a much needed (and long desired) wood stove and the turkeys fancy themselves carpenters. Each morning I find them hanging around the chop saw and providing the builder with suggestions and feedback. He’s convinced he’s learning to speak ‘turkey’ and has grown quite fond of them. I can hear them talking to him and every now and then he talks back.

Lil' Miss Runty-Pants in the foreground.

One of the white turkeys is a runt. She is less than half the size of the others and hasn’t grown since she was about two-three weeks old. She doesn’t have an impacted crop or any other obvious reason for her lack of girth; she is simply stunted. I have watched her closely to make sure she is eating and passing poop (in farming, it is all about poop: making it, passing it, hauling it, clearing it, composting it, top dressing it, and so on) and all seems normal in the digestive areana. I have already started to ponder what I will do with her. I really don’t have the room to keep Lil’ Miss Runty-Pants in the lifestyle she’s grown accustomed to forever, and yet she’s by no means going to make a good ‘market’ bird–I may have to try to pass her off as a chicken!

Of ice and hens

A friend of mine from New Zealand asked me the other day why I stay here, when there are much easier places to farm–I’m beginning to wonder that myself! The night before last, it started snowing; it looked like Mother Nature was just brushing the dandruff out of her hair.  But by morning it had snowed about 18 inches–not that it isn’t picturesque, but it is a make-more-work-for-me-kinda-scene that I am growing tired of this year.

I blame the goats for my negative attitude towards the ice and snow; they hate the snow and that makes me not like it. They stand in their shelters and bleat and moan about it, like I’m somehow personally responsible for their  lack of comfort. It is quite hilarious to watch them run from their barn to their day-paddock; like cats treading through puddles, they lift their feet high trying  not to get them wet. It is the best darn high-stepping trot I’ve seen, and would make many a horse person envious. There is usually a puddle or two along the way and they all leap over it, one by one. I picture them jumping puddles like that at night when I can’t sleep. This is what happens when you don’t have sheep.

When I watch these domestic animals and know how relatively pampered they are, it makes me wonder how the wild goats survive these Canadian winters. Actually, each Canadian winter I survive makes me wonder how any wild creature survives out there without shelter, heat, and readily available food. This year’s cold stretch lasted longer than the previous years I’ve been here, and I noticed the other day the wild birds were eating snow–I guess their puddles and water sources were all iced up and they were desperate.

The chickens, on the other hand, are relatively stoic, and I appreciate them for it. They seem to come out of the barn in nearly all weather. The only time they didn’t make an appearance this winter was for the week of sheer blizzard conditions we had in December. Otherwise, they are out grubbing for a portion of their living. It is helpful that they are an energetic bunch because, even with their enthusiasm for self-sufficiency, I’ve had to buy a lot more feed than previous years, and the feed costs have risen. Consequently, the attempt to be profitable is ever-receding into the horizon. I have yet to do the books, but I’m not all that enthusiastic. We both suspect that the off-farm job is actually paying for the eggs I’m selling. I don’t need to do the books to know we are going through more feed than we are realizing in egg sale returns, so I’m putting the accounting off as long as I can.

I want to farm, but I’m still not sure how I can actually make it work. It is just not enough to have a cute place and funny animals; I need a wage like everybody else. The funny animals take time and effort, and I could justify having them as pets when I had a nice salary; I am having a more difficult time justifying them, along with the ducks, now that I don’t. Surprisingly, when I say that to people (who have nice salaried jobs), they are shocked. “Oh, you can’t get rid of your goats, they’re so cute!” is the most common response. Yes, they are cute. So are the ducks. But cute doesn’t pay my taxes, replace my roof, or replace my truck as it rusts away. When did our society come to expect farms to be cute, and farmers to not make money on their farm? When did we stop caring that, like any other service industry, if it is not supported and can’t make a profit, it won’t last? This principle is well understood for all sorts of business and services, and yet farms seem to be thought of as something that shouldn’t make money. It is as if we’ve all come to accept that it is logical that farmers should work off the farm to pay for their farm. What other business would this (ill-) logic apply to? Would you run a restaurant that way? How about a mechanic shop?

Thus far, neither my ducks nor my goats have had to work for their living. Now that I am trying to make the farm a going concern, I have to look around it and put everything through an income-generating test: does it, or can it, make money? In light of this, I’ve slaughtered most of the ducks and lost the last two females to foxes. I’m going to take the last drake to the game dinner and he won’t be wearing a bow-tie, but I haven’t told him yet. In addition, I have been toying with the idea of finding a buck for my does and putting them to work. I know they will not make money because I’m not allowed to sell the meat, but they will at least provide me with a return in meat and milk. The milk I can make into cheese and the meat I can eat. The fact is, my workload will not change much in order to realize some milk and meat returns for us, directly.

Thus far in my farming career, I have yet to witness the birth of anything that doesn’t hatch, but I am drawn to the idea of mammalian births. I have finally managed to find a willing buck, and now I just have to get emotionally prepared for the result: extra work and butchering the kids. While I love the idea of seeing my goats pregnant, giving birth and having some kids around, I know that ultimately I’ll have to eat them or sell them. Our place is too small to expand the herd and I can’t just keep adding glorified pets to the equation any more.

I’ve managed to evolve emotionally this year and hone my butchering skills to cope with chickens and turkeys. If I get the does pregnant, then I’ll have to fast track the emotional fortitude to do in a baby goat. Learning to hunt this year has helped with the idea. After all, a goat is just a small deer. Still, there is one thing to butchering a deer you didn’t know personally and another thing to do in one of ‘my babies’ (it doesn’t help that they are called ‘kids’!).  Honestly, I’m not sure I’m there yet. I guess if I get the girls pregnant, I’ll have a time limit for that trajectory!

I’d like to raise more chickens and turkeys than I do, and maybe get into rabbits and goats, and sell the meat. Sadly, with all the prohibitive regulations it is nearly impossible to start anything without having to invest hundreds of thousands of dollars (think meat slaughter, poultry slaughter). I’d like to run a goat dairy, but we have the predators to deal with, on top of the prohibitive aforementioned capital investment. In addition to all of this, I’m living in an area where there are few people, so I wonder if there will ever been enough demand to make a farm work here.

Finally, I am struggling with the idea of investing more money here when there is such a huge risk of having my stock devastated by a bear or cougar. Even the losses I have taken (some chickens and ducks) amount to what may have been my profit margin. In light of the above, I toggle between wanting to go out and get a decent paying job so I can go back to playing at farming (and just supplying our own needs), and continuing to work at something extremely under-valued, in the hopes it will amount to something, someday.

I also face legislative blocks. Small farms in British Columbia cannot make a living on the wholesale market. This is why exemption status for small farming is so important. If we want to have local foods from small, sustainable farms that treat their animals humanely, we need producer-processor rights so that we (small farmers) can legally do direct marketing, attain the sales value, and avoid sharing the profits with middle-men. There are many places in the world that still allow this, but we have recently outlawed this in British Columbia for the majority of farming products. That’s why there are days when I think I should go somewhere and get a wage, or find somewhere I can farm more easily… but then I look up at these glorious tree-clad mountains and granite crags, put on my gumboots, and happily trudge out to care for my charges.

Butchering days are over!

Three of the four turkeys I butchered yesterday out and about on their final free range day. They were checking out the Christmas lights hubby had put on the barn.

Yesterday, with the help of my friend Clarence, I finished butchering the last of my turkeys. Clarence, who grew up on a farm and has continued to keep animals his whole 83 years of life, had never seen, let alone tried, a poultry plucker. When I told him about the one I’d borrowed, and what a great time I was having with it, he asked me to let him know the next time I was butchering so he could come over, lend a helping hand, and give it a whirl at the same time. Having learned so much from Clarence over the past couple of years, I was thrilled to be able to pass on some knowledge to him, for a change.

Before I lit the fire yesterday, I left him a message on his answering machine letting him know I was butchering today. I had just gotten the scalding water temperature up to where I wanted it, had hung and was cutting my first turkey, when Clarence appeared at my gate. “Don’t you just have the perfect timing!” I called out when I saw him, quickly finished the cuts on the turkey’s neck, rinsed my hands and, wiping them dry on my pants, made my way over to greet him.

Clarence never brings his truck into the yard but prefers to stop at my gate and walk in. He talks to all the critters on his way towards the house, calling out as he goes, ‘Hello goats, hey there duckies, how ya doing doggy,’ meeting and greeting his way up the driveway. There is often a chorus of replies: ‘mmm-baaaa, quack-quack-quack, gobble-gobble’. What is always absent is Tui the dog’s bark, which impresses Clarence to no end.  He takes this to show how intelligent she is. “You know my dear, she never barks at me,” he happily reports as if for the first time on nearly every one of his visits. “She knows me… you know… knows my voice.” He rounds out the thought with a final affirmative “Mm-hmm.”

Today, he had brought a big beef rib bone for Tui. He’d already given it to her when I’d spotted him, and she was happily trotting back down the driveway, head cocked to one side with the weight of the bone, balancing herself as she made her way back to her spot on the grass where she flopped down and started to work greedily. The bone must have been about twenty inches long. With the prize between her teeth and her paws, her Christmas had come early.

As I drew closer to him I was not greeted by the usual, ‘Hello my dear,’ but “Are your hands bloody?” Well, that’s not a question I’d ever thought I’d hear aimed at me, I thought, and stuck my freshly rinsed hands out for him to inspect. His eyes cast down searching for the answer instead of waiting for my reply. Then, clutching my hands in his and looking them over with care, he triumphantly declared, “Yep, they’re bloody,” pointing to a spot of blood on my ring finger that I’d missed. “OK, I’m satisfied,” he said, dropping my hands and continuing his march towards the barn where I had my butchering station set up.

Then, out of the corner of his eye, spotting something that he couldn’t ignore, he veered quickly off course towards the hung turkey: “Oh, my dear, you haven’t got him… her, cut well enough on the right.” Without pause, he took out his knife and expertly finished the job that I had rushed through in order to meet him a few moments before. I was surprised at how good his eyesight still is at his age, and impressed at how quickly he judged the situation and worked deftly to rectify it. One thing I’ve learned about Clarence is that he hates to see an animal suffer. While he is happy to teach these difficult skills, he’s also quick to finish the job if it is not done right soon enough.

For the rest of the day, we worked steadily together, taking turns at catching the turkeys and scalding them. He asked that I show him how to use the plucker with the first turkey. Suitably impressed and eager to try it out, he did the next one. “Wow, this sure works, my dear!” he called out over the whir of the plucker as he laid his first bird on the rubber spokes, his eyes widening in surprise as he watched the feathers fly off the bird. I looked over to see the result of his newly learned skill, and, in a momentary lapse of concentration–so excited about communicating his wonder at the job the plucker was doing–he nearly lost the bird to the grip of the plucker. “Wow, you see that?” he said, quickly turning to catch hold of the fluttering bird and recover his grip. As he regained his composure he laughed, “You ever drop one of these?” (For those of you who want the answer, click Poultry in motion.)

I let him do all the plucking today, as I could see he was interested in the machine. “Did anyone tell you that I’m taking you for lunch today?” he asked, one hand on the neck and the other on the feet of the turkey, the wet corpse sagging heavily between them still steaming from the scalding water, mist rising up around Clarence like a scene in a B horror movie.   “No,” I replied, looking over at him as the mist evaporated: ‘Elmer Fudd butchers his first turkey,’ I thought to myself.

It’s what I love about Clarence. He’s is such a character, he is almost a living caricature of himself: red and white quilted plaid jacket, buttoned down shirt, blue-jeans, Gortex hunting boots, completed by his green, Elmer Fudd hunting hat–replete with permanent cougar teeth marks from his attack 10 years ago. It’s his ‘Signature Collection’ line of clothing. You could take a photo of him today and, by digitally changing the background scenery, make it true for any season: here’s Clarence in the winter, here’s Clarence in the spring, here’s Clarence in the summer, and here’s Clarence in the fall. The only thing that would be altered to indicate the changing season is what he is wielding in his hands: in spring a seed catalogue, in summer a shovel or pitchfork, in fall a rifle, and in winter a snow-shovel. Yet Clarence’s simple taste is enchanting (the more so because he is unaware of it): underneath he is real, unassuming, and one of the most humble people I’ve ever met–not a pretentious bone in his body.

Having cut and plucked our way through the four turkeys, I ask him if he would mind if I added a couple of roosters. “No better time than now, my dear,” he hand-gestured to all the butchering paraphernalia about us. I’d been keeping the extra roosters partly because they are really pretty, but primarily because I like to let my hens (and thus my flock) ‘do their thing’ when the desire suits them to go broody (the technical term for motherly). For a lot of my time here at the farm, I have relied mostly on the hens to increase the numbers in my flock, supplemented occasionally by my feeble attempts at incubating eggs. It was only this past summer, after a miserable hatch rate (both mine and the hens’),  that I resorted to buying in some stock.

With the four turkeys done and on the table cooling, I looked at the roosters and began mentally weighing them. I want to cull out the smallest and keep the heaviest for breeding stock. I’m trying to develop my flock into good, all-purpose egg and meat birds–those who watch their figures get the knife around here. I spotted the two I thought were the smallest, caught them with my fishing net and brought them over to the hanging tree.

“Can you do this one, Clarence?” I asked, holding up one of the most beautiful roosters I have for him to see. “He’s just too pretty, I can’t do it.” I had been wanting to keep the reamining roosters: the Magnificent Seven I called them. I had grown quite fond of them and these two even had individual names. I still struggle with the ones that have names. Of course, once they were cut I was fine and did the rest of the processing, minus the plucker step, which Clarence was pretty thrilled with operating at this stage. I was also concerned that my knife wouldn’t do a quick enough job of the roosters. These ones in particular had glorious manes and, after doing in a bunch of turkeys that have no feathers on the neck, I knew my knife wasn’t sharp enough to get through all those feathers. I was relieved when Clarence obliged me.

Finally, as we were doing the final clean-up of the area, he touched my arm gently and said, “Awe, I’m glad you got all that work behind you.”  Throwing the last of the feathers on the fire he asked, “You ready to go for lunch now?” I rinsed the table-top and cutting board with soap and water, covered the blood up deep with sawdust, stacked the buckets and other items away in their place and carried the birds over to the garage. Clarence tipped out the scalding water and tidied up the fire and plucker mess. Once done, we headed into town for a hot lunch. It was a lot closer to dinner time than lunch by the time we were done, but it tasted good nonetheless! It is amazing how good a hot meal feels after a day out working in the cold weather, and I said so as I thanked Clarence for lunch.

How deep is your l’eau?

More than ankle deep in the stuff!

We are bilingual in Canada, or so the theory goes. I don’t claim to be, at least not in our  two official languages. However, I do remember a few words from my elementary school days, or what my mother affectionately calls my ‘cereal box french’:  ‘l’eau’ for water, ‘fenetre’ for window, ‘Ouvre la fenetre’ (Open the window), and ‘un bois de l’eau s’il vous plais’ (a glass of water if you please). (I’m certain I don’t remember the correct spelling, so please bear with me while I prove the exception to the theory.)

Today, the view from my ‘fenetre’ is less than appealing, thanks to the amount of l’eau I see in every direction: it has been raining since June. OK, so that is a bit of an overstatement, but only just. It has, in all honesty, rained for most of October, all of November and, apart from a short ‘breather’ of about half a day, all of December as well. Add to this misery the fact that 0ur ‘daylight hours’ stretch all the way from 8 am to 4 pm; although, unlike most of the valley, we have two ‘cuts’ in the southern mountain range which afford us half an hour of sun a day, when the sun is not shining, it matters not.

Water running almost all the way to the turkey and chicken barns.

If I had one (and I probably should, being Canadian and all), I could almost canoe from the front porch to the animals pens. If it weren’t for the trenches I dug between the house and the garden (where the pink gates are and to the left), beyond the garden and before the new chicken barn, and between the chicken barn and the turkey pen, a canoe would be the only way to get around our property now.

It has rained about 5 inches overnight.

Must be 4 or 5 inches of rain.

It is weather fit only for ducks. The goats refuse to leave the barn in the morning on days like this. When I try to shoo them out, there is a plaintive chorus of: “N-o-o-o…I-i-i-t-t’s a-a-a-a-a-a-a g-0-0-0-0 ba-a-a-ack to b-ed day!” as I open their door and shove them out into the paddock. I have spent most of November digging trenches around the property to try to funnel the water away from the animal–and our–housing. I have also spent a lot of time wheel-barrowing gravel and sawdust around the property in an attempt to raise the ground level and gain decent footing. This kind of rain wreaks havoc with our soft land, turning it from spongy grassland into a mucky, slippery mess.

A few brave chickens face the weather in search of tasty morsels.

Usually the chickens brave the weather. Unlike the goats, the chickens are amazingly hearty and not much keeps them down. However, today there were very few to be found in the paddock and around the place. Instead, I found the bulk of them huddling quietly in their barn keeping dry. I guess they heard and took the goats’ advice; I know I’d like to go back to bed and not face this weather.

An uncommon sight: chickens huddling indoors during the day.

It is dark at the best of times this time of year in Bella Coola, but on days like this it is overwhelmingly dismal. The narrow east-west valley makes days like this seem like it is early evening from the time you get up till the time you retire. We have several sky-lights in our home so it is not often during the day that I have to turn on lights, but these days are the exception to the rule; I have on nearly every light we own, inside and out!

I try to see the positive side. Our Christmas lights look so cheery against the gloom, hung up on the barn and in the cherry trees. And a sudden drop in temperature would rid me of all this slush… but… here’s hoping it doesn’t freeze overnight and leave me with a skating rink rather than water-front property tomorrow morning.

Normally a small pond, the duck paddock is now completely submerged.

Hi-ho, hi-ho, it’s off to work experience I go

A couple of weeks ago I had the opportunity to have some junior high school kids come and spend the day with me–doing ‘work experience’. One of the high school classes had come and toured the farm in previous weeks; when the class was asked where they would like to be placed for work experience day, two of the boys chose Howling Duck Ranch! They both are interested in becoming farmers, and were keen to spend some time working on the farm and playing with my animals.

Alec Willie and Clayton Walkus spend time on the farm for work experience day.

I picked them up from school in the morning and we got straight to the ugly stuff. I gave them the choice: mucking out the chicken coup or fixing the fence-line, which do you want to tackle first? They chose the mucking out job, so we set to it. I explained how it should be done, where to pile the muck, and where the replacement bedding was. They went at it heartily and seemed to enjoy the work.

It was a big job, and I was impressed with how they worked without complaint. The room is 12′ X 20′ and the bedding was about 4 inches deep. It took a while to get it all hauled out and into the compost pile. While they worked, the boys asked me all sorts of questions about farming in general, but chicken keeping in particular. They were obviously engaged in the task at hand, as the questions they asked about the chickens were very thoughtful: how often do you have to change the bedding, why are the nesting boxes the size they are, how often do chickens lay eggs, can they lay eggs without a rooster, what do you feed them? and so on.

Once all the old bedding was out, we began to barrow in the new bedding. Again, some good questions arose, and I tried to answer them all. I explained to them why I used sawdust instead of hay or straw as bedding (soaks up the urea better, doesn’t form wet heavy mats like hay does, holds the heat as it composts down better); why it is good to have some cedar in the mix (keeps away lice and fleas, and smells nice); and that I was, for the first time this year, trying an experiment with deep bed litter. I had read about this a long time ago, but not had the right conditions to actually try it out. Now that I have my new deluxe barn, complete with a 6 inch pony wall, I am enthusiastic about trying it.

According to Joel Salatin of Polyface Farm, if you keep the bedding deep (8-12 inches deep), the action of the composting can not only keep the smell down but also add heat to the building. It can therefore cut down on your heating costs. He also merits this system with cutting down on work time, because you don’t have to clean it out as often as I have been. Instead, it is of benefit to keep adding litter and turning the bedding, to keep the compost action working and the urea smell down. He also claims that if the bedding is closer to 12 inches deep, research has shown the bugs that grow can actually contribute to the protein needs of your chickens. It all sounds good, and with no negative aspects, so I’m giving it a go!

They began to place bets on how many wheelbarrows full would it take to fill the coop again. How deep will the litter be? they asked, and then the  serious calculations began. Within about one barrow full, they were spot on in their estimation.

Clayton and Alec bringing in new bedding for the chickens (note the hinged roost for ease of cleaning).

At some point during the new bedding refill work, Alec quite unselfconsciously started to sing, ‘I’ve been working on the railroad’. I’m not even sure he was aware he was singing out loud! It was a very sweet moment and I caught it on camera (but wished I’d had video capability). While they were getting the last of the new bedding, I was spreading it out evenly inside the coop. I was surprised to find a rogue egg. It must have been laid in the outside pile of sawdust by one of my chickens, and had survived the shoveling into the barrow by the boys, then the trip into the coop in the barrow, and even the dumping onto the clean coop floor. Miraculously, the egg was still intact! (It is the egg in the photo above being held beside Alec’s ear by Clayton.) Clayton asked if he could take this one home, so I let him–not sure how he was going to keep it from breaking. First, I asked if he knew how to check if the egg was fresh (I didn’t know how long the egg had been hidden there myself!); he didn’t, so I explained that you should put it in water, and if it sinks, it’s still fresh.

Filling the barrow with new bedding, singing a happy tune.

After this, we stopped for lunch. I made hot chocolate and brought out cookies. They finished their lunches and enjoyed the warm drink. Clayton, in particular, liked the cookies, and said so with enthusiasm (he even politely asked if he could take a couple more home at the end of the day). Once lunch was done we moved on to the fencing job. The boys walked the fence-line and decided where upgrades were needed. We got to work digging down into the grass so we could place boards and other barriers where there were gaping holes. Again there was a raft of questions that showed me they were engaged with what they were doing. While they were performing the tasks throughout the day, both of them had suggestions for how things could be done better and tried them out.

Eventually while mending the fence-line, the boys got distracted by the chickens who, quite easily, convinced the boys that it was very important to stop digging each time a worm was discovered and feed it to them; production came to a grinding halt as the boys fed the greedy girls by hand. Then we got to see the pecking order in action. Chickens are extremely serious about maintaining social order and the question of who gets fed first is not to be taken lightly. The boys picked up on the chicken’s social grace, or apparent lack of, and named one of the more boisterous chooks, ‘Miss Piggy’.

Alec feeding Miss Piggy.

Days end finally came, so we got washed up before I took them back to school. They had one request before leaving: to play with the goats. Of course: the goats always eager to welcome them into their paddock, to nibble at new people, their jackets, their hair, their ears, or to have a nice scratch from the human playmate.  I was surprised that the boys remembered the goats’ names from their first class trip to the farm a few weeks before; they even  got a few correct when trying to identify which one was which. My husband can’t even do that now!

It was great to have Alec and Clayton on the farm, and I was thrilled to have their help in getting a big job done. They worked well together, were keenly interested in the farm, and asked how and why things are done the way they are. I would have them back anytime. Thanks, guys!

Nice clean barn with new bedding!

Notice: turkey plucking photos added to Poultry in motion

I’ve added a couple of new photos to the Poultry in motion post. They are of me using the turkey plucker if you are interested in seeing them, click here.

Poultry in motion

Turkey plucker in background; fire heating scalding water in cauldron in foreground.

Last week I butchered 27 roosters, 8 turkeys and 2 ducks and, until a few days ago, I was doing it all by hand (see Butchering day: turkeys for complete photo documentary of the process).  Several days into the planned massacre, I had a food security meeting at the hospital (it being the only venue in the valley with video-conferencing capability). During the meeting, my mind drifted back to all the work I had to do back on the farm. While I was agonizing about how often I was having to sharpen my knife, it occurred to me that I might just be in the right place at the right time. After all, a hospital is the place where they cut people, in particular their skin, open. Why not use a scalpel?

With that thought I was suddenly anxious for the meeting to end so I could get back to the business ‘at hand’. My mind began leafing through the possibilities of who might give me a contraband scalpel; I mentally listed off the doctors whom I knew well enough to ask and noted, sadly, that all were either out of town or recently retired. While I was lamenting the loss of fruitful connections, one of the nurses walked by as if on cue. Perhaps I would be able to buy one: “Sure, but you might want to consider buying an exacto knife instead,” the nurse replied, listing off the virtues of the exacto knife: they are probably cheaper, just as sharp, not made for one time use, more convenient  and would last much longer. Laughing, he rounded out his thoughts with, “Besides, a scalpel is made for making nice neat incisions that are repairable–not really what you’re after.”

Who knew they were made for one time use? As I left the nurses’ station, I had the good fortune of running into another neighbour who at one time owned a chicken plucker. Convinced I was suffering the preliminary states of arthritis, but suppressing my desperation, I asked him nonchalantly if he still owned the contraption and whether I could borrow it. “It’s actually a turkey plucker,” he said rubbing his chin, then added mercifully, “Sure you can use it.”

Holding his hands in the air and turning them from side to side, he provided me with a quick virtual demonstration of how to use the machine, replete with the final stages of turkey plucking–holding it by the feet and gently letting it roll away from you, careful not to let it go but moving with it as it bounced up and down on the imaginary rubber prongs–and finally we made arrangements for me to pick it up the next day. (I wondered what the other patients thought we were discussing as we stood there in the corridor!)

The sum total of my processing plant: cutting table, scalding cauldron, turkey plucker, guts bucket, hand washing pots and towels.

The next morning, he and my husband man-handled the great machine onto the brick patio which surrounds our fire pit, where I would be working. After they both left, I got myself organized, then got a chicken slaughtered, scalded and ready for the plucker. I plugged the machine on and it whirred satisfyingly to life. Doing my best impersonation of my instructor, I gently laid the chicken over the turning rubber prongs. With a rapid fire ‘tuk-tuk-tuk-tuk-tuk’ (reminiscent of a playing card held on the spoke of my bicycle wheel by a clothes peg), the chicken throttled to life, leaped out of my hands, whisked itself through the plucker with nary a feather lost, and flew through the damp air, pure ‘poultry in motion’, before coming to an abrupt stop on the wet grass on the far side of the machine with an unceremonious ‘thwap!’

Turkey plucker almost winning!

When I switched dance partners from chickens to turkeys, which are much heavier than chickens, the torque was several magnitudes greater, and once again I was caught off guard as the first turkey made one final attempt at flight. Determined to win, I hung on to his legs for dear life, bracing my gumboots against the machine in a desperate tug-of-war. When I thrust my body backwards in a final heave, the battered and torn turkey, still not exactly featherless, brought the whirling prongs to a momentary halt, and I retrieved my bird. If I’d been working alongside Kevin Costner, I would have earned the right (from the native Americans peering at me from the tree-line) to the name: ‘Dances with Turkey.’ While I lamented the loss of my first investment (battered and torn as it was), my dog Tui smiled smugly at the prospect of several gourmet meals.

Dances with turkeys.

After a few false starts, I developed a feel for it. Overall, it was a fantastic addition to my repertoire and sped up my processing operation almost threefold! Here are a couple of (not so great) photos of my ‘slightly more high-tech’ but still incredibly low-tech, little operation.

Hanging turkeys ready for killing.

Submersing the meat in cold water to cool it down quickly after gutting.

Final checking over of chickens for pin feathers and general good condition before bagging.

Bagging up the final product (chickens) ready for the freezer.

Pressure canning meat and poultry

This post is at special request of Jo at Little Ffarm Dairy.

Chicken canned and ready for storage and winter use in soups, stews, and my favourite, curries!

This past week and weekend, I completed a marathon butchering fest. In total, I butchered 27 chickens, 2 ducks and 4 turkeys which may not sound like much, but when you are doing it solo and without the aid of any modern day technology, it is a feat, to say the least.

In the midst of it all I also canned 8 chickens, all the stewing beef from our butchered cow, and am presently in the process of cooking two more turkeys and will can them later today. Having taken in the half a cow, I now have no room left in my freezer, so can I must! Food preservation is a juggling act at all times here, as we do not have much room in our wee house and we don’t have any form of cold storage… yet.

The following information includes recipes and methods for SAFE canning of meat, game and poultry which I have collected over the past few years:

Pressure canning is the ONLY SAFE METHOD for canning meat and poultry

Home food preservation must be done with care, to protect the quality and safety of the food. Jars or cans containing low-acid foods–such as vegetables, meats, poultry and seafood–must always be processed under pressure, to prevent spoilage or food poisoning. The bacteria which cause botulism, a severe and potentially fatal from of food poisoning, are not killed by using the hot water bath canning process.

PRESSURE CANNING MEAT (Beef)

All meat should be handled carefully, should be correctly slaughtered, and canned promptly or kept under refrigeration until processed. Keep meat as cool as possible during preparation for canning, handle rapidly, and process meat as soon as it is packed. Most meats need only be wiped with a damp cloth, though I make a habit of rinsing it in cold water (but that is just personal preference).

Use lean meat for canning: remove most of the fat, cut off gristle and remove large bones, and cut into pieces in a convenient size for canning. Pack hot meat loosely, leaving 1-inch head-space in Mason jars.

Prepare broth for filling jars: place bony pieces in saucepan, cover with cold water, and simmer until meat is tender. Cool liquid and discard the layer of fat that hardens on the surface. Bring liquid to a boil and use it to pack into jars packed with precooked meat (and poultry).

NOTE: Meat should not be browned with flour nor should flour be used in the broth to make gravy for pouring over the packed meat as the starch in the flour makes the sterilization process very difficult, and so this is not recommended for home canners. (Best leave this to Chef Boyardee and Heinz.)

Meats may be processed with or without salt. If salt is desired, use only pure canning or pickling salt (table salt contains a filler which may cause cloudiness in bottom of jar). I use 1/2 teaspoon salt to each pint, 1 teaspoon to each quart. More or less salt may be added to suit individual taste.

Follow step-by-step directions for your pressure canner. Process meats according to the following recipes.

When canning food in regions less than 2,000 feet altitude (dial gauge canner) or 1,000 feet altitude (weighted gauge canner), process according to specific recipe. When canning food in regions above 2,000 feet altitude (dial gauge canner) or 1,000 feet altitude (weighted gauge canner), process according to the following chart.

ALTITUDE CHART FOR CANNING MEAT AND POULTRY

ALTITUDE	DIAL GAUGE CANNER Pints and Quarts	WEIGHTED GAUGE CANNER Pints and Quarts
1,001 – 2,000 ft.	11 lbs.	15 lbs.
2,001 – 4,000 ft.	12 lbs.	15 lbs.
4,001 – 6,000 ft.	13 lbs.	15 lbs.
6,001 – 8,000 ft.	14 lbs.	15 lbs.

Processing time is the same at all altitudes.

PRESSURE CANNING GAME MEAT

Pressure canning is the ONLY SAFE METHOD for canning meat.

Follow step-by-step directions for your pressure canner. Process your game meat according to the following recipes.

CUT-UP MEAT (strips, cubes, or chunks) Bear, Beef, Pork, Lamb, Veal, and Venison
Remove excess fat. Soak strong-flavored wild meats for 1 hour in brine water containing 1 tablespoon of salt per quart of water. Rinse. Remove large bones and cut into desired pieces.

Raw Pack—Fill jars with raw meat pieces, leaving 1-inch head-space. DO NOT ADD LIQUID. Adjust jar lids.

Hot Pack—Precook meat until rare by broiling, boiling, or frying. Pack hot meat loosely in clean, hot Mason jars, leaving 1-inch head-space. Cover meat with boiling broth, water, or tomato juice (especially with wild game), leaving 1-inch head-space. Adjust jar lids.

Dial Gauge Canner—Process at 11 pounds pressure – Pints 75 minutes and Quarts 90 minutes. For processing above 2,000 feet altitude, see chart for recommended pounds of pressure.

Weighted Gauge Canner—Process at 10 pounds pressure – Pints 75 minutes and Quarts 90 minutes. For processing above 1,000 feet altitude, see chart  for recommended pounds of pressure.

PRESSURE CANNING POULTRY

Pressure canning is the ONLY SAFE METHOD for canning poultry.

Follow step-by-step directions for your pressure canner. Process poultry according to the following recipes.

CUT-UP POULTRY

Boil, steam, or bake poultry slowly to medium done. I tend to boil it and make the broth at the same time. If you have broth on hand you can precook in the concentrated broth for more flavor. Poultry is medium done when the pink color in the center is almost gone.

Cut poultry into serving size pieces and if desired, remove bones. I always debone the meat as it is my personal preference. I find it easier to use in recipes if it is done this way. Pack hot poultry loosely in clean, hot Mason jars, leaving 1 1/4-inch head-space.

Make broth from bones and bony pieces, neck, back, and wing tips and the gizzard, heart and liver if you have them. Pack hot meat in clean, hot Mason jars, leaving 1-inch head-space. Do not pack food tightly. Cover poultry with boiling broth or water, leaving 1 1/4-inch head-space. Adjust jar lids.

Poultry may be processed with or without salt. If salt is desired, use only pure canning or pickling salt. Table salt contains a filler which may cause cloudiness in bottom of jar. I use 1/2 teaspoon salt to each pint, 1 teaspoon to each quart.

Dial Gauge Canner—Process at 11 pounds pressure.
With Bone – Pints 65 minutes and Quarts 75 minutes.
Without Bone – Pints 75 minutes and Quarts 90 minutes.
For processing above 2,000 feet altitude, see above chart  for recommended pounds of pressure.

Weighted Gauge Canner—Process at 10 pounds pressure.
With Bone – Pints 65 minutes and Quarts for 75 minutes.
Without Bone – Pints 75 minutes and Quarts for 90 minutes.
For processing above 1,000 feet altitude, see above chart for recommended pounds of pressure.

RABBIT

Pressure canning is the ONLY SAFE METHOD for canning rabbit.

Follow step-by-step directions for your pressure canner. Process rabbit according to the following recipes.

Soak dressed rabbits 1 hour in water containing 1 tablespoon of salt per quart. Rinse and remove excess fat. Cut into serving size pieces. Boil, steam, or bake to medium done. Rabbit is medium done when pink color in center is almost gone. Pack hot rabbit loosely in clean, hot Mason jars, leaving 1 1/4-inch head-space. Cover rabbit with boiling broth or water leaving 1 1/4-inch head-space and adjust jar lids.

Dial Gauge Canner—Process at 11 pounds pressure.
With Bone – Pints 65 minutes and Quarts for 75 minutes.
Without Bone – Pints 75 minutes and Quarts for 90 minutes.
For processing above 2,000 feet altitude, see chart for recommended pounds of pressure.

Weighted Gauge Canner—Process at 10 pounds pressure.
With Bone – Pints 65 minutes and Quarts for 75 minutes.
Without Bone – Pints 75 minutes and Quarts for 90 minutes.
For processing above 1,000 feet altitude, see chart for recommended pounds of pressure.

Butchering days are upon us

I’m back from the hunting, but now engrossed in my ‘down-sizing’. Going to butcher a few ducks, some of the turkeys and all of the roosters over the next few days. Will get back to more regular postings next week. Gotta go light the fire!

Poopy-bum patrol

New babies arrive!

I have just gotten back from a few days hunting trip, without my buck. While I was away, fifty new baby chickens arrived and were snuggled into the nursery part of the barn by the OTT. I got home later that evening and checked on them before going to bed. I thought two of them didn’t look very strong and by morning one was dead, followed by two more later that night. And then there were forty-seven.

A mild case of poopy-bum. They are often a lot worse if you don't catch them early.

You get so you can recognize the ones who likely won’t  make it. One of the things I noticed immediately (and check for this every time I raise baby chicks or turkeys) was that several of them have what I officially call ‘poopy-bum’. This is a condition where the feces form a pasty plug that covers the vent (anus). It is life threatening; the birds will die if it is not corrected quickly. The medicated feed is supposed to prevent this, but it doesn’t seem to be 100% effective so I always do poopy-bum patrol for the first few weeks of their little lives.

Today, I set to addressing the immediate emergency: I took a bucket of warm soapy water, a roll of paper towel and a stool out to the barn, and let the games begin. The game goes like this: I sit quietly, watching the little rear ends as they race by. When I spot a poopy-bum, I reach out and grab it, put it in a small box, and repeat the process until I am satisfied there are no more poopy-bums on the floor. Once I have all the bums-in-need scooped into the box, I wash them gently, one by one, in the lukewarm soapy water.

Carefully dunking just the rear end of the chick so as to not get her too wet.

To do this, gently take the chick in one hand and immerse the rear end in the water. The water should be the temperature that you would feed a baby bottled milk, lukewarm to the wrist. Rub the poop between your fingers, being careful not to pull on it, as you might hurt the tiny bird. Eventually  the water will soften the poop enough for you to clean it off the feathers. DO NOT pull on the poop: you may tear the skin off the bird, or even pull its innards out if the poop is stuck to its colon. Either event is fatal. Be patient: the poop will eventually dissolve, leaving behind a clean behind. Before putting the chick back with the flock, wipe its bum with paper towel until as dry as possible so the chick doesn’t catch a chill. (DO NOT blow-dry with a hair dryer: this will burn the skin completely. Let your heat lamps do the drying.)

Freshly washed, now clean, poopy-bum. Notice the bird is only wet where necessary.

The poop is incredibly sticky. Whoever invented glue from horse/cow hooves obviously never tried chicken poop first! The whole ordeal for one poopy-bum cleaning may take a few minutes, thanks to the tenacity of the poop. It will come off eventually and you will have saved lives in the process. If you don’t clear the vent, the bird will die. I shudder to think about how many factory farmed birds suffer and die in this way.

Little wet, but clean, bum returned to her flock.

I have noticed that I can reduce the poopy-bum rate by feeding fresh, ground up weeds from the garden. Since employing this tactic, I have reduced my losses of brought-in birds significantly.