“Our customers wanted better options for dealing with poultry offal,” says Alex Berland of Passmore Pluckers, a small provincially-licensed poultry abattoir in the West Kootenays. With funding through the Small Projects Program, the company was able to test on-farm composting of offal – heads, necks, feet, guts and feathers – and investigate the feasibility of diverting parts of the waste stream into value-added products. They constructed a simple and wildlife-secure compost system and demonstrated it to their customers. They also held two information sessions on composting and bio-secure handling of offal. This presentation is available online at passmorepluckers.ca.
They then turned their attention to high value pet food that would meet local demand. By modifying their grinder, they were able to test various mixtures of offal minus the feathers. With a set of simple operating procedures in place to ensure product safety, they have made their grinder available to their customers for a nominal cleaning fee. “The composting turned out to be pretty easy and we had good results as long as we followed a few simple rules,” adds Berland.
Funding: $7,644 through the former federal-provincial Safety Nets framework. (SP201)
