by Clare Druce
After a while, the broiler with the swastika feet was euthanased – our vet could see no good future for him, and neither could we. Yet without our intervention his future had been predictable enough – the feet discarded, as likely as not he would have entered the food chain, appearing on a restaurant menu, or maybe in a tin of soup, or even in baby food.
By law, chickens are supposed to be inspected on the slaughter line for health defects, but they go by at lightning speed. Our crippled chicken could easily have made it to the electrified water bath and thence to the knife – at a glance he’d have just looked like any other filthy broiler. Or he might have been destined for religious slaughter, in which case the knife alone would have dispatched him.
Some twenty-five years later, while accessing an Australian website, I found myself looking at a familiar photo. It was of our chickens, the one with the swastika feet.
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The five surviving broilers enjoyed a short convalescence in our garage, before Violet and I took them to a nearby RSPCA sanctuary. A few weeks later we were told that one apparently healthy bird had dropped dead before the new owner’s eyes. We arranged to collect the bird for a post mortem examination, and received this veterinary report: ‘…general poor condition, pale breast muscle, arthritis in the left hock, slightly blotchy kidneys (though the liver was firm) and an engorged heart.’ All these signs of sickness, in a chicken not yet four months old!
I believe most people who rescue broiler chickens choose to feed them to appetite. We always did, feeling it would be cruel to deny them ad lib food, since they’d been specifically bred to eat almost continuously.
And therein lies the problem. By failing to restrict their rations, one ensures an early death in all but unusually robust birds. But, given an existing cruel dilemma, a short life and a happy one would seem the best option.
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Six months later, and only two of the five sanctuary broilers were surviving, for the modern broiler chicken was never intended to last. By the time broiler chicks exchange fluffy yellow down for feathers (at around four weeks) they are, by industry design, more than half way through their short lives.
By slaughtering the birds at around forty days of age, the chicken industry manages to catch their ‘crops’ in the nick of time, just days before the real rot sets in.
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In 2010 a depressing article appeared in World Poultry by Frans Fransen, General Manager of IFT-Poultry in Belgium. In it he extols the virtues (all economy-driven ones) of battery cages for broilers. These have been considered for several decades, but the idea has not made much headway. Mr Fransen admits that ‘public perception’ and cages are not compatible in the EU, but predicts that countries outside the EU ‘…will move step by step toward broiler cages in an unstoppable move for efficiency, lower costs and reduction of their ecological footprint.’ (1) Fortunately, recent EU legislation has curbed moves in Europe to cage broilers (2).
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As if the massive broiler chicken industry were not enough to satisfy what’s often called ‘consumer demand’, we were about to light upon another such industry, though one much smaller in every respect.
Did I say ‘consumer demand’? In fact this newly emerging industry knew no such thing, but was to grow out of an official plan to create that demand where none had existed.
Factory farming’s smallest victim
1985: When driving home after a day’s teaching in Wakefield, a roadside notice advertising chicken feed caught my eye; this could be a convenient place to pick up supplies for our poultry. I parked the car and followed the sign up a narrow alley, between terrace houses.
Suddenly, unexpectedly, I was in familiar territory. Could this be some kind of backyard battery hen enterprise? I peered into a shed, and there, incarcerated in tiers of mini-battery cages, were thousands of quail.
Until that moment, I’d had no idea that this shy little wild bird might be a victim of factory farming.
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By chance, MAFF’s Agricultural Development and Advisory Service (ADAS), ever on the look out for ways of encouraging farmers to intensify, had just produced a document on quail meat and eggs. The author was a M.P.S. Haywood and his Quail Production is dated 1985.
Mr Haywood was surprisingly frank about the way ADAS goes about things.
The section on marketing ended with the warning that no ‘ready market’ was in place for quail products: this ‘has to be created and developed’, he stressed.
Under the heading The Future he advised that the way forward was in marketing. Advertising would be the key, as ‘probably 90% of the population have never heard of quail’. He saw it as ‘quite conceivable’ that quail products could find their way into ordinary market outlets, including supermarkets, and followed this advice up with hints on how to improve ‘the production side’, which included the possibility of ‘improved’ growth rate. Mr Haywood suggested quail producers should employ feed restriction and day-length control.
So quail were to be dragged onto the factory-farming scene, but this time with no pretence of filling a need – no hint of the cheap food argument, the urgency to feed the nation. Times had changed, but not, apparently, official enthusiasm for factory farming.
How often have we heard that a new product is on the supermarket shelves because the consumer (it used to be ‘the housewife’) has demanded it? But here was ADAS, advising farmers to create the demand for something hitherto virtually unheard of, let alone desired.
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The type of quail farmed for their meat and eggs is the Japanese Quail. The ADAS document told us these birds would once have weighed 150g (5oz) when adult, but genetic selection had by then almost doubled their natural weight. Chicks weighing 8-10g on hatching would achieve twice this figure at five days.
A fraction ahead of chickens genetically selected for fast growth, these tiny birds reach between 160g and 260g in weight at five weeks, by which time they’ve achieved about 90% of their mature weight ‘and as food conversion deteriorates markedly after this age it is not worth growing the birds on longer.’ (2) Like broiler chickens, meat-type quail are killed years in advance of their natural lifespan.
Females kept for what ADAS terms ‘eating egg production’ were to endure months of incarceration in mini battery cages, kept twelve to a cage measuring 415mm x 600mm (approximately 16” x 24”), the average height being 200mm (8”), on a wire mesh floor with a 7 degree slope to allow eggs to roll away (3).
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Breeding quail: ADAS advised putting nine females and three males together, to be kept in cages measuring the same as those for the miniature battery egg producers. The ‘useful breeding period’ (in 1985) apparently ranged widely, from 8 to 30 weeks.
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Quail are timid, and easily frightened. Their characteristic escape response is to crouch ‘…and then make a sudden and strong vertical take-off leap which, in cages, results in them striking the ceiling’ (4). This take-off leap is known in the industry as head-banging, and often results in severe injury.
Breeding females suffer head wounds from the vertical leaps, while uterine prolapse is a common cause of death (5). Skin lesions, eyelid injuries, eye-loss and the head injuries from head-banging and feather-pecking result in infections (6).
Intensive conditions deny quail any normal courtship behaviour, resulting in mating which is ‘brutal, rapid and unrelated to the receptivity of the female (7), and the frequent mounting of the female results in back wounds, and even in death (8).
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Some free-range meat-type quail are on sale. Most, though, are reared in broiler chicken conditions in ‘barns’ (for which read crowded, windowless sheds).
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ADAS must have known of the suffering inherent in keeping quail in captivity. There’s been plenty of research detailing the eye-loss, the lethal head injuries, the infected wounds. Perhaps Mr Haywood was only doing his job, doing as MAFF and ADAS expected of him. Whatever his motivation, his ke
enness lead entrepreneurs down the slippery slope to large-scale quail farming, already widespread in many European countries as well as in the Far East, but hitherto virtually unknown in Britain. So the year 1985 marked Britain’s official launch of yet another form of food production fit only for abolition.
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The September 1993 issue of Poultry World ran an article about Fayre Game. Apparently, the company had been set up in 1980 by Michael Kaye, a Lancashire entrepreneur seeking an opening in poultry. ‘ADAS adviser Martin Haywood put him on to quail, recommending that he start with just 40 birds on a one acre site at Lytham-St-Anne’s’ PW told its readers. Thirteen years on, and Mr Kaye owned a company with a 13,500 breeding bird operation, producing broiler and layer hatching eggs, with rearing space for 125,000 meat birds and a 20,000-bird egg flock. A far cry, then, from those 40 ‘starter birds’ back in 1980.
Heading the article was a photograph of a row of tiny quail hung in miniature shackles, awaiting slaughter. Alongside it we see the same birds, still hanging in shackles but dead now and plucked naked of their feathers. The caption read: ‘The Orty plucker has come from France and FEOGA cash has come from Brussels to help build the £400,000 EC licensed plant.’
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We produced a fact sheet on quail meat and quail egg production, and distributed it widely. We accused Sainsbury’s of misleading consumers, when we found they’d included Fayre Game quail in a list headed ‘Wild Game’. With our letter of complaint, we enclosed a copy of the Poultry World article.
Sainsbury’s modified the listing, but remained defensive. In a letter to Violet, dated November 13th 1995, the supermarket claimed to have always been concerned about the welfare of animals. They had dealt with the same supplier of quail meat for more than eight years, they said, and for two years for quail eggs, and considered Fayre Game ‘a well established supplier who has staff with considerable experience of quail production’.
In her wisdom, the lady from Customer Services went on to describe how the caged layers ‘…are grown in cages which have a good supply of feed and water. The system has been inspected by our own Technologists, by MAFF and by ADAS. No reason has been found to raise concerns with the supplier’s current practices’. In view of the MAFF/ADAS connection, it would have been surprising indeed if either were to be anything but supportive of the company.
She then claimed that Sainsbury’s stocking quail meat ‘reflects consumer demand for the product’. And we remembered Mr Haywood’s advice, urging farmers to create that demand.
The letter was typical of those written by just about all Customer Service Departments in those days, the writers totally ignorant of the facts, the letters’ sole aim a cover-up.
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Fast-forward twelve years, to December 22nd 2007: There’s bad news for anyone who’d hoped for welfare improvements on the quail front. The Guardian reported on secret filming by the League Against Cruel Sports (LACS) of Fayre Game’s operation: ‘Footage recorded in the poultry farms of Britain’s biggest quail and quail egg producer, Fayre Game, and seen by the Guardian, shows hundreds of birds packed in filthy, multi-level wire cages in dim lighting. Many have virtually no feathers left on their bodies. Dead birds lie among the living and dying birds, with eggs falling onto trays below.’
The article described Fayre Game as producing pheasants, partridges, guinea fowl, quail and other game birds, as well as exotic meats including ostrich, to supply UK supermarkets, food halls, London’s Smithfield, the catering industry and many top restaurants too. Harrods and Selfridges had been among Fayre Game’s customers, but after LACS’ revelations they immediately removed the company’s produce from their shelves.
Fayre Game’s commercial director, Mike Haines, was reported as saying: ‘I don’t know if the footage is of our farm or not…The League Against Cruel Sports hasn’t shown anything to me.’ He did however confirm that about 20% of FG’s quail production was confined in battery conditions. Any dead birds would routinely be removed, he said. Feathers coming off during mating did, he felt, explain the birds’ near-nakedness. FG maintained ‘the highest welfare standards’ and the presence of heavy rain had forced him to divert his staff, to attend to other birds. ‘It was unfortunate that dead birds were there in the cages but we had to take the decision to use our staff to help save the birds outdoors,’ he concluded, managing somehow to cast FG workers in an almost noble light.
Mr Haines told the Guardian that Fayre Game took animal welfare ‘extremely seriously’ and was working towards gaining formal recognition of its efforts through the RSPCA’s farm assurance and food labelling scheme, Freedom Food.
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Fast-forward once more, to March 18th 2010: Having received no reply to an email, I telephoned Alan Jervis at Fayre Game. Our conversation went something like this:
CD: What percentage of your egg-producing quail is caged?
AJ: Around 20%.
CD: Is FG registered with Freedom Food?
AJ: Not yet, but the idea is ongoing. Our parent company, Tom Barron, is with Freedom Food for various things, so we hope to join the scheme.
CD: Are Fayre Game meat-type quail free range?
AJ: No, they’re in barns.
CD: Are your quail still slaughtered in the conventional way – hung in shackles etc?
AJ: Yes, that’s how all poultry is killed.
CD: No, gassing poultry is a method that’s getting used more and more.
AJ: That wouldn’t be commercially viable for Fayre Game. Anyway, a vet from the Meat Hygiene Service is always on duty – and the MHS is about to become part of the Food Standards Agency.
CD: Birds go by very fast though, on the slaughter line.
What is the speed of your line?
AJ: I can’t tell you that.
CD: And how many quail does Fayre Game slaughter daily?
AJ: I can’t tell you that.
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When we first tried to raise awareness about farmed quail I’d hoped to photograph some myself, to feature on a leaflet. We occasionally visit a park where quail are kept in a spacious Victorian conservatory. The vegetation is rich in there, with plenty of shelter for small creatures, and it’s warm – probably an environment not unlike the quail’s natural one.
But the little birds were so timid, and so good at hiding away among the plants on the soft, moist earth floor of the conservatory floor, that I never did manage my picture.
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A recent feature in Poultry World reported that Fayre Game quail for egg production now spend their 35-40 weeks of lay under a ‘Free to Fly’ system. Kept on litter, with access to verandas, the birds lay their eggs on the floor, in one area. And the group size for these shy birds? Apparently it’s five thousand. So, vastly better than cages, but no life for a quail.
Russell Holdsworth, the company’s sales manager, views the pretty mottling on quail eggs as ‘a useful marketing tool’. And he tells readers that quail meat and eggs are gaining in popularity as TV chefs and cookery programmes ‘continue to fire the imagination of consumers’(9).
Grey Girl
There once was a small auction hall near Huddersfield, now mercifully closed down. On a Saturday, you’d see all sorts of items for sale, from small species of livestock to old lawn mowers. And you could pick up information of all sorts too. One morning Violet and I stood near to a brash sort of punter, listening in to his conversation. He was boasting to a friend how one night he’d outwitted the police when they’d opened his car boot, revealing a spade. Badger digging…I can picture him now, full of himself, a heavy gold chain around his neck. Beside him stood his young son, about ten years old, drinking in his father’s every word. I had a sinking feeling the child could be a badger digger of the future.
It was that same morning that Grey Girl came our way. We’d come hoping to bid for a few battery hens, but could only see cockerels, rabbits and a goose or two. And then we noticed this most beautiful grey hen. Chickens’ eyes are often described as bead
y but hers were soft and appealing. Now and again she’d shake her head, a sure sign of stress.
A fat, red-faced man came up and poked at her breast through the cage bars, checking for meatiness. I looked into her eyes, and felt for her. I overheard the man who’d brought the grey hen in to be sold to the highest bidder tell the fat man she was ten months old.
One more trawl round the cages, and I knew I couldn’t go home without her. Violet and I agreed we were prepared to outbid anyone, and an hour later Grey Girl was ours.
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At that time we had three fully-grown broilers. We kept them separately from the ex-battery hens, since they were slower in their ways, indeed they seemed almost like another species. I decided to introduce Grey Girl to them, as she too was of a heavy build. There was no aggression, as can occur when introducing a new member to a flock – but for a week or two Grey Girl just stood around on her own, like a new girl at school whom nobody wants to play with.
Then one morning, just for a few moments, I carelessly left the gate between the two groups open. When I turned round, Grey Girl had slipped through to join the ‘proper’ hens, and she never looked back. Had she sensed she didn’t belong in amongst those genetically altered, clinically obese birds? We shall never know, but she lived happily with her new, slimmer, friends for some years and gave us much pleasure.
A secretarial blunder
In 1986 we received a letter from a confused supporter.
‘Can’t think what this is all about,’ she wrote. ‘I thought you’d be able to make more of it.’
Enclosed was an official MAFF document, several pages long. And what glorious luck, there’d been a mix up! Our supporter had been sent Animal Health Circular 85/83, an internal MAFF memo destined for all regional Divisional Veterinary Officers, giving instructions how to deal with letters on animal welfare, and demonstrations by the likes of Chickens’ Lib.