Chicken Thread Spin Off (Cow, Pig too!)

[Impish]

Ok, so after reading some of the chicken threads floating around here lately, lol, I announced to Wolf then when we finally get our acreage (assuming that God intends us to be out there before retirement :D) I wanted a chicken coop...eggs, and for eating.

 

He told me fine, but I get to swing the axe, I could do that one handed :glare:

 

Huh. So, for those of you who raise chicken for eating, heck, add in cow and pig too, do you do your own butchering, etc or do you send them off? And if you send them off, how do you find a 'good' place vs a 'bad' place, and how do you tell the difference?

 

Also, in my real estate dreaming, I came across an acreage/farm that was 'certified organic'...anyone have a clue what that actually means in the real world, and what that would take for the typical farm to accomplish?

 

Thanks!

[Remudamom]

We send everything we butcher away, because we have a great butcher just 10 miles down the road.

[amy g.]

We butcher our own chickens and turkeys. I would be willing to send larger animals to the butcher, but I feel like it is better for the animal not to have to be transported if we can help it.

 

I have a chef lined up who is going to come out next year, and teach us to butcher goats.

 

I'm still trying to talk Dh into butchering cows and pigs at home. He started softening when I said I'd buy a walk in cooler to age the beef.

[Tracy in Ky]

We butcher our own chickens. We're raising our milk cow's bull calf for meat; we'll take him to be butchered. Dh also went today to see a man about getting a feeder pig to raise. We're planning getting it next week--after it's weaned. We'll take it to be butchered also. It would be nice to butcher them all, but it's overwhelming to think about!

 

The certified organic land probably means that it meets regulations such as not having had certain pesticides applied to it for so many years, etc.

[amy g.]

Tracy, I don't know how much cheese you make, but I have friends who raise a pig each year on just whey. It takes 8 months instead of 5 to finish them out, but it is supposed to taste absolutely divine.

[Tracy in Ky]

Tracy, I don't know how much cheese you make, but I have friends who raise a pig each year on just whey. It takes 8 months instead of 5 to finish them out, but it is supposed to taste absolutely divine.

 

Amy, thank you for that information. I plan on putting lots of whey and milk into our pig. I've got gallons and gallons of milk frozen already for it, and our cow gives more than we can drink. The bull calf still takes 1 1/2 gallons per day in his bottle, but I plan to wean him down when we get the pig. The calf is probably about 11 weeks old right now, so it's time to start taking him off the bottle some.

 

We give whey to the chickens and cats and dogs! lol.

 

I'm glad you told me this, because while I knew that pigs could be raised on milk, I didn't realize it was THAT helpful in growing them!

 

Thanks again,

Tracy

[Melinda S in TX]

We have butchered all our own meat animals. This includes quail, chickens, turkeys, rabbits, pigs, feral hogs, goat, and deer.

 

We have two calves that we are raising for meat. We've never raised calves before. One we will butcher soon. The other we are going to let get bigger, but will still do the butchering ourselves.

 

Melinda

[Audrey]

Ok, so after reading some of the chicken threads floating around here lately, lol, I announced to Wolf then when we finally get our acreage (assuming that God intends us to be out there before retirement :D) I wanted a chicken coop...eggs, and for eating.

 

He told me fine, but I get to swing the axe, I could do that one handed :glare:

 

Huh. So, for those of you who raise chicken for eating, heck, add in cow and pig too, do you do your own butchering, etc or do you send them off? And if you send them off, how do you find a 'good' place vs a 'bad' place, and how do you tell the difference?

 

Also, in my real estate dreaming, I came across an acreage/farm that was 'certified organic'...anyone have a clue what that actually means in the real world, and what that would take for the typical farm to accomplish?

 

Thanks!

 

 

 

I have what dh calls a "chicken sanctuary." I refuse to kill those sweet girls! They're layers only. For hogs and cattle, we send them to the abattoir. Beef, we get cut. Pork we take back in sides because dh processes several varieties of smoked sausages himself. We can cut and wrap the rest ourselves.

 

Certified organic in Canada can mean a few things depending on the field/farm and what process they've gone through to get it certified. In order to get your land certified you have to go through a process of withdrawing the land from a very long list of chemicals and procedures. If you were to do it yourself, you'd need to either get your Ag Rep to give you a consultation or get someone from your Provincial Organic Org to come out. Inspectors will do consults, too. It all depends on what you're working with to start -- what was the last crop on the field, what did you put on it, what procedures do you use (rotations, tillage, etc.)? It isn't hard to do, but it does involve careful planning and lots of paperwork.

 

Just a word of caution: If I were looking at buying certified organic land, I'd want to see ALL of the documentation beforehand. And, I mean ALL OF IT. There is a lot of documentation you have to supply to keep organic status, and if someone didn't want to show it to you, I'd think "scam" right off the bat.

 

Also, remember -- the first time you mess up on procedure, your organic status will be pulled for the affected field. That even includes if your blankety-blank neighbour sprays on a windy day and that field you've been working on for 3 years catches all his 2.4d drift. Ask me how I know. :glare:

Edited June 3, 2009 by Audrey

[Melissa in Australia]

the bigger animals we take to the abattoir ( boy I had trouble spelling that word) and get killed there. we pick them up a few days later nicely gutted and chilled. we cut it up ourselves, though the last steer we sent to the butchers. They just do a nicer job of all the steaks than me.

[creekland]

We do our own chickens - and we don't use an ax. Hubby pulls the head back and off - at night - when the chickens are calm. It's quite quick.

 

We also do our own deer (hunted).

 

When we had steers and pigs we took them to a nearby butcher because he had the equipment we don't have including a big fridge for aging... I got nicely wrapped meat back.

[MomLovesClassics]

I know some who clean their own deer from hunting. They have some sort of small building cooler room. I haven't been inside it or anything. My brother knows how to clean deer, and he says you must be carful, or your meat will taste bad. He did send his pig and cow away. Chickens they do themselves.

[runninmommy]

I have noticed in a lot of your threads and posts you long for country life. Your my kind of gal.. I just wanted to suggest a book to you that is the best country-living book I have read. The Encyclopedia of Country Living by Carla Emery.

 

http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Country-Living-Carla-Emery/dp/1570615535/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1244031584&sr=8-1

 

It talks about raising animals from birth to butchering, tells you in detail about having a veggie garden and talks about each plant, milling your own flour, beekeeping, canning and preserving, buying your land and tons and tons of info about being self-sufficient.

 

Just thought I'd mention it. :001_smile:

[katemary63]

We have butchered our own turkey, chickens and rabbits. We use an ax and an old stump with 2 nails in it. I do this part as my husband is too "sensitive" to do the killing. Pretty funny huh?

The chickens were not cheaper then in the store, just so you know. I don't think you can raise your own chickens and save money. However, they are drug free, treated well and tasty. Butchering poultry is easy - just disgusting! We don't like doing it.

Butchering rabbits is not near as bad and we think the rabbit meat tastes delicious - all white meat and low fat. ( I'm talking about domestic meat rabbits, I've never had wild rabbit.) Raising rabbits is more economical also. You can really fill up your freezer if you keep your does producing.

Around here, there is no option for sending off poultry or rabbits to be butchered. You have to do it yourself. Plus, you would loose all semblance of reasonable cost if you paid to have your poultry butchered.

We take our beef and hog to the local meat processor. He even makes formed patties for you in the size and quantity you want. Yeah! There are 4 processors within 30 miles of us. We choose the one who vacuum seals

[MomLovesClassics]

When we had 3 hens they roamed around the yard, and ate scraps. I never had to worry about feeding them really. The eggs were big and beautiful, when I say big, I mean bigger than the biggest at the grocery store. Someone let a cat out here, and my husband said don't feed it, so the cat ate scraps with the hens. The cat also ate rabbit. He turned out to be the best cat ever, and now we feed him, but he still hunts. I thought he was overweight, but the vet told me he was muscular from eating wild game. Something got our hens, and I was thinking to get some more, but keep them pinned up. I am apprehensive about growing chickens. Someone said that once they reproduce you can't eat enough of them, and it is easy to get overrun with them. I don't remember ever having that issue growing up. I have also heard it is cheaper to raise a herd of cows instead of 1 cow.

I have heard that organic farmers have to pay a lot of government fees for their certifications and that it is a hassle. I do not know how it works. When we grew up, We made our own jams and jellies, canned and froze lots of stuff. I really feel lazy compared to what my grandmother used to do.

[Impish]

RunninMommy, thanks so much! Yes to everything to beekeeping, as I'm allergic to the stings :glare: I'll definately be looking at that book!

 

Its not so much the being certified organic that I'm concerned with, because I don't plan to sell particularily...nice if it gets to that point, but absolutely not the plan or focus, kwim? I just want to give my family the healthiest food possible. Period. And that's why the 'certified organic' caught my eye, simply because I was thinking that it would already have had the pesticides 'cleared' so to speak. I want us to be as far off the grid, and as independant as possible. Wolf wants us to be in an ecohome as soon as financially possible, either by converting the home we buy, or by building on the acreage...hence why anything under 10 acres is a complete no go. I'm even concerned that 10 acres won't give us enough room in terms of water, etc to completely sustain an eco home, but then, I'm nowhere NEAR knowlegable enough to make that call, just figuring the more land, the better the options. Plus, I want room :lol:

 

I just figure if we're able to self support food wise, then that's a HUGE savings financially, kwim? Just taking that off the table in bills. Then add in the eco home, and no utilities, save phone/net. Bliss. We could double down on a mortgage, and be debt free in half the time, if it even took that long.

 

Sounds like a wonder to me :D

[Denisemomof4]

I like your thinking! I also highly recommend The Encyclopedia of Country Living. I borrowed it from the library and LOVED it. I may buy my own one day.

 

I've been wanting to turn my greenhouse, attached to my basement, into a place do to hydroponic gardening. I've always been fascinated with HG since visiting Epcot :D and wanted to take courses on it at the local extension office. I was thrilled they were offered but had too much going on at the time. I'm assuming it's something I can always research and read about. I've always wanted a root cellar, too.

 

I lived in a suburb in CA and worked in San Francisco. I grew up hearing my neighbors sneeze and flush their toilet. Our back yard was the size of a bandaid. :ack2: We were close to everything and there was tons of traffic.

 

I *LOVE* driving down a mile of dirt to get to my home :D where we own our entire side of the road. There are 3 houses on our road and the other two are nowhere near mine. :hurray: Our house has 28.5 acres and our home is smack dab in the middle. I've learned to LOVE my privacy, and yet we're 20 minutes to the largest city in NH. I have the best of both worlds!

 

Know why I'm telling you this? I'm wondering if there's SOME way that you really CAN do this?! When we found this home we absolutely fell in LOVE with it, but we already owned one duplex and some land. It was during a recession and we paid 75k for land years before and the value had dropped to 25k. We found this house and I cried when we left. I absolutely fell in love with the house (not the land - that came later!) and I never thought we would get this house. We did, and proceeded to build a lovely barn several years later. With the economy the way it is now, you MAY be able to pick something up in your price range if you sell your current place. That's how we got this house. The man who built it was going to lose it; it was going to go to foreclosure. So we offered what we could (the absolute TOP dollar) and were shocked when he agreed because it was so far under what it was worth. We've now been here almost 13 years. So, maybe you can at least go out and look and see what you want and what you may qualify for? Maybe look at homes with acreage and build your own buildings for raising animals? I bought a book on simple building projects. Poor dh has NO idea about the plans I have. :001_rolleyes:

 

My parents thought we were NUTS when we started to cut down our own trees to burn our wood stove (talk about a SAVINGS! That's HUGE in New England!) and I, too, have been wanting to be more self sufficient for the longest time. My older dd and I were just talking today about wanting to start to run the farm ourselves again next year. Oldest son does most of the work as we care for my mom. I miss it!! We're going to have chickens again! Yeah!

 

And know what I bought today? Two heritage breed Tamworth pigs! They're known for their lean meats but I don't have the heart to raise animals for meat. They're known for being great animals for CLEARING LAND!!! So we're going to throw them out with two llamas (we already have) and have the llamas eat up the greenery on the trees and the pigs root them up. :001_smile: I'm so excited about our new adventure! At the farm where we got them today they threw a couple of pigs out to till the soil so they could plant their garden. I'm SO excited!!!!!!! :D

 

Did I tell you I'm excited? :lol:

 

I've traded those high heels (that I never should have worn because I'm SO TALL!) for a plaid shirt and jeans and could NOT be happier. Keep praying and keep dreaming. It WILL happen one day, and maybe sooner than you think!!!