Geese are usually bred for two purposes: for meat and for getting fluff and feather. One adult gives on average about 6 kg of meat, up to 2.5 kg of fat and valuable liver. A baked goose is a traditional Christmas dish for many nations. However, in order to preserve the value and quality of goose meat and extend its shelf life, it is necessary to properly slaughter the bird. Recommendations on slaughtering, plucking, goose and meat storage can be found in our article.
When to hammer a goose: external signs and age
There are various recommendations for choosing the optimal time for the slaughter of geese. Some advise to pay attention to age, others - to external signs. The age at which young poultry can be slaughtered will depend on the type of feed that is provided.
If it was fed with natural ingredients, then it is possible to carry out the slaughter from 7 months. The exact age in this case will also depend on the breed of bird: some of them are ready for slaughter at the age of five months. It is then that, on average, they reach a weight of 4 kg.
When feeding feed goose ready for slaughter in 2-3 months. Everything will depend on how well he has gained weight. Mixed feeding allows you to slaughter domestic waterfowl in 5 months.
Feeding with special feeds for broilers assumes that birds will be slaughtered 72 days after birth. Another method, which determines whether the birds are ready to become meat, is a test for hemp.
It will be useful for you to get acquainted with the technology of slaughter and processing of chickens.
To do this, after molting, hold the hand over the body of the feathered against the growth of feathers. If new hemp is not seen, and the bird looks at least 4 kg in weight, it means that it can be cut.
Lagging with the face of a goose should not be. If the bird is overexposed, then more greasy deposits will accumulate in it, and the meat will lose in taste. Maximum productivity is achieved by the bird in the first 5 years of life. After that, the flock will require an update.
Important! It should be remembered that the slaughter must be done before November, because in winter the bird loses much weight. If you do not have time before this period, the birds will need to be left alone for a year. If, when feeding with special feeds, slaughter did not occur for 72 days, then it would be necessary to produce it at 144.
How to prepare a bird
The preparation of the feathery before slaughter is very important: the bird must be with an empty stomach and intestines, therefore its feeding is stopped 8-12 hours before slaughter. It is better if this period will be at night. It is impossible to starve a hand for more than 12 hours: it will adversely affect the quality of meat.
Simultaneously with the cessation of feeding, the birds begin to drink more. And the water while slightly salted - so the meat can subsequently be stored longer.
We recommend reading about the beneficial properties of goose fat.
For the period of famine or the so-called waiting for geese, they are kept in a separate room. If the stay did not come at night, but during the daytime, then the room where the birds are kept will need to be darkened.
Slaughtering geese at home: the right technique
Among those who carry out qualitative slaughter of geese, two methods are common:
- Outer.
- Interior.
Outer
In the external method, a sharp-edged knife is used for slaughtering. Step-by-step instruction of this technique is as follows:
- Stun a bird with a blunt object on the head.
- Place in a cone upside down.
- Wrap your head with your left hand.
- Make a deep puncture with a knife in the throat.
- Sharply cut the carotid artery and the jugular vein.
- Leave the carcass for a while to bleed from her blood. There is no need to hurry, because not completely blood drained meat will have a shorter shelf life. On average, blood flows from 15 to 20 minutes.
- Remove the bloodless carcass from the cone and proceed to plucking.
Important! A person who is going to slaughter a goose is advisable to get acquainted with his anatomy before this process. He must learn to make accurate and fast movements with sharp objects. So slaughter will be faster, easier and more accurate.
Interior
The internal method as a tool will require scissors. It takes less time than the external, and therefore more popular.
This will look like a step-by-step instruction of this technique:
- Tie a bird paws with a rope.
- Fold both wings in one direction.
- Hang the goose up with its paws.
- Unclaim the beak.
- Insert scissors into it and in one motion cut the jugular and pavement vein.
- Make a puncture in the sky, sending scissors to the back of the skull where the cerebellum is located.
- Spread your wings.
- Give blood to drain.
- After 20 minutes, you can begin to pluck.
The easiest way used by farmers is to cut off the head of the bird with an ax and hang it for bleeding with spread wings.
How to nibble at home
Pluck a goose at home in 3 ways:
- dry;
- with the use of scalding;
- using various devices.
Dry manual mode
Dry plucking can be used directly after the slaughter of the bird. If some time has passed, it will not work.
For convenience, the wings and legs of the bird tie up. The bird is laid on a horizontal surface. Feathers are removed alternately by hand in the direction of growth. Begin with the tail zone, then move to the chest, and complete the neck and legs. First, pluck large feathers, then move to smaller ones.
Did you know? During the molting period, the goose cannot fly. Shedding lasts approximately 1.5 months. All this time, the birds try to live near the reservoirs in order not to fall into the hands of the predator, but to escape in time in the water.
Plucking after scalding
Perhaps the most popular method. It lies in the fact that before plucking the bird carcass boiling water. So it is possible to achieve a softening of the feathers and their compliance when pulling. Despite the simplicity, the method has several drawbacks. First, feathers are easily pulled out, only until the carcass is cold.
Therefore, plucking should be done at a fast pace. Secondly, with this method the shelf life of the carcass is somewhat reduced. Third, scalded feathers and down are not suitable for any purpose. They can only be disposed of.
We advise you to read about how to breed geese at home, why geese are sick and how to treat them when geese start to fly at home, how to properly feed geese from the first days of life.
Video: how to pluck a goose
Use of perosemnyh machines and other devices
Significantly facilitates the process of plucking perossemnye machine. The most popular device is a drum machine, the principle of which is based on the action of centrifugal force. Feathers are removed with finger fingers.
Goose put in the drum, after turning on the car. During its rotation, the fingers beat the bird and remove feathers from it, which fall into a special perosborn tray. Feathers are removed manually.
There are also machines in which feathers are removed with the help of rotating discs. They are mainly used in large enterprises. Skilled farmers resort to making perossemnyh machines with their own hands. They are made from old washing machines, pots, attaching the bilny fingers to them.
Important! In order for the carcass to have a marketable appearance, plucking it with the help of a perostem machine is carried out two hours after slaughter. After that, the killed goose is placed in warm water for 10 minutes and scalded with boiling water.
In specialized stores to remove feathers, you can purchase a drill bit with silicone fingers. When the drill rotates, it pulls out the feathers from the carcass. Scalding with this method of plucking is not necessary. The downside is the frequent damage to the carcass. Therefore, it is better to resort to this method if the goose is intended for its own use. For sale such a bird may not be suitable.
Geese manage to pluck and with an ordinary pump. Suit even the simplest, which is used to inflate mattresses. Iron is also required.
A pump hose is inserted into the neck, between the spine and the skin of the goose. With the help of it, the carcass is inflated until the feathers on the wings rise. Then the birds throat tightly tied with a rope.
The goose is laid on its back, wrapped around it with a cotton or gauze cloth soaked in water and exposed to steam from an iron. This procedure allows you to make the process of plucking feathers easier. If in some places the feathers still abut, steaming can be repeated.
Video: plucking geese
Did you know? Wild relatives of domestic geese when flying to warm countries can rise to 8-10 km in height. At such a height, a person can no longer breathe without an oxygen mask.
How to carve a goose
After careful plucking, the goose will need to be gutted. Do it in several stages:
- Remove the remaining feathers with tweezers, and the fluff - singe the carcass over the gas burner or gas burner.
- Wash the meat and dry for an hour.
- Cutting start with cutting off the head, if it has not been removed before.
- Then you need to go to the paws. They are cut off to the tarsus joint.
- The wings must be cut to the elbow joint.
- Using a knife to separate the spine and trachea, and then the esophagus.
- Make a circular incision around the cloaca.
- Cut along the wall of the abdominal cavity.
- Remove the internal organs: heart, liver, stomach, gaguchuyu tube.
- Place the carcass under running water, rinse it from the outside and the inside.
- Leave the meat for a few hours to cool.
- Start cooking a dish or send the carcass for storage in the refrigerator and freezer.
Familiarize yourself with the species and characteristics of the white-fronted, black, wild, white geese, as well as the geese of the Lind breed.
Proper storage of meat
In summer, a fresh carcass at room temperature can be kept no more than 1.5 days. It is desirable to wrap it with a cloth dipped in vinegar. In the fridge goose is 5 days. For 6-8 days in the refrigerator can be stored carcass treated with saline.
Saline solution is prepared from 300-400 g of salt. It is dissolved in 1 liter of water, boiled and cooled to room temperature. Then, using a syringe, pour the solution into the pharynx, tie the throat and hang the goose by the legs. After 20 hours, the brine is poured. In this case, the meat will not be salty, since the brine will only enter the intestine. If longer storage is expected, then freezing is required. First, the meat for half a day kept in the refrigerator, and then put it in the freezer, wrapped in parchment paper. The shelf life of meat in the freezer is 3 months.
Did you know? Goose is considered one of the first domesticated birds. Its domestication happened about 3 thousand years ago. There is evidence that the birds were bred by man in ancient Rome, Greece, Egypt, China.
As you can see, the quality of meat and the duration of its storage is influenced not only by the conditions of keeping geese, but also by the correctness of their slaughter and plucking. There are several ways of these procedures, so each bird owner can choose the one that will be for him the most simple and convenient.