We planned to butcher our five Broad-Breasted Bronze turkeys just before Thanksgiving so that we would not have to put them in the freezer. This meant giving the birds four or five days of rest between butcher and T-Day. Today (four days before Thanksgiving) was the day.
It was not a small affair. We had several people involved in the process. I bartered with our friend for the use of her plucker and scalder. She got a turkey out of the deal. I also sold the remaining three turkeys...most of which we delivered the following day. One family wanted to see the process, so they came out to our place for the event.
Because we are between farms (moving), we had to transport the birds out to the new house in two dog crates. They weren't hard to catch at all...I opened the crates and threw feed in. The turkeys ran into the crate without a second thought. There were a couple of chickens who got caught in the mix, but they managed to get out. We divided the birds up into the two crates and were on our way. They weren't too happy about the transport, but they settled down quick enough.
When we got to the new house, we set up the scalder and plucker. It was interesting to do this on the solar system...we used the generator to run the scalder as it takes 1500 watts. The plucker wasn't bad so we just plugged it in to the regular system. In addition to the plucker and scalder, we had a table with a butcher block, some knives and kitchen scissors. We also had a small garbage can with a bag. And off in the dirt, we had a chopping block.
We decided to use the 22 for the initial kill. I was concerned that the neck of the bird would be too difficult to get through with an ax. As much as I understand that I am killing an animal, I do not want the bird to suffer in its death. So I picked a bird out of the crate, brought it over to the dirt, and prepared for the shot.
We knew from the chickens that we needed to make sure to pin the wings down tight so that the bird didn't flap too hard after death and bruise the meat. One of the guys in the group offered to hold the bird. When the shot went off, the bird went wild. J and I were both yelling at the guy to hold onto the bird and he was standing there stunned. The bird, having been shot in the head, was dead but was also acting as a morbid sprinkler, dousing everyone within ten feet of it in a splattering of blood. J eventually grabbed the bird, but it had flailed around for quite awhile...bruising the meat pretty good. It was not a graceful event.
From there, we held the bird (still twitching) on the chopping block and with several not so graceful swings, the head was off. At this point, most of the blood was out of the bird (and all over us), but we held it a bit longer to bleed out the last of it onto the dirt.
Once it had slowed to a drip, we took the carcass up to the deck where the scalder and plucker awaited. We dipped it into the scalder, holding tight to the feet and swishing through the hot water to make sure it penetrated the feathers and loosened the pores holding the feathers. Counting slowly to 30, we moved it to the plucker.
Now, with chickens, all you need to do with the plucker is drop the bird in and watch the feathers fly. Not so with a turkey. We had everything running just right in the plucker - the water spraying, the drum rotating - but the minute that huge bird was dropped in, it stopped. Over and over again, the turkey would catch its feet in the space between the drum and the wall, stopping the drum from moving. Over and over again, J would reach in and pull the turkey free, allowing it to tumble again for a few more rotations. When the feet didn't get caught, the bird tended to stay in a single position, thus leaving large portions of the feathers intact. After about five minutes in the plucker, we called it good and hand-plucked the remaining feathers.
From the plucker, we went to the butcher table. This process was almost exactly like the chicken, only with larger tools. The gutting was the same, although we found that turkeys have two intestinal tracts that dead end into what looks like a dual colon system (I still need to look this up on the internet for confirmation). But when it came to cutting the legs and the neck, we needed something a bit larger than the kitchen scissors. We opted for a pair of anvil loppers. I did prefer doing the legs without the loppers, just to keep the bone from being cut into a sharp edge, but the neck would've been impossible without something pretty strong.
After cleaning the bird, we dropped the bird into a water bucket that had iced over that morning. It was perfect for cooling the birds quickly.
Once we had been through the process the first time, the other four went more smoothly. There were only a few variations on the theme. At one point, J was holding the turkey while it was shot. He lost his grip on the wings and I thought I'd just reach in and grab them for him. Um, not a good idea in hindsight. It was as if I had shoved my hands into a mixer and the attachment was beating my fingers to a pulp. I gave up quickly and spent several days after that with bruised fingers.
Another time, we had the eerie experience of the talking dead. One of the beheaded turkeys began calling out through its severed windpipe from the plucker...it would spin around and wail in this hollow voice. We had this happen with chickens a couple times, but the turkey was unearthly.
We also learned that giving the turkey about a minute and a half in the scalder and cutting off the feet ahead of time really helped with the success of the plucker.
We ended up with five cleaned, fresh, turkeys - one 17 pounder, one 19 pounder, one 20 pounder, and two 21 pounders. I sold two for $3.00 a pound and one for $2.00 a pound (only because I was afraid we might not sell it). In the end, we had more people interested in fresh, organic, free range turkeys than we had turkeys to sell.
My thoughts for next year...promote the turkeys before we purchase the poults. Ask for people to put a $5 deposit down to reserve a turkey for Thanksgiving at the time of poult purchase. This way, I have covered the cost of the poults and know approximately how many to buy. If people back out over the summer, they lose their five bucks and I gain a free turkey.
I also think I'd like to try a heritage breed next year. While the Broad-Breasted Bronze were easy-going brids and gave us a ton of meat, I think it's unreasonable to expect most families to want a 20 pound turkey for Thanksgiving. Ours barely fit in the oven! With the heritage breeds, we will get the same quality meat but at a smaller size - something closer to 15 pounds. I can also promote the "natural" breed as opposed to the meat specific breed. And they are prettier too.
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