The Cycle of Life

When we first made the decision to raise animals for meat, one of the main concerns we had was, naturally, “how are the kids going to handle it”. I strongly believe that we need to know where our food comes from, and that where it comes from is a happy place. I also think that as we have the space and means to raise our own animals for food then this is something we should do. If it all goes horribly wrong then we’ll all just have to become traumatised vegetarians, but at least we’ll have tried.

MasterG (now 8) has always loved birds. His huge cuddly chicken called Heidi Hen went everywhere with him, often accompanied by Quiet Penguin and Squeaky Penguin. Aged about 2 he noticed the roast chicken in its glorious entirety coming out of the oven: “chicken!” he shouted. He grabbed Heidi Hen. “chicken” he shouted. A few seconds later after looking between the two, he pointed to the roast chicken and shouted “yummy chicken!”. Back then our little carnivore loved chicken, duck, venison, prawns, limpets and mussels. His tastes are changing (contracting) as time passes, but in principle he doesn’t have an issue with eating meat, and actually spends a considerable proportion of his life being a predatory T-Rex or Smilodon, devouring whatever hapless hadrosaur or giant ground sloth that happens to cross his path.

MissN (now 4) announced, aged 2, that she “wouldn’t eat anything with a heart” (ironically, she’s always eaten sausages!) and has pretty much stuck to that ever since. She will also eat fish fingers, chicken nuggets and meatballs, and both kids go WILD for roast chicken skin.

We started with a discussion about the difference between farm animals (for food) and pet animals (kept forever).

Pigs – easy: farm animals.

Sheep – easy: farm animals.

Quail – hens for eggs and we’d planned on eating our excess males, but had made the rookie error of giving them to the kids as pets when they were chicks. So, pets it is then…

Chickens - slightly blurred line with the laying hens, as they provide food but we’re going to keep them forever. Meat chickens are farm animals.

The initial discussion about pigs went:

Us: So if we got pigs they’d be farm animals.

MissN: And then they’d go for meat? I don’t eat pigs.

Us: Yes, meat like sausages. Do you like sausages?

MissN: Hmmm..yes. But only from the shop. The grown ups can eat our sausages and I’ll eat shop sausages.

The initial discussions about meat chickens went:

Us: So meat chickens are farm animals, so we wouldn’t be keeping them forever as when they grow big enough they’d be food.

MasterG: That is so CRUEL!! How could you eat the cute little chicks!! I’m not doing that.

Us: It’s important that chickens have happy lives before people eat them. And if they live here we know that they’ll be happy.

MasterG: I’m not eating them.

Us: OK, that’s fine you don’t have to if you don’t want to.

MissN: Could we make them into nuggets?

Us. Yes.

Miss N: Oooh yummy! I'll eat a bite of nugget, then I'll cry, then I'll eat another bite of nugget.

Us: And there would be chicken skin, too.

Both kids: Chicken skin!! We’d devour the chicken skin!! Yeah! Skin skin skin!!!

Encouraging start, but the jury’s still out on whether, once The Time Has Come they’ll ever speak to us again. Particularly where the chickens are concerned. So there’s still a chance we might either end up being the world’s worst parents providing the basis for their best-selling memoires entitled "And Then They Killed And Ate Our Pets", or the reluctant owners of three 400kg boars and nine cockerels.