Chicken Day, Making Peace In the Flock

Sunday April 16, 2023 Guerneville CA.

Hawk?

I spotted this bird up in the tree over my neighbor’s place and thought it might be a hawk. Nope, it was just a wild pigeon. My neighbor has a bird feeder out that they visit.

Chicken day

I needed to process the four young roosters that have been keeping my chicken flock all stirred up. Five Roosters is just too many for 11 hens and they make a lot of rooster noises too.

Processing area

I have the stuff I need to make the whole process relatively easy. It needs to be set up to start the process.

Processing

At this point I’ve dispatched the birds and am getting ready to dip them in hot water to loosen their feathers and then they go in the de-feather machine.

I put the finished birds in zip lock bags and into the freezer. All but one that went into my Instant Pot. Roosters tend to be tough so they get pressure cooked and I make some broth when I cook them too.

Discards

The feathers and other stuff that gets discarded needs to be hauled to the blue berry patch and buried.

The flock

On the way to the blue berry patch I went by the older rooster with all  his hens. No more fighting going on.

Blueberry patch

I buried the discards in this blueberry patch by a couple of the smaller plants.

Strawberries

The strawberry plants are just starting to bloom so it won’t be long before I’m eating strawberries.

The are hard to see, but the blueberry blossoms are many this year so I hope for a lot of blueberries soon. The blooms are like little bells.

Roosting

I locked the flock in at their roost late in the day.

And then I sat around and enjoyed the rest of the day.

Sunset

A bit after this sunset I went in the house for the day and was happy to get that chore done.

Nice day, except for the poor roosters. :O)