Pressure Canning Off Cuts? Graphic Question

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GBov

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I was wondering about making my own dog food as I have a pressure canner but can find NOTHING on the web about canning butcher off cuts like heads, gutty bits, and feet.

Do any of you lovely people know if I can pressure can the bits of rabbit (and chickens and pigs and goats) that we don't eat?

And if so, what procedure should I follow?
 
I recommend... hot pack to conserve jar space, ,, then process at [10 lbs in Florida] for 90 minutes... if the pieces will fit into a canning jar, they are just fine for this method. If you choose to cold pack [uncooked meat and bone] process at 10 lbs for 120 minutes... most of the bone will be soft enough for a dog to chew up at that point. If I was processing larger chunks of bone - I would process at 15 lbs, to make the bones break down more [softer] ,
My normal process was... toss everything into a pressure cooker, bring up to 10 lbs, for 30 minutes, let it cool enough to handle, -pack into canning jars, - process at 10 lbs [or 15 lbs] for 90 minutes. -- if i was making bone broth, I would pressure cook the bones for about 3 hours at 15 lbs, then after it cooled down I could feed the bones to chickens or dogs, I then processed the broth in bottles for 60 minutes at 15 lbs.
 
And this is why I LOVE RT!!! No matter how odd my question, someone is already doing it! :lol:

Thank you very much M4G, that is exactly what I needed to know. :D

One more question, can I pressure can with the fur/feathers still on?
 
GBov":2dfrg58n said:
One more question, can I pressure can with the fur/feathers still on?

Can you WHAT!!!! :p lol (I don't think I would)

I cold pack the meat, add hot stock (chicken bouillon, thyme, onion and canning salt) and process 90 minutes @ 15 psi. Hasn't killed me yet. ;)
 
Have I not made it clear this is for dog food? :lol: :lol: :lol:

I feed heads, feet, guts raw to them but when I butcher several things there is just too much for the dogs and the vultures get lots of it.

Nice for the vultures but not so much for me. And I don't want to give freezer space to the bits either.

So I imagined raw packing it into jars and pressure canning it, fur and feathers on but the web is giving me no info. I wonder why?
 
MaggieJ":2ilg58ca said:
I love it, GBov! :D

You ask the most interesting questions. Sorry I have no answer for you this time.

My questions about sum up my life! :lol: :lol: :lol:

I can honestly say, google searches turn up things I never expect when I try looking things up. :shock:
 
The only problems with fur, and feathers is ...sometimes [not that often] it gets into the seal on the jar lid and the seal leaks-- so-- if you turn the pressure caner off when the time is up,leave the weight on, then just let it cool down slowly, the "siphon" will be less, and very few jars will have liquid bubbling out under the seal..
 
michaels4gardens":wvixrefb said:
The only problems with fur, and feathers is ...sometimes [not that often] it gets into the seal on the jar lid and the seal leaks-- so-- if you turn the pressure caner off when the time is up,leave the weight on, then just let it cool down slowly, the "siphon" will be less, and very few jars will have liquid bubbling out under the seal..

Lovely dovely, that is what I will do! :D

Rabbit talk wins again, no one else on any forum even came close to a proper answer.
 
GBov, you need to post a picture of your gruesome pantry full of animal heads floating in broth. :twisted:
 
MamaSheepdog":214fawyb said:
GBov, you need to post a picture of your gruesome pantry full of animal heads floating in broth. :twisted:

I told my mum that THOSE jars would be the hidden jars! :lol:

The first available chick order is for middle of next month so I might just go down to the local farm swap and get some cheap rabbits instead. I can quarter the heads and see how canning them goes.

If anyone had given me a sneak peek at my life script a few decades ago, I never would have believed it! :shock:
 
GBov":2npas6cr said:
MamaSheepdog":2npas6cr said:
GBov, you need to post a picture of your gruesome pantry full of animal heads floating in broth. :twisted:

I told my mum that THOSE jars would be the hidden jars! :lol:

The first available chick order is for middle of next month so I might just go down to the local farm swap and get some cheap rabbits instead. I can quarter the heads and see how canning them goes.

If anyone had given me a sneak peek at my life script a few decades ago, I never would have believed it! :shock:

And they're REALLY cheap in our area right now. If you're still in Marion County there's a couple small animal auctions (http://floridaclassicsales.com/Small_Li ... ction.html in Ocala and https://www.yellowpages.com/bushnell-fl ... e-28924217 in Bushnell) and typically you can get adult rabbits cheap at them.

I could also sell you a few of mine cheap too honestly. I fractured my 5th Metatarsal and it's not healing properly so I have been selling rabbits cheaper than I'd like. I have a few young fryer-aged standard rex left but they're missing toes from a duck attack right after they were just born so I've been hesitant to post them for sale anywhere. I was going to wait until winter for their pelts. No pressure though if that's not what you're looking for.
 
You intrest me greatly DH! PM me with prices and a huge THANK YOU for the auction details, I will check it out.

And OUCH to your broken bone! How did you manage to do that?
 
Hey @GBov I have the same original question as you and found this post! I am curious how canning with fur worked out for you? What recipe did you use for canning for dogs? I'd love to get some insight from you on this :) I've never canned anything before but this is exactly what I will be doing once I start. Right now my freezer stores all of these bits that I would rather just can! Any tips you care to share?
 
When pressure canning meat, use quart jars or smaller so they get to the proper temperature. Doesn't really matter what you put in the jar, AFAIK, just get the heat up high enough to sterilize everything and keep it sealed. If the meat is in big pieces (i.e. an entire head), then you'd probably want to process for a bit longer to make sure it gets up to temp.

We used to put bones in vinegar, I think it was, to make them into fun rubbery bones. It wasn't for any purpose other than a 'gee whiz' look at that sorta thing, dunno as if a vinegar flavored bone would upset a dog or not?
 
When pressure canning meat, use quart jars or smaller so they get to the proper temperature. Doesn't really matter what you put in the jar, AFAIK, just get the heat up high enough to sterilize everything and keep it sealed. If the meat is in big pieces (i.e. an entire head), then you'd probably want to process for a bit longer to make sure it gets up to temp.

Thank you so much for the advice! Knowing me, I'd probably try to pack everything into a big jar 😂 I'm glad I asked!

We used to put bones in vinegar, I think it was, to make them into fun rubbery bones. It wasn't for any purpose other than a 'gee whiz' look at that sorta thing, dunno as if a vinegar flavored bone would upset a dog or not?

I actually have done this, too! It is vinegar that does this. Now I'm curious if I could do that with ACV and feed to the dogs. It would just be collagen at that point. I think the calcium gets dissolved, so only benefit to that would be giving them ACV.
 
Fur and feathers have no nutritional or dietary benefits. Packing them in with the meat and bones seems to be only a matter of saving a few minutes. Even for dogs and cats one can spend the little time to strip feathers. Now the collagen in the rabbit skin may be worth while. One could extract it by cooking, or one could slip the hair prior to packing. Slipping the hair can be done with ash solution or lye solution. OK, that is getting labor intensive..... thought experiment done.
 
Fur and feathers have no nutritional or dietary benefits. Packing them in with the meat and bones seems to be only a matter of saving a few minutes. Even for dogs and cats one can spend the little time to strip feathers. Now the collagen in the rabbit skin may be worth while. One could extract it by cooking, or one could slip the hair prior to packing. Slipping the hair can be done with ash solution or lye solution. OK, that is getting labor intensive..... thought experiment done.

Fur is actually a great dewormer for dogs! I'm sure the same can be said for cats and other carnivorous pets, but cannot confirm. And as you stated, you are correct that they gain no nutrients from them. So for me, I love feeding fur as a worm prevention. I used to feed them whole prey because of that. Now that I raise my own rabbits, I keep the pelts for myself hehe.

I would intend on keeping fur on paws and skulls if canning, though. Only because I tried skinning the skull once and thought it was too little reward for the effort I took, but maybe that is just because I need more experience. I could never figure out how to keep paws on the pelts on my own and the dogs love them, so I also stop bothering.

My primary concern is the fur preventing the lid from sealing properly. I could remove the fur beforehand by skinning or the solutions you mention, however I think I'd be afraid of harming the dogs with the solution. Maybe not ash, but lye. Hmm.....yeah, this is getting to be more trouble than it may be worth.
 
Our border collie would scale fish before eating them and many animals will pull the feathers and fur off before eating the meat so maybe taking the feathers off before canning would be worthwhile? If you take out the flight feathers, the down and small body feathers are good for pillows. Get 'ticking' fabric that is featherproof, though, so the feathers don't come through the fabric.
 
Fur and feathers have no nutritional or dietary benefits. Packing them in with the meat and bones seems to be only a matter of saving a few minutes. Even for dogs and cats one can spend the little time to strip feathers. Now the collagen in the rabbit skin may be worth while. One could extract it by cooking, or one could slip the hair prior to packing. Slipping the hair can be done with ash solution or lye solution. OK, that is getting labor intensive..... thought experiment done.
I wonder about that fur and feathers - I can't remember what the nutritional supplement is but basically it's just little capsules of Chinese duck feathers. It was an expose on what's actually in your vitamins and that was some sort of nutritional supplement so there may be some nutrition in fur and feathers. 😆

Okay I went back and found it here is an article on nutritional supplements made of human hair and duck feathers. Everything you ever wanted to know about L-cysteine but were afraid to ask. - Free Online Library
(The human hair came from barbershop floors in China...yum!)

Liz
 
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