Bucket of Chicken

Good ole Colonel Sanders



No, not this bucket of chicken.  The night before last I read on the Internet (and we will test this theory) that a 6 pound live weight Cornish Cross meat chicken will dress out a 4 pound carcass.  What that means is that if you weigh a live 6 pound bird, once you clean him, you'll actually lose 2 pounds of feathers, blood, guts, feet, and head.  You'll be left with 4 pounds of meat and bone.  Actually, it will be a tad more since we save the heart, liver and gizzard.  Once we clean the birds and weigh them, we'll see if the theory holds true and report back.

I thought of several different ways to weigh a chicken: 

• I was going to bring our bathroom scale out to the patio and do a gross and tare calculation - meaning, I'd step on the scale and weigh myself (tare weight).  Then I'd grab the bird and weigh myself holding the chicken (gross weight).  Subtracting the two weights would leave you with the actual weight of the live bird.
• Or I would try to figure out how to make the chicken get on the scale and stand still enough for the digital scale to pick up an accurate reading.  That would be kind of fun, but not a good idea.
• Finally, I decided to weigh the bird on the kitchen scale in a bucket after zeroing the scale with the bucket on it.  Easy?  Yes!

First, I zeroed the scale.  I placed the bucket on the scale and there is a brass adjustment dial that you can turn that will bring the scale to zero.

Bringing the reading to Zero.

Then I retrieved the chicken and put him in the bucket.  Not exactly a Kentucky Fried Chicken bucket from Colonel Sanders, is it?


Bucket 'O Chicken



I placed the old boy on the scale.  Yes, I'll definitely clean the bucket well before using it again in the laundry room!

The Biggest Loser - Farm Edition?

Let's take a closer look.


Just shy of 5 1/2 pounds

So the meat bird tips the scale at a little under 5 1/2 pounds.  Using the 'rule of thumb' pointed out in the opening paragraph, we'd have a carcass weight of a little under 4 pounds this Saturday.  We generally like a 4 - 5 pound chicken, so I checked with the boss and she said, "Let's wait until next weekend."  Yes ma'am.  So we'll firm up the calendar for a February 9th butcher date.

A lot of the information on Cornish Cross Chickens tell you that they can be butchered at 8 weeks.  Ours will go an additional week.  Here's the primary reason (I think) the birds are stalled by a week.  Most poultry growing guides tell you to start off feeding a Chick Starter ration that is between 21 - 24% protein and keep them on it for 2 - 3 weeks.  The chick starter ration that we can get locally is medicated.  Since we're eating these guys, we don't do medicated feeds as we don't want any medicine, antibiotics, or hormones in our food.  So we start off with the 18% Chick Grower ration for them from day one.  We've found that it normally delays maturity (size) by one week.

That's okay with us.  We've had a busy week at the Southwest Louisiana District Livestock show (more on that later!) and this will give us an extra week to sharpen the knives and get everything ready for "la boucherie."

“Hard work beats all the tonics and vitamins in the world.”  Colonel Harlan Sanders, Founder of Kentucky Fried Chicken