October Rose Farm’s

All Natural    Old Fashioned    Home Grown

FRESH  PASTURED  CHICKEN

Values vs Costs!

Our Pastured Chicken	Commercial Chicken
LOW STRESS LIVING CONDITIONS	HIGH STRESS LIVING CONDITIONS
Live in species appropriate flocks (50 or fewer)	Grown in huge factory houses (20,000 typical)
Uncrowded	Crowded
Fresh, clean air	Air loaded with fecal dust and ammonia
Fresh, living forage always available	No access to green material, bugs or nature's foods
Free to exercise	Severe crowding limits exercise
Vigorous, healthy, disease resistant birds	Problems masked by drugs and chemical additives
Beneficial bacteria aid healthy immune system	Antibiotics depress immune system, harm intestinal flora
Brooder and pens open to fresh air and sunlight	Closed brooder and grow-out houses
Natural Trace minerals	Trace minerals manufactured and acidulated
Unvaccinated	Vaccination depresses immune system
No artificial lighting (for a good night's sleep)	Electric lighting 24/7 to maximize feed intake
No antibiotics	Routine antibiotics
No appetite stimulants	Routine appetite stimulants (arsenic)
No debeaking (no cannibalism)	Debeaked (cannibalism in factory conditions)
Production follows natural seasonal cycle	Grower a slave to year-round business interests
PROCESSING	PROCESSING
Locally grown, processed and sold (feeding neighbors)	Routinely trucked across the country (feeding strangers)
Careful hand evisceration	Machine evisceration (spills feces on carcass)
Nothing injected or added at any time	Injection of dyes, preservatives, tenderizers, water, etc.
No chlorine baths	Numerous chlorine baths
No irradiation	Irradiation compromises vitamin content
Each and every bird inspected by grower and customer prior to sale	Inspected by sampling (Taxpayer provided, government inspected)
Customer always welcome	Customer never sees what goes on
ENVIRONMENTAL RESPONSIBILITY	ENVIRONMENTAL IRRESPONSIBILITY
Offal composted and returned to land as fertilizer   for growing plants	Offal cooked and fed back to chickens as protein supplement
Low process water consumption	High process water consumption
Effluent used to irrigate growing plants or to aid composting	Effluent treated as waste water (sewage)
Manure converted directly to growing plants	Manure fed to cattle or applied to land inappropriately
No contribution to antibiotic resistant "super-bugs"	Routine use of antibiotics in livestock feed gives rise to drug resistant pathogens
We clean up after ourselves.	Factory farming practices foul the air, water and beauty of the Finger Lakes Region.
HIDDEN BENEFITS	HIDDEN COSTS
Decentralized (small, local) food system; very sustainable	Centralized (large, multinational) food system; non-sustainable
Promotes small farming	Promotes giant factory farming
Fosters entrepreneurial spirit	Fosters wage/time clock employment
Price includes true production costs	Taxpayers lose when government cleans up mess
Customer/producer relationships fostered	Customers alienated from producers
CONSUMER OBSERVATIONS	CONSUMER OBSERVATIONS
Low fat content	High fat content
10% shrinkage in cooking maximum	20% carcass weight loss in cooking typical
Firm, toothsome texture	Soft, fatty texture
Rich, delicious flavor	Bland, nearly tasteless
* Farm Fresh: Customer knows processing date	Manufacturer's "Sell by" date "suggests" freshness
Fresh does not mean "Frozen"	Frozen & previously frozen birds legally called "Fresh"
Highest value	Lowest value
A bargain!	Not a bargain at any price!

Table inspired by a similar one by Joel Salatin in Pastured Poultry Profits, 1999, Polyface, Swoope, pp. 311-314.