McDonald's finally did something right

[Mac in Wisco]

Quote:
Well, what's pictured is hatching egg production versus table egg production, but that same system is typical of a modern, state of the art, cage free layer system.

OSUman, what do you see here? Do you view this as inhumane? Just curious as to your viewpoint.

 

[OSUman]

Quote:
Well, what's pictured is hatching egg production versus table egg production, but that same system is typical of a modern, state of the art, cage free layer system.

OSUman, what do you see here? Do you view this as inhumane? Just curious as to your viewpoint.

I think its needed because you cant feed the world on free range chickens.

 

[Mac in Wisco]

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I think that's a pretty nice system. It has manure belts to dry and remove manure from the house. It provides structure for the birds to run and jump and express their natural behaviors while building good muscle tone necessary for a healthy bird. The structure allows the birds to segregate themselves into groups and allow submissive birds to escape from the dominant ones.

But... I shy away from such systems, as they tend to look too "industrial" to the uninitiated consumer. I market organic eggs to consumers that expect a more traditional farm setting, so my hen house tends to emulate a large backyard coop with floor raised birds, perches, roosts, individual nest boxes, and green pasture.

 

[OSUman]

Quote:
I think that's a pretty nice system. It has manure belts to dry and remove manure from the house. It provides structure for the birds to run and jump and express their natural behaviors while building good muscle tone necessary for a healthy bird. The structure allows the birds to segregate themselves into groups and allow submissive birds to escape from the dominant ones.

But... I shy away from such systems, as they tend to look too "industrial" to the uninitiated consumer. I market organic eggs to consumers that expect a more traditional farm setting, so my hen house tends to emulate a large backyard coop with floor raised birds, perches, roosts, individual nest boxes, and green pasture.

Yea I used more of the backyard coop, Im down to just a few show breeder birds right now but hope to get into egg layers again soon. I have toured a battery cage system and also a breeder system and the one I visited looked alot better then any I have seen from the animal rights activists.

 

[deerman]

Quote:
Well, what's pictured is hatching egg production versus table egg production, but that same system is typical of a modern, state of the art, cage free layer system.

OSUman, what do you see here? Do you view this as inhumane? Just curious as to your viewpoint.

except egg production they have more hens in the barns like 128 hens per 4 feet.

Plus those breeder are better care for , giving more space.

 

[Mac in Wisco]

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As I said in my initial post, they selectively film things to get the desired response. There are groups that have done the same with backyard chickens. You can find essays online that tell you how inhumane this all is. It's fairly easy to paint a picture of amateur hobbyists that buy mostly female chicks (leaving the male chicks to be destroyed), haphazardly raising them in poor conditions that leave the birds out in the extremes of weather, exposed to predators and disease. If the birds manage to survive, many find that keeping chickens is too much work and not all it's cracked up to be so they dump them at local shelters where extra birds are becoming more and more of a problem.

Is there anything there that doesn't have some semblance of truth? It just doesn't tell the whole story, not unlike the story that influenced McDonald's to drop a multi-million dollar contract.

 

[deerman]

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I wouldn't go that far either... When you say "the birds" which birds are you talking about? Don't confuse backyard pets with a food production system that feeds hundreds of millions of people. There are varying degrees of what is considered humane that can be applied. At one extreme you find folks that believe that any use of animals for our own purposes is inhumane. At the other extreme you find those that lack any sort of empathy and abuse animals. Somewhere in between I think we can apply backyard pets and mass production models, although not necessarily to the same degree for each.

There is a lot more to a safe, ethical food production system than just letting chickens run around outside. Most backyard setups are lacking on immunization, biosecurity, rodent and pest control, and general food safety measures. All of these are things that need to taken into account when designing a production system that lets birds run willy-nilly outdoors.

Well guess i shouldn't say cruel, as far as backyard chicken , guess more like small egg producers...yes maybe i will catch heck for saying this...but alot of those mass production eggs are really safer than the small backyard flocks.

even from this forum you wll read , some don't worm their chickens of even feed them proper, then hear how some handle their eggs......


Mac i think we are on the same though on this subject.........i'm just not great on the way im posting

 

[OSUman]

heres a better example of cage free, from Big Dutchman

 

[Matthew3590]

What breed of chickens do the commercial farms use?

 

[deerman]

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ok now look at the hens with all the stain back feather ....my guess from ones above them craping on them.

my guess also those hens have not been there long either....just you know they are going to show the best pics. just like some of the caged ones.