chicken's feed vs chicken's weight

I just saw a comment on some youtube video someone saying: ''they feed 3 millions lbs of feed to the chickens to produce 1 million lbs of chicken meat, maybe we should eat the feed!'' later on I saw another video in which some high ranked guy from Cobb claimed the birds ate 1.8 lbs of feed per lbs of chicken meat. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1xMND9UBaSA ... so at the end of the life cycle, an 8 lbs chicken has eaten around 15 lbs of commercial PROCESSED food. How is that even possible!!? Anyway I thought the numbers were quite impressive and I thought I would share them. What if you could raise chickens without using any processed food? the comment that said that we should eat the feed would be irrelevant. Let the chickens do the work for us!!

When the lead in narrative said "Monsanto would like to recognize them" I turned it off. I actually will not knowingly watch something sponsored by Monsanto.

I really enjoy watching stuff sponsored by monsanto. I watch it for pure entertainment. How far will they go!!?
I also like to know what the conventional farmers do. The information I meant to convey with my post was simply the numbers that conventional chicken farmers are shooting for right now, 1.8 lbs of feed per 1 pound of meat. Its un natural to get any animal to a total weight of 8lbs with only 15 lbs of feed in their lifetime, isnt?. While conventional farming is focusing on these crazy numbers to try to make the most money with the least investment, I prefer the permaculture way where we let the chickens eat fresh food for free or mostly for free. Granted we cant raise a zillion chicken a year on 1 acre with the permaculture way, so it makes it hard to compete.

around 15minutes into the video is where they talked about the feed.

The chickens they are talking about have been designed to grow out to kill weight in seven weeks, at 8 weeks old these chickens will break legs from not enough strength in the limbs to support the body weight. They were also designed to be raised in cages only as large as the chicken, no movement allowed. It is a cruel life these chickens were designed to live.

I raise true free range, old world chickens, True Rode Island Reds, etc. They feed themselves all day long and get a meager amount of sprouts in the evening which is one of their treats, it brings them home just before the sun starts going down so they can be in the coop, safe and snug.

Although some producers raise their birds in questionable ways, I still don't think that permaculture can feed the whole country. If that should happen, food will be very very costly.

The whole purpose of permaculture is to get people growing/ raising their own food, while resurrecting the soil that produces that food.

When we build on what mother earth has designed, we become nurturing beings.

When we destroy the natural land, add chemicals to replace the natural fertilizers, add chemicals to control insects, we are not nurturing, we are destroying beings, no more than parasites sucking the life out of the planet that sustains us.

There is no way that the current commercial farming can provide good, nutritious food that is healthful. The commercial farming emphasis being on quantity instead of quality is the one factor that makes it seem you are getting a good deal at the grocery store. It is merely smoke and mirrors, scientific studies are now showing that the current lack of nutrition in the food is causing the diseases and sicknesses humans are getting. This mind set is also prevalent in the Medical community, it is all about greed and money for big businesses, always has been and unfortunately it always will be. They are slaves to their own greed.

Companies like Monsanto, know these studies are true, they are working diligently to produce propaganda that disputes the real facts, their purpose is to make money, no matter the cost to human beings.

The real question is; Just how good is empty of nutrition food no matter the dollar cost of said food? Or in other words, Is it better to eat chemically infused food that makes your body sick at a low cost to your pocket book or is it better to eat food full of nutrition, with a lack of chemicals from fertilizers and insecticides at a higher cost to your pocket book?

There is a way for permaculture to feed more people, it is called farmer's markets. It is idiotic to think that any farming, modern commercial or other method can "feed the world's masses". Each country should be growing the food needed by that countries population.

I agree with most thing you wrote. Our modern method of farming have destroy the soil structure and lead to washing away of fertile top soil. Chemicals have threaten important insects like bees such that China's apple farmers have to hand pollinate their apples. There is no end to the disadvantages, but personally, I still believe that we can still practice commercial farming while eliminating most/all the disadvantages. For example, researches are saying that rather than using antibiotics for growth promotion and disease prevention, safer alternatives like probiotics, herbal extracts, acidifiers etc can be use. Talking about growing your own food, I don't think we can achieve that because I wonder how many people will like to do that. You may have passion for it but what about the neighbour who even hate the crow of a cock (we're not talking about the 'stink' of animal poop). The few that are into permaculture cannot even meet the huge food demand in their country. So I don't think factory farming/ large scale farming should be scrap because small holders can't just meet demand. A great deal of this arguement can be found here: Factory farming - A Blessing or A Curse?

Hau, Henry. I am confused about some of the premises you seem to be supporting. Firstly let me say this, I am not saying Big farming should be scrapped. I am saying we must change methodology or perish.

Big Farming is all about using poisons, in the forms of fertilizer, insecticides, defoliants, all of which leach into the water supply your drinking water comes from.
Feed lots create a very real cesspool situation of lakes or ponds of manure which regularly spill into the surface water supply.

Big Farming is production oriented, not Nutrition oriented, which means the food you buy in the grocery store, going up in price weekly, is not really feeding your body the way food is intended to do.

No matter what research shows to be the best option, Big Farming is always going to go with what is cheapest to use and get the job intended done, if that means feeding Arsenic (a poison, which incidentally doesn't go away) to chickens to keep them "healthy", then that is what Big Farming is going to do.
Probiotics, herbal extracts, etc. are far more expensive therefor they are not going to become the mainstream treatments, Big Farming doesn't work that way, they are all about Profit and Production.

Growing food is a passion, no way around that simply because it has to be.

However, there is a difference in a country growing the food for its own people's consumption and a country growing food for their own people and all the other people on the planet.
At some point the current Big Farming system (both plant and animal bases) will collapse, it is far to dependent on low energy costs, which if you haven't noticed are going up and the world oil supply will not last forever, it will go away at some point.

There are but a few countries that seem to think it is their responsibility to feed the rest of the world.

That is not what we, the folks that promote permaculture think, we think each country should be feeding its own people, with methods that preserve the earth not destroy it.

There are far to many people living today that don't understand that once the earth is dead, people are dead, period, end of the human story.
Continuing on the current path of destruction, destruction will occur, at that point it will no longer matter, every human living will die.

People are quiet capable of growing some of the foods they eat, they did it during world war 1 and 2 without thinking it was hard or nasty or not their place.
During the great depression, many people grew their own food, just so they could eat at all.

If people are so lazy that they don't want to grow their own food then they have to be willing to pay the price, that price being spending their money at the grocery store and living with the illness and disease that comes from unbalanced nutrition.

What you seem to be saying is; "No worries, we must continue doing what has not worked because it will eventually work. People must be fed, no matter that the food they eat doesn't really supply their bodies with the nutrients required for a healthy life".

I will, however, defend your right to your thoughts and beliefs. I just don't have to agree with them.

It is right now, on several farms, being shown that we can provide healthy, nutritious foods by using the methods of poly culture growing, it is also being shown on these same farms that No-Till, multi-layer plantings of crops work.

But if you go and ask 50 farmers who practice the methodology of Monsanto company types "would you change to these new methods that work better, cost less and produce more quality and quantity?" you will find resistance such that you would not believe. Why is this so? It is because "That's not the way my daddy or his daddy before him did it" and " There aren't any subsidies going to be paid to me if I do that".