Practice beheading chickens.

[settingdusk]

Use a stable wood surface that doesn't move when you chop. A stump is ideal. Make a V with two nail for the head to go and use a thick rubber band or something to lock the head in place. Covering the eyes will also stop the chicken from moving sometimes. Make sure your hatchet or cleaver is nice and sharp. Get a good, clean swing to chop the head off in one blow, this stops you from getting bone splinters in the meat.

 

[KNHKLUCKERS]

I just wanted to express my importance for "bleeding out" chickens. From what I have learned if you break the neck (spinal cord) the heart quits beating. I am a nurse and am quite certain that that is true. When the heart quits beating your not going to get the blood out. The blood contaminates the meat. If you sever the whole head not only are you severing the spinal cord and stopping the heart but you also open the windpipe, which allows blood to enter the lungs. This is also not good. So the proper and most humane way to peacefully end a chickens life is to either use rope to hang the chicken by the legs or to use kill cones. You may not believe me but when you hold a chicken by it's back legs they become very docile and comfortable. Then with a very sharp knife (I hear that a box cutter or a small sharp kitchen knife work very well) cut the jugular vein. To do this hold the chickens beak in front of the eyes and pull down hard to hold the bird steady. With your sharp knife make a 2 inch cut just behind the jaw and into the base of the skull on both sides of the neck, severing the jugular vein.
After doing that you may want to debraining the chicken. So here's an excert from Storey's Guide to Raising Chickens by Gail Damerow.
"Debraining helps loosen feathers for hand picking. Debraining is done with a sticking knife, which has a dagger type blade that's usually sharp on both sides, any knife with a sharp, narrow blade will do. After cutting the vein for bleeding, insert your knife into the mouth, its sharp edge toward the groove at the roof. Push the knife toward the back of the skull and give it a one-quarter twist. The trick is to avoid sticking the front of the brain, which causes feathers to tighten instead of loosen. You can tell your knife hits home when reflex causes the bird to shudder and utter a characteristic squawk." If your not planning to pluck the bird this probably isn't necessary. But some food for thought from a nurse. When any large vein or artery is severed, in any animal for that matter, they drift off to sleep with little to no pain. I unfortunately know this from experience. I have been cut by a piece of tin several years ago and it really didn't hurt but I got dizzy and passed out. Same with the chicken. So please don't contaminate your hard earned meat. Bleed them out!!!

 

[coffeychicks]

Knhkluckers very well said

 

[settingdusk]

Hm, you would think so but there has to be residual nerve impulses and blood pumping. I think you will find that when you chop a head clean off, you sometimes get a "runner." The head-less chicken will run around the yard for a minute. So just to put to rest any skeptics....

So I respect your training and what not as a nurse but, take a look at this chicken that went down in history for surviving 4 years without a head.

I also am in a health field and there are different types of death. Brain dead and physically dead are totally different.

 

[KNHKLUCKERS]

I see your point...however what I am trying to get across is not how the chicken is killed, so much, but the process in which to empty the chickens body of the blood during the dying process. I watched the videos that you linked and then read some of the comments below them, and one that I really agree with is..
"So let me get this straight....they first attempted to cut it's head off, that didn't work out as planned so in finding out that it wasn't going to die, they let it live and fed it so that it would stay alive. Talk about a bipolar change of intent... How did they go from "I want to kill chicken" to "I want to feed mutilated chicken so that it will live"??????

From my understanding those chickens lived because the brain stem was still intact. That brings up what you said about brain death and physical death. So without going into a lot of medical "mambo jumbo" I will have to assume that you are thinking of clinical and biological death. The difference being that clinical death is the point at which a person's or chickens heart stops beating. At that time, breathing and blood circulation stop. Biological death occurs some four to six minutes later, when the brain cells die from lack of oxygen. And I agree with you that when you cut off the head it is just as humane and a chicken will run or try to fly because of the nerves, and with the brain not hooked up to tell them what to do, they start firing randomly. They won't feel any pain or for that matter have any consciousness because the pain receptors are in the brain which has been severed. The head dies just a little later when all electrical function stops due to the lack of oxygen.

Again the point that I'm trying to bring to the table concerns the blood, and it being a "contaminate" and that when you cut off the head the blood from the severed jugular which is located right next to the chickens esophagus enters the lungs. From what I have read this is not good. But I have yet to find out why. Either way I believe everyone can agree that after the chicken is dead your supposed to let the blood run out. So to each their own.

 

[Ridgerunner]

Do you think perhaps you are “over-thinking” it? That just maybe the way it has been done for thousands of years isn’t all that contaminating.

Have you actually looked at the lungs of chickens that have been killed using different methods so you could compare, say chop block versus killing cone? With your medical training you should have an idea what you are looking at.

 

[Blaineiac]

I find the easiest way is to hold the bird by the back legs. After a few pets, they relax and stretch out. Then lay their head on the ground, step firmly on the head and give a good pull. I hold the carcass against a stump until the throes are finished, then string it up for a few minutes to gravity bleed. The other birds don't care, they fight the dogs for the heads.

I'm not saying it is good to hurry and get careless, but people over think things and make it way more work than necessary. They freak themselves out before they get anything done. I talk to them while petting, and tell them thanks. Then it'[s over. Good Luck. Blaine

 

[settingdusk]

Hm, excellent debate. I may have to do an agricultural study where I do different ways of execution and then provide the meat to a blind panel after researching the results. Would be a great project for one of my classes.

 

[Blaineiac]

Hm, excellent debate. I may have to do an agricultural study where I do different ways of execution and then provide the meat to a blind panel after researching the results. Would be a great project for one of my classes.

This is a good idea for a paper or something similar; but there are too many variables to be very scientific. I try to handle my fowl regularly, and just get the job done. I butcher my own hogs too. I feel bad about it, since I keep them "dog tame". But They go from eating apples to bled out in 30 secs. Hanging from the skidloader 5 mins after that. Keep the animal calm and in natural (familiar) surroundings is as humane as I can get. Good Luck, Blaine

 

[BCMaraniac]

Do you think perhaps you are “over-thinking” it? That just maybe the way it has been done for thousands of years isn’t all that contaminating.

Have you actually looked at the lungs of chickens that have been killed using different methods so you could compare, say chop block versus killing cone? With your medical training you should have an idea what you are looking at.

I have given a lot of thought to this, probably "over-thinking"....LOL. I think everyone agrees that the better the bleedout, the better in terms of the quality of the meat.

The neck-wringing that our parents/grandparents did resulted in the chicken's head being in their hand(if done properly) with the rest of the bird flopping around. Same with the hatchet.....except the head ends up on the ground. In both instances, the chicken bled. After each of those procedures, the heart would continue to beat for a period of time, probably a couple of minutes tops, because of the heart's intrinsic conduction system that is independent of the control of the brain/brainstem. The flapping of the chickens wings from random nerve impulses following severing of the spinal cord would further help with the bleedout, but then the chicken would be hung upside down to continue draining.

Could blood get into the lungs with all of the flapping around...certaintly, though respiration does stop with the severing of the spinal cord because it separates the body from the brainstem, which completely controls respiration. Does it affect the quality of the meat? I doubt it. If blood goes into the trachea(windpipe) and is aspirated into the lungs, it would follow the route that air would take. The avian respiratory system is very different from humans. A small amount of air goes into the lungs, but most of the air goes into the air sacs of the body, some of which are in the neck, and some of which are even in the abdomen. SO, if blood goes into the trachea, the bulk of it would go into the air sacs, and could remain there. The issue of the blood would come into play during processing. If the air sacs are full of blood, and are in the neck, chest, and abdomen, then when we remove them, there is blood leakage, which is messy....but we have water hoses to rinse that out of the chest and abdominal cavities. We promptly process and remove those, so the meat should not be affected.

Now, many feel that a bleedout by severing the carotid artery(better bleedout than with just severing the jugular vein because of the heart pumping) is the most humane, and I have no intention of debating that. The spinal cord is not severed, so respiration will continue briefly, though the bird is unconscious within seconds, followed quickly by death.

The long and short of this, following my "overthinking"...LOL is that any of these procedures, if done properly, achieves the same results: the bird is dead quickly, the blood is drained from the body, and we have a wonderful, tasty food source,