Anyways, I helped catch them, carried them to the gallows, carried them from the gallows, dunked them in hot hot water and dropped them into the plucker machine, plucked any missed feathers, cut off feet and heads, gutted them and rinsed them and bagged them. Crazy. I think that’s all the animal-killing we’ll have to do this year… Feeling pretty reaffirmed in vegetarianism for now, though I may try some of the chicken soup they're making with those old hens. The process was really fascinating once I got over the initial shock of seeing a living, squirming creature be drained of all its blood into the grass and lay still. Once the feathers were off and I'd cut the heads and feet with the butcher knife, it really did look just like a chicken you'd buy wrapped in plastic at the store. When we gutted them it felt like 7th grade biology, except this was much larger than a frog, and the organs seemed more familiar - intestines, esophagus, heart, squishy little lungs..all such pretty colors! And the egg sacks were the coolest thing - we found so many partially formed yolks and eggs with all but the shell just waiting to get their crust so they could be layed. We collected about 7 or 8 actual eggs that were ready to eat, just hadn't popped out yet. I feel weird about eating those though... Not sure why.
Farmer Chris had marked the ones she'd seen eating their own eggs with red twist ties around their feet. It was kind of funny when we were preparing to chop off a foot and you see this little twist tie and say, that one there's a convicted egg eater.
After they were all "processed" we had them sitting in a tub of cold running water. We went in for 2nd breakfast and afterward I came out to help Farmer Paul finish drying and wrapping them up for storage and he said "It looks like a bathtub full of babies." So I lifted one up out of the water with my hands under its little wings and bounced it in the air and cooed. Sick. I got my father's sense of humor, I think. :P Overall it was a really solemn affair. Farmer Paul doesn't like to kill things, and while we were slicing their necks and they'd struggle he'd say, "Nothing likes to die." Which seems true.
He actually had the most comforting words for me when I told them about my little bird buckling that was paralyzed and had died alone in the pen during the night three Wednesdays ago - he said, you know, you're suffering emotionally for watching him suffer, but he was really just trying to live. It hurts to see things struggling, but while they are in the midst of a struggle that's what they're focusing on... So I hope that the little buckling was laying in that straw trying and trying, and then just fell asleep and didn't wake up. I hope that's what happened...though I wish I could have held him and told him it was okay to let go...that he didn't have all that much to look forward to anyways.
Aaaaanyways. I don't live on a goat dairy anymore. Butchering was an interesting experience, but I don't think I could butcher anything but poultry right now, and even that makes me sad when I think about it. I was holding two live ones waiting for their turn in the cones and a nice breeze came up, and I wondered if she, dangling there by her feet with her wings spread out, was still enjoying the sun and wind on her feathers... I just don't know. There's no way I could lead a little lamb or a cow to slaughter...absolutely nothing with big brown eyes. Though the dissection part would be interesting.
The rest of the week we've been working in the greenhouse pretty much - seeding lettuce and peppers and tomatoes and kale and broccoli and fennel and celery and eggplant and transplanting all those and more. Very interesting to learn about their germination process, what type of soil and temperature and light they require. And I didn't think these little seedlings would be quite so cute. I love pulling a little one up with the scupula tool and seeing its long roots stretch out - you can just about hear the little thing let out a contented sigh when you plant them down in a couple inches of nice soil...nice and roomy. Cute. Cute. Cute. :) It feels like we're in there doing a service to all these little guys - rescuing them from suffocating spaces and releasing them into wide open space. I like this part.
Graphic photos of chicken butchering to follow...
And the most graphic picture... :/
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