'Hugh's Chicken Run' A Moral Dilemna for DFWs?

In_Search_Of_Me

Well my cats can tell the difference! They normally leave me alone when I'm eating but while I've been tucking into my free range ham they've been like flies on....!! Problem was I caved & shared a bit & that must NOT become a habit!! Free range sausages about to be cooked! Will let you know if they're yummy or the same - they certainly look more meaty than "normal!

ZTD

In_Search_Of_Me wrote: »

Well my cats can tell the difference!

Can *you* tell the difference?

In_Search_Of_Me wrote: »

They normally leave me alone when I'm eating but while I've been tucking into my free range ham they've been like flies on....!!

"Quick! Get her! She's eating better than we are!"

competitionscafe

fc123 wrote: »

Hydrogenated oils also just go into the body and "sit" around your middle.
Therefore you can eat with a normal appestat but STILL carry excess weight.

Hydrogenated oils (trans fats) are unhealthy in many other ways too:
http://www.tfx.org.uk/key1.html

They can be quite hard to avoid though - they can be found in pastry, biscuits, ice-cream, crisps.......... http://www.tfx.org.uk/page13.html

competitionscafe

littlevet1 wrote: »

Sorry, this isn't true.

The majority of pork produced in the UK is NOT produced outdoors. This document http://statistics.defra.gov.uk/esg/evaluation/pirs/section2.pdf page 14 suggests that "outdoor production accounts for 20-25% of breeding sows in the UK" - although I can't find anything more up to date at the moment.

Farrowing crates/sow stalls are certainly still in use. Current legislation (The Welfare of Farmed Animals (England) (Amendment) Regulations 2003) states the following:

7. - (1) The dimension of any stall or pen used for holding individual pigs in accordance with these regulations shall be such that the internal area is not less than the square of the length of the pig, and no internal side is less than 75% of the length of the pig, the length of the pig in each case being measured from the tip of its snout to the base of its tail while it is standing with its back straight.

- (2) Paragraph 7(1) shall not apply to a female pig for the period between seven days before the predicted day of her farrowing and the day on which the weaning of her piglets (including any piglets fostered by her) is complete.

and
31.If they are placed in farrowing crates, pregnant sows and gilts shall be thoroughly cleaned.
45.Where a farrowing crate is used the piglets must have sufficient space to be able to be suckled without difficulty.

This legislation can be found here http://www.opsi.gov.uk/SI/si2003/20030299.htm
It basically means that sows can be placed in crates from 7 days prior to farrowing, until weaning (21-28 days in most units). Incidently, a farrowing crate allows the sow to stand up and lie down, but she cannot turn or move around. The aim is to reduce piglet death by the sow lying on them. There are many reports written about their effectiveness, and regarding their impact on animal welfare. I haven't done a big search but there are a few references sited on this article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gestation_crates

Indoor pig units are, in my opinion, factories aimed at maximising profit with little regard for animal welfare. However the situation in the UK is better than other European countries. In Denmark I believe there is no restriction on the use of farrowing crates and sows can be kept in them permanently (I haven't checked this so please prove me wrong if you know otherwise).

regards
littlevet1

Interestingly the Real Meat company "set up in 1986 to offer what we sincerely believe to be the highest standards of welfare, purity and eating quality" pork is from indoor reared pigs and they also use the farrowing crates -
http://www.realmeat.co.uk/acatalog/More.html

In_Search_Of_Me

ZTD wrote: »

Can *you* tell the difference?

Verdict on the ham is it was much nicer but just had the sausages & they were more meaty but I prefer a mre appley prok & apple - the hunt on that one continues!!


"Quick! Get her! She's eating better than we are!"

...nope they eat better than me as they get yummy burns cat food and the stuff I eat so they get best of both worlds!!Plus they dont have to get up & go out in the pourig rain tomorrow to go to work to pay for it all! Instead they get to stay at home chilling all day!

In_Search_Of_Me

burns pet food link
http://www.burns-pet-nutrition.co.uk/index.htm

battery hen link (find out how you can adopt a battery hen!!)
http://www.bhwt.org.uk/index.php

ZTD

competitionscafe wrote: »

They can be quite hard to avoid though - they can be found in pastry, biscuits, ice-cream, crisps.......... http://www.tfx.org.uk/page13.html

And even if you do avoid them, they change the recipe and they come back in. However...Iceland try to avoid them for you, and their stuff is often quite cheap in that department.

JoeHel

sleepymy wrote: »

It wasn't clear from your post, that's why I said 'if' it was factory farmed. Wasn't intending to offend you

Oh I didn't take offence don't worry The pork thing was just a side comment - the main point was that all the free range chickens had gone, which means the message is getting through! woohoooo!

I just thought that Hayley looked like she was desperate to get on TV, and now she wants a bit more fame so she's starting on the papers instead.... heh heh. She's still not 'fessing up on what was in the trolley though. :rolleyes:

Smidster

As I said on my living for free diary while of course in an ideal world the birds would be treated better I am really against this latest campaign to make us all feel guilty and just wish that the likes of JO would go away and let us live our lives in peace.

hbl_2

pania wrote: »

Aye,but animals are acting on animal instinct, following their natural reactions, a human has a choice whether to pull the trigger that ends someones life. whether to torture their prisoner or drop bombs that decimate the town it falls on, unselectively. very much like the fox going into a feeding frenzy and unselectively killing chickens. the difference is in knowing right and wrong and exercising choice.

That doesn't give proper creedence to political duress, duress by circumstance, culture etc. Yes people have choice, to this is not an absolute. I think the Milgram experiment goes some way to explain that, for all its flaws. Marx would agree that people have a choice - work or starve. Given the above insight on the human condition, how would explain Dresden, or Operation Rolling Thunder? Who is culpable, and to what extent. You could even consider Enola Gay. I realise, that this is probably OT by some margin, but my point is that it's not that easy a distinction to make.

pania wrote: »

there are extremes of everything. it is knowing where the extremes are and where to draw the line. look at the problems with mink in the uk. result of extremists. i was responding to hbl's comment of "i don't care much for animal welfare - peopleI think a lot of time and energy is wasted by people who care more for animals than they do .

You've obvious got a bee in your bonnet about this one, so I should for your benefit at least explain my own position a little better. I admit that my comment was trollish and unnecessarily glib, and to my own detriment I think I confused 'animal welfare' with 'animal rights'.

Naturally I don't think animals which are kept by people should be subjected to unnecessary torture or cruelty. To say otherwise would be an indefensible position. However, I have absolutely no problem with animal use, provided its for the benefit of people and not for the sake of people's whims. Animals for food = good. For instance, I don't believe cosmetics should be tested on animals, because people don't need cosmetics. If you want to test pharmaceuticals on animals, be my guest. Cure for cancer, cure for aids. Yes please.

I think wearing fur is morbid, but I've no problem with leather. I think the ban on foxhunting was more about curtailing the landed gentry from running roughshod all over the countryside perpetrating offending middle class liberal persuasions than it was about animal cruelty. It was socio-economic, and they still run around on horseback.

pania wrote: »

animal welfare people do such a fantastic job to provide a voice for those who don't have it. The RSPCA, the sanctuary's that often survive with no government assistance just purely on charitable donations. Is this such a waste of time and energy?

Yes they do, and no it's not a waste. It's a waste if it's unnecessary. I would give money to a cancer trust, or the NSPCC before I gave money to the RSPCA. Respect their work, well done, but people are more important to me and always will be.

I don't believe in charity through consumerism - nothing can be solved by buying one product over another. It's erroneous to think people can solve the world's problems by buying a specific brand of baked bean. I think that whole (red) brand is a false start, it's turning an altruistic act and commodifying it. I don't need to buy an mp3 player to show people that I take AIDS seriously.

However I would say that NOT buying something is the only choice you have as a consumer. Therefore not buying broiler chickens (yup, just tied the thread back into my polemic) may affect the short term profit of all those in the supply chain, but does it change the system, or does it encourage it to be more efficient in other respects? Supply and demand works at the lowest level, but on a grand scale, the capitalist system operates at a level of abundance, where supply far outstrips demand. We have rockefeller and carnegie to thank for that. Make something cheap enough and you don't need to sell all of it to see a healthy return.

I haven't bought a nestle product in over ten years as I feel strongly about the boycott, but I couldn't tell you what difference its made. I hope some, but I will never know.

pania wrote: »

Sadly tis true. Is why you get kobi beef in restaurants, animal is provided completely clean bedding, massaged and groomed every day and have aromatherapy oils burnt in their stable and ambient music played for a completely stress free life style. Then one day, bang! Is the least marbled most tender meat available apparently. as a result of no stress. Yes this is an extreme but shows a point.

On Heston Blumenthal's show where he did fish pie, he explained this effect in langoustines, the difference between those 'upset' when they were caught compared to those which weren't. The explanation was to do with the enzymes/chemicals released by the body under stress and how this affected the meat. I should imagine I would be hard pressed to tell the difference. A friend of mine is a marine biologist (and a vegetarian) so I only buy fish from sustainable sources on her direction, and that's good enough for me. I don't care how upset they are when they come out of the water. As kurt cobain said, it's okay to eat fish because they don't have any feelings, and who am I to argue with that?