No Nonsense, chickens are livestock, advise. Tell me like it is.

[top of the hill]

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Well said.

Agreed.

 

[real_redhead]

Love this thread!

 

[zrossk]

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No. A normal human being would find it hard to murder a defensless animal for sport. Killing an animal for food isn't "easy", it's just part of the process. If you don't want to process your own - don't. If you've decided to, be it chickens or any other livestock, killing the animal for processing is just something you have to do. Done correctly, this can be with great respect for that animal.

True, that is why i am changing one of his tips he has learned from this forum that killing chickens is easy. You just agreed with me that it is not easy.

 

[Fred's Hens]

Easy? as in mentally for the human? Or, easy, as in simple or straightforward? There may be a couple of issues intertwined here.

 

[zrossk]

As in mentally.

 

[Anna_MN]

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I agree with your dog comment, however my dog is a 4 1/2 year old lab that has never been exposed to chickens and she loves them to death! She herds them into their coop if they get too far away and they love pecking the flies off her legs in the summer time. All we had to do was put her on a leash and showed her that they are friends NOT food. She only chased a chicken once, but when it started squaking she stopped. Be a good owner and show the dog who is boss and the difference between right and wrong!

 

[wsmith]

If I am not mistaken, the OP was referring to the actual process, not the mental preparation:

"6. Chickens are food. It isn't hard to kill a chicken, pluck it, clean it, and cook it. Plus, it tastes much better than store bought."

It takes preparation, both in facilities and tools, but also mental preparation as well. Taking a life for food is one thing, killing for "fun" is another. As a youngster, we would "process" birds en mass, up to 30-50 in a day. It was a family job, and everyone had his/her assignment. (mine was usually catch, pluck and clean) It usually got put off a couple of times before jumping in and doing it, especially if a favorite old hen was involved. Never really pleasant, but a necessary part of farm life. We relied on the chickens for a large portion of our food supply, along with eggs, and usually a steer. I don't ever remember buying meat as a kid. If the chicken owner raises the chickens for the purposes of meat and eggs, and has kept that in mind the whole time, it is easier. My dad was always reminding me that the chickens, calves, sheep, ducks, etc were livestock and to not get attached to them, as it would make the whole experience harder when the inevitable time came.

Just my 2 cents.

 

[bobbi-j]

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Yes, it can be if one is prepared for it. You have to know from the beginning that the chickens you are about to butcher are for that purpose. Now, I'm not saying that we approach this gleefully. My husband was raised here on the farm where animals were for food purposes only. Cows supplied milk and meat, chickens supplied eggs and meat. They were not pets. I was raised in a suburb of Minneapolis. It was a little harder for me to take this approach, but I've learned. It's easier if you don't name them. Never name your food. Where I was struggling with your statement, "A normal human being would find it hard to kill any defensless animal." is that it doesn't sound like a tip. It sounds judgemental. If you want to call that a "tip", maybe you could say, "It might be hard for people to butcher (kill, cull, you fill in the blank) their chickens because they may become attached." I know you don't have chickens, and that you love the idea of them. I'm glad you're here learning everything you can about them. But you have to look at it from many different perspectives, and you will learn to do that as you get older. (I know from some of your other posts that you're still quite young) I will tell you one other thing. If you lived anywhere near me, I'd be happy to lease or loan you a chicken for a 4-H project. My sons were all involved in 4-H, one of them even showed chickens. Unfortunately, you live way too far away for that. Sorry, I'm rambling here. Just trying to explain how things work for some people. Maybe more than you know...

 

[cobrien]

Chickens are food to many people.
Dogs are food to some people in other cultures.
Chickens and dogs are pets to some people. To think of dogs as food make many people flinch at the thought. For some, the same applies to the thought of chickens as food.
The personal and spiritual beliefs of people should be respected whether they choose to eat animals or not.
The most important thing is to treat all animals and humans with kindness and respect.

 

[zrossk]

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