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permaculture - Re: [permaculture] critique of pastured poultry

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  • From: John Wages <jwages@earthlink.net>
  • To: permaculture <permaculture@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [permaculture] critique of pastured poultry
  • Date: Fri, 17 Aug 2007 11:51:08 -0500 (GMT-05:00)

The author has some very good points---which any observant, unbiased pastured
poultry producer would be quick to recognize. For example, not many people
are really satisfied with the over-bred Cornish Cross. Even when healthy,
they are so big at 8-9 weeks that some of them can barely walk. In my
opinion, it's inhumane to breed an animal to have such extreme
characteristics. Again, most producers would agree---these points are
continually discussed on pastured poultry listservs. The problem is that the
economics of growing traditional meat birds like White Rocks on a commercial
scale is not comparable to that of the Cornish.

The Salatin system is being improved. Some folks have gone to hoop shelters
for better ventilation in hot climates. As for predators, one strand of
electric wire near the bottom of the unit suffices in raccoon-rich
environments. And, of course, it's easy enough to marry the pastured unit
concept to a day-range system using electric-net fencing, which is the system
we use.

Pastured poultry as it's currently practiced is not very permacultural and
probably not sustainable in the post-cheap oil era. But, anything more than
a few hens is going to require outside inputs. Perhaps the scale is the key
to the problem.

But, I wholeheartedly disagree with the author's premise that pastured
poultry is no better than confinement poultry systems. Let's not destroy the
good for the sake of the perfect. Instead, let's improve the system or
invent a better way.

John

John Wages
Tupelo, MS




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