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I have a sniff of interest in my next book. Early days yet, certainly far too early to break out the champers, but interesting enough to mention.
'The alpha to omega of Greekification' was written under the fairly uninspired working title of 'A Greek Dairy'. Indeed, the folder it resides in on my desktop is still called that. However, it has metamorphosed from the rather sad little autobiogrpahical exercise it began life at, way back in 1995. My God, over ten years ago...
It is time to publish this too, and to move on.
I look forward to opening the folder called 'Year of the Monkey' and actually writing again. The fresh page, a fresh start, worlds to discover.
Watch this space.
Thursday, December 07, 2006
Wednesday, December 06, 2006
Down Under
On a less serious note, we're off Down Under for Christmas. Job hunting and visiting friends. By January 10, we should know where our little family is going to spend the next four or five years. Quite exciting, that.
Tuesday, December 05, 2006
Christmas platter
I seem to have become sidetracked into the cruelty of the Christmas feast.I have been a vegetarian longer than not, preferring though to siply say 'I don't eat meat' than to preach 'the cause'. Maybe I'm wrong, and I ought ot be more overtly crusading about it.
I'm even considering going vegan, thoguh quite how I could live without cheese is beyond me.
I know I shall never eat meat or fish again. Perhaps it is time to commit and go all the way....
Sunday, December 03, 2006
Christmas is coming...still...
Christmas is coming,
The geese are getting fat...
Turkeys in their natural state
Turkeys have a zest for living and, treated with respect, they become very friendly. Turkeys have large, dark, almond-shaped eyes and sensitive fine-boned faces. Wild turkeys live in North and Central America. They are striking and handsome, graceful and intelligent. They roost in trees and roam in woodlands, eating vegetation and insects. They live in harems - the mothers being very protective of their young. An adult bird can fly up to 50mph.
Conditions in turkey farms
There are two main systems of turkey rearing:
a. Windowless units. The most common system where as many as 25,000 turkeys are kept in one shed. The birds are crowded together like broiler chickens, on a litter floor. Many develop ulcerated feet and painful burns on their legs and breasts as they spend their short lives standing on litter which often becomes wet, dirty and produces ammonia. Lighting is dim to discourage aggression.
b. Pole barns. These allow daylight and ventilation but conditions are still grossly overcrowded. Stress causes fighting and birds attack each others eyes and toes.
Slaughter age
Turkeys would live up to 10 years in the wild. Farmed turkeys are usually slaughtered between the ages of 12 and 26 weeks, although according to DEFRA some are as young as eight weeks.
Mortality rate
6%- 15% of turkeys die in sheds each year. Many die because they never learn to reach the food and water points (‘starve-outs’). Others die from disease or as a result of growing too quickly.
Aggression
Turkeys peck at each others feathers, toes and eyes when overcrowded. Sometimes their eyeballs are destroyed by the pecking. Cannibalism can be common in intensive farms. Turkeys are often kept in near darkness to discourage cannibalism. In the wild, turkeys would not be aggressive but on factory farms birds are driven to aggression by the conditions in which they are kept.
Mutilation
Debeaking is considered essential to many turkey rearers. 10% of all turkeys are debeaked (DEFRA, Oct 2001) When turkeys are only a few days old, their beaks are partially amputated, a section of the upper beak being cut off with a red-hot blade or with clippers. Potential breeding stock are debeaked again at around 16 weeks, and sometimes at a later stage too. Beak trimming is painful and can result in permanent pain. Research at the AFRC Institute of Animal Physiology and Genetics Research, Edinburgh, indicates that debeaking results in chronic pain similar to ‘phantom limb pain’ in human amputees. Birds have been observed, over a 56 week period, to show signs of behaviour associated with long-term chronic pain and depression, following partial beak amputation.
(“Behavioral Evidence for Persistent Pain Following Partial Beak Amputation in Chickens” - Michael Gentle et al, Applied Animal Behaviour Science, 27 (1990) 149-157).
Toe removal is also performed on male breeding birds which can result in open wounds, blood loss and pain.
Desnooding is practiced to minimalise cannibalism. This is where the long fleshy appendage extending from the front of a turkey’s head over its upper back is removed with an instrument or pulled off.
When farmers want to prevent turkeys from flying, dewinging is carried out where the flight feathers of one wing may be clipped.
Slaughter
22 million turkeys are killed each year in licensed plants with an estimated 10 million being killed at Christmas (based on consumption figures, DEFRA, 23/10/2001).
Including small-scale enterprises which slaughter on premises, 35 million turkeys are killed in the UK every year. (Meat Hygiene Service, 1998)
According to the Meat Hygiene Service (MHS), there are 50 slaughterhouses licensed to kill turkeys. 34 out of 50 plants stunning turkeys use the electric waterbath. Others use gas stunning and very low throughput premises tend to use an electric hand-held stunner.
UK slaughter legislation states that birds may be killed by decapitation or dislocation of the neck. These procedures do not require a license provided that they are carried out on premises forming part of an agricultural holding on which the bird was reared.
Decapitation is not widely practiced but neck dislocation is the most widely used method of slaughter on small-scale enterprises. Scientists Gregory and Wotton expressed concern about the effectiveness of neck dislocation in poultry. They tried crushing and stretching the necks of poultry (method 2 works in a similar manner to manual neck dislocation) and concluded that, “neither method consistently produced concussion and it is uncertain whether they cause instantaneous unconsciousness.”
(N. G. Gregory, S. B. Wotton, 1990. Comparison of neck dislocation and percussion of the head on visual evoked responses in the chicken’s brain. The Veterinary Record 126, 570-572).
Researcher Roger McCamley says that, “There is certainly a potential for welfare problems to arise when small scale seasonal producers kill large birds by neck dislocation. Usually, no training will have been sought or received and because of the small number and infrequency of slaughtering, little expertise in slaughter will be obtained.”
R. McCamley, 1992. The welfare aspects of poultry slaughter on farms. The Meat Hygienist, December edition, 5-11.
If turkeys are not killed on the farm at which they are reared, they are transported live to a processing plant. Turkeys are caught from the rearing sheds and stuffed into crates for transportation to the slaughterhouse. Rough handling often causes severe bruising and injury. At the slaughterhouse the birds are hung upside down with their feet in shackles for up to six minutes before they are stunned (DEFRA, 2001). Birds are in great distress at this time, especially those with diseased hip joints or legs.
The shackled turkeys move to an electrically-charged water bath through which their heads and necks pass. The electric shock is meant to stun the birds. Turkeys tend to arch their necks at slaughter and may not be stunned before they reach the neck cutter. Each year, conservative estimates suggest that around 30-40,000 will enter the scalding tank alive. Around 43% of birds will receive painful electric shocks before being stunned because their wings touch the electrically-charged waterbath.
From http://www.viva.org.uk/campaigns/turkeys/index.htm
Enjoy your Christmas dinner.
The geese are getting fat...
Turkeys in their natural state
Turkeys have a zest for living and, treated with respect, they become very friendly. Turkeys have large, dark, almond-shaped eyes and sensitive fine-boned faces. Wild turkeys live in North and Central America. They are striking and handsome, graceful and intelligent. They roost in trees and roam in woodlands, eating vegetation and insects. They live in harems - the mothers being very protective of their young. An adult bird can fly up to 50mph.
Conditions in turkey farms
There are two main systems of turkey rearing:
a. Windowless units. The most common system where as many as 25,000 turkeys are kept in one shed. The birds are crowded together like broiler chickens, on a litter floor. Many develop ulcerated feet and painful burns on their legs and breasts as they spend their short lives standing on litter which often becomes wet, dirty and produces ammonia. Lighting is dim to discourage aggression.
b. Pole barns. These allow daylight and ventilation but conditions are still grossly overcrowded. Stress causes fighting and birds attack each others eyes and toes.
Slaughter age
Turkeys would live up to 10 years in the wild. Farmed turkeys are usually slaughtered between the ages of 12 and 26 weeks, although according to DEFRA some are as young as eight weeks.
Mortality rate
6%- 15% of turkeys die in sheds each year. Many die because they never learn to reach the food and water points (‘starve-outs’). Others die from disease or as a result of growing too quickly.
Aggression
Turkeys peck at each others feathers, toes and eyes when overcrowded. Sometimes their eyeballs are destroyed by the pecking. Cannibalism can be common in intensive farms. Turkeys are often kept in near darkness to discourage cannibalism. In the wild, turkeys would not be aggressive but on factory farms birds are driven to aggression by the conditions in which they are kept.
Mutilation
Debeaking is considered essential to many turkey rearers. 10% of all turkeys are debeaked (DEFRA, Oct 2001) When turkeys are only a few days old, their beaks are partially amputated, a section of the upper beak being cut off with a red-hot blade or with clippers. Potential breeding stock are debeaked again at around 16 weeks, and sometimes at a later stage too. Beak trimming is painful and can result in permanent pain. Research at the AFRC Institute of Animal Physiology and Genetics Research, Edinburgh, indicates that debeaking results in chronic pain similar to ‘phantom limb pain’ in human amputees. Birds have been observed, over a 56 week period, to show signs of behaviour associated with long-term chronic pain and depression, following partial beak amputation.
(“Behavioral Evidence for Persistent Pain Following Partial Beak Amputation in Chickens” - Michael Gentle et al, Applied Animal Behaviour Science, 27 (1990) 149-157).
Toe removal is also performed on male breeding birds which can result in open wounds, blood loss and pain.
Desnooding is practiced to minimalise cannibalism. This is where the long fleshy appendage extending from the front of a turkey’s head over its upper back is removed with an instrument or pulled off.
When farmers want to prevent turkeys from flying, dewinging is carried out where the flight feathers of one wing may be clipped.
Slaughter
22 million turkeys are killed each year in licensed plants with an estimated 10 million being killed at Christmas (based on consumption figures, DEFRA, 23/10/2001).
Including small-scale enterprises which slaughter on premises, 35 million turkeys are killed in the UK every year. (Meat Hygiene Service, 1998)
According to the Meat Hygiene Service (MHS), there are 50 slaughterhouses licensed to kill turkeys. 34 out of 50 plants stunning turkeys use the electric waterbath. Others use gas stunning and very low throughput premises tend to use an electric hand-held stunner.
UK slaughter legislation states that birds may be killed by decapitation or dislocation of the neck. These procedures do not require a license provided that they are carried out on premises forming part of an agricultural holding on which the bird was reared.
Decapitation is not widely practiced but neck dislocation is the most widely used method of slaughter on small-scale enterprises. Scientists Gregory and Wotton expressed concern about the effectiveness of neck dislocation in poultry. They tried crushing and stretching the necks of poultry (method 2 works in a similar manner to manual neck dislocation) and concluded that, “neither method consistently produced concussion and it is uncertain whether they cause instantaneous unconsciousness.”
(N. G. Gregory, S. B. Wotton, 1990. Comparison of neck dislocation and percussion of the head on visual evoked responses in the chicken’s brain. The Veterinary Record 126, 570-572).
Researcher Roger McCamley says that, “There is certainly a potential for welfare problems to arise when small scale seasonal producers kill large birds by neck dislocation. Usually, no training will have been sought or received and because of the small number and infrequency of slaughtering, little expertise in slaughter will be obtained.”
R. McCamley, 1992. The welfare aspects of poultry slaughter on farms. The Meat Hygienist, December edition, 5-11.
If turkeys are not killed on the farm at which they are reared, they are transported live to a processing plant. Turkeys are caught from the rearing sheds and stuffed into crates for transportation to the slaughterhouse. Rough handling often causes severe bruising and injury. At the slaughterhouse the birds are hung upside down with their feet in shackles for up to six minutes before they are stunned (DEFRA, 2001). Birds are in great distress at this time, especially those with diseased hip joints or legs.
The shackled turkeys move to an electrically-charged water bath through which their heads and necks pass. The electric shock is meant to stun the birds. Turkeys tend to arch their necks at slaughter and may not be stunned before they reach the neck cutter. Each year, conservative estimates suggest that around 30-40,000 will enter the scalding tank alive. Around 43% of birds will receive painful electric shocks before being stunned because their wings touch the electrically-charged waterbath.
From http://www.viva.org.uk/campaigns/turkeys/index.htm
Enjoy your Christmas dinner.
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