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I'm pretty sure the owners wouldn't have sacrificed 5.3M chickens in profit if they had seen any other way. Also, I find it odd that the Guardian apparently did

I'm pretty sure the owners wouldn't have sacrificed 5.3M chickens in profit if they had seen any other way. Also, I find it odd that the Guardian apparently did not wait for them to reply before publishing the story. If they had waited any significant amount of time, they probably would have gone with something else than: "Rembrandt Enterprises has been approached for comment"

t0mas88 5y ago
Killing the chickens was required of them by the government (as it has over here in Europe for several locations, for the same reason). But they decided to do it in the cheapest way possible, because shutting down the environmental control costs nothing as opposed to hiring an external provider to do it in a more animal friendly way. They could have made a more animal friendly but less profitable choice. I think the slightly more animal friendly way is to pump the building full of CO or CO2.
- wildzzz 5y ago
  Dying from CO2 inhalation is painful although CO inhalation is less so. Nitrogen inhalation is entirely pain free. Although I'm sure it's more expensive since CO and CO2 can easily be produced with common materials.
  - wahern 5y ago
    Chickens aren't humans. The CO2 asphyxiation response seems to very across species. For example, this agricultural guide claims that chickens lose consciousness before reaching the response phases that we would consider painful: > While rats do not lose consciousness prior to aversive responses to CO2, chickens become unconscious very quickly in high concentrations of CO2 and somatosensory neuronal potentials are not evoked until several seconds after the birds are unconscious. > ... > Webster and Fletcher (2004) reported that while White Leghorn chickens could detect atmospheres enriched with CO2 at 30, 45, and 60% in air, there were no differences in behaviors associated with the various atmospheres. They concluded that most hens, given modest motivation, were not sufficiently deterred from entering any of the CO2-enriched atmospheres. ... Source: https://animalcare.illinois.edu/standards/co2-euthanasia-poultry-and-young-swine-guidelines https://animalcare.illinois.edu/standards/co2-euthanasia-pou...
wildzzz 5y ago
I feel like most of the reasonable outrage is on how the chickens were culled and the treatment of the workers. If pumping the barn full of CO2 is an option, why not use nitrogen instead? Painless death whereas CO2 causes pain. Giving thousands of chickens deadly heatstroke seems inhumane as well. 104F isn't going to kill a virus so it's just going to cause pain like heatstroke in humans. Its unfortunate that they had to kill so many birds but it seems entirely necessary given the risks of avian flu. As for the workers, culling a significant number of your livestock is going to mean there will be a significant number of workers no longer needed although I'm sure this will be temporary until the facility is back to normal capacity. The state government needs to make sure that these workers can receive unemployment payments until they can find new work or their jobs reopen since laying off that many people at one rural location is going to have significant impact on the community.
BitwiseFool 5y ago
I don't have a citation for you because I heard this from someone I met in university, but large farms take "bio-security" incredibly seriously. Trying to treat the livestock is far more expensive than simply culling them all and sterilizing the enclosure. Additionally, even if they tried to treat the flock instead of culling it, the disease would linger in the population and be a continual concern.

t0mas88 5y ago

Killing the chickens was required of them by the government (as it has over here in Europe for several locations, for the same reason). But they decided to do it in the cheapest way possible, because shutting down the environmental control costs nothing as opposed to hiring an external provider to do it in a more animal friendly way. They could have made a more animal friendly but less profitable choice. I think the slightly more animal friendly way is to pump the building full of CO or CO2.

wildzzz 5y ago
Dying from CO2 inhalation is painful although CO inhalation is less so. Nitrogen inhalation is entirely pain free. Although I'm sure it's more expensive since CO and CO2 can easily be produced with common materials.
- wahern 5y ago
  Chickens aren't humans. The CO2 asphyxiation response seems to very across species. For example, this agricultural guide claims that chickens lose consciousness before reaching the response phases that we would consider painful: > While rats do not lose consciousness prior to aversive responses to CO2, chickens become unconscious very quickly in high concentrations of CO2 and somatosensory neuronal potentials are not evoked until several seconds after the birds are unconscious. > ... > Webster and Fletcher (2004) reported that while White Leghorn chickens could detect atmospheres enriched with CO2 at 30, 45, and 60% in air, there were no differences in behaviors associated with the various atmospheres. They concluded that most hens, given modest motivation, were not sufficiently deterred from entering any of the CO2-enriched atmospheres. ... Source: https://animalcare.illinois.edu/standards/co2-euthanasia-poultry-and-young-swine-guidelines https://animalcare.illinois.edu/standards/co2-euthanasia-pou...

wildzzz 5y ago

I feel like most of the reasonable outrage is on how the chickens were culled and the treatment of the workers. If pumping the barn full of CO2 is an option, why not use nitrogen instead? Painless death whereas CO2 causes pain. Giving thousands of chickens deadly heatstroke seems inhumane as well. 104F isn't going to kill a virus so it's just going to cause pain like heatstroke in humans. Its unfortunate that they had to kill so many birds but it seems entirely necessary given the risks of avian flu. As for the workers, culling a significant number of your livestock is going to mean there will be a significant number of workers no longer needed although I'm sure this will be temporary until the facility is back to normal capacity. The state government needs to make sure that these workers can receive unemployment payments until they can find new work or their jobs reopen since laying off that many people at one rural location is going to have significant impact on the community.

BitwiseFool 5y ago

I don't have a citation for you because I heard this from someone I met in university, but large farms take "bio-security" incredibly seriously. Trying to treat the livestock is far more expensive than simply culling them all and sterilizing the enclosure. Additionally, even if they tried to treat the flock instead of culling it, the disease would linger in the population and be a continual concern.