respectful chicken harvest part 1 of 2 kill and pluck - how to

http://www.permies.com

Alexia Allen of Hawthorn Farm is a wilderness skills instructor who also has a small farm in Woodinville, Washington. I thought she did a really good job of demonstrating a respectful harvest of a chicken.

I thought about trying to squeeze everything into a five minute video and decided instead to edit out very little. So there are two parts. This part is ten minutes and focused on killing the chicken and plucking the feathers from the chicken. Part 2 will be about separating the tasty parts from the not so tasty parts: butchering. (twelve minutes)

Alexia has many approaches to her philosophies about harvesting animals:

"I usually like wearing pink when I do my butchering. It makes me the angel of death. I have come to this process of killing animals with this sense of being almost a midwife? Or at least when I teach people about butchering chickens I want to emphasize It's not about being brutal or macho, it's really about 'hey, you kill things and eat them.' That's part of how the world seems to work. I didn't make up how the world works. It just seems to be what needs to happen whether it is a chicken or a carrot. It's just a vertabrate bias that might make a chicken seem different than a carrot."

Relevant threads at permies:
http://www.permies.com/permaculture-forums/8690_18/critter-care/respectful-ha...
http://www.permies.com/permaculture-forums/6498_0/critter-care/bleeding-out-c...
http://www.permies.com/permaculture-forums/2847_0/critter-care/killing-and-bu...
http://www.richsoil.com/raising-chickens.jsp

music by Jimmy Pardo

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• chicken
• butchering
• respect
• respectful
• harvest
• plucking
• eco
• green
• permaculture
• organic
• sustainability
• how to
• how to kill a chicken
• humane
• humanely
• diy

[paulwheaton12]

I don't get it. About once a week a militant vegan shows up and posts some crazy rant. Why would a militant vegan go looking for videos about chickens? They just have bottled anger they need to spew? So, just to let folks know, I've been deleting these. I'm glad youtube gives me the ability to do that.

[MrAnthonyRizzo]

Being a vegetarian to protect the sanctity of animal life is incomplete because it only minimizes the suffering of animals that the vegetarian owns and that he has not consumed. All other animals are still at the mercy of nature or mankind. Wild animals die unpredictable deaths. Livestock animal will not, so making that inevitable moment as peaceful as possible is important. Death is an inevitability that being a vegetarian can’t stop, so striving to give animals happy lives is more practical.

[paulgem123]

I think if we eat meat then to understand this process makes you value life more rather than thinking they magically get on our plate. Respect for life is key which you clearly understand. Thank you.

[MrAnthonyRizzo]

@zachariah2391I absolutely loved Bob Ross. His take on the world around him was so idyllic. I remember when he screwed up something on the canvas he was painting and he would just shrug it off as “happy little accidents.” What a wonderful human being. I miss him!

[MrAnthonyRizzo]

@gardengreentheworld …and a healthy Halleluiah to you too! :)

[MrAnthonyRizzo]

@KrykoStorm That is a fair question. My point of view stems from having seen the story of Temple Grandin’s life. Her view on a person’s responsibility to the animals that he brings into this world makes sense. I’ve also seen news reports about scientific studies that confirm that meat from grass fed animals that are allowed to roam naturally is healthier than the alternative. That has to be some indication as to the health and happiness of the animal. BTW: I would rather be happy!

[KrykoStorm]

@MrAnthonyRizzo Would you rather have someone give you a happy life, than kill you, or let you live your life normally and as long as you usually live? I don't really have a definite opinion regarding vegetarianism, just kinda trying to figure it all out.

[txroye]

That's just weird

[gardengreentheworld]

With her calm voice its like "oh man this is so soothing" and then you hear the squish of dead bird...... forgot what i was watching for a sec

[gardengreentheworld]

@MrAnthonyRizzo Aaaaaaaaaaaamen....



[txroye]

Why not just place it in a chicken size funnel with its head out, hang it upside down, and off with the head? Seams fast. Why does cutting the wind pipe effect the bleeding?

[MrBagginsEsq]

@paulwheaton12 You are 99.999 percents correct. What you are incorrect about is that there all vegans. Some think meat grows on trees in the back of a supermarket (got that cool chant from another youtuber)!