Free-range conjours up such nice images doesn't it? But (sorry to be a "Debbie Downer"......


.“Free-Range” Birds Raised for Meat
Birds raised for meat may be sold as “free-range” if they have government certified access to the outdoors. The door may be open for only five minutes and the farm still qualifies as “free-range.” Apart from the “open door,” no other criteria such as environmental quality, number of birds, or space per bird, are included in the term “free-range.” A government official said: “Places I’ve visited may have just a gravel yard with no alfalfa or other vegetation.”

A visitor to Polyface Farm in Virginia wrote: “I toured Polyface on a sweltering day. Chickens were in tiny cages with tin roofs in the beating sun, panting like mad. The cages were located over manure piles the birds were supposed to eat larvae from. Rabbits were kept in factory-farm conditions in suspended, barren wire cages. There was no sign of freedom or compassion for these animals.”

Visitors to Springfield Farm in Sparks, Maryland reported: “The ‘free-range’ turkeys we saw were housed in a field in the freezing cold with no shelter except a small wooden tarp-covered structure only big enough for half of them. The others huddled together shivering in the weather. The farmer roughly grabbed the turkeys by their legs and held them upside down while they flapped their wings desperately to upright themselves. That is how he carried them.




Man, such a cruddy life, then they kill you. Dead on a plate, doesn't sound so "free-range" to me. Other than going vegetarian (I like meat myself, in moderation), sometimes you buy things you think for the right reasons cause the labels make it sound better and healthier but it just costs more. Know what you're doing. Educate yourselves. (the computer and Google are a good start.)