Roasters aren't broilers! And while we're at it, most ducks aren't 7 week old Pekins!

Recently I wrote this and was prmpted to start a new thread. I would also like to give some cred to TruNorth for having such a friendly response when I basically said "I really hate you marketing project, it makes me angry".

Country Thyme Farm wrote:
Now I'm going to open a big can o' worms that I have been dutifully avoiding for so long, but this has pushed me over the edge.

"Rustic broilers", which I will admit is a clever marketing scheme, are I believe doing far more harm to heritage poultry right now than Greenfire Farms is ever going to be capable of. We finally had so many people getting sick and tired of frankenchickens that they were starting to look at heritage dual-purpose birds as a viable alternative to meat production. Now here some people come along saying "oh look, I have this rustic broiler, it makes such a nicer meat bird than all those crappy heritage birds cause they take so long and it's a different colour so can feel like your raising something less horrific" Now all those people with open minds that we could have had as allies in saving traditional meat breeds from extinction by raising them for their actual intended use are now lost to us again because it has been reaffirmed to them that "meat bird" has a different definition than "heritage chicken".

1. It's just a freaking broiler with crappier feed conversion and a slower growth rate that hasn't been inbred quite long enough to cause the other usual health problems!

2. Heritage meat birds aren't broilers at all! Stop trying to treat them like broilers! Heritage meat chickens are roasting chickens! They have actual fat on their bodies and their meat has enough texture to actually justify calling it meat. I can't even make "tastes like chicken" jokes because it actually tastes like something and that something is pure awesome!

Ok, I feel better now.

I have wanted to say this for a very, very long time. It makes me really angry. Seriously, I have long rants about this to family and friends, they're probably getting sick of it by now. I can't stand it when people complain on chicken forums that their six month old roosters were tough when they BBQ'd or broiled them and the response is usually "oh, my (insert dual-purpose breed here) tasted great when I butchered them at 14 weeks but they were all bones, no meat". I really just want to say "let the birds grow till there's some meat on their bones, who cares how old it is as long as its less than a year. Then learn to cook it properly!" I also get a little upset when a prospective customer hangs up the phone or leaves the market without wanting one of my chickens just because I told them I won't be selling them a broiler, but this is more a sadness than an anger at their loss, since I don't really expect them to know any better.

Then I want them to read this: [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

I get so excited when Anna or I pull out our big clunky cast-iron roaster out of the cupboard and plop in a nice chicken from the freezer. Sometimes we put in a cup of rice and some chicken stock and cook the rice in the roasting juices. Sometimes we make a nice wheat flour seasoning and dry roast it. Sometimes I add a little wine, but that's more a thing for an even more awesome Muscovy roast! I'd pull out our gigantic cast-iron turkey roaster since the scovies are too huge and the mallard-derived's are too long for the chicken roaster but we just don't have a cast-iron one yet. Have I mentioned that every heritage breeders kitchen should contain a cast-iron roasting pot?

They crow, they fight. They try to get into the pen with the pullets so they can have some sex. (the hens are just as tasty, the're just usually laying by then and it's oh so tempting to keep all the hens for tasty eggs instead) They run around in circles for hours every day getting some nice dark meat on their thighs. The fat layer on those older lads is so wonderful and flavourful and I look forward to nabbing some crispy, fatty skin in my dinner. I live in a gastronomical dreamland because I get to eat all these heritage chickens and ducks. No wonder Slow Food chefs are only interested in Chanteclers and Buckeyes and Jersey Giants and the like. They're all sitting in their offices salivating at the thought!

See how easily I went from anger to food lust just thinking about roasting a heritage chicken. My point stand though despite my hunger. Broilers and roasting heritage chickens should not be compared, ever. Broiler does not equal meat bird, it equals chicken killed really young.

I love eating the Chant boys that don't make the cut. It is nice not having to try and get 'rid' of all the roosters.
I grow them out to 22-24 weeks, pick my 3 breeders and the rest go in the freezer. They are sooo good. I have even dry roasted them and have been happy. Truly I am lazy and wet roast in a cast iron roaster, long and slow. It lets me do other things and not have to keep an eye on the meal.

Oh, and I feed them the dreaded CORN as I like the flavour of a corn fed bird. I know it is all about personal taste and I suppose ethics in breeding. I have never fed the Franken birds and have not interest in the 'rustic' broilers, so I can not judge, but we love our home raise over store bought.

I didn't get enough roosters this year....when do you ever hear anyone say that????

You really do have to let them grow. I have boys hatched the begining of April and they are all boney like a 13 year old. Need some time yet, they just dont' get to fraternise with the girls as I dont' like how they taste after that kind of activity.

Interesting thoughts Country Thyme Farm.

Interesting post

I have become so accustomed to home grown heritage chicken that eating any other type just tastes flavorless. Ours grow until they "feel" meaty enough, then they are processed. Some are faster (like our silver sussex - amazing meat qualities this year!) and some are slower growing like the orps and wyandottes, though they ALL fill out beautifully and make very nice dinners for our family! (the wyandottes have a delightful shape and look like beautiful roasters with plump breasts and large thighs...)

We have cooked ours most ways and as long as you cook them a little slower then "broilers", they are just as tender as the big fat white birds. Just last week we did a nice 6lb cockerel on the BBQ as a "beer butt chicken". It was so tender it literally fell off the bones. Yep, chafes my behind when people poo-poo the heritage roo's, they are flavorful, healthy and definitely the way I prefer my chicken

just a question here, i am not being a smartazz i promise! o.k now why is every one anti big juicey cornish meat bird? after all they are just a cross of some heritage birds to make a super plump birds thats bred for eating? i just dont understand when i hear people say "oh! i am gonna cross this with this...to make myself some meat birds".....umm whats wrong with the standard cornish x white rock??? = the meaty bird? LOl this is just a question.. i just dont understand....i have eaten the maran boys, "claude "RIP he was alright but he was over a year old and he was dressed out kinda small? thats allot of time to put into these boys for not much getting outa them to strictly raise them for this no? the meat birds were bred because they were the best conversion of feed- time possible...sure they eat more but they are only around for 8 weeks...so in all reality they will eat the same or even less than the roos we grow out for a year.....? anyways, i will be eating my xtra roos as well i am excited to try my standard dark cornish this fall. anyhow...i will go hide now LOL

For me, the broilers represent slavery. The world's meat bird supply is under the genetic ownership of somthing like 3 corporations. Some like to try and deny it, but those rustic broilers are owned by the french based corporation. Yes, the meat birds may have originally been developed from heritage breeds, but they are not our's anymore. They are corporate owned. Publically owned heritage breeds represent food freedom for me.

As recently as a year ago, I believed as Country Thyme, that heritage breeds were Roasters. Pure and simple. Then I read that ALBC article and a few more light bulbs went on. Went online and got a copy of Beard's Fowl Cookery book. Coupled with what Brisco and Beard wrote, Dawn and I set out this year to test methods of cooking heritage chicken that went beyond roasting and the crock pot. We have been pleasantly suprised at just how excellent the results have been. We can now sautee 18 week chicken legs and get excellent juicy tender results. Only took three chewy failures before figuring it out, LOL! It's all in the cooking and re-learning some traditional skills.

Why pretend with the Rustic Broilers when we can have the real thing with our own local heritage breeds? Speaking from first hand experience I can say that all it takes is caring enough to invest the effort.

I write a small newsletter for our local poultry club and I'm using the newsletter to share ideas on improving our use of roosters in the kitchen. I started by condensing Brisco's ALBC article and in future issues will be sharing slaughter results and various recipes. The newsletter welcomes input from anyone with something to share on the subject.

oops, kinda cheeky to not include a link to the newsletter, LOL. Not intended!

hope this works

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I have lots of cockerels, some going for processing next Thursday. We have my Sister from the coast coming, and the old song "coming round the mountain when she comes" comes to my mind. We are having chicken dinner on Sunday and we will be cooking the young yellow roosters, probably two of them (buff orpingtons). They will be rested for two days before the cook, hope that is long enough, smiling. Ya, had failures with cooking two times with tough birds, the third time I slow cooked in my slow cooker and boy oh boy, yummmeee and so tender. From my miniscule reading, the longer the bird grows the better the flavour is developed in the meat. I love this thread, and Wayne, gonna check out the newsletters that you linked us to, but not this morning. Off to the wild blue yonda!! Have a beautiful day, CynthiaM.

Please be kind to the broilers!

My first chickens were the Frankenbirds and they are the birds that hooked me into keeping chickens! I would come home after a hard day of work and sit beside the chicken doghouse in the big field. The Frankenbirds would gather around and I could just feel my blood pressure lowering. They would eat from my hand and scratch and peck all around me.

They were charming!

And they were delicious!

I stopped raising them because the Nisku processor shut down and bought layers. Eventually I discovered heritage birds and later I discovered I could find birds that suited my purposes. They seem to be Cornish. Small combs, beautiful plumage, decent eggs and delicious bodies. What more can you ask for?

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they were my very first as well LOL me not knowing any different thought they would be my nice layers but i googled them, realized they were bred for meat lol ect..long story short, i LOVED THEM! sooooo friendly, ate anything i threw over the fence for them! they also free ranged just fine, out of 12 birds i only lost one to a heart attack.. i sold them when they were ready to butcher a family come picked them up, i was heart broken LOL they are still my favorite birds as they are super friendly... LOL

Wonderful post, Country Thyme! My sentiments exactly. I love having the extra Orpington and Chantecler cockerels, and I do not try to hurry them along.
I am not feeding them anything special to fatten them up, just a good mix of our own grains with the peas/seeds mixed in. If corn was more affordable here I would like to add it in to encourage some fattening, but this year they will have to do without that.

I enjoy having them here. They are welcome to stay the entire spring and summer and into early fall until such a time as I feel they are ready to be processed. I'll go around from time to time picking up a cockerel or hen, feeling their weight, checking out breast and thigh muscle development.

This is such a laid-back, no stress way to raise birds for meat. I don't really have anything bad to say about the broilers. I've had my share of cornish cross. (It bothers me when I hear them called frankenbirds - they can't help that they were made that way ) I've always grown them slowly as well, and have ended up with some giant birds with good results. But they were never a pleasure to raise due to thier supidity and lack of survival instincts. They are simply eating/pooping machines that never seemed interested in much else life has to offer a chicken in the great outdoors.

But what I love most is being self-sufficient. It is such a good feeling to be able to feed my family good wholesome meat that I've hatched and raised myself. We've found what works for us, and I'm continuing to experiment with growing my heritage chickens for meat. My family have all come to prefer the taste of chickens that have been prepared for the table the same way they were raised: with time, care and patience.

I have tried a few things over he years. Eventually I will get what works for me figured out.

This year I have miller broilres in a tractor, they are grazed and fed turkey starter (I like pellets). Our chanties are let loose to graze daily and are given some pellets and some dog food (they LOVE thier kibble) in the evening to get them into the pen.

The chanties are growing well and getting bigger, we will be processing some of the roosters.
The commercial broilers, wow they are a little different this year. Last year they were very regular chicken like. Size, feathering, meatiness, nothing unexpected. I only had 5, and 3 I grew out and kept, but the other two were indistinguishable from the heritage birds I had processed. THIS years birds are much smaller, have little to no feathers on their butts, thinner feathering everywhere else, and they are FAT!. These are like bowling balls on legs! I dont know if I should bring them in. I thought they would be bigger. Im going to give them a grope today, hopefully, and see how they feel. THey just dont look like the other birds from last year.

So a question... sorry to hijack... how does one decide when to butcher? Assuming slow grow and various breeds, is there a way to pick up and "feel" that they are ready to process? I dont rememebr when I got them, so how many weeks old isnt an option. I could weigh them, but weight does not tell you meatiness. Would when they start to crow be any sort of indicator?

Well, CTF, I agree with you regarding the fine eating quality of a well cooked rooster. No argument there. I learned to cook in the 40's, before the Frankenbirds were available, and I’m a devotee of slow cooking. But before you get pouty that people won’t turn back the clock, contemplate a little history... a reality check on chicken eating:
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Look at those carcasses that won the competition! Listen to what market researchers discovered that housewives of that era wanted. (Look at the wax model – no plastic in those days!)

The reality is that chicken was not a popular a menu item in the 40's – the apogee of the heritage chicken! Per capita consumption was much lower than it is now. Chefs chose hens and capons over roosters whenever possible. Most women were too busy to slow cook, even then; fried and BBQ’d chicken was already more popular than roasted chicken. ‘Rubber chicken’ was a common butt of jokes and a frequent hazard of cheap restaurants and institutional fare.

I sell hundreds of young mature roosters every year, but few to Canadian-born people. Most are purchased by immigrants who know how to pluck and dress them and whose wives turn them into curry. I sell them at cost or a small loss, because that is what the market will bear, so I am very much aware of the extra cost to feed them for those extra weeks. [Fortunately I make money on their sisters who sell at a profit.]

Must get back to farm work. I will write in defense of the rustic broiler later.

KathyS wrote:(It bothers me when I hear them called frankenbirds - they can't help that they were made that way ).

Sorry Kathy! I love the term "Frankenbirds". I don't equate them to monsters, ( though they do get pretty big) but think of the term Frankenbirds as birds made up of different birds just like Frankenstein's monster mas a man made up of parts of other men.

But then all hybrids are Frankenbirds. . . ?

Okay, regarding your very unkind words about 'my' Mistral Gris --

"Rustic broilers", which I will admit is a clever marketing scheme...

I don't understand what the scheme is. ?? The term 'rustic broiler' was coined by Don Shaver, not be me. 'Rustic' in poultry insider lingo means backward or old fashioned, and is descriptive of the fact that these birds are less efficient and slower growing (i.e. more like heritage chickens) than the commercial broilers. 'Broiler' in poultry insider lingo means a bird that is intended to be harvested at 4 - 6 lbs dressed weight, which obviously doesn't apply to the majority of Frankenbird broilers that are harvested smaller, and is not IMO a good size for broiling either... but that's the way the word is used. Do you think "rustic broiler" is misleading?

1. It's just a freaking broiler with crappier feed conversion and a slower growth rate that hasn't been inbred quite long enough to cause the other usual health problems!

Ahhh... no it’s not. First of all, Frankenbirds are not inbred – they are the result of a 4 way cross to maximize heterosis, and are maximally outbred in terms of proportion of heterozygotic genes. They have health problems because they have been ‘optimized’ for fast muscle growth at the expense of all else, and it really is sad, poor little clucks. I asked Don Shaver how he could have been party to this nasty development, and he replied that he and all the other breeders were striving to solve the problem of that time period, which was widespread human hunger and malnutrition, and cranking the chicken genome that far from ‘healthy for the chicken’ was the best way to do it. His own dislike of the product was a stimulus to the development of rustic broilers.

The 4-way cross technology that produced Frankenbirds is also the technology behind the rustic broilers, but that is like saying that Chevys and Toyotas both come out of car factories. Different birds were used as foundation stock, and the crosses were not optimized to the same criteria. [And note, there is nothing devious or sinister about crossing lines, or breeds, or crossing 4 lines/breeds – the farmers of the 40's frequently produced their product birds by crossing 2 lines/breeds.]

For all chickens, from the slowest growing Langshans to the 37 day Frankenbirds, feed conversion rates are totally dependent on days to harvest. So while it is true that the rustic broilers rate a 'crappy' 4 compared to the Frankenbirds’ 2, the heritage birds are generally at 8 and higher. What would you call that... crapulostic?

2. Heritage meat birds aren't broilers at all! Stop trying to treat them like broilers! Heritage meat chickens are roasting chickens! They have actual fat on their bodies and their meat has enough texture to actually justify calling it meat. I can't even make "tastes like chicken" jokes because it actually tastes like something and that something is pure awesome!

I agree that heritage meat birds are lousy broilers, and I never recommend them for broiling, but if broilers are what the buyers want, then I think we need to pay attention to that. And rustic broilers are a pretty perfect product to serve that market... misguided tho they may be in your opinion.

But I don’t recommend heritage meat birds for roasting either, in the hands of today's cooks who will dry roast them. They taste great when SLOW roasted, but the carcass still looks boney and flat chested to most people, and the serving portions are often awkward because of the long (and fully hardened) bones. They usually have less fat on them than the overfed Frankenbirds, and the breast meat especially is often dry and stringy even when well cooked.

In all these respects, the rustic broilers are better than either the heritage birds or the Frankenbirds. They are harvested old enough and fat enough to have flavor. Their carcasses are meatier for the length of bone. And the meat is firm without being dry and stingy. Have you eaten one? Please don’t tell me that you are slinging all this vitriol at the eating quality of a bird that you haven’t eaten.

But I’m thinking this is a waste of bandwidth to talk and talk about eating quality. For several of the local doubters, I have simply given them a freshly dressed 12 - 14 week old MG to cook in their own kitchen. All of them ordered MGs promptly thereafter. One fellow, a biodynamic farmer who produces meat for many of Vancouver’s top restaurants, is now raising 1,000 MGs.

I want to wrap this up and get back outside, but can’t resist challenging you, CTF, to define ‘heritage breed’ based on production or eating qualities (rather than the British Poultry Club/APA definitions of exhibition traits). I think if you knew more chicken farming history, you would know that pre-Frankenbird chicken farmers rarely if ever grew purebred birds, and were always looking to improve upon the birds available to them, and were already into designed crosses long before Shaver took it to a second generation. Rustic broilers are the natural evolution of yesterday’s birds... which weren’t good enough!

[I don’t know whether to don my flame suit or quote Monty Python: “Engarde! I f*rt in your general direction!!!”]

A word in support of Mistral Gris - we have six, that we obtained in a trade for six broilers; we're rearing them together. The broilers are about 35 days old, and the MGs 45. THe MGs are VERY impressive, even accounting for the age difference! Some are larger than most of the broilers, and the have a very satisfyingly porky look to them; plump and firm. However they are alert, robust and agile.

I'm guessing that problems people have had with them may have been from issues in transit.

My take on this whole "meat chicken" thing is it's all about personal preference. That does not mean anyone person should take someone else's opinions personal! And I think some are just a bit too passionate about their favourite table fare!! Again, just so there isn't any confusion here, this is just my observational opinion.

First of all, I will say this. The food factories have made amazing poultry products! Those Frankenbirds are impossible to beat and anyone who has a problem getting them to perform really needs to look at their husbandry practices rather than the genepool.

With that in mind, the so-called rustic broilers are nothing short of a compromise. They take longer to convert more food into each pound of feed. Yet they still have the downside of being a corporate controlled product.

"My take on this whole "meat chicken" thing is it's all about personal preference."

Preference? I say self respect. I have far too much self respect to allow my exististence to be corporate controlled. Corporations do not get to decide for me what foods I get to choose from. I will die a free person.

This discussion's initiator is spot on with her concerns, the rustic broilers are a threat to the heritage breeds, especially because of how they are being marketed. I agree, it is a clever scheme.

It's a tremendous shame that the person promoting the Rustic Broilers doesn't put as much effort into her Sussex development as she puts in the corporate genepool. Wouldn't it be great to see a re-birth of the Sussex? What I'm doing with the Ameraucana is one thing, but to do the same with a breed as old as the Sussex would be absolutely special! However, instead of encouraging people to start consuming her own breeding, she is enabling her customers to remain dependent on corporate controlled food.

I understand this because I was there. The corporate meat birds are profitable and I once used them to subsidize the feed bill of my heritage birds. Unfortunately I was really good at it. In time I realized I was only shooting myself and my breeding efforts in the foot. I was making it easier for my customers to feel good about their food purchases while still consuming corporate owned food. Customers that truely care about these things.

While I was building my farm's brand and developing a solid reputation of quality heritage organic food, I was unwittingly attaching that brand to the meat birds. I was helping that corporate product secure market share with my own sweat! And even worse, I was weakening the market perception of heritage breeds. Enough of that!

As someone who now is 100% financially supported by putting heritage foods on people's dinner tables, I can tell you this. About 5% of the population truely cares about where their food comes from. This may not seem like much, but it is huge! Far more than enough to support all of us. In our local community,roughly 1% of that 5% now financially supports my farm. While we are still learning and evolving, targetting that 5% is really all we need for a good healthy and free lifestyle. What the other 95% does or wants is really not a concern.

OMG: the Mistral Gris are not owned by any corporation. They are wholly owned by the man who bred them them, who is an Amish farmer. It took me nearly a year of research and a trip to Pennsylvania to find him... that's why you can't look him up on Google. Please stop declaring that the MGs are owned by the international corporations. It's not true.

And I am, wholeheartedly, continuing to improve Light Sussex. Why would you say I am not? I have produced almost 700 of them this year. My breeder roosters weight 9 lbs. My hens are laying large eggs and lots of them. I am very proud of them, and looking forward to continuing to improve them.

Don't tell lies about me.

My research into Mistral Gris led me directly to Master Gris, a corporate owned product. The owner of the Master Gris is fully aware of it's product being marketed as Mistral Gris.

What initially gave me reason to question the Amish story was the fact that the volume you claimed them producing in a week is completely inconsistent with the relative obscurity of the market name. It's simply not believable that that volume of chicks can be moved on a weekly basis without any online mention of it anywhere but up here in western Canada. It's like you are the only customer of this Amish farmer. Really hard to believe.

Furthermore, there are several hatcheries in the Pennsylvania that are using Master Gris hybrids to product slow grow broilers. In fact, Penn state is the center of these broilers in all of North America! Pretty big coincidence to think that an Amish farmer built an equivalent bird in the center of North America's Rustic Broiler territory and has been able to market the volume suggested in complete obscurity.

I'm sorry but it's simply not believable. I find it easier to believe the corporate rep's suggestion that the Mistral Gris is simply their product being sold under a false name.

Omega Blue Farms wrote:
My research into Mistral Gris led me directly to Master Gris, a corporate owned product. The owner of the Master Gris is fully aware of it's product being marketed as Mistral Gris.

What initially gave me reason to question the Amish story was the fact that the volume you claimed them producing in a week is completely inconsistent with the relative obscurity of the market name. It's simply not believable that that volume of chicks can be moved on a weekly basis without any online mention of it anywhere but up here in western Canada. It's like you are the only customer of this Amish farmer. Really hard to believe.

Furthermore, there are several hatcheries in the Pennsylvania that are using Master Gris hybrids to product slow grow broilers. In fact, Penn state is the center of these broilers in all of North America! Pretty big coincidence to think that an Amish farmer built an equivalent bird in the center of North America's Rustic Broiler territory and has been able to market the volume suggested in complete obscurity.

I'm sorry but it's simply not believable. I find it easier to believe the corporate rep's suggestion that the Mistral Gris is simply their product being sold under a false name.

That sounds very familiar! I wonder who else is marketing birds with a similar name?

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looks like they are in the uk as well... different names to

OBF - this is not funny. You've gone online and found a bird with a similar name, and based on the name alone you accuse me of completely fabricating the source and identity of Mistral Gris. Your comments are arrogant and libelous.

I looked up the Master Gris: it is a white bird with ermine mottling, yellow skin and legs. You yourself described the Mistral Gris you saw and handled as looking like a Barred Rock with cuckoo barring, white skin and slate legs. The father of the Master Gris is white and the mother is red, so if I crossed such a bird with Light Sussex I could not get the birchen hens that many of you have seen. And Ev's F2s, which you have also seen, would not look like Barred Rocks at all.

You've talked to 'the owner' of the Master Gris, have you?? The Hubbard corporation, in person? What a joke. Give me 'the owner's' name and telephone number, and I'll have my lawyer phone him, right after writing a letter to you.

Look, I'm really enjoying watching this conversation play out.

I realise that you two are mortal enemies or whatever, trunorth and OBF. Honestly Trunorth, stop taking everything so personally and settle down a bit, if you can't stop calling Wayne names this perfectly good discussion is going to end up getting shut down. OBF, you know full well how she reacts every single time you call her out and at this point it's starting to look like you keep posting just to get her all worked up, Isn't it getting a bit old yet? I'd be pretty bored with it by now myself.

I like keeping both types of birds.
We have JG, Rocks and hopefully soon, some Cornish.
Originally the JGs were to supply eggs and meat, but unfortunately it has been disappointing going down this road. Perhaps if one day I get some nice stock from Ont, this will change. They are still a lovely bird.
Now I have Rocks in the barn as well. Hopefully the cross, especially when some Cornish are added to the mix, will provide some edible eye candy. They will also always be there if the supply of MKs becomes an issue.
MKs are just so easy. Ours truly free range, well away from the other birds, or else they get picked on. They go into the woods and pick for bugs, and just yesterday I was asked where I got my Chantecler from. They do not have health or leg problems. They also do not get much to eat, they get the same amount as the heritage birds do. They either look for food, or they get hungry. They catch mice, grasshoppers, snakes and anything else they can, and they can run fast. Especially if you are carrying a food pail. Mine have chosen to sleep under the stars, and thankfully have not been visited in the night by any predators.
I like being able to get 3 meals from one bird. Even with a plucker, it is time consuming dressing birds. Why not clean one rather than 3. The MKs will be kept for roasting, while we will grind the others for sausage and make soup with the bones. For us, it is a good compromise. It also reduces the number of birds we have to over winter.
My question is, how do you keep your MKs from crossing the road to go to the neighbour's yard?