Will Cornish X live normal lives if you don't kill them ever?

[Rafter 7 Paint Horses]

Congratulations on the ones who have had success on raised Cornish X to those ages.

I have not had very much luck with this. I have tried, and mine weren't very bright, they wouldn't go out and forage at all. They laid by the water and waited for me to feed them. They also got abscesses on their feet, their legs would give out if they tried to walk very far.
Even with restricting their feed from the time they were hatched, they got huge for their frame. They had a lot of feet and leg problems. My other chickens picked on them a lot, too. I won't try this again, it was too labor intense for the result, and my chickens did not benefit from it.

After the shows around here, the meat pens must be processed. They can be sold, but the buyer is actually buying the processed birds, not the live birds.

Jean

 

[deerman]

Quote:
I am talking about people ,starving them so they stay smaller to live longer. I also feed mine 12 hours aday so they live to butchering age.

If you feed these birds what they need they will get huge, not obese. Still to big not to have trouble. Can we say 25 lb chickens, that cant fly off a roost, more like falling, even hurting their legs.

Is it cruel to raise chicken longer, if you know after 6 month they will have a hard time living??????????? to each their own....

Is it cruel to starve one to keep it small ????

They are not the same as the parents either, mothers are white rock which can live a normal chicken life, fathers are cornish ,large legged to hold their weight, the cross get the body mass from the father, but not the body frame...

 

[deerman]

The OP ask could a cornish X live a normal life, if never killed.

Normal " NO" Had them to live a year, did they live a normal chicken life "NO"

 

[jaku]

Quote:
I am talking about people ,starving them so they stay smaller to live longer. I also feed mine 12 hours aday so they live to butchering age.

If you feed these birds what they need they will get huge, not obese. Still to big not to have trouble. Can we say 25 lb chickens, that cant fly off a roost, more like falling, even hurting their legs.

Is it cruel to raise chicken longer, if you know after 6 month they will have a hard time living??????????? to each their own....

Is it cruel to starve one to keep it small ????

They are not the same as the parents either, mothers are white rock which can live a normal chicken life, fathers are cornish ,large legged to hold their weight, the cross get the body mass from the father, but not the body frame...

Unless I'm misunderstanding you, hat just isn't true- by no definition does ANYTHING that eats 12 hours per day count as "starving." If you feed for a few minutes a day to keep it small, then yes, that's starving it. But 12 hours? No way.

Not to mention, the same could be said for ANYTHING- heck, even people start to get fat as they get older, eventually have heart problems, then die. It happens to dogs just 10 years after they're born! Even if what you're saying is true, how can something's existence be cruel simply because it has a short expected lifespan? I guess I could get behind your argument a little bit if you're talking about people going to extreme measures to ENSURE that their birds live longer, but then we could get into the larger debate of quality of life for ANY animal that has lived towards the end of its lifespan.

 

[jaku]

Quote:
But that is a "normal" life, as defined by you. The OP asked because she didn't want to see the birds slaughtered, to which my answer is still the same one I gave on page one- they probably won't live very long, but I'm sure they'd prefer a natural death over being killed and eaten, and it's ridiculous to say that allowing them to live out their lives, no matter how short that ends up being, is somehow "cruel."

 

[BirchHatchery]

DEERMAN Read this before you preach how diffrent they are or read a Cobb Vantress breeding programe guide and tell me me how diffrent they really are? READ BEFORE YOU PREACH PREACHER http://www.mcspotlight.org/media/reports/fawn.html

 

[Buster52]

Well, maybe what is and is not humane is a subjective issue. I'm sure that people who keep a million leghorns in tiny cages stacked 8 feet high believes they are treating their animals well. But I could never do that.

In fact, for all I talk about sustainability, that isn't even my main reason for raising my own meat and eggs, or paying a premium for my milk from a local farmer. It is the way the animals are treated, and their quality of life, that most concerns me. Yes, I will be taking that life at the end, but when I do so, it will be quick and as free of fear and trauma as I can make it. Heck, I won't even slit, because I don't believe that is a quick enough death according to my personal value system.

And also based on that personal value system, I don't believe the genetics of the Cornish cross is humane, nor the system that creates it. And I don't believe that keeping them to adulthood where they are likely to live a very short life of pain and chronic illness is the best way to show a concern for the animal's welfare.

I know the birds I raise for meat are going to come to a violent end. But the logic that somehow that means I shouldn't care how they lived escapes me entirely. If how they lived their lives didn't matter to me, I doubt I could even bother.

Walmart is much easier and cheaper.

 

[Buster52]

Quote:
Actually, that link merely underscores the problems for me. The entire system that creates these birds is messed up. How could I raise a chicken for meat in order to avoid the factory farm system, when that chicken comes to me as the result of a factory farm system?

 

[ticker9400]

 

[Chickiemama1010]

Quote:

me too. i dare not throw in my 2cents