[iandwk]

Originally Posted by K9-Lovers

iandwk, Excellent post. Thank you.

However, no matter how well the chicken Factory Farm Facility is run, the facts remain:

overcrowded, causing disease, fighting, cannibalism
treated with antibiotics and hormones, therefore in our meat
no sunlight, artificial "fresh air"
live in their own waste
many cannot support their excess weight and cannot move
grow so fast that their lungs and heart do not keep up
this is not the environment God intended for these creatures
treated viciously by collectors, often breaking legs & wings
this produces meat that is not high quality

the food industry workers are exploited

and finally, VAST IMPROVEMENT IS NEEDED

I will answer these as honestly as I can.
They aren't overcrowded. I guess if you put humans in a comparably small area, we would feel that way, but the chickens grow and thrive and are therefore not stressed about it. I say not stressed because a stressed animal of any kind does not stay healthy and will not grow to its fullest capacity, but would be stunted and useless. You have to remember to include all factors when making a decision. By human standards, stressful, yes. But animals are not human. If we expected them to feel what we feel, how unrealistic would that be? Everything is done to produce the largest bird possible with the least amount of feed. Stress would hinder that goal.

What diseases do they cause by being raised in a poultry house? Again, that would be counterproductive to profit, which drives this industry. Are there diseases out there that could decimate a flock? Yes, of course. That is why the grower does his best to keep them healthy and give them every opportunity to fight off a disease if it gets introduced somehow

Fighting? When I raised roosters, they would square off occasionally, but having not yet developed spurs never did any damage to one another. If you want to see roosters fight, put 2 of them around any bunch of hens anywhere.

Cannibalism. Yes, they are cannibalistic. If you leave behind a carcass on your daily rounds, they will peck at it, but I have never seen one completely devoured, even in a house of 30,000 fully grown chickens. If the grower does his job, that won't happen. There is a disease that hit some houses that I knew of back in the early 90's called dermatitis. When one died, the others would reportedly devour it, but that is the exception, not the rule.

Antibiotics and hormones. I honestly don't know for sure what the integrators put in their feed. Each one mixes their own. I always heard their was growth hormone, but I have no concrete knowledge of this. I wouldn't be shocked if it were true. I do know that I grew a 3.5 pound live weight chicken in 37 days. After processing the chicken would likely weigh about 2-2.5 pounds, not much bigger than a Cornish hen. That was the market I grew for. Ryan's restaurant chain wanted a half breast weighing about 4 ounces, and that's what I grew. Cornish hens, btw, are the same breeds as what we all grew. The law requires that they have a strain from the Cornish gene, which all have nowadays. Just another way to get you to pay a lot of money for not much product.

No sunlight. Tyson uses black curtains and no sunlight is allowed in. The integrator I grew for before Tyson (Cargill) had clear curtains and we always had sunlight. What is the difference between incandescent light and sunlight to a chicken? I don't know. Maybe you can educate me on that one.

Fresh air. I don't know how you would get artificial fresh air. The fronts of the houses have cooling pads that outside air is drawn through and exhausted out the rear. Each of my houses had 9 1hp fans to do the job. It was like standing in a wind tunnel. The air came from outside, so I always assumed it to be fresh air. I don't even understand the term "artificial" fresh air.

They do live in their own waste. They also eat it if they don't have enough food. A healthy chicken deposits a pile of almost dry fecal matter mixed with the familiar white streak, which is its urea. A modern poultry house has so much air flow that it dries the feces out very quickly and it becomes powder. Is it slimy and gooey? No, it dries quickly and becomes powdery. Caking can become a problem in the winter when you try to regulate the air flow so as not to break the farm budget with propane bills, but with experience a farmer learns how to avoid most of it. Some caking is inevitable. I always shoveled dry litter over it to keep the chickens away because it can breed bacteria.

They do pretty good supporting their weight. There are some that become lame in a leg due to lack of tendon growth. The lame ones are culled out. If you don't they get runted, yet still eat the same amount of feed. They would eventually die because they can't get to the feed or the water, which is raised to allow the chickens to get to them at a comfortable angle as they grow. The runts can't get to either, so they are culled. By culled, I mean killed, destroyed, slaughtered, murdered, or whatever tag you may want to put on it. It really isn't much different than putting a lame horse out of its misery. The death of choice for a chicken is a broken neck. As I said in an earlier post, the mortality is not as high as you would think. 1-2% is normal. I did occasionally go as high as 4% a time or two.

Heart attacks were the most common cause of mortality. I don't know for sure if they are caused by their growth or just normal numbers in that large a population. Maybe 300 maximum out of 30,000. It wouldn't surprise me to learn that it is because of their rapid growth. I have no concrete knowledge of that, only rumors I have heard.

As far as being treated viciously by the catchers, I refer to the statement that I have made in other posts. Why would an integrator allow them to damage their product and cut profit. It makes no sense. Watching them being caught may be considered vicious, I guess. When it was done by hand they would grab them by a leg and get 4 in each hand and put them in cages. Nowadays they use automation. They are picked up by machine and conveyed into cages. I'm sure there is some loss due to catching, but it isn't as great as what your post suggests. As a grower I never heard much about that aspect of the business. The loss, if any, was completely the integrator's. We were paid according to the weight of the chickens on the truck before they offloaded them, dead or alive. I believe government regulations require an injured chicken to be destroyed and not sold for consumption. I may be wrong about that. They may just be required to remove the injured portion and discard it. If you ever buy one that has a broken limb, you can tell if it was done before slaughter by the meat. If it is bloody, it was done prior to slaughter. If not, it was broken after death.

Did I feel exploited? Monetarily, yes, which was the reason we left the business. Do they exploit others? Monetarily, yes. Minimum wage is the norm for most of the processing plant workers. This is Tyson I am referring to. I have little direct knowledge of the other integrators. I have a friend in North Georgia who grows for Pilgrim's Pride. He is paid 1.5 cents more per pound than Tyson pays. I grew an average of 1,000,000 per year at 3.7 pounds. Multiply all of that times 1.5. I would be making 55,500 more per year and probably still be in the business.

Just one question. Do you consider what I did a factory farm? I owned it and operated it. I grew the chickens to the best of my ability with help from my county extension agent when needed and help from Tyson field reps, but the chickens were my responsibility. If they had all died due to my negligence, I would have still had to pay all my bills. Tyson owned and operated their breeder houses, which I would consider factory farms.

As I have said, I am not trying to defend anything. I am telling you the way it is. All this talk about roosters being useless and some of the other statements that have been made are not coming from facts, but from inflammatory filmmakers and columnists, and perhaps others with an agenda. As I said before, I grew roosters for 2 years. How could I have done that if they destroyed all of them? I know they were roosters because they had wattles and they grew much faster and larger than pullets. Tyson currently trucks their roosters to farms in Jacksonville, unless they have changed since I got out of the business. They are definitely edible, and if you buy lunchmeats or dine out and get chicken, or buy the huge leg quarters that occasionally go on sale at the grocers, then you have probably eaten roosters. You don't have to take my word for it. It's easily checked out, but don't check with PETA or filmmakers. Check at the source, and get with your county agent and go and see for yourself. If I am not mistaken there are poultry houses in Gainesville. I'd be glad to go with you if you want to arrange it.