Prop 2

[john250]

No one else has posted about Prop 2 in CA, I guess y'all were up late celebrating change.
Probably the most effect in the short term on us in animal ag was California passing prop 2, which is the "chickens rights" question on the ballot out there.
If you don't belong to a industry group, I suggest joining up. Farm Bureau, NCBA, R-Calf, Farmers Union, whatever. You can surely find a group which supports your views. Even if you are a hobbyist, these folks want to dictate to you how to care for your animals.
Clearly, no one supports "cruelty". I don't know anyone who intentionally mistreats animals and I doubt you folks do either. Unless you consider slaughtering them humanely to be cruel. I consider it natures way.

 

[I luv herfrds]

Pretty sad deal there. I feel bad for the guys in California. Those people who voted for it don't care about their livelihood. Maybe they should eat eggs from China.
Since they want free range I'm pretty sure they won't mind the Avian bird flu.

 

[Alice]

Pretty sad deal there. I feel bad for the guys in California. Those people who voted for it don't care about their livelihood. Maybe they should eat eggs from China.
Since they want free range I'm pretty sure they won't mind the Avian bird flu.

Good point...excellent point!

Alice

 

[john250]

Now we are in a space in time where more meat and eggs is considered a bad thing.
I have never seen affordable meat as a bad thing.

 

[Lammie]

I take it that people from California still like to eat, right?

I am ready to divest myself of my chickens. Nasty, hateful things. I wish feed still came in burlap sacks. I would have an " all the chickens you can stuff in a burlap sack" sale. I am sure that Jesco's relatives would come out in force.

 

[I luv herfrds]

I just can't see paying over $5.00 for 6 eggs because they are organic/free ranged. That is how much they cost in the grocery stores in the city. Who can budget for that?

 

[dun]

That talk is that the chicken busines will be leaving CA

 

[Lammie]

I just can't see paying over $5.00 for 6 eggs because they are organic/free ranged. That is how much they cost in the grocery stores in the city. Who can budget for that?

I just have too many for us and certainly too many to feed all winter while the don't lay much. I only need maybe six to eight chickens. I have more like 25 that are caged and Lord knows how many on the range, as they say. I hardly ever find eggs from those and I only feed them scratch when they come out to the barnyard. They came with the house.

 

[DavisBeefmasters]

Speaking from California, and being a member of associations that did our best to inform voters of the ramifications of Prop 2... it was a disappointment.

You should have seen the commercial ads that were put on the TV to scare people into voting for it -- all the clips were of people that have already been fined and legally prosecuted and some of which have NOTHING to do with the subject matter of Prop 2 (example: the whole Chino Hills processing plant and mistreatment of downer animals for slaughter).

We'll just have to see what happens and have until 2010 to comply.

 

[hillsdown]

It is the Europeanization of North America and it will get much worse.

It seems to me that celebrities have far to much power because of the oodles of dollars they have. Pathetic that we pay more attention to the words of a celebrity than the main man that lives and works it day in and day out.

ILH the sad thing is us low fellas will be forced to eat the crap while the guys with the big bucks will have the cream of the crop. :help:

It is going to happen in the beef and dairy industry soon unless we can all somehow be heard and actually listened to for once.

 

[john250]

We'll just have to see what happens and have until 2010 to comply.

What agency or department will be enforcing this wondrous law?

 

[ga. prime]

Hopefully that chicken business will move into my neighborhood so I can have a ready supply of chicken litter to spread on my fields.

 

[RD-Sam]

Watch what you wish for, them chicken houses stink to high heavens! I was out in California about 6 years ago, and I got down wind of Chino, that was about the most rank smell I believe I have ever smelt! Of course the polution was so bad there was a brown fog in the air. I topped the ridge driving towards the valley and the air was brown! I sure couldn't live like that! :o

 

[DavisBeefmasters]

We'll just have to see what happens and have until 2010 to comply.

What agency or department will be enforcing this wondrous law?

Aaaahhhh, another joy of California... anyone can report anyone... commercial producers will be inspected as part of their annual process.

 

[iowafarmer]

Drovers had an article in the back on it before the election that i just got around to reading it the other day, and its not just chickens, it bans veal calf crates,sow-gestation crates, and chicken battery cages, so hog industry is getting hit also but chickens are getting hit the hardest.
ok lets look at how this bill; affects the chicken industry in California. It is impossible to get that many eggs without having them confined, can you imagine how much labor, time, effort it would take to scratch out a living trying to meet standards that way. Also it would be impossible for them to make any kind of pofit. They would loose chickens to the weather if they are outside not to mention preditor problems. You would have to hire a lot of people to gather all them eggs by hand. Disease would run rampant through all of the flocks killing hundreds upon thousands of birds not to mention endangering people. Salmonella would become a major problem also do to the fact that all these chickens are running aorund outside in non confined pens that are a lot harder to keep clean and sanatize. It will drive up consumer prices. California pretty much just kicked out every chicken farmer in the state and lost revinue from them and the sad thing is now they will still be eating eggs from confined chickens cause they wont want to pay more so they will have their eggs shipped in from other states and Mexico.
the hog industry.They dont relaize also that it is more humane to have that sow in a gestation crate than running in a group pen. In a group pen it is hard to control diseases and sickness. The sows fight and beat eachother up and will often cut eachother with their teeth. Same thing happens when you put a bunch of pregnant women with terrible attitudes together in a room and lock them up there. Sows will also kill another sows pigglets or try to claim a different sows piglets as her own. They sometimes lay on their piglets and kill them.
People need to stop getting their information from people who never deal with it and jsut look at it and say this is wrong rather than the people who deal with it every day and know how to do things. I hope they realize that if there wasa better way of raising them that doesnt confine them and still makes a profit that we would raise them that way but there isnt and we raise them the most humane way that we can that still make a profit.
Just one more quick little rant and that is that the Humane California group says that proposition 2 supports the family farmer. I want to know how they came to that conclusion.
Thats my opinion on this growing problem for agriculture in the United States.

 

[Onthebit]

Change is acommin!

 

[CKC1586]

Drovers had an article in the back on it before the election that i just got around to reading it the other day, and its not just chickens, it bans veal calf crates,sow-gestation crates, and chicken battery cages, so hog industry is getting hit also but chickens are getting hit the hardest.
ok lets look at how this bill; affects the chicken industry in California. It is impossible to get that many eggs without having them confined, can you imagine how much labor, time, effort it would take to scratch out a living trying to meet standards that way. Also it would be impossible for them to make any kind of pofit. They would loose chickens to the weather if they are outside not to mention preditor problems. You would have to hire a lot of people to gather all them eggs by hand. Disease would run rampant through all of the flocks killing hundreds upon thousands of birds not to mention endangering people. Salmonella would become a major problem also do to the fact that all these chickens are running aorund outside in non confined pens that are a lot harder to keep clean and sanatize. It will drive up consumer prices. California pretty much just kicked out every chicken farmer in the state and lost revinue from them and the sad thing is now they will still be eating eggs from confined chickens cause they wont want to pay more so they will have their eggs shipped in from other states and Mexico.
the hog industry.They dont relaize also that it is more humane to have that sow in a gestation crate than running in a group pen. In a group pen it is hard to control diseases and sickness. The sows fight and beat eachother up and will often cut eachother with their teeth. Same thing happens when you put a bunch of pregnant women with terrible attitudes together in a room and lock them up there. Sows will also kill another sows pigglets or try to claim a different sows piglets as her own. They sometimes lay on their piglets and kill them.
People need to stop getting their information from people who never deal with it and jsut look at it and say this is wrong rather than the people who deal with it every day and know how to do things. I hope they realize that if there wasa better way of raising them that doesnt confine them and still makes a profit that we would raise them that way but there isnt and we raise them the most humane way that we can that still make a profit.
Just one more quick little rant and that is that the Humane California group says that proposition 2 supports the family farmer. I want to know how they came to that conclusion.
Thats my opinion on this growing problem for agriculture in the United States.

Good post, too bad these points could not have been voiced on the O show. I really used to like that woman, but I think the money/power etc have gone amuck in her. These are scary times with the radicals and zealots voices being heard by people in power....
I remember when my Dad started using farrowing crates because he was loosing piglets from either the sow laying on them or eating them. Didn't see anything inhumane about it, quite the opposite.

 

[Onthebit]

I just read Prop 2 and watched some videos for and against it and I am siding with a yes vote. I believe there is something wrong with factory farming. I am surprised more people on this board can't see the benifits of eliminating them. The problem here in Canada though is there are so many laws to protect factory farming that family farming is almost impossible. As for the price of eggs? here, omega 3 battery caged chicken eggs cost almost 6 $ a dozen while my free ranged (where the heck are they laying now?) eggs sell for 3$ a dozen!

 

[dun]

I just read Prop 2 and watched some videos for and against it and I am siding with a yes vote. I believe there is something wrong with factory farming. I am surprised more people on this board can't see the benifits of eliminating them. The problem here in Canada though is there are so many laws to protect factory farming that family farming is almost impossible. As for the price of eggs? here, omega 3 battery caged chicken eggs cost almost 6 $ a dozen while my free ranged (where the heck are they laying now?) eggs sell for 3$ a dozen!

So what do you classify as a "factory farm"?

 

[Onthebit]

A lot of animals in tight quarters under a small roof! I classify large beef feelots as factory farming also. Quite a few dairy farms around can be considered factory farming too. I know this could piss some people off but it is what i think. I grew up on a white veal farm. In fact, at the time we had the largest number of white veal under one roof in NA! I have seen calves raised in crates and those raised in loose pens....Although the loose housed calves didn't have the gain the crated ones did, the meat tasted good and the calves had normal joints...

Farming can survive without the cruel practices we think are normal. I would love to see more familys get involved in producing the food we eat. Ethically speaking! I think it is our duty to provide a good environment in which our food is raised. The end result is the same but the manner in which we do it has to change.