Farmers Put Live Chickens in Wood Chippers (what the cluck?)

Reuters ^

[Dallas]

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) -

Two California poultry farmers who fed some 30,000 live chickens into wood chippers will not face criminal charges because they had permission from the U.S. Department of Agriculture , prosecutors said on Friday.

But a spokesman for the Humane Society of the United States called the farmers "callous and barbaric" and disagreed with the decision not to prosecute them.

The farmers needed to destroy the chickens because they were "spent" -- or no longer able to produce eggs -- and could not make chicken soup out of them because the farms were under quarantine for the poultry virus Exotic Newcastle Disease, District Attorney's spokeswoman Gayle Stewart said.

Stewart said the men, who run a poultry farm near San Diego, asked a senior veterinarian with the Agriculture Department if they could employ the wood chippers and were given permission.

"Once they had permission we decided that they did not have any criminal intent," Stewart said.

Brothers Arie and Will Wilgenburg, who run Escondido-based Ward Poultry Farm, could not be reached for comment on Friday. Earlier, they told the San Diego Union Tribune newspaper that they were doing "what we thought we had to do" based on expert advice and stopped as soon as they learned otherwise.

Wayne Pacelle, a spokesman for the Humane Society, said that explanation was unacceptable.

"The act of feeding live chickens into a wood chipper is an extraordinarily callous and barbaric act and I can't imagine any person with a whit of common sense would use a wood chipper as a killing tool," he said. "No person with any experience in killing animals would sanction the use of this technique."

Pacelle said the District Attorney's decision not to prosecute the brothers rested on the "faulty assumption" that using wood chippers to kill chickens was an accepted practice.

[nevergore]

At the risk of sounding callous.....

Were the animals dead in less than a second? Hardly prolonged agony....A chicken isn't filled with dread or have a concept of what was to happen....They weren't torturing them, feeding their little feet a few inches at a time....It was quick, Toss, grind, Toss, grind, Toss, grind...etc.

Seems like a high production way of killing chickens when the byproduct can't be used....

You'd never eat sausage if you saw the way it was made....

NeverGore

[Dallas]

LOL

[areafiftyone]

OH GROSS!!

[sharktrager]

Where does one download the "Request to put live chickens in a wood chipper" form?

[BOBTHENAILER]

But a spokesman for the Humane Society of the United States called the farmers "callous and barbaric" and disagreed with the decision not to prosecute them.

I DON'T RECALL THE HUMANE SOCIETY SAYING ANYTHING ABOUT SADDAM HUSSEIN FEEDING HIS POLITICAL OPPONENTS THROUGH WOOD CHIPPERS OR SHREDDERS.

[Mr. K]

but without the entertainment value

[onehipdad]

How many chicks would a wood chipper chip if a wood chipper could chip chicks?

[Freedom2specul8]

Oh crap..! I've heard of that kind of thing happening to people.

" They weren't really going to give them all IV drugs that put them to sleep were they?"

I thougth about doing something to the food supply..but was thinking of cost. Here's some morbid thoughts. Was this a tax deduction..loss of livestock etc?

[Liberal Classic]

Saddam would have gassed the chickens.

[Freedom2specul8]

You are so bad........

[hobbes1]

The act of feeding live chickens into a wood chipper is an extraordinarily callous and barbaric act and I can't imagine any person with a whit of common sense would use a wood chipper as a killing tool ....for anything other than Democrats....

 

 

Humor Disclaimer

[Mr. K]

could be a new version of the Bass-O-Matic

"Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmm - that's GREAT BASS!"

[RichInOC]

Chicken strips...they're harder than they look.

[dead]

I'll bet lobsters would kill to die this humanely.

[Freedom2specul8]

BUMP

[Lysander]

If I was a chicken I would mush prefer having my head chopped off or my neck broken....

This did both!

[Dallas]

LMBO

[DonQ]

Geeze louise..there was no other way?

I gotta admit, it sounds barbaric to me ... but there probably was no other practical way to kill and dispose of so many chickens in short order.

I don't think chicken farms have any special facilities for "exterminating" large numbers of chickens quickly. The usual slaughtering method, of wringing their necks and then chopping off their heads, is rather slow and tedious and labor intensive - which gets very expensive considering the chickens no longer had any marketable potential. Moreover, slaughtering them in the usual way leaves the chickens' bodies pretty much in the condition they'd be in a butcher shop, which is too dangerous a temptation considering these particular chickens were supposed to be tainted.

The wood chipper was probably fairly quick, maybe quicker than the traditional methods, and, unless one of those chickens had an engineering degree, they probably didn't feel much fear or stress until the very last second.

[hchutch]

Oh, man...

This is just revolting if it's true. Hope they don't graduate to people.

[Pravious]

I'm wondering if the RATS have initiated some kind of laws yet banning wood chippers.