I ate a chicken..

[Vamoosh]

I keep hens for eggs, we acquired the current hens and cockerel because a friend was moving house and couldn’t take them. One of the hens was broody last year and hatched 3 chicks that turned out to all be male.
We have recently had them humanely dispatched and I prepared them and ate them. They have always been free range in our garden so have had a decent life and a stress free death.
A few different friends have been appalled that I’ve eaten my ‘pets’ and have reacted like I’ve cooked up my dog! (I will add that all of these friends eat meat!!)
AIBU for eating the cockerels?

Oh course you're not BU. Too many kids are being brought up to think that meat literately never looked any different to how it looks in a packet from Tesco, it's not healthy for them to have some distorted ideas.

My kids on the other hand both have their own chickens and are looking forward to eating the first of the cockerels we've matured! Even they roll their eyes and despair at some of the ignorance they hear about regarding 'where food comes from'!

Well for anyone with a modicum of sense its not unusual. You have excess livestock you eat them. Not rocket science.

You have excess livestock you eat them.

🤣👍

Carrie7469 My first thought was Yasmeen too

YANBU, it all sounds very reasonable to me. Those birds had a better life than many commercially raised birds, I'm sure. In your position I'd do the same with any other rooster/cockerel birds, as it would prevent any further chicks being born (plus the males make an awful racket).

I wouldnt eat my hens, but then egg layers don't make good meat birds!

Knowing the fate of most Cockerels I would rather they have a good life and a quick dispatch, they make nice meat birds

I couldn’t prepare it myself I don’t think (bit squeamish) but in theory I’d rather eat something that I know was well raised and had a nice life prior to death. Cocks are hard to re-home and would likely only have been done by someone else if not by you. YANBU.

One of the hens was broody last year and hatched 3 chicks that turned out to all be male.

So you counted them?

I have thought about getting chickens for eggs, but I am a hypocrite. I can’t bring myself to eat them. So I go to the store and buy chicken to eat. I recognize this is absolutely ridiculous. Humanely raising and dispatching of your own meat is far more ethical than buying it commercially.

@Carrie7469 You beat me to it about Yasmeen! Poor Charlotte Bronte 😥😋

My mum has kept chickens for meat, separate from the flock she kept for eggs. Best chicken I've ever tasted. I'd much rather eat meat that's come from her smallholding than anything from a supermarket. At least I know her animals have lived a good life.

Everylifehasasoundtrack
Whats so funny? You cant possibly be that stupid can you? No you are just running out of smart alec comments.

Ever been to the country?
There are these places called farms with lots of animals which they breed and these new extra animals or any unproductive animals are sent for slaughter, wait for it....to be eaten. And there are even people who have large gardens....where they keep chickens or ducks or geese for eggs or eating.
Its amazing you should try it.

It is far kinder to the animals to be either hunted, fished or home reared than what happens to them in mass production. The problem is most people don't stop to think where the food came from, to them it just comes from the supermarket wrapped up with a use by date all ready for cooking.

My friend had chickens and when one was really old and on its last legs it was humanly delt with - I think I found this out when I went round for dinner once at it was chicken !! Ironically she is individually veggie separate to her family of meat eaters so the main meal was chicken. Perfectly okay and no different to buying it in shop, are all your friends vegetarians then !!!

I do draw the line at hedgehog though, although it's supposed to be full of vitamins.

That's fleas, Devlesko . . .

YANBU but for me personally I wouldn't be able to eat a chicken I've seen in my garden 😂. I do eat meat but I couldn't bring myself to eat the chicken I looked after. It's all in my head 🤪

they are ancient bantams so be little point

I don't know - a single canapé, perhaps?

One of the hens was broody last year and hatched 3 chicks that turned out to all be male.
So you counted them?

Quite a few of us on here can count as far as FIVE!

No, not unreasonable
((Animal lover here - not that it matters))

Please can somebody enlighten me regarding the Yasmeen story from Corrie? I’m curious!

Yasmeen's Horrible Husband Geoff had been witholding her money as part of his bullying and abusive actions .
She made a plain vegetarian meal , he wasn't impressed and sent her upstairs .

He went out to her beloved chicken's coop .....then you see him serving up a delicious chicken dinner and goading her into admitting how delicious it was , he was so organised etc.

Then says something like "She is quite tender for an old bird" and Yasmeen twigs that it is her chicken she's eating .

@70 thank you

Friends of mine did the same (ate their rooster), because he wouldn't stop harassing the hens. He attacked them so often they were getting flattened by him several times a day.
I helped eat him; he was delicious.

But I didn't eat the deputyyy no no no 🎶

I have killed and eaten a cockerel I had raised from egg. I found it quite a moving experience, but not one that has put me off eating meat. Pet animals are the same as food animals, anyone who thinks differently is practising the fine art of self-delusion.

I feel like my username is apt here

YANBU at all OP, your friends sound like the sorts who want to eat meat without ever thinking where it’s coming from.

But as an aside, please tell me if you keep cockerels that you live in the countryside and/or don’t have near neighbours?! Over new year we went to stay with some friends whose neighbours had cockerels and we won’t be going back there again!