4m x 3m Omlet pen, cube, new auto door still boxed and coop light

[lisa33]

GRRRR

 

Yesterday one Golden Partridge Bantum Cockerel

 

Today one Light Sussex Cockerel

 

What are they going to do if they can't find homes for them!?!?!?

[ubereglu]

I actually dread to think.

[Grovefarm]

I thought you couldnt put up livestock on freecycle im sure I saw that in the T&C's pages

[Egluntyne]

Let's hope they don't get into the hands of the cock fighting brigade.

Edited July 16, 2008 by Guest

[lisa33]

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/letchworthfreecycle/message/21166

 

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/letchworthfreecycle/message/21143

 

Don't know if these'll show if you're not a member.

[Egluntyne]

They don't.

 

Can you copy and paste the text?

[lisa33]

Cockerel 1 :

 

We took two of these and can only keep one - very friendly, will look after your

chooks well. Please send me an email if interested,

 

Ta,

 

Jane

 

 

Cockerel 2:

 

I have a beautiful cockerel which I would love to find a new home for

as I can't bear the thought of him having to be killed just because

he's a boy. We can't keep him where we live but he is sooo sweet. He

has been hand reared and very tame with beautiful green, brown, orange

and black feathers. We affectionately call him Harry Hairy Toes as you

guessed it, his feathers go all the way down to his feet. He's

only 7 weeks old so still a baby. If you could give him a loving home

please contact me - I'll even deliver him to your door with a grateful

smile!

 

 

Poor little things.

[Egluntyne]

Thanks.

 

Such a shame, and they don't really know what the fate of the poor things will be.

[Olly]

Cockerel 1 :

We took two of these and can only keep one -

 

well why did they take two then?

 

This sort of thing is maddening. Poor cockerels.

[craftyhunnypie]

Poor little boys! They shouldn't hatch if noot prepared for the consequences of cockerels hatching.

I love my Bumble to bits - he's mummy's 'big' soldier!

Frizzle cockerel arriving Saturday.

Bumble wanders the woods & front garden, frizzle will be with the banteenie cupcakes in the back garden.

Bumble is the softest boy ever, with only 5 - 6 crows a day, that's all he can manage. He's gorgeous.

 

I feel very sorry for these poor cockerels.

 

Emma.x

[Electricbarbarella]

makes me feel vey sad after sending bob back, I know he will go to a nice home but I didn't realise horrid things still happen to cockrels or i would have tried to keep him, he was so lovely.

[Ange1]

Oh I dream one day that I'll live in a place where it would be allowed to have a cockerel! Lucky you Emma!

 

Shame that those people have to resort to freecycle, it's not as if they're an old bike that they don't want anymore

 

Surely they should have tried their local equestrian 'pet board' or pet shop?

[The Bantam of the Opera]

i think in some cases it is better for the cockerel to be killed than to be just given away. if theyre free you never know who might take them and i think a quick death is a thousand times better than cock fighting or being killed for halal meat. (where i used to work on a farm cockerels were often sold for a few quid and asian families often bought them and they were definitely not chicken types.)

[debbie26pet]

im not sticking up for them, but you can put animals on freecycle, and if u do, you have to provide names, addresses etc to the people who run freecycle and the names of those who request to home them.

they can do checks etc so i think well i hope so they cant get into the wrong hands to easily

as for killing for meat etc u should look at XXXXX auction, alot go there and i grudge buying or taking any mine there for that.

[Madchook]

Well maybe they will find a good home???? I would have thought people who cock-fight wouldn't have a problem getting hold of cockerals anyway, and I would have thought they would be specific about breeds. I would think it was more likely that they get no response... you don't know these people haven't tried other avenues first, there isn't much of a market for boys sadly. Not condoning it, I think they are muppets.

I personally hate the fact that people hatch with some romantic idea they can home all boys as pets...I know someone who hatches every year and last yr all 6 were boys...oh and she doesn't even keep chooks herself, just likes the cute bit. She homed all 6 to a man to keep on his allotment who *promised * not to eat them! I hope for their sake he planned to....

 

I'm getting a baby boy next week I personally don't have an issue with dispatching, obv rather they all got lovely homes or were eaten but it can't be. I do feel bad tho as I have to choose one of two, knowing the fate of the other...for some reason that is the aspect I feel uneasey about....

[superjules]

I saw the bantam one last week lisa, it did make me quite sad and annoyed as he sounds like Sonic.

 

Madchook, cock-fighting types use these poor "free to a good home" birds as training for their fighters. I'd far rather kill a bird myself than have it fall into the hands of these head-cases. It's so sad that people are still naive enough to hatch without a second thought about plans for the boys.

[HENthusiastic]

Excuse my ignorance... but where do all the boys go? Just thinking about all the hundreds of thousands of hens in factories.......... there must have been equal numbers of boys born. Are they all killed as soon as it can be detected that they are boys? Then what......... animal feed???? Do most boys never even reach adulthood?

[superjules]

Breeds that are used in the egg industry (including omlet chooks) are autosexing, this means that on hatch the girls and boys can be told apart by the colour of their down. Boys are gassed with carbon dioxide at a day old and go to zoos for animal food.

[Gallina]

This is something we all need to keep in mind when we feel too virtuous. Someone else did our dirty work and killed most of our girls' brothers -- or all of them in the case of hybrids, as a hybrid cockerel would be completely useless for anything.

 

In nature, I suppose, the young cockerelss would fight each other to death so that there was only one left to rule each roost. That isn't much better either.

[HENthusiastic]

There really is no way to be truly ethical about hens then is there? I guess you could take some miniscule comfort from the fact that they don't lead hideous lives. I guess, really, the baby boys could even be said to have a better deal from life than the girls who go to live in battery farms. With all the incredible things that breeders have done to adapt hens to suit their needs, you'd think it would be possible to have slowly adapted cockrels so they they don't make such a racket. Then more people who had 'pet' hens would be able to keep one. Its terrible. I like to feel I'm doing my part to help chickens, but theres just no getting away from the horror of virtually half a species being automatically killed on birth.

[JamesH]

There are costs for everything we do, most of these are hidden. Who sewed the clothes we wear, who grew the coffee we drink, the bananas we eat? What cost the fuel to transport these?

 

If we bought eggs from the supermarket the same cost would be there, but we would not be providing the personal individual care to the hens. The hens will also get a longer life than commercial egg laying ones. We get to provide a superb food source for ourselves and family, one of the best. We provide our hens with the best of care, better than even organic eggs. Better to know that there is a cost and that we have reduced it.

[beach chick]

Better to know that there is a cost and that we have reduced it.

 

sorry, that's meant to be a quote - good point JamesH.

we cant change every industry practice, and realistically if nature and/or agriculture (not the right word, but I cant think of it) hasnt evolved so that cockerels are produced in much smaller quantities than hens then the only thing that will be done is that they are culled. much better to be gassed painlessly at 1 day old than live life in a battery farm like their sisters. at least they are then fed to zoo animals, birds of prey etc.

Edited July 23, 2008 by Guest

[beach chick]

sorry, managed to post twice...