KILLING POULTRY 321 
parallel with the connection between the two veins and very close to 
it but has not cut it, and another has run from the angle of the 
mouth to close to the point where the blood vessel on the left side 
of the head breaks into the two smaller vessels and penetrates the 
bones of the skull. The only vessels which were cut in this chicken 
were the small superficial veins supplying the roof of the mouth and 
from which the bleeding amounted to almost nothing. Head B 
shows a cut in the right direction but it did not go quite far enough 
back to reach the veins at their junction. Head A, in Fig. 69, shows 
the cross cut which is advocated by so many killers. In this case it 
was made too far front. Both of the large veins escaped and only 
the small vessels of the roof of the mouth were disturbed. “B” 
is a good illustration of indiscriminate cutting by a badly directed 
knife, which in all probability was far too large, since the upper cut 
extends all the way across the roof of the chicken’s mouth and almost 
as far front as the beak. Another cut which partly follows the groove 
in the roof of the mouth would indicate that the killer had tried to 
make a cross cut. 
Such examples of bad cutting might be multiplied indefinitely. 
Yet the general principle is the same and the result is the same — 
namely, a fowl which is not completely bled, which is unsightly, even 
in the packing house, and which deteriorates as a food stuff more 
rapidly than does the well-bled chicken under similar conditions. 
SUMMARY 
The facts which have been stated in the foregoing pages may be 
summarized as follows: 
(1) Grasp the chicken when killing by the bony part of the skull. 
Do not let the fingers touch the neck. 
(2) Make a small cut inside the mouth on the left side of the 
throat just where the bones of the skull end, using a narrow-bladed 
sharp-pointed knife. The direction of the knife is upward and to- 
ward the left when the bird is held head downward with the throat 
toward the operator while killing. 
(8) Brain for dry picking by thrusting the knife through the 
groove which runs along the middle line of the roof of the mouth until 
it pierces the brain in the back part of the skull, causing a loosening 
of the feathers. 
(4) For chickens use a knife the blade of which is 2 inches long, 
