Chicken Processing: Commercial and Backyard Style

Heyy! This is going to be an update of the week so that you are all caught up. So Monday, we basically spent the whole morning in the production garden and weeded the strawberries, then we worked on the float for the rest of the day. On Tuesday, we went gleaning at Martha's Vineyard, which turned out to be the most fun gleaning I have ever had. All of us met at morning glory and since Jaimie wasn't there ( the one who organizes it all) we just sat around waiting for her While we were waiting, I decided to get a cup of iced coffee and then after finishing the first one, decided i needed a second so i went back inside and bought another one. Then, when Jaimie arrived, we all walked right over to the fields and began harvesting and because of the coffee, I had a ton of energy and was ready to work. I had managed to fill 3 boxes before Jaimie needed me to sort the produce. There were anywhere from 20-30 people harvesting, so we got far pretty quick. Then, after just about everything was harvested, we were told that we could take some corn. Each person took a row and we walked down the aisle picking the biggest ones. When everyone was all pooped out, James asked if anyone wanted to play Hide and go seek tag in the corn rows so Me, Aaron, Jaimie, James and Melindas foster son played. We all hid while James counted and I would stand really still and at one point, he walked a couple of rows in front of me and I stood there hoping that he wouldn't and when we was ahead of me, ik moved over a couple rows and he heard me and chased me and i fell so he tagged me. On Wednesday, we did chicken processing and helped out with killing them and then putting them in the scalder which helps lossen their feathers, then pluck them and take out all their guts. It was okay, but I didn't want to do the killing part even though amos did. Then, today, we worked on the float and Me and James went out to the field and helped Caitlin and Liza's group move the sheep over to new grass. The kids were irritating me because one kid was chasing after the sheep and since the sheep were really skiddish, they would run away. So this kid was chasing after them and I had to tell him to stop 2 or 3 times. Then, as we were moving the fencing, the kids pulled up the fence and all the sheep got out, but we were able to get them in and it was okay. Later on today, we worked with Ann's group and made seed paper. Then we slaughtered 2 hens backyard style. So the first one, Katie slit its neck and the second one, we chopped its head of with an axe. The one that we chopped its head off with and axe, we let it run arounnd because the nervous system is still working even though it was completely dead. It was so funny and disguting at the same time. Then after that was all done, and cleaned up, as I was walking back to the main building, i heard a lot of squealing from one of the pigs. I knew that Jon was killing one of the pigs because Aaron told us it had a hernia in its belly. So when i heard the squealing, i went over there and saw Jon with a rifle and then i heard him shoot the pig. Aparently, he hadn't gotten that clean of a shot because it was squealing really loud and rolling around in pain. Then there was no more noise and Conor brought the tractor over so that he could pick up the pig. We got to Watch as Jon took out all of its intestines and cleaned it all up. It was pretty neat to see how to do it all. Anyway, I hope you enjoyed reading it all!!! Bye!