Who is Speaking up for the Chickens?

With more than 500 million farmed birds slaughtered in response to bird flu outbreaks in the past 12 months, avian bird flu, it would seem, is becoming a cyclical thing, with each slaughter at every “outbreak” of avian flu being way more deadly the last.

While smaller businesses are impacted badly, the corporations can “suck it up,” and move on. Possibly if I were to dig deeper the big chicken corps are undertaking a renewal process, clean out a farm and introduce new chickens. The smaller privately owned farms are just the collateral damage of alarmism. As they say, follow the money.

But in every outbreak it is the chickens, the victims, who pay the ultimate price.

In my last article I wrote about a similar thing happening to bees. However, when the bureaucrats decide to change their approach to managing a problem rather than trying to eradicate it, bee-keepers were left with the mental anguish of wondering if starting over is worth the immense effort and cost required.

More on apiculture as a hobby here.

Chickens are a much different proposition, and don’t have the wild environmental experiences bees have to develop defensive systems against pests and viruses.

Actually, chickens are so far down ecological chain it is unusual for people to think of…