Abstract: Method and apparatus are provided for mechanically processing an organ or organs taken out from slaughtered poultry in a processing device or processing line, which organ or organs form part of an organ package and wherein said organ or organs are separated from the organ package. The organ package is spatially oriented by the processing device without notably breaking tissue connections in the package, and in a preselected order so as to cause harvesting of organs from the package to occur in a preselected sequence that depends on the location of the organ package in the processing device or processing line.

Abstract: A method and apparatus for harvesting livers and hearts from a giblet package comprising an infeed pinch roller assembly, a slide assembly, an indexer assembly, an intestine pull down and a liver and heart separator assembly, for harvesting livers and hearts with an increased yield. The steps of the process include loading a load viscera pack into a feed chute that channels the pack to a pair of counter rollers. The viscera pack is captured by infeed pinch rollers thereby forcing the package into and between the rollers with only the gizzard remaining on top of the roller body. The liver and heart is isolated and separated by a pull down stripper assembly and a stripper arm assembly.

Abstract: An apparatus for processing the gizzards of poultry of various sizes which comprises a conveyor with drivers for moving the gizzards along the top of a guide past cutting means for cutting the gizzards open as they are moved along the guide. Auxiliary guide means is disposed along both sides of the top of the guide and moves in synchronism with the conveyor for guiding the gizzards as they move along the top of the guide past the cutting means. The auxiliary guide means may be driven by engaging the conveyor.