Got invited to hunt chickens... now what?

Longshot said:
Hey for those that hunt upland in BC, am I correct in thinking that your shotgun must be plugged to two in the mag? Or is that just for waterfoul?
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If your shooting birdshot or buckshot,lead or steel you have to plug up even for grouse.It's only when shooting slugs you can unplug and load up in bc for the bush.
 
Zeon: some people pluck them but most just pull the breast off. The sooner the better, but leave a wing on (BC regs) until you get home. I cheat on this one at times but you should be aware that this is a requirement.
 
H4831 said:
No meat of any kind should be kept in plastic.
A warm bird will sour, probably within the hour, if put in plastic.
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I respectfully disagree. Every single bird I've ever hunted - numerous grouse varieties, Hungarian partridge, pheasant - all went straight into an ordinary plastic grocery bag as soon as they were retrieved. Hot days, rainy days, below freezing - no difference. For the past 4 or 5 years, the bird in the plastic bag then goes in the plastic game bag attached to the back of my uplands jacket.

I don't buy the "let the meat age" nonsense that I've seen in other thread, either.

Carry the bird home in a canvas bag, a plastic bag, or any other kind of bag for that matter. Clean the bird the same day it was taken and you won't have any meat going "sour".
 
I was hoping someone would mention the "cleaning part"! Its been at least 25 years since I hunted chicken. For the life of me couldn`t remember which one of the bird family was it: That you stand on their wings, grab their legs and pull...whoa la....cleaned bird! I know hunting pheasent, we wouldn`t pluck no feathers. Just open up the breast and cut out the meat since the rest of a pheasent is un useable.
 
darcy32171 said:
I was hoping someone would mention the "cleaning part"! Its been at least 25 years since I hunted chicken. For the life of me couldn`t remember which one of the bird family was it: That you stand on their wings, grab their legs and pull...whoa la....cleaned bird! I know hunting pheasent, we wouldn`t pluck no feathers. Just open up the breast and cut out the meat since the rest of a pheasent is un useable.
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The way the most of the people on CGN are so devout, in bragging how they always eat everything they shoot, will advocate pulling a grouse apart, thus leaving a goodly portion of delicious meat in the bush.
Immediately on shooting a grouse, I cut the head off, then open the rear at the thin membrane and pull everything, including the windpipe and gullet, out the back. I then put a little stick in the rear opening, to hold the hole open so air can circulate, and take them home that way.
At home they are easily skinned, then sll the meat can be cooked by your favourite method.
 
I do clean grouse this way by standing on the wings.........but besides the obvious breastmeat, I do not discard the back legs, neckbone and hips.
I clean them off and save if for soup fellas.
One just has to be very careful not to fully detach the spine.
 
Wired leader said:
could you elaborate ?
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Standard thing step on wings and pulling the feet upwards. Now things seperate and do this with a measured amount of force. With the guts exposed and the spine still attached, now stop and clean away the body cavity with the upper and lower part of the body still attached only with the spine. Sometimes it's almost as if the head & neck are pulled partly inside out of the skin like a sock is the only thing holding it together. Yes, a delicate operation for grouse.
And usually will only work if the wings and backbone have not been busted up from birdshot.
Predictably this cannot work 100% of the time.
 
But 60% of the time, it works everytime....

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Brutus said:
Standard thing step on wings and pulling the feet upwards. Now things seperate and do this with a measured amount of force. With the guts exposed and the spine still attached, now stop and clean away the body cavity with the upper and lower part of the body still attached only with the spine. Sometimes it's almost as if the head & neck are pulled partly inside out of the skin like a sock is the only thing holding it together. Yes, a delicate operation for grouse.
And usually will only work if the wings and backbone have not been busted up from birdshot.
Predictably this cannot work 100% of the time.
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I'm familiar with the standard method but have only had one attempt at it. It did not work the way it was supposed to. I have to assume it was because I was not stepping on the wings close enough to the body.
Having said that, I peeled the skin back and just pulled the breast off the bird. Once I did that, I pulled the spine/ribs(?) off the breast and I was left with a very nice piece of meat.....and tasty too!
After reading & rereading your post, I am still a little fuzzy on what you are saying.
From what I read, you do not immediately fully separate the two parts completely?
What would be the reason for not pulling it completely apart?
From my first experience, the bird was very easy to pull apart and although, I fudged it up a little, I had no problems separating the meat from the bone.
The breast did come off with bone attached, but I just pulled any bone from the meat and had the double breast still in one piece with no damage.
I took my instruction from Utube and as you know everyone does it a little different.
When you said to be very careful to not detach the spine, it sounds like a warning, so I'm still wondering......
I again looked at a handful of vids on utube to see if I could find one that appears to do it your way so I might have a better understanding, but everyone did it different more or less.

I plan on more grouse this fall and would like to know that I'm field dressing it correctly, or at least know that I'm not doing anything drastically wrong.
 
Stand on the wings and gently pull the legs until the carcass legs, guts and back separate from the rest. Next rip the head and remaining skin from the rest. This will leave the beast meat attached to the keel with wings still attached.

Then with a pocket knife I detach these wings at the joint...or you can leave the wings attached until you arrive at home for legal ID reasons...as if there would be any doubt as to what species of grouse you have in hand.

Whole process takes less than 60 seconds. IMO nothing on the back or legs worth salvaging. Plucking ruffies is very time consuming and futile as they have paper thin skin which rips off anyway.
 
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