Earlier quoted context omitted.
What's wrong with entrenching the existing social order?
If you're the wealthy, meat eating country, with a higher standard of living, longer lifespan and lower infant mortality, nothing, I guess.
Exactly.
Why I Would Raise Chickens
181–190 of 272 posts
Re: Why I Would Raise Chickens
#182The way chickens are raised today, you'd be insane to raise chickens. Chickens of the old, roamed the grass, picking little shits that no one could find or eat, growing slowly but steadily, surviving and mating. Today, they gorge on soybean-B12 juice that was raised on ex-rainforest area. It's highly unsustainable and ridiculously bad investment. Bill Gates has previously written about meat and its sustainability and…
This is a clear troll. Absolutely nothing said by this poster has anything to do with the actual article. Additionally, the user account is only 13 days old. Moderators, please kill this account and postings.
Re: Why I Would Raise Chickens
#183Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why would you think that? Larger animals are usually much more energy efficient for various reasons - less surface area to radiate heat, and economies of scale with larger organs.
No, beef and lamb are the most energy consuming sources of meat. (A dairy producing cow is different.) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feed_conversion_ratio For cattle, a FCR range from less than 5 to more than 20 kg feed dry matter per kg gain may be encountered.[ Whereas for chickens: Poultry has a feed conversion ratio of 2 to 1.
Again, that's simple mass efficiency. We can also talk about other efficiencies, like cost of feed versus cost of meat.
Re: Why I Would Raise Chickens
#184Earlier quoted context omitted.
I highly doubt that Beef is a more efficient if source of meat than Chicken. I think Chicken meat is a lot more efficient. A little quick googling and I found: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feed_conversion_ratio
The conversion ratio would hold if they ate the same things. Cows can survive on grass, which is often plentiful. Chickens more so on grains, which are harder to come by.
Having raised chickens when I was a kid, I can tell you that chickens will survive on almost anything organic. They're like little organic waste disposal units. There is a reason that no plants grow where chickens are kept in pens: they eat anything that grows. They'll eat any bugs they can find. I've also seen them eat other chickens that had died of some natural cause.
Chickens usually get fed grain because grain is cheap and plentiful and easy to dispense, but if you give them enough room to roam and vegetation to eat, they will eat it.
We used to throw all our food scraps (bit of bread, fruit, vegetable peelings) in a container and throw it to the chickens at the end of the day. They loved it, and would eat it all. We'd also collect rotting fruit from under the fruit trees and throw it to them. It would all get eaten. I found that pretty much the only thing chickens wouldn't eat were peach pits. Peach pits are way too hard, I guess.
In winter when we didn't have as much of a garden, we'd also let the chickens out of their pen. They'd happily roam around the yard, eating grass and whatever tasty bugs they can find. In the evening, they'd return to their chicken house in their pen and go to sleep. Very convenient.
I've come to the conclusion that chickens would happily eat us if they were large enough.
I believe that chickens are very efficient to raise. If you have enough vegetation around, you don't need to feed them at all.
Re: Why I Would Raise Chickens
#185My parents live in a village in Eastern Europe with less than $2 a day (I also chip in to financially help them), and they do indeed raise chickens, they've being doing that for the last 15 years or so, since they moved out to the countryside. Bill Gates is correct in his assessment, it's way more profitable to raise chickens than, say, cows. You need to have a bigger barn for cows, you need to do all the hay thing,…
This immediately makes me think that, as the supply of chickens goes up, their value goes down. You won't be able to sell a chicken for $5 anymore if everybody has enough. But the point is taken that they produce a lot of food for how little upkeep they require.
On the other hand, they also have a pretty clear floor on their sale value, because if the price drops too low, the farmer could just eat the meat/eggs themselves.
Re: Why I Would Raise Chickens
#186My parents live in a village in Eastern Europe with less than $2 a day (I also chip in to financially help them), and they do indeed raise chickens, they've being doing that for the last 15 years or so, since they moved out to the countryside. Bill Gates is correct in his assessment, it's way more profitable to raise chickens than, say, cows. You need to have a bigger barn for cows, you need to do all the hay thing,…
> it's way more profitable to raise chickens than, say, cows. You need to have a bigger barn for cows, you need to do all the hay thing, which is very time consuming and demands a lot of extra work just for feeding said cows, you need to pay someone to take care of the cows when they go out to eat in the summer on the communal field. This is surprising to me. Of course a cow should be more work to raise than a chicke…
It is important to remember that if you kill a chicken, you can consume it entirely in the same day with no need for refrigeration and electricity.
Also, chickens reproduce, grow faster and lay eggs that you can also consume.
I grew up in my grandma's backyard (literally) with chickens, cows and porks. Cows were mostly used for milk than meat.
Re: Why I Would Raise Chickens
#187Earlier quoted context omitted.
The conversion ratio would hold if they ate the same things. Cows can survive on grass, which is often plentiful. Chickens more so on grains, which are harder to come by.
Having raised chickens when I was a kid, I can tell you that chickens will survive on almost anything organic. They're like little organic waste disposal units. There is a reason that no plants grow where chickens are kept in pens: they eat anything that grows. They'll eat any bugs they can find. I've also seen them eat other chickens that had died of some natural cause. Chickens usually get fed grain because grain i…
^ can confirm.
Re: Why I Would Raise Chickens
#188I don't know why would you raise chicken, but I do know why your mother raises cocks
Re: Why I Would Raise Chickens
#189Some idiot in my neighborhood tried raising chickens, and they got loose. Some days I've had 16 chickens in my front yard. There are at least two roosters, so the flock is self-sustaining. They hide in the creek gully where they're hard to catch. This has been going on for two years now.
> Some idiot in my neighborhood tried raising chickens, and they got loose.
Sounds like some philanthropist has kindly provided you with all the chicken you can eat — if you catch it.
Re: Why I Would Raise Chickens
#190Earlier quoted context omitted.
I highly doubt that Beef is a more efficient if source of meat than Chicken. I think Chicken meat is a lot more efficient. A little quick googling and I found: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feed_conversion_ratio
The conversion ratio would hold if they ate the same things. Cows can survive on grass, which is often plentiful. Chickens more so on grains, which are harder to come by.
These two claims you make were addressed in both the original article and the comments higher up in this thread:
> Many breeds can eat whatever they find on the ground (although it’s better if you can feed them, because they’ll grow faster).
> ...for cows, you need to do all the hay thing, which is very time consuming and demands a lot of extra work just for feeding said cows