Make Your Own Chicken Plucker

Make Your Own Chicken Plucker LIVESTOCK Poultry 26-6-18 When Herrick Kimball decided to raise a few chickens for home use, the Moravia, New York, farmer soon came face to face with the messy job of chicken plucking. He borrowed a table-top chicken plucker only to find it didn't work as well as he'd expected. He decided he was better off plucking them by hand. Then he discovered a friend's tub-style mechanical plucker. This simple home-built machine was patterned after a commercial plucker. It worked great so he decided to build one of his own. After building three prototype machines, he came up with what he calls the Whizbang Chicken Plucker. It consists of a wooden frame and an electric motor, as well as rubber plucking fingers, rubber belts, bearings and pulleys, all of which were off-the-shelf parts. He figures you can build a Whizbang plucker for under $500. Kimball put together a detailed, 58-page plan book that was published by Back Home Magazine. It's available for $24, including shipping and handling. Kimball says there's also a Yahoo discussion group for people interested in building a chicken plucker for in home or small-farm poultry processing. The address is: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/whizbangchickenpluckers/ Contact: FARM SHOW Followup, Herrick Kimball, Tradesman Publications, Box 1117, Moravia, N.Y. 13118 (E-mail: hckimball@baldcom.net); to order contact: FARM SHOW Followup, BackHome Plans, Box 70, Hendersonville, N. C. 28793 (ph 800 992-2546).

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