How do you live with yourself eating the birds you raised?

[glassparman]

Wow, what can I say that hasn't already been said??

I raise mine for food; both eggs and chicken. They are not my pets but I am friendly with them and they love to jump up on me when I come in to feed. They can free range when I'm home and have good living conditions. But they are food not pets.

I must say though, one of my older (4+) chickens seemed to be sick so I removed her to her own space. I went in to check on her last week and she could barely lift her head. I laid her on her side and she stayed there. I knew she was going to die and when I looked her in her eyes she looked back at me as if to say that it was OK to put her down. She did not fight it and went quickly. It was a little hard for me to do that because I had her for over 4 years but . . I did take her out to the desert (I live in the desert) and put her by a tree where she could be food for a local coyote. She was gone the next morning.

The point is it's all part of the circle of life and a natural order of things. I firmly believe that GOD created some creatures to survive as food for other creatures. But I still have a humane way of treating them.

 

[PunkinPeep]

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I have sat down to a meal with a sincerely Christian family and listened as they said grace. Their grace includes something like "thank you, father, for providing the food we are about to eat." If their meat was commercially raised in what might be considered poor conditions, does this mean that they are wrong? That is: is it something other than God that provided the meat? If it was God, why did he use such conditions to raise the meat? If those conditions are good enough for God, why aren't they good enough for you?

I am not going to get into an argument about this, and i certainly am thankful to God for any sustenance i am provided. However, as i learn more and more about His creatures are treated, i desire more to eat animals that were treated well during their lives.

 

[TennesseeTruly]

Being raised a city girl in NY I just couldn't fathom someone killing their own food and eating it...(isn't that what grocery stores are for?) Now that I live in the south in the country and raise my own poultry, I understand completely. I used to cry when I saw a deer tied to the back of someone's pickup. Now I think "they're providing for their family". It's a whole different mentality.

I know for me that I know where my food is coming from. I raise my birds, most from an egg. I treat them with the utmost care and dignity and even love. And when it's time to take their lives for our meals, then I thank them for their sacrifice. Its just that way.

Some can't do it and that's fine. It's not a money issue or a convenience issue because we all know that when chicken's on sale at rock bottom prices, its more cost effective and convenient to jump into our car and purchase that chicken. But it's about knowing where my food came from and knowing what we're putting in our body!

Laurie

 

[ChickieBooBoo]

Heres how I think about it, you hatch or raise chicks for meat. You give them a good life, living the way a chicken is supposed to live. You love them and give them a good life until fall. THEN you go to the store and get a store bought chicken that was tortured its whole life, was killed cruely and humiliated its whole life. Which chicken would you rather eat? Do you want to support the commercial industry? Or backyard farming?

 

[lacasitarojafarm]

Quote:

So true. We raise cornish for meat. 100 plus each year. You *don't* love them. In fact you cant wait until week 20. Araucancas/Ameraucanas, Orps and Br for eggs. You get attached sometimes. I cried when an eagle took away and ate two of our Orps. Those were the first birds of the year and SO TAME. We had too many roosters, no problem with putting them in stew it was delicious. Different birds have different purposes and maybe I am not that sensitive ?

 

[Brunty_Farms]

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I would understand and agree if the OP ate chicken and just couldn't process her own. I get the reality of coming to grips to kill something you raised, it takes a special person to do it. Most of society can not and I understand why. However to completely stop eating chicken because you have one as a pet is a little extreme don't you think? This just illustrates our society as a whole and shows us how extremely out of touch we are with reality. It goes back to those pretty little packages at the store. That's not meat, but the notion of meat.

To the OP.... I understand if you're a vegetarian. I have plenty of vegan and vegetarian customers that don't eat meat and they have their reasons which I totally respect. So if you are in fact vegetarian, disregard my comments as I totally understand. Many people just can't come to grips of killing any animal for meat and that's ok. Or if you're not, and eat meat, then I'm a bit lost. If you eat beef or pork than like I said earlier that's an animals life that you're taking. So it's almost as if you contradict yourself about not eating a chicken because you couldn't take it's life, regardless of whether you did it or someone else,because of the fact that it reminds you of your pet(s).

And if you're really trying to overcome eating chicken, than good for you. You're supposed to feel sad when you process, it's just part of it. You're feeding your family with good, clean meat. Why process your own? Read the last 8 pages and people have already told you.

 

[lacasitarojafarm]

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It's interesting and touching that you would provide food for the trickster that most consider a pest.

For most of our time here on earth animal protein was a luxury. It was either for those who could hunt and kill their own food or their extended family/friends. You can survive and thrive on a vegetarian diet. Now with CAFO's and factory farms that produce very cheap meat and eggs everyone can afford animal protein. However, IMHO eggs and meat (including chicken and farmed fish) from the store is just gross on many levels and I can't see eating it or worse, having my chidlren eat it.

 

[ChickieBooBoo]

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I agree,

 

[Illia]

Hmm. Well I guess I'm a little different from others here. . . I raise and eat my own chickens because I do find chicken tasty, but also because I want humanely raised chicken as well as humanely BRED chicken. (I do not believe in Cornish X's even if you limit their food supply. . . It is disgusting to raise such a weak, unhealthy bird)

But, when I do raise them, I don't do it the way most others do - I don't have a meat flock, but instead all my extras and culls that don't get sold or I don't want to be sold will be raised just the same as the others. They won't have names, but they do get nicknames (blue-red, cull boy, Hades' brother, Wheaten guy, Silver Duckwing, etc) and I do spend time with them like any other. Some of them I do get attached to, too - But I know that their death will be quick and their lives were good, so what's the difference? All chickens die at somepoint . . . So why make their lives horrible by giving them rude names, not spending time with them, or raising them in a confined area?

Basically all my meat boys (I don't kill extra girls - I sell them) get raised in the bachelor pad or a separate bachelor pad if it there are too many in there, and they're fed, cared for, spent time with, and treated just like all the others - Then, when it is their time, it is their time. And nothing of them gets wasted. (if we or our animals won't eat a part, the crows will)

So, that's how I do it.

 

[PunkinPeep]

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I agree with this completely. All of my chickens may or may not get a name. But i have learned that if i treat a chicken like i'm going to keep it forever, i give it a better life. Everyone here is raised together too and treated the same.