Pheasants, poultry and Bird Flu
 

On 4 Mar, 22:29, wrote:
On Sun, 04 Mar 2007 18:31:03 +0000, Derek Moody



wrote:
Green Issues

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A weekly column on current issues by John A Burton of the World Land
Trust. The views expressed are personal, and do not necessarily
reflect those of the WLT. Feedback and comments are welcomed.

Pheasants, poultry and Bird Flu
Wednesday, February 28, 2007
Last year there was a furore in the British Press when it was
discovered that pop singer Madonna was importing pheasants from
France, to release for shooting on her estate on the Wiltshire/Dorset
border in southern England. In addition to the 1000 pheasants imported
from France, she and her husband had also imported another 31,000 from
Wales. But this is nothing to the 39 million chicks of various poultry
imported into Britain in 1999, or the 11 million adult birds imported
in 1998 (Hansard June 2000). And, in answer to a Parliamentary
Question from Roger Williams MP, in 2003, 2004, 2005 the imports were
around 1 million a year from France alone(figures from Hansard March
2006). But unfortunately the UK government does not actually
distinguish between 'poultry' such as pheasants and partridges which
are destined for release into the countryside, and those designed for
batteries and sheds. A quick check of the government website for trade
statistics seems to suggest that trade statics for live poultry are
currently being suppressed.

With birds being imported and deliberately released into the
countryside, to me the surprise is not that Avian flu is a threat, but
that there are not far more diseases in our wild birds and poultry
flocks. Local livestock markets have mostly closed, and
slaughterhouses have been 'rationalised'. All this means more and more
animals are being shipped around the countryside. Combine that with
imports, add it to the factory farm conditions many of them are kept
under, plus the cocktails of antibiotics and food supplements they are
fed (including ground up animal protein), and it is no wonder that we
have problems with bovine TB, bird flu, BSE etc etc etc.

Time to take stock and re-evaluate.

Exactly.

Angus Macmillanwww.roots-of-blood.org.ukwww.killhunting.orgwww.con-servation.org.uk

All truth passes through three stages:
First, it is ridiculed;
Second, it is violently opposed; and
Third, it is accepted as self-evident.
-- Arthur Schopenhauer (1788-1860)

I had Asian bird blue. I contracted it from a chinese chicken.