Français

Pastured chickens are raised outside in fresh air and sunshine on fresh green growing pasture, in small groups, protected by large bottomless pens which are moved daily onto new ground.

Here is a comparison describing the differences between small farm, pasture-raised, hand processed poultry versus "factory" chickens.

Small Farm, Pasture Raised, Hand Processed Chickens	Conventional Chicken
Unvaccinated	Vaccinated (immuno-suppressant)
Full beak (no cannibalism)	Debeaked (cannibalism a problem)
Probiotics (immuno-stimulant)	Anti-biotics (immuno-depressant)
Composting litter in brooder (sanitized through decomposition)	Sterilized litter (sanitized through toxic fumigants and sprays)
Practically no ammonia vapor (smell)	Hyper-ammonia toxicity
Brooder skylights	No skylights
Rest at night--lights off	Artificial lighting 24 hours/day
No medications	Routine medications
No synthetic vitamins	Routine synthetic vitamins
No hormones	Routine hormones
No appetite stimulants	Routine appetite stimulants (arsenic)
Natural trace minerals (kelp)	Manufactured and acidulated trace minerals
Small groups (300 or fewer)	Huge groups (10,000 or more)
Low stress (group divisions)	High stress (huge group populations)
Clean air	Air hazy with fecal particulate (damages respiratory tract and pulls vitamins out of body, overloading liver)
Fresh air and sunshine	Limited air and practically no sunshine
Plenty of exercise	Limited exercise
Fresh daily salad bar (pasture)	No green material or bugs
Short transport to processing	Long transport to processing
Killed by slitting throat (per Biblical directives - see Leviticus	Killed by electric shock (Inhibits bleeding after throat is slit)
Carefully hand eviscerated	Mechanical eviscerated (prone to breaking intestines and spilling feces over carcass)
Guts and feathers composted and used for fertilizer	Guts cooked and rendered, then fed back to chickens
Effluent used for irrigation	Effluent treated as sewage
Customer inspected	Government inspected
No injections during processing	Routine injections (anything from tenderizers to dyes)
Low percentage rejected livers or carcasses	High percentage liver rejects or carcasses (breast blisters)
Sick birds put in hospital pen for second chance -- most get well	Sick birds destroyed
Manure falls directly on growing forage and active soil for efficient nutrient cycling -- converted to plants	Manure fed to cattle or spread inappropriately (ammonia vaporization -- air pollution; nitrate leaching -- water pollution)
Fresh air and sunshine sanitize processing area	Toxic germicides to sanitize processing facility
Cooking loss 9% of carcass weight	Cooking loss 20% of carcass weight
Long keepers (freeze more than a year)	Short keepers (freeze only 6 mos. or less)
No drug-resistant diseases	Drug-resistant diseases (R-factor Salmonella)
Low saturated fat	High saturated fat
No chlorine baths	Up to 40 chlorine baths (to kill contaminants)
Environmentally responsible	Environmentally irresponsible (hidden costs)
Promotes family farming	Promotes feudal/serf agriculture
Decentralized (local) food system	Centralized food system (processed one place, shipped to other places to market)
Promotes entrepreneurial spirit	Promotes low wage/time-clock employment
Rural revitalization	Urban expansion
Consumer/producer relationship (you & me)	Consumer/producer alienation (us vs. them)
Rich, delicious taste	Poor, flat taste
Edible	Inedible