Pastured Poultry Talk

After listening to the episode on learning the art of scalding, listener Chad asked if I could explain how to pick a chicken plucker. I happy to help. Quick disclaimer: While the advice in the episode is general purpose, the examples use the Poultry Man line of pluckers to illustrate the points because that's what I know the best. The first question I'd ask is, "Do you need a plucker?" This is a personal decision, but the question is for those homesteader and family flocks who may be doing 20 or 30 chickens at a time a few times a year. I'm a strong believer that your first purchase needs to be a scalder. You buy the plucker second because the quality and ease of the pluck is controlled by the scald. I talk about scalding chickens in Pastured Poultry Talk episode 67. The primary decisions points about selecting an appropriately sized chicken plucker comes down to the following: Match the scalder/plucker capacity. Purchase a scalder based on processing day volume. Know your power requirements. Evaluate the d