calling any one from missouri

[shawluvsbirds]

thats about as cruel as it gets honestly.I spent 5 years living on a commercial chicken farm

edit, they use this crazy giant vacuum cleaner thing to suck up the chickens when they catch them now, seems like it would not be fun if you were a chicken

 

[SueT]

What's the benefit of grinding? Why not just kill them the old fashioned way?

I think I won't google it.....

 

[1cock2hens]

oh wow...and do the hatcheries really grind up the excess male chicks?

they definitely used to, I would guess they still do since missouri passed the right to farm bill that protected all the traditional ways of doing things. It's just a quick and easy ay to make chicken meal for dogfood etc, if you kill them first it's an extra step. extra steps = extra time= extra money

 

[jeria]

UGGG, grinding chicks, how awful. Commercial chicken farms are something else. I used to know someone who got into it years ago to save his family farm. He was concerned about his animals though and wasn't that happy with how many others treated their birds. He wouldn't crowd them as much as the company wanted him to and kept his several chicken barns as clean as he could. He sanitized the barns after each batch of broilers was shipped off. I found the system of growing them fascinating but rather cruel to the young birds. The individual growers are tied with contracts to follow the way the company wanted things done.

We actually had some big parties in the empty barns, once they were cleaned of course.

 

[1cock2hens]

yeah a foreman stops by a couple times a week when you commercially raise, checks your computers, weighs birds, does ozone testing and water readings. They give you little notes to try new things or go back to the old way of doing things. they are all up in your business when you raise broilers.
I thought the broilers had the life honestly. It's not like they are living years in those conditions, they live to be 6/7 weeks old and spoiled almost the entire time. Happy birds eat, get fat and make the farmers money. broilers are kept with ample feed, space, some broiler houses have large windows, we used to leave the big doors open on the ends of the houses for days and the chickens didnt ever even get out, it was like an invisible wall right at the exit lol.

 

[jthornton]

One commercial raiser east of me told the "company" why do it your way, I raise more birds than you do in your barns...

JT

 

[jeria]

The big chicken barns were amazing. This was in the 90"s so not computerized yet. They did have lots of ventilation, huge windows and automatic fans that clicked on or could be turned on manually. He scooped out the poop with a front loader after the chickens were trucked away and it was spread on his fields. If they let the broilers live very long they would be too heavy for their legs to allow them to move. They were of course bred for huge breasts and quick weight gain.

 

[SueT]

It's snowing here....

 

[1cock2hens]

The big chicken barns were amazing. This was in the 90"s so not computerized yet. They did have lots of ventilation, huge windows and automatic fans that clicked on or could be turned on manually. He scooped out the poop with a front loader after the chickens were trucked away and it was spread on his fields. If they let the broilers live very long they would be too heavy for their legs to allow them to move. They were of course bred for huge breasts and quick weight gain.

my firs texperiences were in houses around 96' but i have been in very old houses that were still in commercial use, they added computers and most of the automated tech in the early 2000's, other the that the chicken houses have not really changed. some companies prefer you use a specific style of house like simmons wants tunnel houses with only vents up at the top of the walls, an evaporative cooler system on one end of the house and 10 giant high powered fans on the end while some companies like georges would let you use older style housed with the curtains and fans distributed evenly around the houses. when I first helped with broilers they averaged 8 weeks old at butcher by the end a lot of the time they picked them up at about 6.5 weeks. they always left a few behind and we would give them to my cousin, some of them would live a couple years with his regular flock running around free ranging, none ever had leg problems but they did have random heart attacks and often laid wrinkly eggs. We sold the poop, people paid us to come and take it )

I would like an old chicken house to turn in to a greenhouse. just roll curtains down, strip the sheet metal and put up some vinyl or something

 

[jeria]

It's snowing here....

We had about 2 inches and the roads in my neighborhood are really slick and it's dang cold.