When the earth rumbled in Virginia two years ago, Hobey
Bauhan, president of the Virginia Poultry Federation,
had to debunk a widespread belief that nervous fowl sense
the ground trembling before we humans do. “It would
be great if we could get poultry to warn us of earthquakes,”
he told a Washington Post reporter in December 2003. “But
I just don’t think it’s realistic.”
(“In Quake’s Wake, A Flood of Impressions,”
December 11, 2003).
While our commercial birds can’t predict natural
disasters, the Commonwealth’s poultry and egg industries
generate top dollar in the agricultural sector. The more
than 880 chicken farms, 330 turkey farms and five processing
companies, which include familiar brands such as Perdue
Farms and Tyson Foods, employ 12,000 people and have contributed
more than $615 million annually to the state’s economy
in recent years. (Virginia
Poultry Federation Facts and Figures).
The bulk of that income comes from broiler chickens. According
to 2003 figures (the most current available), Virginia
farmers produced more than 265 million broiler chickens,
23 million turkeys and 744 million eggs. The state ranks
9th in the nation for broiler production and 5th for turkey.
In fact, Virginia produced half of the turkeys consumed
in the U.S. several weeks back at Thanksgiving.
Broilers, chickens raised specifically for their meat
instead of eggs, were developed in the 1920s and 1930s.
A Delaware woman, Mrs. Wilmer Steele, is credited as the
founder of the commercial broiler industry. In 1923, she
produced a flock of 500 broiler chickens. Three years
later, she was able to build a broiler house that could
accommodate 10,000 birds. (National
Chicken Council). Perhaps this is why Virginia’s
Eastern Shore on the Delmarva Peninsula, is one of the
state’s two major poultry producing regions. (The
other is the Shenandoah Valley.) The conditions for raising
poultry are good weather; adequate land and water; and
access to corn and soybeans, used in poultry feed.
Raising poultry is so essential to some local Commonwealth
economies that when Texas-based Pilgrim’s Pride
announced it would close its Shenandoah Valley turkey
processing plant, a group of local turkey producers scurried
to form a cooperative to buy it. Even Rockingham County,
where the plant was located, and the largest turkey-producing
county in the U.S., chipped in $100,000. Now, the Virginia
Poultry Growers Cooperative operates the plant, saving
many of the 1,300 jobs that would have been lost and 200
farmers from possible bankruptcy. (“Co-op Completes
Purchase of Virginia Turkey Plant,” Rural Cooperatives,
November/December 2004).
But, Virginia’s chickens and turkeys are globetrotters,
as well. VPF President Bauhan testified before the U.S.
House of Representatives Agriculture Committee a few years
back on international trade agreements. Apparently, U.S.
consumers prefer the front half of broilers – the
breast meat, while the rest of the world provides a potential
market for the back half – the legs, etc. (“Multilateral
and Bilateral Agricultural Trade Negotiations,”
Federal Document Clearing House, Congressional Testimony,
June 18, 2003.) Virginia
farmers export poultry to Russia, Hong Kong, Mexico, South
Korea and the Caribbean.
Virginia’s poultry industry is not without its critics,
from environmentalists concerned about waste pollution
in waterways (when chicken litter is used as fertilizer);
animal rights activists lobbying for more humane production
and slaughtering conditions; and those who fear the spread
of avian flu to humans in the U.S.
In 1999, Virginia enacted the Poultry Waste Management
Program. Growers with 20,000 or more broilers or laying
hens or 11,000 or more turkeys were required to obtain
special permits for poultry waste management by October
2001. Still, a when a large number of fish died in the
Shenandoah River last July, the event produced an exchange
of letters to the editor in the Washington Post between
poultry industry spokesman Bauhan and an Annapolis environmentalist
(“A Cleaner Virginia Poultry Industry,” August
5, 2005 and “If These Are Best Practices,”
August 8, 2005).
The industry also defends its treatment of poultry, explaining
poultry is raised in large, open structures known as growout
houses not cages, with ventilation systems and heaters
and adequate food, water and space per bird. (National
Chicken Council -- Animal Welfare). Ironically, consumers
who prefer to purchase free-range poultry because of concerns
about crowding may contribute to the last and most significant
problem – the spread of avian flu. “The problem
with free range poultry production,” says Dr. Elizabeth
Krushinskie, a poultry veterinarian who headed the American
Association of Avian Pathologists in 2004, “is exactly
what the name implies – the birds are out on open
land with exposure to disease-carrying wild bird populations.”
(The
Poultry Site).
Virginia’s poultry farmers have experienced several
avian flu epidemics, the last in 2002, which threatened
the industry rather than the population at large. More
than 4.7 million chickens and turkeys were destroyed in
the four-county Shenandoah poultry-raising area. Disappointed
youngsters who raised show chickens for state fairs were
banned from participating that year. The Delmarva Poultry
Industry, which did not experience the epidemic, even
cancelled its annual meeting, so farmers would not spread
the disease.
Avian flu is again in the news because of the virulent
strain of H5N1 (“type Z”) that has required
the destruction of millions of poultry in Southeast Asia
and has jumped to about 120 humans. At present the strain
has never been seen in the U.S. Should it arrive, there
are various industry measures that might keep any impact
in check. Biosecurity at major poultry farms and processing
plants requires coveralls, boots and hairnets. Migratory
birds in Alaska and the West Coast are continuously tested.
Individuals are restricted from visiting U.S. poultry
farms if they have traveled to infected areas. Backyard
flocks and open air poultry markets in major cities are
harder to regulate. They worry poultry industry and health
officials the most (“Poultry Farm Tactics May Thwart
Bird Flu,” USA Today, November
14, 2005).
Still, chickens have been with us for thousands of years
and turkeys, native to North America, domesticated for
several hundred. Virginians will probably provide white
and dark meat to chicken and turkey aficionados for sometime
to come.
January 3, 2006.
Nice & Curious
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