Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
8
Meat Chickens
ONE VARIETY OF MEAT BIRD DOMINATES
the current poultry market. You know it well.
You see it displayed in tidy packages at the supermarket, and you're pleased by the low
price and the little picture of the colorful, happy hen with a kerchief wrapped around
her neck. You buy it, mostly boneless. You serve it to your family using 16 different re-
cipes and you eat it. Give up? It's the modern, commercial broiler chicken — the Cornish
Cross.
When the Cornish Cross was first created more than 50 years ago, the original intent
was to develop a faster-growing chicken that provided more meat per bird. Its develop-
ment was a boon for farmers and consumers alike. Over the years, however, as the raising
of chickens became the domain of corporations, the focus has shifted away from raising
vigorous, healthy chickens and toward practices that are most profitable. Today's Cornish
Cross broilers mature so quickly that the growth has actually outpaced the birds' immune
system, making health problems prevalent among these breeds.
Many folks involved in the commercial poultry-raising business today argue that the
modern broiler chicken is a cheap and rapid source of meat. In this twenty-first century,
however, the citizens of this planet have begun to start looking at all of the costs involved
in growing our food supply, not just the monetary expense. We are asking how the en-
vironment, and the poultry and human populations are affected by the poultry industry.
We wonder about the long-term survival of the chicken species when the greatest num-
bers of meat birds raised are totally dependent on man, on energy, and on a germ-free
environment to live. We seek a safer, more humane, and more sustainable method of food
production.
Meat Chicken Choices
For hundreds of years, the predominant meat chicken in the United States was the White
Rock, a recognized American Poultry Association breed. White Rocks grew fast relat-
