The Natural Chicken Keeping thread - OTs welcome!

[mlowen]

Well, it didn't have anything to do with chickens (except in the sense that it has to do with every living thing on the planet), and I tend to go on and on about things I care a lot about.  So sometimes I go on too long for people who aren't as interested, and it's hard for me to tell when I've hit that point!

I love the info! AND being a grown up and all, I can skim/skip anything I don't want to read. Keep it coming, Chaos and LM!!

 

[tjo804]

What does Natural Chicken keeping mean? No store grain/layer pellets?

Not at all it just means not in a factory or treating with Chemicals. I do believe.

There is Tons of information here and Friendly Knowledgeable people You will learn a lot about chicken keeping and you are allowed to do what you believe *natural* to be.
Not all of us are set up to where we can keep chickens without store support.

 

[superdeluxe]

Oh okay thanks! Yeah, pretty much our girls get layer pellets and then just free range all day. They don't typically eat much of the layer pellets because I'm guessing they are getting their fill from foraging!

 

[Leahs Mom]

Oh okay thanks! Yeah, pretty much our girls get layer pellets and then just free range all day. They don't typically eat much of the layer pellets because I'm guessing they are getting their fill from foraging!

That's wonderful!

 

[Jewelwing]

I think when you see the talk about FDA labeling chicken or beef as not GMO free they are talking more about the feed that the animal is receiving. If you are feeding a feed that is labeled GMO free then your chicken will then be GMO free. The same with your cattle and beef.

Yes, that's how they would label the meat, if they ever get around to actually doing that. It's not so much the plants' modified (engineered) genes the animals are eating that we worry about, but that these plants are sprayed with such huge amounts of Roundup. Then the Roundup gets in the animals, and then in us. And they are far from harmless.

Just as you'd keep the jug of Roundup away up on a shelf away from your toddler, we should all worry just the same about feeding meat contaminated with it to our children. The amounts are not minute, and they have major consequences. So, yeah, I'd like to know if it's in the meat I'm buying or not. For the people who disagree that it's a problem, they are still free to buy that meat. Why should there even be a controversy about it?

I'm going based off of the technical definition of genetically modified organism. Just because the implied GMO meaning (in the media) is of "laboratory altered DNA" that doesn't mean the actual definition of GMO is that. Anything that has been altered by human intervention to select certain genes to propagate is technically a genetically modified organism since it is not a naturally occurring organism.
Is anyone working on better defining the term or changing the name of the laboratory altered organisms since GMO is clearly too broad a term?

By selectively breeding animals, we are taking DNA from two desired hosts and combining them (through sexual reproduction) for desired traits. ... where do we draw the line between that and doing it in a petri dish where the genes have been chemically altered?

First of all, thank you for opening up this discussion. I'm sure a lot of people are confused by the term GMO and why other people are so upset about the whole thing.

I see exactly what you're saying (but you should have the very same problem with the term "organic"). The words "genetically modified organism" separately mean exactly what you say - an organism that has been modified genetically, which certainly all selectively bred plants and animals have been. The term GMO should absolutely not have been chosen to describe what is meant by it now, but I imagine that there was a very good reason that it was. It does not sound alarming, because it is, indeed, what humans have been doing since the dawn of time. If we called them "engineered organisms" or "spliced & diced creations," my guess is that they would not have been so accepted by the general public. My guess is that it was purposely chosen to be misleading, and there's no way they'd change it now and risk people thinking the process deserves further risk analysis. "GMO" has served its purpose very well, precisely because it is so unclear. And now we use it to mean something different than it should mean (and technically does mean), just like organic.

But there's a very clear line to draw between selective breeding (or even grafting) and splicing bits of DNA from one organism into another one's genetic code, because there is a huge chasm between them. Gigantic.

The genes in GMOs haven't been chemically altered - they're taken from completely different species (sometimes plant or even bacterial genes into animals, or animal or bacterial genes into plants). The DNA of an organism is ripped apart and DNA from something completely different is inserted. There are often unforseen consequences. Not all surprises are good.

Besides that very real risk (it has happened already), to be able to make such huge changes in an organism's makeup by selective breeding would take millions of years, and even then it may not be possible to get the changes we're trying for. When it takes that long, the entire ecosystem has a chance to keep up with those changes and adapt to it.

With GMOs, we're doing it essentially instantaneously, and nothing has a chance to adapt. Not any plants, or any animals (including us). It's kind of like introducing an organism from another country (an exotic) into an ecosystem. A lot of times they take over because they don't have any natural predators. But this is on a much bigger scale, and affects pretty much everything in its way. As Misbehaven said (see below), Roundup kills all the plants, which then kills the animals.

At the very least, we humans should figure out what we're doing a little better before we do it on a grand scale and unleash it on the world.

I have seen first hand where some GMO test plots are grown nothing will grow sometimes after for years do to the testing just how many chemicals the new strains can handle...I live in seed country central Pioneer bags it seed not 10 miles from my house as do many other seed companies a lot big farms here grow nothing but seed corn for the rest of the country....Native wildlife has dwindled you figure the deer,birds, other small animals eat that seed which is heavily sprayed with poisons and then carry that poison in their system or die from it....there is a lot more to it...It is more what the GMO grain withstands 2 or 3 times the levels of chemicals which then get eaten by animals then we eat the animals , or grain ourselves.....chicken laced with roundup sound yummy to you?

 

[ki4got]

Quote: the current definition of GMO IS modification by gene splicing.

there are NO creatures on this earth that humans have had any experience with that are not bred through selective breeding. that includes people. so by your definition, even you, yourself, are a GMO creation... your parents chose each other, based on something. looks, personality, etc.

my father fell in love with my mother's singing voice. I (fortunately) inherited that trait from her. (dad can't carry a tune in a bucket!). her father fell in love with her mother's bright blue eyes. again, I inherited that as well. Papa has brown eyes and is left handed. These are all genetically influenced traits that have been selected and passed along to the offspring.

the apple trees you refer to though, are not hybrids or mutations. they are grafted. some fruits have been selected for one thing over another, sweetness, size of the fruit, quantity of the fruit produced, sometimes in detriment of other traits, like growing sturdy trunks or limbs. with trees especially, grafting is a means of using one hardier, sturdier, faster growing variety, grafting in part of a younger, harder to grow variety, then once it's taken hold, removing the growing portions of the original variety. this doesn't affect the grafted part genetically at all. it simply gives the grafted variety a stronger base upon which to grow and produce fruit much better and sooner than it would have on it's own. that would be very much like a dorking incubating cochin eggs... yes that dorking mother (the tree trunk) is raising the chicks (the grafted branches) but she has no genetic influence over them.

for all intents and purposes, GMO is not the same as selective breeding. it is manipulating DNA in a way that would not occur naturally, to produce an end product that contains genetic material not naturally found in anything even remotely related to it in nature. it would be akin to putting the dna that creates chlorophyll into a dog to give him green fur or something. (not likely at this point, just an example)

google "definition GMO". the first page that comes up gives

A genetically modified organism (GMO) is an organism whose genetic material has been altered using genetic engineering techniques. Organisms that have been genetically modified include micro-organisms such as bacteria and yeast, insects, plants, fish, and mammals. GMOs are the source of genetically modified foods, and are also widely used in scientific research and to produce goods other than food. The term GMO is very close to the technical legal term, 'living modified organism' defined in the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety, which regulates international trade in living GMOs (specifically, "any living organism that possesses a novel combination of genetic material obtained through the use of modern biotechnology").

 

[Jewelwing]

it sounds like a plot to make us chemically dependent on pharmaceuticals to keep us alive.

It kind of is, except it's a plot to make the world dependent on Monsanto (even if we don't all end up alive as a result). This is from a blurb describing a documentary about Monsanto (my emphasis added):

The story starts in the White House, where Monsanto often got its way by exerting disproportionate influence over policymakers via the “revolving door”. One example is Michael Taylor, who worked for Monsanto as an attorney before being appointed as deputy commissioner of the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in 1991. While at the FDA, the authority that deals with all US food approvals, Taylor made crucial decisions that led to the approval of GE foods and crops. Then he returned to Monsanto, becoming the company’s vice president for public policy.

Thanks to these intimate links between Monsanto and government agencies, the US adopted GE foods and crops without proper testing, without consumer labeling and in spite of serious questions hanging over their safety. Not coincidentally, Monsanto supplies 90 percent of the GE seeds used by the US market.

Monsanto’s long arm stretched so far that, in the early nineties, the US Food and Drugs Agency even ignored warnings of their own scientists, who were cautioning that GE crops could cause negative health effects. Other tactics the company uses to stifle concerns about their products include misleading advertising, bribery and concealing scientific evidence.

You can watch the documentary here. I haven't watched it (it's long and I'm too busy at the moment), so I don't know how credible it is - I just used the site for the quote because it says in a fairly understandable way what I've found from internet searches and reading sources I know to be credible. The facts presented in the quote appear to be true. Anyway, here's the link. If anyone watches it, let me know if it does a good factual job or if it's just extremist:

http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/the-world-according-to-monsanto/

 

[Leahs Mom]

the current definition of GMO IS modification by gene splicing.

there are NO creatures on this earth that humans have had any experience with that are not bred through selective breeding. that includes people. so by your definition, even you, yourself, are a GMO creation... your parents chose each other, based on something. looks, personality, etc.

You are right that our selective breeding is not genetic modification.

But, unfortunately, there are animals that are genetically modified by the correct definition. It is very unfortunate, but it is happening.

I posted a whole host of links to that activity that is going on right now. You can see it in this post:

https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/...eeping-thread-ots-welcome/30190#post_13214130

Salmon are one of the most imminent that they are trying to get approval for human consumption.

 

[Leahs Mom]

Here's a quote summarizing from one of those articles:

Quote: http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2013/01/08/genetically-engineered-fish.aspx

 

[armorfirelady]

 

Oh....and my birds have never eaten any spinach when I tried to give it to them. 

Mine will not eat spinach. I love spinach... more than any other greens, but... Since spinach and chard are so high on oxalates I no longer plant them in the garden. Now... If only the guineas would quit eating my cabbage and cauliflower. Chickens are easy to keep out of the garden. Guineas? Not so much.

I'm the same way.  I love spinach too but avoid the oxalates as well.  Of course, if you lightly cook it and add a little grated raw cheese it does help that issue some .

Anyhow, I've always thought they wouldn't eat it because of the oxalates.  I figured that they must have enough sense to avoid it unless there is something in it that they need at the time.  But I read lots of folks that say theirs will eat it. 

I really believe that when livestock are given a smorgasbord they eat what they need and what is best for them. Take buttercup for instance... It doesn't take much buttercup to kill a cow but only a very hungry cow on over grazed pasture will eat it. We need to listen to what our livestock is telling us. ;-)

I have no idea what oalates are guess I need to look that up lol

But I agree they eat what they need. I use a flock block for nutrients not in their grains since I don't use nutribalancer in the mix. I've seem where people say their flock block barely lasts a month yet mine thru winter lasted 4 months. They had no greens with all the snow except what I gave them. Apparently they didn't need the nutrients in the flock block. Apparently their grains, fish meal & alfalfa are exactly what they need