PeTA is one of the biggest causes of headaches for people in agriculture. They are one of the most supported, high budget, animal welfare groups in the country; they are also one of the most misinformed. Actually I’m not sure that PeTA is misinformed but they are one of the biggest misinformers. I will put the link to one of PeTA’s articles here for you to check out if you like and then I’m going to go through and point out all the BS!
Before I start let me say this: I am not against PeTA. Shocking, I’m sure. I don’t agree with everything (most things) they say and sometimes what they say is complete garbage; however, they are trying to help (I think) and their efforts do put pressure on corporations to do the right thing. I can’t find anything wrong with that. I wrote a term paper on animal welfare when I was in high school and I like to think that I'm pretty damn hardcore about it; I've been that way since I was a child. There is no way I could do what I do on a daily basis if I knew I was mistreating animals.
“Every year in the United States, almost 300 million turkeys are killed for their flesh. Virtually all spend their entire lives on factory farms and have no federal legal protection.”
I actually was surprised to find out that PeTA is right about there not being any federal legal protection for the welfare of turkeys. Many places have their own welfare programs (we do) in place but a lot use or build from the program that the National Turkey Federation (NTF) puts out called “Animal Care Best Management Practices,” you can find that here. Animal Welfare is a big public concern and all major turkey producers take it very seriously.
“Turkeys raised on factory farms are hatched in large incubators and never see their mothers or feel the warmth of a nest. When they are only a few weeks old, they are moved into filthy, windowless sheds with thousands of other turkeys, where they will spend the rest of their lives.”
It’s true that poults (baby turkeys) are hatched from large incubators and never see their mother or feel a nest; however, I don’t see how that’s such a bad thing. Poults, like all poultry, are precocial (meaning they are relatively mature and mobile from the moment of hatching, the opposite is called altricial and that refers to most songbirds who are basically helpless after hatching) and don’t really need their mothers for much more than protection and warmth, both of which we supply when they are brought to my farm. As for the nest part, well that’s just funny. Have you ever seen a turkey nest? Here I’ll show you.
Before I start let me say this: I am not against PeTA. Shocking, I’m sure. I don’t agree with everything (most things) they say and sometimes what they say is complete garbage; however, they are trying to help (I think) and their efforts do put pressure on corporations to do the right thing. I can’t find anything wrong with that. I wrote a term paper on animal welfare when I was in high school and I like to think that I'm pretty damn hardcore about it; I've been that way since I was a child. There is no way I could do what I do on a daily basis if I knew I was mistreating animals.
“Every year in the United States, almost 300 million turkeys are killed for their flesh. Virtually all spend their entire lives on factory farms and have no federal legal protection.”
I actually was surprised to find out that PeTA is right about there not being any federal legal protection for the welfare of turkeys. Many places have their own welfare programs (we do) in place but a lot use or build from the program that the National Turkey Federation (NTF) puts out called “Animal Care Best Management Practices,” you can find that here. Animal Welfare is a big public concern and all major turkey producers take it very seriously.
“Turkeys raised on factory farms are hatched in large incubators and never see their mothers or feel the warmth of a nest. When they are only a few weeks old, they are moved into filthy, windowless sheds with thousands of other turkeys, where they will spend the rest of their lives.”
It’s true that poults (baby turkeys) are hatched from large incubators and never see their mother or feel a nest; however, I don’t see how that’s such a bad thing. Poults, like all poultry, are precocial (meaning they are relatively mature and mobile from the moment of hatching, the opposite is called altricial and that refers to most songbirds who are basically helpless after hatching) and don’t really need their mothers for much more than protection and warmth, both of which we supply when they are brought to my farm. As for the nest part, well that’s just funny. Have you ever seen a turkey nest? Here I’ll show you.
Looks comfy right? Yeah I didn’t really think so either. They aren't missing out on much there. As for the "filthy, windowless shed" bit, the barns are far from filthy but it's true that there aren't real windows in them. However, there are plenty of places for natural light to come in through the fans and inlets.
“To keep the birds from killing one another in such stressful, crowded conditions, parts of the turkeys' toes and beaks are cut off, as are the males' snoods. (The snood is the flap of skin under the chin.) All this is done without any pain relievers. Imagine having the skin under your chin chopped off with a pair of scissors.”
Where I work we don’t toe trim anymore because we didn’t see any adverse effect from leaving the toes on & it also made our litter quality better; it’s like having 10,000 little rakes keeping the litter turned over. The beaks are not “cut off” but we do trim the tip of the top part of the beak (maxillary beak) with an infrared technique the day they are hatched. There is a different article on PeTA’s site talking about how they aren’t administered any pain medicine during the procedure, well neither are baby boys during circumcision and people still have their children circumcised. At least beak trimming is done for a reason other than appearances. You could kill a baby turkey, who weighs somewhere between 45-85 grams at hatch, very easily trying to give them any kind of pain medicine. We also don’t de-snood where I work but the same procedure applies to the snood as to the beak & toes. I think of it the same way I think of circumcision. Yes it hurts them when it’s done but I doubt they remember the pain. They are also 100% wrong about the snood being on the neck. The snood is that part that hangs down over the beak.
“To keep the birds from killing one another in such stressful, crowded conditions, parts of the turkeys' toes and beaks are cut off, as are the males' snoods. (The snood is the flap of skin under the chin.) All this is done without any pain relievers. Imagine having the skin under your chin chopped off with a pair of scissors.”
Where I work we don’t toe trim anymore because we didn’t see any adverse effect from leaving the toes on & it also made our litter quality better; it’s like having 10,000 little rakes keeping the litter turned over. The beaks are not “cut off” but we do trim the tip of the top part of the beak (maxillary beak) with an infrared technique the day they are hatched. There is a different article on PeTA’s site talking about how they aren’t administered any pain medicine during the procedure, well neither are baby boys during circumcision and people still have their children circumcised. At least beak trimming is done for a reason other than appearances. You could kill a baby turkey, who weighs somewhere between 45-85 grams at hatch, very easily trying to give them any kind of pain medicine. We also don’t de-snood where I work but the same procedure applies to the snood as to the beak & toes. I think of it the same way I think of circumcision. Yes it hurts them when it’s done but I doubt they remember the pain. They are also 100% wrong about the snood being on the neck. The snood is that part that hangs down over the beak.
Seriously PeTA? You couldn't even take the time to get the anatomy right?
“Millions of turkeys don't even make it past the first few weeks of life in a factory farm before succumbing to "starve-out," a stress-induced condition that causes young birds to simply stop eating.”
On my farm we usually lose about 100 birds (out of 10,000) due to starve-out during the first week, but it’s not a “stress-induced condition” and the birds don’t “simply stop eating,” they never started. If you perform a necropsy (animal version of an autopsy) on a starve-out bird you will find its crop, stomach and intestines empty. The bird never eats or drinks a single thing. It’s a strange thing because there are plenty of places to find food & water. Here’s a picture so you can see what I mean.
“Millions of turkeys don't even make it past the first few weeks of life in a factory farm before succumbing to "starve-out," a stress-induced condition that causes young birds to simply stop eating.”
On my farm we usually lose about 100 birds (out of 10,000) due to starve-out during the first week, but it’s not a “stress-induced condition” and the birds don’t “simply stop eating,” they never started. If you perform a necropsy (animal version of an autopsy) on a starve-out bird you will find its crop, stomach and intestines empty. The bird never eats or drinks a single thing. It’s a strange thing because there are plenty of places to find food & water. Here’s a picture so you can see what I mean.
Food & water everywhere! It’s a sad thing but there’s nothing you can really do about it. The same thing happens in wild birds sometimes. It’s just one of those things.
“Turkeys are bred, drugged, and genetically manipulated to grow as large as possible as quickly as possible to increase profits. In 1970, the average live turkey raised for meat weighed 17 pounds. Today, he or she weighs 28 pounds. According to one industry publication, modern turkeys grow so quickly that if a 7-pound human baby grew at the same rate, the infant would weigh 1,500 pounds at just 18 weeks of age. Turkeys are now so obese that they cannot reproduce naturally; instead, all the turkeys who are born in the United States today on factory farms are conceived through artificial insemination.”
The part of that first sentence saying, “turkeys are bred, drugged, and genetically manipulated,” is misleading. Turkeys are bred to grow as large as possible as quickly as possible this is true and it is done through breeding programs. They pick out the biggest/fastest growing toms (male turkeys) and breed them to the biggest/fastest growing hens (female turkeys). There’s really nothing sketchy there. It’s no different than a dog breeder. You select the traits that you want your offspring to have and you allow those animals to mate. They are never genetically manipulated for growth, that’s impossible for now. I’m not sure what they mean by drugged. Some places feed probiotics in hopes that it will help with weight gain but, at least in my experience, they don’t make a difference. I know some farms used to feed antibiotics as a growth promoter but that is illegal now even if it weren’t too expensive. I don’t know about the growth rate comparison, whether that’s true or not. Turkeys are definitely not “obese” that was an “LOL!” moment for me when I read that. “Obesity is a medical condition in which excess body fat has accumulated to the extent that it may have an adverse effect on health, leading to reduced life expectancy and/or increased health problems.” – Wikipedia. Turkeys have an extremely low fat percentage. That’s why all you health conscious people substitute it for beef when you cook! They are definitely not obese. It is true that all turkeys are conceived through artificial insemination (AI). This is because of the large breast muscles that turkeys have; it makes them too heavy to fly up on the back of the female to mount. I actually think it’s better for the hens that they don’t have to put up with natural mating. Broiler breeder chickens aren’t so lucky and usually end up losing the feathers on their back and getting all scratched up from the males mounting them.
“Their unnaturally large size also causes many turkeys to die from organ failure or heart attacks before they are even 6 months old. According to an investigative report in the Wall Street Journal on the miserable conditions on turkey farms, "It's common in a rearing house to find a dead bird surrounded by four others whose hearts failed after they watched the first one 'fall back and go into convulsions, with its wings flapping wildly.'
Our birds are raised to 42 weeks of age and I never hear about anything like this happening. If it did there would be a huge problem. Our biggest problem is pecking; which is when the turkeys will peck one another to death, this is the reason why we beak trim. There is definitely something wrong if turkeys are just falling over left and right having heart attacks. That sounds like a nutrition problem. Something is missing from their feed that is causing that to happen.
“Factory farm operators walk through the shed to kill the slow-growing turkeys (so that they don't eat any more food), such as those who fall ill because of the filthy conditions or become crippled under their own weight.”
No. We don’t. We only cull (“the process of removing breeding animals from a group based on specific criteria” –Wikipedia) turkeys that are sick and suffering and wouldn’t have lived any way. Any time we cull a bird it’s because we want to stop them from suffering. If we didn’t cull eventually they would die from starvation which is a much more horrible way to die. At my farm the only way we cull is by cervical dislocation. There are other ways to euthanize animals but this is the best method for my farm. Having to euthanize an animal is never easy or fun. Veterinarians and people who work with animals just have to accept this as part of life. It doesn’t mean we like doing it. I hate having to euthanize my birds but I can do it because I know it’s what’s best for them. I’m sure vets feel the same way. At least I’m spared the agony of having to go tell a kid that their best friend isn’t going to make it and that putting him to sleep is the best option. I could never be a pet vet. I have nothing but the utmost respect for y’all. Also my barn is never filthy. As soon as a flock moves from my farm to the finisher farm we clean out all the used litter with a Bobcat. Then a contracted power washer company comes out and power washes everything in the building. We then disinfect the barn twice with two different kinds of disinfectant. And just in case that isn't enough we also fog our buildings with a third disinfectant. So it's pretty freaking clean!
“Turkeys are bred, drugged, and genetically manipulated to grow as large as possible as quickly as possible to increase profits. In 1970, the average live turkey raised for meat weighed 17 pounds. Today, he or she weighs 28 pounds. According to one industry publication, modern turkeys grow so quickly that if a 7-pound human baby grew at the same rate, the infant would weigh 1,500 pounds at just 18 weeks of age. Turkeys are now so obese that they cannot reproduce naturally; instead, all the turkeys who are born in the United States today on factory farms are conceived through artificial insemination.”
The part of that first sentence saying, “turkeys are bred, drugged, and genetically manipulated,” is misleading. Turkeys are bred to grow as large as possible as quickly as possible this is true and it is done through breeding programs. They pick out the biggest/fastest growing toms (male turkeys) and breed them to the biggest/fastest growing hens (female turkeys). There’s really nothing sketchy there. It’s no different than a dog breeder. You select the traits that you want your offspring to have and you allow those animals to mate. They are never genetically manipulated for growth, that’s impossible for now. I’m not sure what they mean by drugged. Some places feed probiotics in hopes that it will help with weight gain but, at least in my experience, they don’t make a difference. I know some farms used to feed antibiotics as a growth promoter but that is illegal now even if it weren’t too expensive. I don’t know about the growth rate comparison, whether that’s true or not. Turkeys are definitely not “obese” that was an “LOL!” moment for me when I read that. “Obesity is a medical condition in which excess body fat has accumulated to the extent that it may have an adverse effect on health, leading to reduced life expectancy and/or increased health problems.” – Wikipedia. Turkeys have an extremely low fat percentage. That’s why all you health conscious people substitute it for beef when you cook! They are definitely not obese. It is true that all turkeys are conceived through artificial insemination (AI). This is because of the large breast muscles that turkeys have; it makes them too heavy to fly up on the back of the female to mount. I actually think it’s better for the hens that they don’t have to put up with natural mating. Broiler breeder chickens aren’t so lucky and usually end up losing the feathers on their back and getting all scratched up from the males mounting them.
“Their unnaturally large size also causes many turkeys to die from organ failure or heart attacks before they are even 6 months old. According to an investigative report in the Wall Street Journal on the miserable conditions on turkey farms, "It's common in a rearing house to find a dead bird surrounded by four others whose hearts failed after they watched the first one 'fall back and go into convulsions, with its wings flapping wildly.'
Our birds are raised to 42 weeks of age and I never hear about anything like this happening. If it did there would be a huge problem. Our biggest problem is pecking; which is when the turkeys will peck one another to death, this is the reason why we beak trim. There is definitely something wrong if turkeys are just falling over left and right having heart attacks. That sounds like a nutrition problem. Something is missing from their feed that is causing that to happen.
“Factory farm operators walk through the shed to kill the slow-growing turkeys (so that they don't eat any more food), such as those who fall ill because of the filthy conditions or become crippled under their own weight.”
No. We don’t. We only cull (“the process of removing breeding animals from a group based on specific criteria” –Wikipedia) turkeys that are sick and suffering and wouldn’t have lived any way. Any time we cull a bird it’s because we want to stop them from suffering. If we didn’t cull eventually they would die from starvation which is a much more horrible way to die. At my farm the only way we cull is by cervical dislocation. There are other ways to euthanize animals but this is the best method for my farm. Having to euthanize an animal is never easy or fun. Veterinarians and people who work with animals just have to accept this as part of life. It doesn’t mean we like doing it. I hate having to euthanize my birds but I can do it because I know it’s what’s best for them. I’m sure vets feel the same way. At least I’m spared the agony of having to go tell a kid that their best friend isn’t going to make it and that putting him to sleep is the best option. I could never be a pet vet. I have nothing but the utmost respect for y’all. Also my barn is never filthy. As soon as a flock moves from my farm to the finisher farm we clean out all the used litter with a Bobcat. Then a contracted power washer company comes out and power washes everything in the building. We then disinfect the barn twice with two different kinds of disinfectant. And just in case that isn't enough we also fog our buildings with a third disinfectant. So it's pretty freaking clean!
That's the inside of my barn with the turkeys around three weeks old. Looks pretty clean to me. That being said the barns do get pretty dirty during the 26 days that I have my turkeys. That's because they are growing feathers which is a very dusty business.
Well I don’t want to end my blog talking about euthanasia and dust. So instead I’ll tell you about watching turkeys run. Whenever you walk into a barn as soon as the turkeys see you they instantly RUUUUUUN as fast as they can to get to you. It’s hilarious; especially when they’re about two weeks old. Every time I see them all I can think about is how they look like little T-Rex’s running at me. Then I instantly think how terrifying it would be to see a turkey the size of a T-Rex. Good thing I wasn’t around for all that.
Well I don’t want to end my blog talking about euthanasia and dust. So instead I’ll tell you about watching turkeys run. Whenever you walk into a barn as soon as the turkeys see you they instantly RUUUUUUN as fast as they can to get to you. It’s hilarious; especially when they’re about two weeks old. Every time I see them all I can think about is how they look like little T-Rex’s running at me. Then I instantly think how terrifying it would be to see a turkey the size of a T-Rex. Good thing I wasn’t around for all that.
Did you know it's quite possible that the chicken is actually the direct descendant to the T. Rex? Read this to find out!