Pullets at what cost? (...not in dollars and cents)

[junebuggena]

Ducks are no less prone to illness than chickens - and there's no less of need to cull a significant amount of males. If you have too many roosters, you'll have some beat up chickens. If you have too many drakes, they'll kill all your duck hens.


Killing chicks via grinder is quick, and pretty humane - and for hatcheries (and most people growing sustenance levels of meat) its not worth growing out a whole bunch of birds that will take 6-8 months to get to 3lbs - 4 months of which they'll spend crowing, harassing hens, and trying to kill each other. It's much more efficient to grind them up and ship them off to the pet food companies - dogs gotta eat too.

Right! It seems horrific, but they have to do something with them. And it isn't cost effective to raise them to butchering age; not when there are Cornish X available that go from incubator to table in less than 2 months.
At least by being made into dog food, they aren't being wasted.

 

[donrae]

I'm with the last few posters. I order sexed pullets from hatcheries cause I want specific female birds. I'm well aware of what happens to the male chicks there and I sleep just fine at night. Course, I also hatch sex link chicks and have culled my own male chicks. To some of you all that puts me on a level with the evil hatcheries. To me it's simply a management decision. I only have so much space. I do raise up some males to eat, we had chicken stir fry just last night provided by my incubator. But my production-type egger breeding projects really don't yield cockerels with much meat on them, most folks would say they're not worth butchering.

If you don't want to support a hatchery, don't order from one. I do know there are "no-kill" hatcheries out there, but can't recall the names right off....

 

[keesmom]

If you don't want to support a hatchery, don't order from one. I do know there are "no-kill" hatcheries out there, but can't recall the names right off....

Sand Hill Preservation is one. They do not sex chicks at all, so you really get straight run (unlike the major hatcheries). However if you are not allowed roosters that leaves you males you have to do something about.

Germany is supposedly developing a way to sex eggs at 3 days of incubation. It is far too slow at the moment to be a viable solution for the hatcheries, but may become better over time.

https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/1050059/has-anyone-been-following-the-sexing-of-eggs-from-a-lazer

Here I hatch my own birds. Extra cockerels, and sometimes extra pullets, go to the freezer as well as old hens. I usually raise a batch of Cornish X to add to the mix.

 

[popsicle]

Honestly, going vegan is probably the only way to avoid being a participant in the grinder-death of male chicks. Eat anything with eggs from a restaurant, bakery or store? Male chicks went in the grinder to provide those eggs. At least until that egg-sexing method is employed by all the commercial-egg-farm-chick-providers.

I don't think very highly of somebody that's going to disparage people from ordering a few pullets to provide eggs for their families, yet chow down on who-knows how many commercial eggs throughout the day.

 

[junebuggena]

Honestly, going vegan is probably the only way to avoid being a participant in the grinder-death of male chicks. Eat anything with eggs from a restaurant, bakery or store? Male chicks went in the grinder to provide those eggs. At least until that egg-sexing method is employed by all the commercial-egg-farm-chick-providers.

I don't think very highly of somebody that's going to disparage people from ordering a few pullets to provide eggs for their families, yet chow down on who-knows how many commercial eggs throughout the day.

You'd have to avoid feeding pet dogs and cats commercial dog food too.

 

[ShrekDawg]

You'd have to avoid feeding pet dogs and cats commercial dog food too.

I already do this, though not cause they kill male chicks, rather cause i find most foods found in the grocery stores atrocious for pets. I know some animals do well though so that's fine and I don't have a problem with it but mine didn't, especially my cat. I don't feed raw or any like specialty or organic food or $100/bag or anything like that but I do feed grain free and right now it's between around $50-60 for my dogs dry. The cat gets wet but I just bought her new dry. We switch every month. Right now they're both on Wellness CORE but I also buy Zignature for the dog. We used to also have Merrick, Earthborn Holistics, Canidae, Fromm, etc. And cheaper but still good brands In the mix but haven't lately. Moght add Merrick back. I find he does best on Wellness and Zignature though but he usually does well on most things. Canidae my dad and I found that he had much lower energy than usual so we tossed the remainder and ordered something different. But yeah. Sorry for rambling hahah although I wonder, I bet even these "better" brands get their meat from somewhere. I know Orijen and Acana (the $100+ bags, well, Acana is the cheaper of the 2. Same company. Also Canadian) in the most expensive formula uses wild boar and other such weird meats delivered to the factory regularly so that drives the price up but also makes it quality but these other ones with just chicken and such i guarantee they use factory chickens. Or if they raise their own probably use meat ones. Can't imagine they raise their own though. Too expensive. They probably use factory birds too. Although at least in that case the cockerels get used too so they're probably not throwing them in the grinder

 

[IdaClaire]

Yup, I suppose you could definitely call it hypocritical to eat eggs that flow out of the current industrial mindset if one has a concern about the baby cockerels. Don't think I agree with Crazytalk about it being humane to grind the cockerels on day one. Maybe if they were defective bolts or something inanimate...even though dogs do need to eat, and they are not currently vegetarians.

To take it a long step further (bear with me), are eggs for chickens (solely for reproduction) or for people? Is the milk cows produce for the calves or for people (a further extrapolation, given that calves in dairies are generally taken away from their mothers within days, which also seems harsh)? Can there be a little of both? Surely it can be so in a small farm situation.

Of course this calls into question the whole industrial farming system, where unbalanced mono-systems now rule the roost, and profit (the end) justifies the means -- sometimes in ugly ways. Thomas Jefferson saw the danger of this (not only in the arena of farming) and wrote out against it in his book Notes on the State of Virginia. And he wasn't primarily concerned about baby cockerels -- he was concerned about freedom, and that a people who could not provide for themselves on their own land could easily be manipulated into servitude. Most of us who are interested in backyard chickens certainly get that point.

I think the big problem is that, on the whole, we have the industrial system supplying small flock keepers/farms with chicks. That is probably where the breakdown occurs. It could be perceived as a values mismatch (depending, of course, on the keeper of the flock).

To dig deeper still, in the beginning of creation people only ate plants and what they produced. The eggs were for the chickens, the milk was for the calves, and things were perfect. It took a serpent in the garden and a desire "to be like God" that threw an ugly wrench called sin in the works -- and now we live in a world that includes death in its many forms. This is why we struggle with what doesn't seem right, because we have a yearning for the perfection that was and is no more.

The consumption of animals was permissible after the flood (the flood itself being the result of even more sin), presumably because the wrecked environment wouldn't support life as abundantly as it once did. It was another pivot point. But even if the Creator allowed using animals for food so long ago, it still wrenches some of us inside. Not all, but certainly some -- even if we know that's the way it is nowadays. We still long for Eden.

I realize that there are those who do not adhere to a Christian view of creation and the world, and certainly they are entitled to have and express that view -- and may kindly oppose my thoughts. But I do think in some humble way these thoughts express the reality of the world we now live in, and may explain the angst some of us have when baby cockerels meet a meat grinder, or when we hear of or see anything out of sorts in the world. We all have to make choices based on our values.

For me, at the moment, I think that means finding hatching eggs or birds from a small farm or homestead in my local area. For the most part it avoids direct interaction with the industrial system, and it supports folks who have the same convictions. I am sure there are holes in my reasoning if it's prodded far enough, but it's a choice I can be at peace with right now in an imperfect world.

 

[CrazyTalk]

Yup, I suppose you could definitely call it hypocritical to eat eggs that flow out of the current industrial mindset if one has a concern about the baby cockerels. Don't think I agree with Crazytalk about it being humane to grind the cockerels on day one. Maybe if they were defective bolts or something inanimate...even though dogs do need to eat, and they are not currently vegetarians.

What is your argument for it not being humane?

They're dead literally instantly - no pain, no suffering.


Also, could we not get into religious rants on this forum - that stuff isn't allowed.

 

[ShrekDawg]

I got a message earlier about my other thread (you responded, the one about the video of chicks and stupid cow thing) how talking about animal rights groups or cock fighting wasn't allowed which, i mean, I'm not mad about, been here 7 years and haven't read the rules since and maybe they changed, so i should have read up and known, but my point with saying this is at least with our thread it remained civil and people learned (at least I think so? Do you thinkit did?) Yet it seems that this thread and one other similar one are starting to get slightly heated. Not saying you specifically but referring to their post as well as you saying religion not being allowed. Ot reminded me of that.

What is your argument for it not being humane?

They're dead literally instantly - no pain, no suffering.



Also, could we not get into religious rants on this forum - that stuff isn't allowed.

 

[ShrekDawg]

But i dont know, what do you think?