- Jun 29, 2012
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As an evangelical pastor (meaning, conservative--but not fundamentalist, nor am I liberal in all my understandings of the Bible), I see everyone's concerns here and it concerns myself also as a chicken/pheasant person. We raise eggs for eating, but we only order straight runs in getting new chicks. This, to me, gives ME the responsibility and not the hatchery in disposing of males as needed. When I say "dispose", what I really mean is utilize, and for us as Christians with a decidedly "green" take on environmental and animal husbandry issues, we utilize the males in three different ways: 1) we keep some of them for the hens. Our hens seem to do better with a male or two around that makes them feel "afe", I'm not sure why but they do act like groupies with the big red rooster in their midst, so much so we named one of them Justin Bieber and another Steven Tyler (for all the Aerosmith fans out there). I also know when I watched cartoons as a kid, Foghorn Leghorn was ALWAYS in the midst of the hens protecting his cartoon flock from Henry Hawk...
2) We use them as free range bug control. We choose the BEST for breeding back to our hens when it comes to the bantam and "purty" birds we have, but instead of putting down all those unwanted silkie roosters, red jungle fowl, and old english bantams for instance--they have their own small coop next to the eggers pen wherein they come and go every morning and night, looking for wild food. With coyotes, red foxes, hawks, etc--we DO lose some now and then, which in the name of feeding the wild-life I put up with to a certain extent. (if the coyotes get too friendly, then sometimes a coyote joins the circle of life per my .30.30...) Most of the time, these roosters simply leave each other alone, mix it up with the ducks out and about, and often end up traveling into the nearby corn field with the guinea flock. They do go feral here in Northeastern Colorado...
3) We eat them. If you ever saw the old TV show Home Improvement, there was an episode where the three young boys were not being very thankful to their parents for supper and lunch fixins...their neighbor, the venerable Wilson, took Tim aside and explained the boys had lost the respect for food as they no longer had to hunt their quarry. So, donning a turkey in hand, the boys "hunted" the turkey as Tim ran around the living room with it and eventually the barbarous kiddos "killed" their meal. While I don't do that, necessarily, I DO think if someone is going to enjoy meat they better learn not only HOW its killed but HOW TO KILL IT. If you cannot stand the sight of preparing a chicken with bleeding, plucking, gutting, etc. you are questionable in my eyes at least as to how much you respect that animal for what it is giving you. My kids watch my 68 year old mom and myself butcher the chickens (and at times pheasants or even guineas --sometimes the guineas end up getting hit on the road, rather than letting them go to waste, I dispatch them and cook up a pheasant-type roast for the fam) and due to the fact they can watch, they can eat later also. They do NOT take enjoyment in the process, but are taught to respect the value of life and the reality of death when it comes to our use of meat as a food. Our oldest daughter, however, does not eat meat other than chicken. I don't know what kind of vegatarianism you could call that or carnivorism for that matter--but she understands the process of butchering the chicken, respects it, and can deal with it. For bovine or pork products she says there is too much behind the eyes for her to deal with in eating it, and I as her father and pastor agree with her--if it cannot be eaten respectfully in faith, this then is a stumbling block and should be avoided.
Do we force our younger kids to watch? absolutely not. It is there choice 100% up until they are teenagers at 14 or 15. Then, at that point, we expect them to be old enough to understand where their food comes from, even milk and eggs. Anyhow, this is a long story..LONG...but I hope it can explain and maybe help someone to understand what you can do to both treat unwanted fowl as humanely as possible in several different ways. We live on three acres, with lots of weeds, trees I have planted (the neighbors accuse me of taking a "beautiful neat-freak style homestead" and turning it into the "garbage dump of Weldon Valley"--so be it, we have lots of scrub brush but we do have happy birds, and lots of quail, pheasant, and squirrel seeking shelter here!).
2) We use them as free range bug control. We choose the BEST for breeding back to our hens when it comes to the bantam and "purty" birds we have, but instead of putting down all those unwanted silkie roosters, red jungle fowl, and old english bantams for instance--they have their own small coop next to the eggers pen wherein they come and go every morning and night, looking for wild food. With coyotes, red foxes, hawks, etc--we DO lose some now and then, which in the name of feeding the wild-life I put up with to a certain extent. (if the coyotes get too friendly, then sometimes a coyote joins the circle of life per my .30.30...) Most of the time, these roosters simply leave each other alone, mix it up with the ducks out and about, and often end up traveling into the nearby corn field with the guinea flock. They do go feral here in Northeastern Colorado...
3) We eat them. If you ever saw the old TV show Home Improvement, there was an episode where the three young boys were not being very thankful to their parents for supper and lunch fixins...their neighbor, the venerable Wilson, took Tim aside and explained the boys had lost the respect for food as they no longer had to hunt their quarry. So, donning a turkey in hand, the boys "hunted" the turkey as Tim ran around the living room with it and eventually the barbarous kiddos "killed" their meal. While I don't do that, necessarily, I DO think if someone is going to enjoy meat they better learn not only HOW its killed but HOW TO KILL IT. If you cannot stand the sight of preparing a chicken with bleeding, plucking, gutting, etc. you are questionable in my eyes at least as to how much you respect that animal for what it is giving you. My kids watch my 68 year old mom and myself butcher the chickens (and at times pheasants or even guineas --sometimes the guineas end up getting hit on the road, rather than letting them go to waste, I dispatch them and cook up a pheasant-type roast for the fam) and due to the fact they can watch, they can eat later also. They do NOT take enjoyment in the process, but are taught to respect the value of life and the reality of death when it comes to our use of meat as a food. Our oldest daughter, however, does not eat meat other than chicken. I don't know what kind of vegatarianism you could call that or carnivorism for that matter--but she understands the process of butchering the chicken, respects it, and can deal with it. For bovine or pork products she says there is too much behind the eyes for her to deal with in eating it, and I as her father and pastor agree with her--if it cannot be eaten respectfully in faith, this then is a stumbling block and should be avoided.
Do we force our younger kids to watch? absolutely not. It is there choice 100% up until they are teenagers at 14 or 15. Then, at that point, we expect them to be old enough to understand where their food comes from, even milk and eggs. Anyhow, this is a long story..LONG...but I hope it can explain and maybe help someone to understand what you can do to both treat unwanted fowl as humanely as possible in several different ways. We live on three acres, with lots of weeds, trees I have planted (the neighbors accuse me of taking a "beautiful neat-freak style homestead" and turning it into the "garbage dump of Weldon Valley"--so be it, we have lots of scrub brush but we do have happy birds, and lots of quail, pheasant, and squirrel seeking shelter here!).
I got chickens in April and for the first time Processed a chicken! Had 10 CX. Was really anxious to do it 'right' so my birds wouldn't suffer any more than I could help. But LOVE knowing that my chicken is fresh and not pumped full of junk that isn't good for us (or them). Now if the pullets would start laying eggs I would be eggstatic! Could the leghorns be 'fried' or should I just use them as soup stock etc.....?
