I love chickens.. I love their personalities, their walk, and their talk. Thinking of the life of most chickens in this world saddens me to no end. First, let me tell you a little about chickens.. and then introduce you to what chickens used for food go through. Leading animal behavior scientists from around the glove know that chickens are inquisitive, interesting animals whose cognitive abilities are in some cases more advanced than those of cats, dogs, and even primates. Like all of us, chickens love their families and value their lives. They are always looking out for their families and other chickens in their group. As a owner of two beautiful hens, I can tell you they have complex social structures, adept communication skills, and distinct personalities as you and I. Chickens can complete complex mental tasks, learn from watching each other, demonstrate self-control, worry about the future, and even have cultural knowledge that is passed from generation to generation. Chickens comprehend cause and effect relationships and understand that objects still exist even after they are hidden from view. They are actually more cognitively advanced than small human children.
When chickens aren't confined to factory farms, chickens form complex social hierarchies, known as pecking orders. Boy oh boy, do I know about pecking orders. Every chicken knows his or her place on the social ladder, remembering faces and ranks of more than 100 birds. Scientists agree that chickens' complex social structures and good memories are undeniable signs of advanced intelligence comparable to that of mammals.
Each bird has a different personality that often relates to his or her place in the pecking order. My Joonie Bird is more shy and watchful, while Ms. Pam is playful and fearless.
Researchers have also found that chickens have a cultural knowledge that they pass down from generation to generation. In one study at Bristol University, chickens were fed a mixture of yellow and blue corn kernels. The blue kernels were tainted with chemicals that made the birds feel sick, and they quickly learned to avoid the blue corn. When these hens hatched chicks, yellow and blue corn was spread around the farm (this time harmless), and the mother hens remembered that the blue corn had previously made them sick, so they carefully steered their young away from it.
They have impressive communication skills, including more than 30 types of vocalizations to distinguish between threats that are approaching by land and those that are approaching over the water, and a mother then begins to teach these calls to her chicks before they even hatch. She clucks softly to them while sitting on the eggs, and they chirp back to her and to each other from inside their shells.
Now to the horrors.. chickens are the most abused animals on Earth. Just here in the U.S., seven billion chickens are killed for their flesh each year, and 452 million hens are used for their eggs. Ninety-nine percent of these animals spend their lives in total confinement from the moment they are hatched to the moment they are killed. Even though more chickens are raised and killed for food than all other land animals combined, there are no federal laws that protect these animals from abuse. Two thirds of Americans say they would support the law, but no.
Chickens raised in factory farms have no chance to do anything that is natural and important for them. A baby chick will never be allowed contact with his or her parents, let alone be raised by them. They are deprived the chance to take dust baths, feel the sun on their back, build nests, roost in trees, or breathe fresh air. Instead, chickens raised for their flesh are referred to as "broilers" by the chicken industry. They spend their entire lives in filthy sheds with tens of thousands of other birds, where intense crowding and confinement lead to outbreaks of disease. They are bred and drugged to grow so large so quickly their legs and organs cannot keep up, making leg deformities, organ failure, and heart attacks common. Many become crippled under their own weight and eventually die because they cannot reach water nozzles. When thy are no more than 7 weeks old, they are crammed into cages and trucked to slaughter.
Birds exploited for their eggs [laying hens] are crammed together in wire cages where they have not enough room to spread their wings. Because they are crammed so close, normally clean animals are forced to urinate and defecate on each other. At just a few days old, a large portion of each hen's beak is cut off with a burning-hot blade, and no painkillers are used. Many birds, unable to eat because of the pain, die from dehydration and weakened immune systems. They cut sensitive beaks cuts off so that they won't peck one another out of frustration created by the unnatural confinement. After enduring these mutilations, hens are shoved into tiny wire "battery" cages, which measure roughly 18 by 20 inches and hold five to 11 hens, each of whom has a wingspan of 32 inches. Even in the best-case scenario, each hen will spend the rest of her life crowded in a space about the size of a file drawer with four other hens, unable to lift even a single wing. The birds are crammed so closely together that these normally clean animals are forced to urinate and defecate on one another. The stench of ammonia and feces hangs heavy in the air, and disease runs rampant in the filthy, cramped sheds. Many birds die, and survivors are often forced to live with their dead and dying cage mates, who are sometimes left to rot. The light in the sheds is constantly manipulated in order to maximize egg production. Periodically, for two weeks at a time, the hens are only fed reduced-calorie feed. This process induces an extra laying cycle.
After their bodies are exhausted and their production drops, they are shipped to slaughter, generally turned into chicken soup or cat & dog food because their flesh is too bruised and battered to be used for much of anything else. Male chicks of egg-laying breeder hens are unable to lay eggs and are not bred to produce excessive flesh for the meat industry, so they are killed. Every year more than 100 MILLION of these young birds are ground up alive or tossed into bags to suffocate.
When it is a chickens time for slaughter, their bodies are exhausted and they are shipped out, where their fragile legs are force3d into shackles and their throats are slit. They are immersed in scalding hot water to remove their feathers.. almost all birds are still conscious when their throats are cut and many are literally scalded to death in the feather removal tanks after missing the throat cutter, which seems to happen frequently.
Please go vegan.
When chickens aren't confined to factory farms, chickens form complex social hierarchies, known as pecking orders. Boy oh boy, do I know about pecking orders. Every chicken knows his or her place on the social ladder, remembering faces and ranks of more than 100 birds. Scientists agree that chickens' complex social structures and good memories are undeniable signs of advanced intelligence comparable to that of mammals.
Each bird has a different personality that often relates to his or her place in the pecking order. My Joonie Bird is more shy and watchful, while Ms. Pam is playful and fearless.
Researchers have also found that chickens have a cultural knowledge that they pass down from generation to generation. In one study at Bristol University, chickens were fed a mixture of yellow and blue corn kernels. The blue kernels were tainted with chemicals that made the birds feel sick, and they quickly learned to avoid the blue corn. When these hens hatched chicks, yellow and blue corn was spread around the farm (this time harmless), and the mother hens remembered that the blue corn had previously made them sick, so they carefully steered their young away from it.
They have impressive communication skills, including more than 30 types of vocalizations to distinguish between threats that are approaching by land and those that are approaching over the water, and a mother then begins to teach these calls to her chicks before they even hatch. She clucks softly to them while sitting on the eggs, and they chirp back to her and to each other from inside their shells.
Now to the horrors.. chickens are the most abused animals on Earth. Just here in the U.S., seven billion chickens are killed for their flesh each year, and 452 million hens are used for their eggs. Ninety-nine percent of these animals spend their lives in total confinement from the moment they are hatched to the moment they are killed. Even though more chickens are raised and killed for food than all other land animals combined, there are no federal laws that protect these animals from abuse. Two thirds of Americans say they would support the law, but no.
Chickens raised in factory farms have no chance to do anything that is natural and important for them. A baby chick will never be allowed contact with his or her parents, let alone be raised by them. They are deprived the chance to take dust baths, feel the sun on their back, build nests, roost in trees, or breathe fresh air. Instead, chickens raised for their flesh are referred to as "broilers" by the chicken industry. They spend their entire lives in filthy sheds with tens of thousands of other birds, where intense crowding and confinement lead to outbreaks of disease. They are bred and drugged to grow so large so quickly their legs and organs cannot keep up, making leg deformities, organ failure, and heart attacks common. Many become crippled under their own weight and eventually die because they cannot reach water nozzles. When thy are no more than 7 weeks old, they are crammed into cages and trucked to slaughter.
Birds exploited for their eggs [laying hens] are crammed together in wire cages where they have not enough room to spread their wings. Because they are crammed so close, normally clean animals are forced to urinate and defecate on each other. At just a few days old, a large portion of each hen's beak is cut off with a burning-hot blade, and no painkillers are used. Many birds, unable to eat because of the pain, die from dehydration and weakened immune systems. They cut sensitive beaks cuts off so that they won't peck one another out of frustration created by the unnatural confinement. After enduring these mutilations, hens are shoved into tiny wire "battery" cages, which measure roughly 18 by 20 inches and hold five to 11 hens, each of whom has a wingspan of 32 inches. Even in the best-case scenario, each hen will spend the rest of her life crowded in a space about the size of a file drawer with four other hens, unable to lift even a single wing. The birds are crammed so closely together that these normally clean animals are forced to urinate and defecate on one another. The stench of ammonia and feces hangs heavy in the air, and disease runs rampant in the filthy, cramped sheds. Many birds die, and survivors are often forced to live with their dead and dying cage mates, who are sometimes left to rot. The light in the sheds is constantly manipulated in order to maximize egg production. Periodically, for two weeks at a time, the hens are only fed reduced-calorie feed. This process induces an extra laying cycle.
After their bodies are exhausted and their production drops, they are shipped to slaughter, generally turned into chicken soup or cat & dog food because their flesh is too bruised and battered to be used for much of anything else. Male chicks of egg-laying breeder hens are unable to lay eggs and are not bred to produce excessive flesh for the meat industry, so they are killed. Every year more than 100 MILLION of these young birds are ground up alive or tossed into bags to suffocate.
When it is a chickens time for slaughter, their bodies are exhausted and they are shipped out, where their fragile legs are force3d into shackles and their throats are slit. They are immersed in scalding hot water to remove their feathers.. almost all birds are still conscious when their throats are cut and many are literally scalded to death in the feather removal tanks after missing the throat cutter, which seems to happen frequently.
Please go vegan.
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