Organic Poultry Basics - Humane and Healthy Poultry Production - page 3

though there has been little, if any, scientific research conducted to verify such benefits. Poultry
may also play a key role in nutrient cycling. Nutrients are returned to the soil via manure and
composted litter. Poultry can be moved around the farm to where nutrients are needed. The
farmer's job is to determine how and where poultry best benefit the overall organic farm.
The Intersection of Size, Sustainability, and Profitability
According to Poultry magazine, a commercial poultry processors' resource, “High production
costs remain an obstacle to moving organic production to the mainstream. Complying with or-
ganic requirements is generally not compatible with the practices and routines of conventional
broiler production which is achieved through high volume and efficiency.” 2 This view is par-
tially correct because many organic poultry producers follow older, traditional methods of an-
imal husbandry. However, due to increased market demand, organic production has also been
innovating, and there has been growth in productivity. There are certified organic poultry farms
of all sizes in the Northeast from small flocks (fewer than 1,000) on diverse farms to relatively
large commercial flocks in barns (107,000 hens at Pete and Gerry's Eggs in Monroe, New
Hampshire—perhaps others are bigger) to large packers and processors who contract out to a
multitude of small growers. Systems vary somewhat according to size of operation, but all start
with the basic principles that organic poultry means free-roaming birds fed organically and
raised without conventional medications and physical alterations, such as wing and toe clipping
and debeaking. Farms interpret these principles differently, but organic producers, regardless of
size, ideally see their farms as living entities with all organisms benefiting each other—not as
mono-species factories benefiting only the farmer.