Pro tip: a scissor style poultry shear beats a cleaver on spatchcock birds every time
I used to break down whole chickens with my 8 inch cleaver because that's how the old head at my first shop in Reno showed me. After 2 months of slipping on greasy skin and wrecking the breast meat, I switched to a $22 pair of scissor shears and my yield went up maybe 8 percent per bird. The cleaver crushes the rib cage and sends little bone chips flying, while the shears cut a clean line right down both sides of the spine in about 15 seconds. I still keep the cleaver for splitting pigs feet and heavy stuff, no argument there. But for 40 birds a day on spatchcock prep, you'd be nuts to fight it with a blade. Curious if anyone here runs shears on rabbit too, since the joints feel even tighter.
Tbh the cleaver guys at my old spot would rather lose a finger than admit shears work better. Forty birds a day though, that's a lot of finger risk just to keep the old school cred. Rabbit joints are tighter but shears handle 'em fine, just go slow around the ball sockets.