What to do with old chickens and roosters?
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NOTES:
Life and death is part of life on the farm. Both should be treated with respect and mindfulness. As a production egg farm we need to keep an eye on financial sustainability as well as environmental sustainability.
Our older laying hens who are less productive give us another product in the form of meat. Our customers love getting soup hens and the rotation of new birds helps keep us in good egg numbers.
1:32 - As my 62nd birthday approaches, I'll console myself with the thought that I'm not past-it, I'm just tougher and a lot more flavourful !
Lol.
🙄
Lol, I'm just a few years behind you, but I agree, "The older the violin, the sweeter the music "! John says, "they used to," and I'm old enough to remember when a chicken butchering was, like a branding, a gathering of friends and families. Lots of people bringing lots of birds and going through the whole process assembly line style. Then a big meal and BSing fest, hatching eggs were swapped, and everyone left with chickens ready for the freezer, fryers and stewers.
But you're no longer worth the cost of feeding
LOL!!
I love how calm your hens are. It's clear that they are very well cared for. Thank for solving my issues with the end of the life problem. I've been struggling with the issue. Your presentation is compelling and I'm glad you had the skills and strength to approach this truth with such grace. Thank you :)
this is a farm not a petting zoo this is where real life happens.
And death.
Liuhuayue ...so is a garden.
The french used the old birds to make a stew called coq au vin or chicken in wine. the difference between a regular chicken and an old hen is incredible, the old hen has totally fabulus taste and I cook them for about 5 hours cut up with a mirapoi, or mixted vegetables with bacon and, I perfer a pinot noir not a heveay red wine..
+Pat Naef Thanks for the recipe tips! Great, now I'm hungry.
so thts what that dish is. thanks for the tip. i was wondering about "old" hens.
I agree with that too. yum yum.
Pat Naef sounds great!!👍🏻
NICHOLAS SERGENT no, fuck you! Fucking hypocrite
Some breeds of heritage hens make great brooders when they get older and will set on any eggs, so those birds can be egg hatchers that you don't have to plug in. The added bonus is a broody hen will show the chicks how to drink and scratch and eat and forage and rear them with a literally almost no help, just a secure coop and a bit of feed. So not all older hens need to become soup, but for those that do, they make grat pet food for cats and dogs too.
Thank you for the simple, matter of fact approach to harvest on the farm. I notice the comments really underscore the disconnect so many have about where their food comes from and how it lives before it reaches their plate. Harvesting a hen after its lived a good hen life seems to me to fulfill its destiny, if a chicken can be said to have a destiny, and complete the cycle of life on the farm.
Cris Wentz exactly! For example Tyson chickens have a miserable life.
Cris Went
People who are able to kill a chicken or who buy its mean are gross and disgusting
Good market idea. Joel Saltine started marketing spent hens early on. Also the spent hen has excellent immune boost in her fat. My hens continued to be brooder moms and soil manufactures but were separated from active egg layers. 🐓🥚🐣🐥🐓🌱🌱🌱🌱. We transferred all slow egg layer birds to the scratch Hill to turn piles of compost into mature planting material. My oldest hen was 14. She raised 36 chicks a year. Most years we aided our older hens to broodiness by controlling light, adding 10 golf balls to nests.
I must comment that your chickens look so healthy and content. It's nice to see a 'real' chicken farm as opposed to how factory chickens are raised.
"Old spent hens" That reminds me, the wife is having her sisters over for dinner tonight.
Lol
👩🦰
😂
lollllllllll
😯😃😅😂😭👍😉
I used to have roosters to protect our flock, a dog ate him. Rest in peices Paco
ironically he was named after a dog
@@alexisfishinhuntinandfarmi2923 paco ate paco
I have a bantam hen that is 17 this year. Most of my chickens live to 10 or more. Most still lay a few eggs a week.
We can buy day old roosters from our hatchery for .85 cents each vs. hens/pullets at $3.85 each. I order a batch of 50-100 all rooster and feed them great for about 12-15 weeks. It fills up the freezer cheap. You have to butcher then in time or they start to fight each other. Less of a problem if they are free ranged. The male hormone provides the fast growth vs. a hen.
When I had chickens, we had such a small flock that it didn't really hurt us to just let the birds live out their lifespans. They were more pets than livestock to us. However, sometimes this is the most humane thing to do if they get sick. Personally, I wouldn't eat a hen that's been sick, but we had a hen who was really not doing well, and she was about 7 years old. She wasn't eating, and she was laying on the ground in the hot sun. We brought her inside and tried to feed her and give her some water, and she was just not having it, she was too sick. So we put her in a crate and carried her around town trying to find a vet or humane society that would euthanize her, but we couldn't find one. I don't know why, but they don't euthanize chickens. So we had to take her home and dispatch her ourselves, just like you would for a meat chicken, except instead of cleaning her, we buried her.
A product that seems to be on the advance here in Sweden (still a niche product for sure, but it's getting popular) is ground chicken. Essentially mince meat ground from culled laying hens. I believe they make a better mince than broilers, probably something to do with the texture of the meat of older birds being different. Pretty cool, and pretty tasty. A nice option for smaller scale egg producers!
I'd wait for a 3rd molt at least. I have hens that lay very well, after 2 years old. You could be selling yourself short. I've had hens that were still giving eggs into their 4th year. I have a large rooster that is about 8 years old or so, still loves the ladies and is in good health.
Like he said, their production goes down about 20% each year. So the older birds would still be laying just 20% less, but with the amount he is paying in food it might not be profitable after that second year.
@@keepingithumble6285 then you need to reconsider your model. On a sustainable farm chickens are the engine of the system by cleaning fields and pastures, eating leftovers of harvest, producing manure and processing compost.
@@grafvonwalbeck8261 There model is about making good money whilst they can and their model is based on feed probably pellets and grains. As you very well said many chickens thrive well on leftovers and their manure is very expensive as it is an excellent medium for growing vegetables and the like. I used to buy chicken manure for $30 a bag and it was a waste of money when I could produce it myself and make a more sustainable living.
Roosters are really good for the psychologybof the brood. It provides the hens with a sense of security. If they are releaxed, they make more eggs so the rooster pays for itself.
I've had a few hens that stuck around 3-4 years. They didn't lay quite as much, but the eggs they were giving were MASSIVE! It was worth it to me to be able to have huge eggs in my batches to give to customers to keep those hens around longer. Use New Hampshire Reds here...a few Barred Rock
+Robby Dingman That's a good point Robby. What I post on the channel here is not "absolute". Farming will always adapt to suite the goals of the farmer. Glad you're hanging on to the birds and it's working for you.
+Robby Dingman Yes, my 2.5 yr old hens are laying massive eggs, i can't even fit them in an egg carton but people love getting them. I don't sell my eggs, I have an egg ministry.
+John Galt Egg ministry sounds good, like an hug ministry
Yes!
Mine are 4 and 5
I have chickens reaching 3 years age and still producing eggs. My kids have grown attached to them, they all have names and oddly enough, answer to their names. Making them into soup has been a topic we have discussed. But we will cross that bridge when we get there.
Your comment was written 2 years back. Your chickens were 3 years at that time....
It is kind of sad just how many people have such a disconnect with their food. Chicken, pork, beef. Doesn't matter. Where do they think it comes from? Some factory in New Jersey? No, it comes from the farm just up the road. Thank you for the videos John. They are very informative and well done.
as always, a very kind and compassionate discussion of a difficult topic for the more squeamish. good for you john. keep up the vids!
+ruth a Will do Ruth, thanks for the compliment.
The old hens are great for canning with pressure cooker to use later for soup , dummplings, and lots of things
Nothing better than old hens or roosters for chicken soup!! that is the absolute best soup you can eat!!!
I'm not a farmer but I do have a couple chickens with a wild rooster that moved into our yard, we will eat the eggs but never the chickens no matter how old they get. Farm life is what it is, things are there to provide for your farm/family so you do what u gotta👍
Thank you. I got an education on the difference of a Soup bird & a Broiler bird. I honestly didn't know that. It is much appreciated. I expect that will be very helpful to me to know exactly what I will be getting & when. How to plan even for a more flavorful bird. Awesome! I will put that new knowledge to good use.
thank you for answering this question. I'm thinking about getting a few hens for laying eggs and I couldn't find any information on what usually happens to older hens. I'm doing my due diligence before pulling the trigger on getting hens. You were a great help.
Hi. This video answered my previous questions about your chickens. Glad I found it. Thank you. Smile!
Just found your channel and videos and just wanted to say thanks! I love the set up, and how clear and easy they are! Thanks so much!!
We call them Gumbo hens in South Louisiana!! :-)
TheSwampSloth Lawd Yes! Throw in some andouille sausage...oh, yea! :-D
We just culled our first 6 hens.. I could not bring myself to eat them but my son made soup that everyone said was great. I told them in the fall we have 8 more to go I will make my own soup and can up a couple.
Do you tag your egg layer hens so you know how old they are when it comes time to process them?
John I truly love to listen to your videos. They are so informative and enjoyable. I have been in the "business" community for a few years (since 2001) and think I know a few things too. I have been a "backyard farmer" most of my life and feel comfortable with the concept of growing own for both food and nutrition and for the ability to sustain my personal future and the future of the small farmer in America. Even though I feel confident in the ability to grow my enterprise of my new homestead financially, and that I can do what you are teaching us, your forthright and sharing approach to this has given me even more confidence to "go forth and multiply" for my family and my personal community. I look forward to more contact with you in the future and sharing your vision.
calvin busch Thank you so much Calvin! We're all learning and hopefully having a good time doing it. I take life as a life-long learning process and never assume I know everything. Sharing what I am doing has been very helpful for me asother people ask questions, give feedback, and grow the community.
We have a blue Cochin that's a pet and is 5 years old now, but we cycle through our other birds and cull them once they're over two years old. We've had three accidental roosters so far from store-bought chicks; we let them grow until they start hassling the hens and then we cull them. Our big blue fluffy girl will be with us as long as we are lucky enough to have her :-)
Im so glad your in my home state John!!!!!
Anyone else notice the rooster doing what roosters do best in the background? Lol good video. I just wonder if I will be able to cull when the time comes. I was always raised knowing it was a fact of life but, we never actually had any farm animals growing up.
Sue Robbins I hadn't noticed! Hysterical!
Thank you for this. Honestly I have been struggling with this and it's nice to hear a talk about this.
I am glad it was helpful.
Yep I agree, I have been doing the same for the last 80 years. grew up that way. and we always have a healthy flock.
Hey Bro. Sustainability is the key to viability. That's my philosophical going- off -on- a- tangent comment for today. Having overcome that challenge, I would like to make a suggestion to ALL consumers of spent layers. After braising or , after you have brought the soup boil to desired tenderness, add some COCONUT MILK to the pot and simmer (reduce/thicken) to your desired thickness.. Go ahead and enjoy the taste of the tropics in mid winter.
My old chickens are some of the best friends I ever ate!
How do you ID the slackers from the layers ?
The color or their comb and wattles will be more pale then normal, and if you check her vent it will be dry and tight and a little pale. A good laying hen will have brightly colored combs and wattles and a moist more open vent. You can usually tell easier the longer you have chickens what you are looking for. I know I have 5 older hens that will go to the stew pot here soon. Hope this helps.
At what age do hens stop laying? I took two hens from a family moving away that were said to be 4 and 5 yrs old. I didn't think we would get eggs from them and we would just keep them as pets for my grand daughter. Well, one of them is laying again! Not sure which one, but we were very surprised at the age they are supposed to be that they would lay again.
ann in most cases they lay till about 7 years old some of this is how they are feed now and when young as well.
However, if they are hybrids such as the typical farmer's layer, e.g. a goldline or blue belle, they will usually die at age 4 from a laying complication, or from nutritional, particularly calcium depletion. Laying that many eggs per week cuts their life span in half. It's heart breaking to watch a hen die of a laying complication....like dying in child birth but it takes a couple of weeks.
@@elizabethcoates5036 Shot gun or hatchet. I remember my favorite hen's face was bitten off and her body mulled by a Racoon. It broke my heart and took a lot, don't think just do... but I beheaded my old friend. No one should suffer like that. 27 deaths and Now I own a 5 strand electric fence and metal mesh in ground and over the top to protect my Chickens. no deaths in many years and extra bonus it looks like jurassic world! if your hand will fit the racoon will fit. Its locked tight and electric guarded.
My grandpa taught me how to clean a chicken when I was about five. He snapped their necks like a wet towel but I had to use a hatchet. I don't think they feel a thing when done properly. I'd rather die like that than linger on as a old broken down geezer.
Hey I resemble that remark.
Shouldn't we offer people the same thing?
Once above a certain age, yes.
No, I don't think you should offer it to people. BTW I don't really get sarcasm so sorry of that is sarcasm and I interpreted it literally.
@@TheMercenary-zj5vo
It should not be offered. It is not offered to the animals.
It should be imposed. Once a human passes its proftability age, off goes the head....
Humanely.....
Thanks for a little real world insight into farm life.
When my chickens are old or stop laying eggs I keep them as house pets
250 house chickens would be tough.
5winder haha imagine living with that
Better than 250 cats. xD
Santouryu3 not when you can’t litter train them🤣
Maylee Cao hypocrite
Can't wait to process out some more meat birds this year we have a little over 35 birds. This is the second go around!!! Thanks for all the tips!!!
I haven't tried coq au vin yet but have been keeping backyard chickens for about 5 years. I process my own and cook the old hens into bone broth (heads, feet, and all). Even in slow cooked soup the meat is inedible - tough as an old shoe, lol. The dual purpose roosters I process as soon as they start crowing at about 20 weeks so they have a little bit of good meat on them so they make soup.
I have 2 hens going on 8 years. I usually get 4 new hens a year but most get killed off by animals so I have a steady population of around 10 hens every year.
I only have 2 roosters, their still pretty young. but thats all I have , I bought chicks, but what do I do with roosters? I'm not gonna kill them, thats just me. I've had them for a while, and somehow ive created a system where I whistle and they come running and sometimes jump on my feet and chill lol.
Then you have pets, and there's nothing wrong with that. Keep them as pets. Chickens are great.
Me too my rooster breed white leghorn
This might be a silly question: how do you know which chickens had their second molt?
TRUE ....IN WINTER SEASON THE SOUP TASTE SO GOOD
We go a bit longer than the 2nd molt, but aren't in it for the money. As they're usually pretty darn old, they really aren't good even for soup, but they don't go to waste. We hatchet the necks, then skin and gut them. I pressure cook them, pull the meat, then pressure cook the bones for an additional 2 1/2 hours. I put all the meat, bones, and scrap through a meat grinder and add enough water to make it a slurry. I pressure can it (as specified for meat) to make a dog food treat to pour over kibble.
I like the term (cull)
+Brian Fox It's way better than selective murder.
What about creating capons? A capon used to be very popular.
Would you ever consider keeping the old hens for nannies or for chicken manure to sell?
free advice ---- don't refer to them as old hens but fresh hens, before fall holidays and Christmas many people in the south buy them for broth to cook with as you said way better flavor. they can demand a higher price than broilers at that time of year if marketed as lets say "Fresh Hens for the Holidays" good luck when I was young I was raised on a broiler farm with 48000 birds we were paid about 2 cent a pound for raising them with the company furnishing the feed, 7 days a week, good luck and follow your dreams. Its a journey
Lots of people have returned to pressure cookers, the ideal way to accelerate cooking of old birds.
I'm coming at it from a foodservice point of view, and I can confirm, braised hen is one of the tastiest meats I've ever prepared or eaten. Even their stock is more flavorful. I wish it was more commonly available, but people seem to want broilers.
Would you use the same process of resting the chicken before freezing? We normally leave the carcasses in the fridge for a couple days before freezing, we find it helps the meat be less tough. Does that not matter as much with soup chickens? I have a rooster that I need to process and want to make sure we get the most out of it.
Love how ur talking about eating em right in front of em lmfao
You will grow out of lafo about it. .... hopefully
Cool show I have a roster that killed 5 hens I had to quarantine it. You have any idea what I should do or should I just eat it ?
Its simple, you either put them in the pot for chicken soup, chicken and dumplins or in the compost barrel...
Hey John, I farm meat kings roughly 400.Just getting into laying hens.How long will it take from production to the good old pot.thx
Dude! They’re RIGHT behind you!
So, if I have hens (layers/duel purpose) how old can i allow them to get and still have broilers? Thanks.
I love this video. Very cute John and his honest introduction.
Really liked your video on UA-cam concerning spent chickens! Thank you for sharing your knowledge and also you taking the time to respond to comments! 🐤
+Pat Schweinebraten My pleasure Pat
Yeah I can’t kill my chickens. They are getting old but we are still getting eggs. I love them so much!
Do they still lay everyday
i have a question, we have a small flock and we have a easter egger bantam rooster and i would love to know if he will beat up our flock too much or stop the egg production? can you please make a video on, Is a rooster bad for your flock?
that would be so helpful because a family member wants to kill him cause he thinks he is gonna disturb the flock, thanks.
Chickens 29 Roosters are great for your flock! They protect their hens and will even find food for them.
Are the rest regular size? He might not be able to reach high enough to do the deed! Roosters can be great for the flock, but they do have their own personalities. If he's a sweet bird, let him live, if he's mean, make soup.
All my hens, and roosters for that matter are less than 2 years old. I have 6 Rhode Island Reds that are 10 months. 1 Americana that is going on her second year. Three mixed hens. One game rooster, and one Light Brahma Rooster.... He is huge. The mixed hens really lay well. The Rhode Island Reds are just now starting to lay. The Americana is not laying right now, but she was giving an egg every other day. Anyways, you get attached to them. I never thought about dreading to kill them before. Oh well. I guess when it comes time, I will be able to do it.
We create micro flocks to seed other flocks so they aren't as smart. If we put older hens in with them that know what to do and what is up it helps the 100 other hens to figure it out.
Old roosters make great chicken and dumplings.
Haha, just like the song "She'll Be Comin' 'Round the Mountain"! One verse is "we will kill the old red rooster when she comes....." followed by the verse "and we'll all have chicken and dumplin's when she comes"....etc.
I butchered a 9 year old rooster. boiled him for 9 hours and he was still too tough to chew. We fed him to the dogs and they weren't too happy either.
And mean child flogging roosters also make excellent chicken and dumplings! I despise a mean rooster!!
How old are egglayers when they start decreasing the amount of eggs they lay, what a good cut off time?
Chickens are very very cute and I love them and their good precious eggs!!
When I read the title to this video I thought about a line from the move "Chicken Run" that went, "Chickens go in, pies come out"
Good vid - thanks. How do tell if your chicken is laying? It doesn't look like you use trap nests. Thanks.
I appreciate John. Always great.
Have to think of a chicken as an Elder Scrolls Orc, Orcs don't go the way of humans to become feeble and weak. They go out fighting, it's a concept that makes sense to the Orcs but not to humans since it's encouraged to live a long life despite health eventhough there's a big cost to doing so. The concept of life and death is complicated and we tend to value life more but in the grand scheme of things humans are complex creatures with complex feelings and thoughts compared to chickens. It's sad and it's hard to accept these things and not everyone will accept it but this makes sense but it's a depressing thought :(
Ty
My chicken is 7 year Old, I Will never Kill her 🙂
Hold strong!
friends for life. how old can they get?
Kristian K Actually, I am not sure. I've Read the Most chickens can become 8-10 years, when I was 7 years I got two chickens. Tessa (She is still alive) and Katja. Katja was very weak for her kind. And died after 2 years :(
8-10! thats quite old. learn something new everyday
According to the Montana State University Extension, no one knows a laying hen's lifespan.
Do broiler hens in the tractors still lay eggs? Or are they harvested before laying age? Or does the diet not allow eggs to properly form? Or are the broilers all male?
John,nice,good and resonable video.I had Hrvatica(croatian) variety hen for 6 years.She was living incubator,she fed me and my family,kept this loving animal untill she died.Btw.do you have croatian ancestry?
Each to their own. I know this is your business and you have to make money, but personally I could never kill my chickens that have gave me free eggs for the past 5 years. I know it is different for yuk though. I name all my chickens and they are basically pets. I use my old hens as nannys for the chicks :)
+GeorgiaJCP Did you feed your chickens? If you didn't feed your chickens how did they eat? If you did feed them then those eggs weren't free, you just didn't care about the cost. This channel can be helpful if you're homesteading or have a hobby but the over-all message that I want farmers to take away is that what we do is important, difficult, and expensive. Raising plants and animals in a healthy and humane manor takes time and money and those skills are valuable. I want to instill the fact that farms are not charities and that they need to think about the bottom line if they are going to survive.
Yes I know I'm sorry. That's why I said each to their own.
No wonder you are so dumb. You eat their babies but not the mother.
GeorgiaJTV right, and you have 5 hens not hundreds on a farm
It's not free, he gives them water, food and shelter and that can get expensive when running a business.
Excellent idea, will be great to include your favorite soup recipe
The Rock is a hybrid as is the Gold Line and the Blue Belle. There are many, many types of hybrids. They lay more eggs, but die earlier, or in other words live half as long if allowed to live a natural life span. Reminds me of the beautiful droids in Blade Runner... To return to your question, if you bred from your hybrids you would get pure breeds again (50%). I don't think anyone does this. The eggs you buy typically are not fertile, because there aren't any cockerels or roosters around. (Because they don't lay eggs, and because farmers use another breed for meat chickens. That said, many hybrids are dual purpose birds as are many pure breeds.) The last four hens we adopted from the British Hen Welfare Trust were so huge and heavy as bricks, totally featherless. They looked like the chickens you see on the shelves of stores. (Our friends were horrified to see them! I'll never forget the expression on their faces.) Within a few weeks, they lost all that frightening overweight and grew back their feathers --and laid many eggs. One of them would come sit in my lap and lay the egg right there in my lap! What a sweetie... Anyway, given their overweight---typically your layers are underweight---we decided they must have been meat hens. I wonder what happened there...maybe they were rejected for some reason. Animal farming is highly regulated so it's possible the slaughter house was not allowed to take them. I don't know much about slaughter houses, however, so this is just my guess. Given all the regulation, I am surprised at what bad shape the layers are in when we adopt them...but it's expensive feeding so many hens. I truly don't know how farmers make any profit at all.
Question? How do u know the old from young if they are all mixed up or are they all the same age?
John, any thoughts on the differences in butchering a layer versus a meat bird? I find it takes a bit more time, as the layers are smaller and it's hard to get inside to do a proper job
Souper!!! Thanks for the video! 😎👍 Looks like we'll be putting away some soup birds into the freezer this coming winter. 😁
In the background, you have one active rooster doing his job!
I have a question for you John ... i have a barred rock Hen but sings like a rooster is that normal? Just want to know if you have ever experienced that and i also have a rooster in the flock when he sings she sometimes sings right after him but not all the time... well i would really appreciate it if you can give me more info on that thanks.
+Norma Lopez I had a hen that crowed like a rooster. I had Rhode Island Reds and Barred Plymouth Rocks at the time and I don't remember which breed she was. I was told that hens who crow have higher than normal testerone levels.
How to determine if a Chicken is spent. I think that's a topic of interest.
I've tried them before, but found that even after an hour of boiling, they were kinda tough. Any tricks for them, or just have to boil,all day? The flavour was far richer btw, just the actual meat wasn't the best.
So the chickens that wind up becoming, say for example, such products as nuggets, tenders, ground meat, etc. -- I take it they're mostly old spent hens too?
So, you're culling at two years old? My barred rock is about three, and still laying almost every day. I understand your point, but I probably won't make her into soup for another year or two yet.
I love making chicken soup but I could never eat my own chickens! I've grown attached to them so they'll just be pets till the end lol
That's nice where can I buy this chickens at
It must be hard to not get somewhat attached to them in some way, they are cute.
Old hens are delicious. To many young roosters, fryers. Cleaning chickens is very easy. It taste better and you know the meat is clean and the chicken was healthy. Just remember the chicken you buy in the store under the plastic was alive also.
What are the steps to making them soup chickens? Is there a video for that.
I've only seen 2 of your vids so far... but I can tell you're on point! Thnaks for the great vids... subbed on first vid!
At what age exactly would you say a hen is to old or ready to be turned into soup?
At the second molt which is about 2 years.
Thank you for posting this video.