Ye-HaMeat-type Chicken Pickin'
Broilers in a Factory Farm
(Photo from FarmSanctuary.org)
So, meat-type chickens, also known as broilers, must have a better life, right? After all, they can "turn around freely, lie down, stand up, and fully extend their limbs."
So here is the real life of a meat-type chicken on a factory farm.
Just like in egg production, chicks have the tips of their beaks cut or melted off. Here is a picture of broilers where you can clearly see their beak tips melted off.
Broilers with Melted Beaks
(Photo from FarmSanctuary.org)
Chicks are shipped from the hatcheries to the factory farms, frequently through the U.S. Mail. What??? We damn near fell out of our chairs when we uncovered that one. Maybe we need a commemorative stamp for the poultry industry. Somebody photoshop a stamp for us!!!!
It is legal to ship young birds through the mail, as long as they are under 24 hours old when presented for shipping, and delivered to the receiver within 72 hours. It is expected that many will die in route, but the losses are accepted by industry.
The chicks arrive at the factory farm and are crammed into long sheds where feed and water is delivered automatically through long pipes. The sheds are often kept dim becuase it makes the chickens less aggressive.
Giant fans circulate the ammonia produced by all of the manure in which they stand to the outside and draw in fresh. Close to the floor, however, where the chickens walk and lay the ammonia is strong. High ammonia levels cause painful skin and respiratory problems in the broilers, as well as pulmonary congestion, swelling, hemorrhage, and even blindness.[1]
Chicken manure used to be a prized fertilizer, but factory farms produce it in such large quantities it is considered toxic waste. Poultry waste has more than twice the concentration of pollutants per pound than cow or pig waste. The state of Maryland estimates that it produces 650 million pounds of chicken manure a year. They pile it in open fields where the rain washes it into the Chesapeake Bay. So much of it is washing into the Chesapeake Bay, one of the nation’s most polluted estuaries, that it's killing the seafood and ruining the fishing industry. The phosphorous and nitrogen levels causes algae to bloom which uses the oxygen and suffocates the fish and crabs. It is estimated that the crab population has dropped by 70%. [2]
Their stay in these horrid living conditions is thankfully short. Meat-type chickens have been bred to reach slaughter weight in just six short weeks.
Many suffer from crippled legs because their legs can not support their abnormally large body weight. The leading health problem caused by fast growth is the high rate of leg disorders causing crippling and painful lameness. [3]
Broilers now grow so rapidly that the heart and lungs are not developed well enough to support the remainder of the body, resulting in congestive heart failure and tremendous death losses.[4]
They frequently can not support their own weight and are thus condemned to lie in their own feces and possibly starve or dehydrate to death. Is it more profitable to grow the biggest bird and have increased mortality....Simple calculations suggest that it is better to get the weight and ignore the mortality.[5]
Broilers may be labeled "free-range" if they have U.S. Department of Agriculture-certified access to the outdoors. No other criteria are necessary. There may be only one small opening at the end of a large shed, permitting only a few birds to go outside to a dirt lot at any given time.
Organic farming ins't any better. This is the exact text from the living conditions requirement, "Access to the outdoors, shade, shelter, exercise areas, fresh air, and direct sunlight suitable to the species, its stage of production, the climate, and the environment."
When they are ready for slaughter, farm workers grab them by their wings and feet, often times causing dislocated and broken hips, legs, and wings, as well as internal hemorrhages, and shove them into crates, bring them outside for the first time in six weeks, and load them onto open trucks. They receive no food or water from this point forward. They are not protected from the elements, such as sun, heat, cold, and freezing rain. Some chickens die from suffocation, heat, or just freeze to death. Others suffer bruises, broken bones, and sometimes mortality. Chickens find transport a fearful, stressful, injurious and even fatal procedure.[6]
When they arrive at the slaughterhouse, they are unloaded either by hand or forklift and brought to the assembly line where they are shackled by their feet and hung upside down on a conveyor line. One study found a 44-percent increase in newly broken bones following shackling.[7] We are wondering why we've never seen broken bones in chicken that we have purchased.
Some slaughterhouses run the chicken's heads through an electric water bath to electrocute them into paralysis, although they don't get 100% of them since the chickens are struggling and sometimes miss the bath. Even when stunned many are still conscious because the slaughter houses don't want to use too much electricity because it damages the carcasses.
The next stage is the throat cutter designed to cut their throats, kill, and bleed them. This isn't 100% either and the throat cutter misses some chickens. The problems associated with inefficient neck cutting are only too common in poultry processing plants.[8]
The next step is the scalding bath for feather removal. If a chicken is still alive at this point it is scalded alive. Since it's blood is still in it's body, it's skin turns red. These are known as "redskins."
What can you do? Keep informed and vote with your wallet. If at all possible, buy your chicken from local farmer’s markets or from local non-factory farm producers with whom you can talk about their practices. Avoid eating chicken in restaurants unless they purchase from farms where chicken is raised and slaughtered humanely. Eschew fast food restaurants.
There are almost two million farms in the USA. About 80% of those are small farms, and a large percentage are family owned. More and more of these farmers are now selling their products directly to the public. They do this via CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) programs, Farmers' Markets, Food Coops, u-picks, farm stands, and other direct marketing channels.
Google for Farmer's Markets and farms in your area. Also try the key words CSA, pastured, and "share program." www.buylocalfood.com helps you locate these and has a host of other helpful resources as well.
45 Days: The Life and Death of a Broiler Chicken:
(The higher quality original can be found here: Compassion Over Killing)
Part 1
Part 2
Find out just how humane chicken slaughter really is:
DATA REFERENCES:
1. Berg C, “Foot-Pad Dermatitis in Broilers and Turkeys,” Veterinaria 36 (1998)
2. The New York Times, November 29, 2008
3. Leeson S, Diaz G, and Summers JD, Poultry Metabolic Disorders and Mycotoxins (Guelph, Canada: University Books, 1995); Julian RJ, “Rapid Growth Problems: Ascites and Skeletal Deformities in Broilers,” Poultry Science 77 (1998): 1773-80.
4. Martin D, “Researcher Studying Growth-Induced Diseases in Broilers,” Feedstuffs, May 26, 1997.
5. Tabler GT, Mendenhall AM, “Broiler Nutrition, Feed Intake and Grower Economics,” Avian Advice 5(4) (Winter 2003): 8–10.
6. Webster A, “Thermal Stress on Chickens in Transit,” British Poultry Science 34 (1993): 267–77.
7. Gregory NG and Wilkins LJ, “Broken Bones in Chickens: Effects of Stunning and Processing in Broilers,” British Poultry Science 31 (1990): 53-8.
8. Gregory NG, “Humane Slaughter,” Outlook on Agriculture 20 (1991): 95–101.
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