Poultry plant tour

[orthodoc]

I toured a poultry 'processing' plant today, aka an abattoir. I was NOT looking forward to it, having read various accounts of same and being a non-meat-eater currently for various reasons. Re raising animals for meat, I've done it. My family had a small farm when I was in my teens and we had chickens, pigs, and a milk cow. No beef cattle and no sheep, no ducks, geese, etc. But we did raise chickens and pigs over the summer to slaughter in the fall, and we traded a pig for a side of beef with a neighboring farmer, that type of thing.

The poultry place hatches their own chicks from breeding stock, literally farms them out for six weeks until they reach 4 lb live weight, then calls them in for slaughter. We were not permitted anywhere near the 'kill room' or the 'plucking room'. The rest of the place was an exercise in processing 2 million birds per day. I suppose what struck me was the sheer scope of it, the incredible numbers our greedy population demands. Our per capita meat consumption has soared over the past century and there's no good reason for it. Agribusiness and Big Food/Fast Food have prodded our appetites to want more and moar ... and if we're all dying of diabetes and hypertension and cancer, who cares? Just get those units of production out the door.

Seeing the amount of waste, the fat and parts and slime and blood all over the floor, and knowing that virtually all of this particular plant's 'product' was off to feed the fast food industry, I cringed. How can we ever explain this to people who don't have enough to eat? And these birds are bizarre-looking, pale and watery and no decent breast or wing muscle. But then, they've never used their wings. They've lived truncated lives of only a few weeks in crowded pens with no natural light, had their beaks cut off, and grown to only a fraction of their potential. They've eaten only gmo corn mixed with the rendered remains of relatives they never knew (they're pretty much genetically identical anyway); they've never scratched in the dirt or crowed or done a single thing chickens are supposed to do. Why would we think we could be healthy eating them?

It's bull to say that this is the only way people can eat. We can do better than this. The 10 lb of grain we put into gaining 1 lb of meat would be far better used elsewhere. More importantly, the idea of thinking of an animal as a 'unit of production' is antithetical to compassionate stewardship.

So, opening a huge can of worms. I realize there are differences of opinion. What do you think?

[glatt]

Do you think the chickens know any better? Do they seem unhappy? I know it looks like a hellish place to live to us, but we've seen the outside. If a chicken grows up there and doesn't know anything else, is it unhappy?

[Griff]

First wash thoroughly. A friend of mine was doing environmental testing in a kosher chicken processing facility and picked up our little friend campylobacter.

I do eat factory chicken and I do find it repulsive. Eventually I'd like to work out a more humane system for my families food. Our gardening is improving, we're adding bees this Summer, and I'd like to come up with a pastured poultry system that works for me. Humanity in general? I don't know if they can keep breeding and expect to eat.

[orthodoc]

It's clear that the chickens are stressed; their beaks are cut off because, in the stress of existing in such cramped space that they can't actually walk or move about, they start attacking each other and some of the 'units of production' (aka profit) are lost. This behavior does not occur in a flock with outdoor access and enough space to move around. It's a behavior that we see in animals more intelligent than chickens, including humans.

Chickens that are raised in wire cages, standing on wire, have another problem; because they can't move around, the wire cuts into their feet and their skin then grows around the wire. They end up stuck in place. When the time comes for slaughter they are ripped off the wire.

We know enough about the natural life cycle of chickens to understand their requirements for a healthy life. We can choose to raise them from birth under artificial light, in impossibly crowded conditions, eating 'food' that no normal chicken would eat. I suppose the question is, if we accept this, are we fulfilling our obligation to another species? Is this how we would want to be treated by a more intelligent species, regardless of how intelligent we think we are? Or do we owe the responsibility of reasonable compassion to species that we happen to be able to control?

[Undertoad]

and I'll just start eating my blackened chicken caesar burrito from the burrito place,



and let's see what people have posted --

[orthodoc]

Originally Posted by Griff

Our gardening is improving, we're adding bees this Summer, and I'd like to come up with a pastured poultry system that works for me. Humanity in general? I don't know if they can keep breeding and expect to eat.

I also hope to add bees and pastured poultry. I'll get a donkey to defend the poultry.

As for humanity - the answer is that we can't expect to eat, at 9 billion by 2050 (or before), unless we drastically change our eating habits.

Why should we let Agribusiness/Big Food dictate our future? They certainly don't have our best interest in mind.

[glatt]

I don't know the answer. I support raising animals to eat them. But I think we should not cause them pain while doing that. I also think that we should not routinely treat livestock with antibiotics, but that's just because I think we should save them for human use. I don't think livestock could be kept in dirty conditions if antibiotic use was banned. So that would pretty much take care of the problem.

[orthodoc]

The trouble is that the 'protein product' companies have designed their operations to get their 'product' out the door as quickly and cheaply as possible. The means don't matter. So animals are raised in filthy, unbearable conditions and stuffed with antibiotics because they're sitting ducks for disease due to overcrowding, and mutilated because their conditions of living make them crazy. It doesn't matter to the corporation. These companies have enormous political clout and antibiotic use in food animals won't be banned anytime soon.

The only path to change is for we the consumers, who along with the animals suffer so that Agribusiness can profit, to vote with our wallets. And to demand better from our politicians. Our elected 'leaders' will only vote for a healthier food supply if we make it clear that they have more to gain from doing so than they have to lose. Conversely, that they have more to lose from failing to act.

We did it with tobacco; we can do it again. The stakes are even higher now.

[fargon]

We have just ordered our chickens for the year from the same Amish guy that we get our vegetables from. They are humanly raised and processed, as well as being organic and free range birds. They are quite good.

[Griff]

You da man fargon! How much more do you figure its costing you? Or is this a screw the cost this is how we eat thing?

[Clodfobble]

Originally Posted by Griff

Or is this a screw the cost this is how we eat thing?

This is our philosophy. Most of the time I don't have the energy to push for political change--I contributed to the GMO labeling law in Washington state, but it failed anyway--but we definitely vote with our wallets. We figure we actually come out ahead in the long run after all. Pay for the good food now, or pay for the shitty health later.

[monster]

scuse me, but chickens don't grow on trees. Ain't no poultry plants f'reals.





I'll be here all week, try the alligator. tastes lik------------------------

[xoxoxoBruce]

if you live close to the Amish it's not much if any more expensive. If you're buying as a tourist, rather than a local, it can get spendy.

As for humanity - the answer is that we can't expect to eat, at 9 billion by 2050 (or before), unless we drastically change our eating habits.

Naw, we could feed the world, not gruel or soylent either, good shit. The fly in the ointment is they can't afford to pay for it. Were no more benevolent with the third world than we are with chickens.

[Sundae]

I'm in the screw the cost this is how I eat camp.
I've eaten much more meat in the six weeks since I found out I was going to have to move, because I've been cooking for Mum & Dad. I'm close to being vegetarian when I'm on my own.

As far as I am aware, all of the meat I eat is farmed responsibly.
Eating misery is bound to make you miserable.
I feel terrible wasting any food, but I feel worst of all when we have to bin rotisserie chickens that have been on display for four hours. It's the law. But I hate it because that was a life and because that's pretty much a meal for a family just being discarded. I want to sell them for 1p, just so they're not wasted, but that devalues the brand. Apparently.

Braised pigs cheeks in cider tonight.
Which I will eat with a clear conscience.

[fargon]

Originally Posted by Griff

You da man fargon! How much more do you figure its costing you? Or is this a screw the cost this is how we eat thing?

We ordered 10 chickens @ $3.00 lb. They run about 3 to 4 pounds each.