Chicken slaughter

My Ameraucana was my most productive layer last summer/fall. However after the winter break, she never started laying again. My chickens are livestock rather than pets, which means that they need to pull their weight on the farm. Plus, I suspected that there was a health issue underlying the lack of eggs, so I figured it was more humane to give her a quick death than let her continue getting more sick.

I had read about slaughtering chickens but I was nervous about doing it on my own. Fortunately I recently made a homesteading friend who is experienced with poultry slaughter and she was happy to guide me through the process.

First we paused to admire how beautiful this girl was.

Then we placed her in a restraining cone and I sliced her throat open. The body thrashed a few times and the blood drained into a bucket below. I got lightheaded and had to sit down for a few minutes, but I was able to chat and joke. I didn't have any problems with what I'd done, but it was still shocking to actually kill a bird you've been raising for a year.

We had a hot pot of water ready and we dunked the bird and started plucking feathers. I've heard people complain about this part but it went quickly for us. I was amazed at how easily the feathers came out. Soon we had a carcass that looked almost like a store-bought bird.

We each took a foot and cracked it at the joint, then used kitchen scissors to get them off all the way. At this point my friend took over with cutting into the bird and removing the guts and organs, which was fortunate because we soon discovered that this was not a typical bird to learn on.

The Ameraucana had a huge buildup of thick, bright yellow fat filling up her inner cavity. It was so thick that it was pretty much a solid. It encased her vital organs, and it was clearly the culprit behind the lack of eggs. After a little sleuthing my friend diagnosed this as Fatty Liver Hemorrhagic Syndrome. Left alone, it would have led to internal bleeding and certainly a painful death.

We decided to try roasting her for lunch the next day, since all the internal fat would make up for her being beyond typical roasting age. We turned out to be wrong and the meal was only so-so. Next chicken will go into the soup pot instead. Still, it was very cool to eat an animal that I had raised, and knew exactly how it had lived and what it had eaten over its lifetime.