Homestead Butchering - Chickens

And thoughts on home butchering from a former vegetarian

At the age of 23 living in downtown Kansas City, I was traumatized by a documentary featuring inhumane and devastating treatment of chickens in a large meat production factory. Followed by another on egg laying hens stuffed into tiny cages, and then another on commercial pig slaughter operations. As I wasn’t raised on a farm, I assumed this was how all meat was produced, and immediately vowed to never eat meat again.

Several years later, I met my soon to be husband and his Kansas born cattle ranching parents. They didn’t know what a vegetarian was, and I’d never met real beef farmers before. Because of my own skepticism, I watched them very carefully. And I got the privilege to witness the love and care they gave to their animals as if they were family. They stayed up on cold nights and brought baby calves in to warm up in the heated garage. They spent countless hours checking on them, ensuring their safety, and mending the sick. Their hard earned money went to extra hay and feed when pastures were killed by drought. My mother-in-law still tears up over every calf lost and grieves for each one. It didn’t take long for me to realize that the small family farmers aren’t the problem with our food supply chain.  They are the solution.

And this, my friends, is what I fear to be the biggest problem with food production today. The separation of food producers from consumers. Many of us (myself included) are so far removed from our food sources that we blindly believe that all animals are loved as much as they are on the family farm. We trust that all animals are treated well, fed wholesome food, un-medicated, and get to see fresh grass and sunlight each day. Sadly, that isn’t the case.

In 2018, our family ventured into homesteading. We knew there was a humane and sustainable way to raise and harvest meat for our table. And so we set out on a mission to not only honor the life of that animal, but also to harvest in a manner that fit within the mission of this farm and this family.