This section contains homesteading wisdom for the butchering of food animals. It covers butchering, preserving, tanning, and the other things to most efficiently use the all the bounty from the harvest of your animals.
Skinning chickens is way better than plucking when you butcher. Saves tons of time, is fast and easy and makes for a nice clean bird.
Don't try hanging a chicken upside down from a rope around it's legs and swinging an axe to cut it's head off against the tree...... Don't even ask how I know this one... just don't do it. And make sure your axe is sharp. Hitting a chicken neck more than once is a gruesome experience. You want it clean, fast and easy.
The easiest way I've found to butcher chickens is to put the chicken under a 5-gallon bucket with the head and neck sticking outside. Hold the bucket down with one foot and you've got both hands free for a clean whack with a sharp hatchet. Continue holding the bucket clamped down on what's left of the neck until the chicken quits flopping. You can then remove the chicken and hang for draining. This way you don't have to chase down a headless chicken and you'll have a clean bird for butchering. I find it most efficient to do batches of 5 or 6 at a time.Pick a warm day to butcher but not a hot one. Start early. Have a really sharp knife. Many warm Fall days around here turn COLD as soon as that sun begins to dip, and then you've got wind, wet hands and handling wet birds and buckets and bowls of water. A very miserable day. Butchering when it's really hot is even worse. Flies, heat, smells, need I say more?
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