Questions for those who can answer them:
1.) What is the difference between “Milk” and “dairy herd” with regards to pollution and land use? Honest question.
2.) I’ve always wondered, but didn’t want to get flamed for asking: What if you have pet chickens? I don’t eat them, they live a great chicken life, but I end up with a ton of eggs that I give to people I know. Obviously those eggs are eaten. Does this count as some kind of horrible animal cruelty?
The dairy herd seems to be about beef from a dairy herd. So still meat, but offset by the fact that milk is produced as well. Not sure how they calculate it, nor have I ever seen beef labelled as that (…granted I also haven’t bought any in years), but it makes sense.
This just seems like a pet with a byproduct to me but maybe someone knows more about the effects of breeding for egg laying on chicken quality of life
I hadn’t considered that they would sell the meat from dairy cows, so thanks for that answer. My neighbor has cows but that’s the extent of my knowledge on them.
A few of my chickens are basically “mutts”, which haven’t been bred for anything specific. (we got them from a local who sells chickens, she turned out to know even less than I do about them, though. They’re not as healthy as the others and I suspect they are inbred) The rest of them were picked up from a farm supply store and seem to be specific “breeds”, I have some easter eggers, some Australorps, a welsummer, a black star, and some rhode island reds. I may not be doing everything right BUT my chickens have a half acre to run around on instead of being locked in a tiny box their entire lives, and the meanest thing any of them have endured is me catching them by the tail feathers before putting them back over the fence.
NomNom