#Culling

[kedreeva]

You kill your birds? I thought you loved animals...

I do love animals. I breed quail for meat and eggs, and that means that yes, I kill some of my birds, just as I kill some of my mice who are unsuitable for pet homes or unnecessary for breeding, just as I have sent overtly aggressive peafowl that would be dangerous to other birds or humans home with someone to be dinner.

Loving animals and understanding meat source animals must be killed to be eaten and that domesticated husbandry requires some amount of hard culling for the benefit of the breeding program and species as a whole are not mutually exclusive ideas. It is my job to give my animals good, proper care, enrichment, and love until their time in this world is over (for some that's sooner than others), to ensure that death is as humane as possible, and to ensure that as little as possible goes to waste after.

And almost nothing here does go to waste; offal or unusable parts goes to the crows and other scavengers I feed at the front of the house (and in turn they chase off nosy hawks and eagles), meat gets eaten, bones get used to make stock and then composted for the garden. Mouse culls and quail feeder culls (quail hatched specifically to be feeders for other animals) almost all go to reptile owners who want ethically sourced animals kept in better conditions/fed better feed (the exception is when Bug eats some of them instead). And the two times I have ever had to cull aggressive peafowl, they both went to a hunting family that made use of the meat.

Additionally, on several occasions now, I have been called upon by others to help euthanize their fowl friends. Strangers who couldn't afford a vet bill but wanted to put an end to their bird's suffering. Strangers that knew it needed to be done but couldn't do it themselves, or that didn't know how. I have taught others how to do cervical dislocation in case the need arrives ever again, so the bird doesn't have to wait. I have held sobbing owners who thanked me for being able to do what they couldn't even when they knew it was necessary. And yes, I have demonstrated the butchering process to folks who want quail meat, so that I know they're giving a quick, humane end to their birds.

Death is a part of life. When you raise purpose animals, death is going to be a part of the deal at some point.

It doesn't mean I love them any less while they're here, or in general.

[biboocat]

I finally went through my shelves and culled a few dozen books that I didn’t enjoy and books that had left no impression: books of genres that I never liked, unsuccessful second and third books by an author whose debut work I loved, debut works that attracted me with glowing reviews or endorsements but failed to meet expectations. At first it was a bit painful to admit that I spent time and money on these, but I understand that it was part of the journey of discovery. Now I don’t miss them at all, and my library more accurately reflects who I am. I am now more judicious about my book purchases having a better understanding of the kinds of books that I enjoy and more skepticism reviews and endorsements. I now favor the classics and recommendations of like minded readers.

[acti-veg]

Never mind the enormously positive ecological impact of the wolves population increase, never mind their ability to control deer overpopulation and overgrazing, never mind that they have more right to be in their ancestral hunting grounds than ranchers do. Wolves are killing a tiny number of livestock, so we’ve got to start culling them to protect their profits and your meat.

[daisylovesrumble]

petition: Stop the Massacre of Sweden's Brown Bears. Demand an End to This Brutal Cull!

[homeofhousechickens]

genq, how do you not get attached to the chickens you're culling? i love animals including chicken as well and i don't know how i'd be able to part with them personally so i'm genuinely interested. does it hurt at all, emotionally? do you have bonds with every chicken you breed? what got you into chicken breeding? and do you do other small animals as well or plan for it, like rabbits for example? sorry if this comes off weird!

I do have bonds with every chicken I breed. Unlike some people I name every bird and I get to know them personally. It doesn't really bother me because I know I gave them the best care and this is just another part of the cycle of life. I'm just not as removed from my food as a lot of people, to me I feel the same kind of sadness and satisfaction as I do when harvesting vegetables. It's like I helped grow this, and now it's gone and it's going to be used to feed me and my family now.

The only time I am genuinely upset when culling is when I have to do it because the chicken is suffering but then I feel relieved because they are now no longer suffering.

I got into chicken breeding because I have always been interested in animal breeding. It kind of runs in my family my grandmother bred horses for example.

Right now I'm not interested in any other animals besides chickens. Maybe if I move to a more rural location I'll think about other animals but I see way to many people get way to many different kinds of animals without mastering the first animals they got and started breeding.

[thenixkat]

I will say I do think crabs, lobsters, and large shrimp/prawns should be killed b4 cooking them. Like if it takes more than a few seconds of boiling to kill them, then it should be like cut through the head first to not be cruel.

[grimowled]

3. a trait they express in the wrong way!

☽ why is my muse hot garbage?? - accepting!!

ooh boy, this one is easy because there are many lmao

VI. ON OBSESSION

the most glaring trait is how he expresses any kind of affection or infatuation. take the latter, for example: when he falls for someone he does so in the most intense, immoderate and unhealthy way; he will not be above using the goetia arsenal at his disposal to manipulate and keep them bound to him: his power(s), social status & influence, wealth, knowledge and cunning. he may even lord something over them, like his grimoire with blitzø if he believes the other to be a particularly tough nut to crack. it is all kinds of wrong wrong wrong!

he does not relent easily and will shamelessly display obsessive behaviours such as keeping tabs on them by means of magic and connections, showing up unannounced, blowing up their phone, courting and seducing them enthusiastically, offering a contract etc. and just generally being rather pushy. he is not always subtle with it either - with blitzø, for example, he is openly scandalous, and in a way it's also because he wants to see how much he can get away with.

it's hunger, yearning, obsession, boredom and desperation all wrapped up in a terrible beast created by aeons of repression / unhealthy ways of managing his emotions, ingrained infernal behaviours, as well as no real examples of healthy relationships. that and ... he is a demon, an apex predator, and therefore indulges in skewed morals by definition. he basically behaves as if he is hunting them, and is not satisfied until they are snatched up and held fast in his claws, until he can devour them metaphorically and irrefutably own every part of them, tear their pretty mind wide open and gaze lovingly at every little detail.

it's a demonic belief that everyone has a price, that he can buy most people's loyalty and company like his own father did for him; but that isn't to say he doesn't appreciate a less transactional relationship: in fact he much prefers it when the objects of his affections willingly choose to indulge him, and he does not need to bind them through contracts or by any other means.

in time he has learnt to appreciate choice (that which he lacked when his own marriage was arranged) : there is nothing sexier than adoring loyalty but he does thoroughly enjoy the hunt.

tldr; he desperately wants to be loved but ... he only knows to offer a twisted imitation of it, like everything in hell.

[wuh2k]

I’ve taught my daughter to love pigeons. That one’s easyish…they’re fluffy and dorky in a cutesy way.

But I’ve also taught her to love gulls (seagulls aren’t real), but naturally there won’t be any videos of her feeding them out of her hands.

And if you ask her at 6yrs old, she’ll tell you that the reason we need to love them the most is because people hate them the most.

And I don’t know why.

I know the reasons people give…

They’re noisy.

They make a mess (poop & torn open garbage bags)

They steal people’s food.

And I’m like…is that it? Minor inconveniences also caused by your average drunk crowd on a Friday night? That’s it? You’re calling for culling because of slight annoyances?

We destroyed their nesting sites so they adapted and moved to the artificial cliffs of the coastal cities.

We stole all their fish, so they root through our garbage and occasionally steal someone’s chips.

And for that you want to cull them?

I love watching them on stormy days, killing it as they ride, dipping and diving, on the drafts. It makes me smile watching them wing their way home to bed at sunset, calling out to their kin and friends to join them.

Just fucking let them be. We’ve stolen enough.

[xluciifer]

💗 :>

Send in 💗 for me to use a love meter to check the compatibility of our muses. / Currently Accepting!

I find this hilarious because your Vox and I got a fucking 93 and we get a 74.

[spidersins]

@culling replied to your post “Angel has appeared! What to do? Pet Violate Ask to...”:

pet ….. and then ask very kindly to leave ❤️❤️ in fact the petting turns into a polite shove out his door!

❛ an’ there i was thinkin’ you were a gentleman. gonna rile me all up then leave me all alone? mean. ❜

[kedreeva]

i have an odd animal husbandry question you seem like you might know the answer to, your comment about stan reminded me - ive been thinking about getting into backyard chickens for a couple years and the thing that makes me hesitate most is hard culling. im confident in my ability to put down an animal thats sick, or infirm, or for food, but for like, temperament? or for poor egg layers? just sticks on me for some reason. i think it would feel like telling them theyre not a good enough chicken for me. how to you process this part of animal husbandry?

This will be a little long, so bear with me.

If you want to keep use animals (animals bred for a purpose, to be used for a purpose instead of kept as a companion), you gotta get good with the idea that they are here for you under the agreement that you will only keep them as long as you need to. When you take them on, you are agreeing that you will release them to whatever their next life holds for them as soon as you do not need (or they've completed) their service. Maybe for some people that's just release to the biological cycle of life, for others maybe there's an eternal rest, for others maybe it's reincarnation. For soft culling that's just moving to the next household. Whatever it is, you are allowing them to pass to it in as humane a way as you can, and ultimately it is the single greatest kindness and gratitude you can show to them, to give them proper care while they are here and allow them to end with little to no pain- something animals outside of our care rarely get. You are thanking them for their service, and letting them go. Worth does not even begin to factor into it.

It is not easy to take a life. It is NEVER easy, regardless of reason, regardless of excuse, regardless of anything. It is ALWAYS heavy, and it will always hurt you. And it should. I am grateful for the weight of taking a life, because it reminds me that it is serious, and reminds me to take the production of life seriously, because at some point any life I cause to come into existence via breeding animals will have to end.

On top of that, some things ARE heath related that do not seem health related. Aggression in domestic animals IS A HEALTH ISSUE. A cock is aggressive because he is stressed about intruders, containment, mating threats, resource guarding, etc. Even with the best of care this can be true, and unfortunately for you both, this means the animal is not suited for domestic keeping. The same goes for animals (in any stripe of use, but particularly private care) that display repetitive stress behaviors from normal, proper captive care (for example, mice that are food chewing are stressed and should be culled from lines where possible because they are not having a good time). You are doing them a disservice to keep them in a stressful situation you cannot change because of their biology. It has nothing to do with not being good enough for you, and everything to do with producing/keeping animals that do not experience that stress in captive care and releasing the rest from duty because they will not be okay in any captive care.

For some issues (poor egg laying, for example) you CAN pet-home culls instead of hard culling. It's harder to do, you will spend time finding people who just want pets that don't intend to breed or don't care, but it can be done. However!! Is the bird just slow at producing eggs because her genetics say that's how fast eggs get produced, or is she producing slowly because there's a health problem that isn't immediately evident? Is her ovary damaged, is her reproductive tract infected, does she have a disorder that prevents her from processing food correctly so she can't get what she needs to produce eggs as fast as normal? Are you setting the bird up for failure (and someone else for heartbreak/money troubles) sending them to a pet home? Is it something which could lead to pain/suffering down the road if she's allowed to continue? Hard to say without spending a lot of money. Are you willing to risk your reputation, if someone takes a surprise illness/genetic issue down the road badly ("Oh THAT breeder sold me a sick/unhealthy bird/bird with bad genetics"), and compromise your ability to find homes for healthy birds down the road?

You are okay with culling a bird for food- there's nothing that says you cannot eat the bad temperaments, the poor egg layers, the one with genetic issues, and so on. And if you can tell early enough that you, personally, can't make use of the meat, there are plenty of folks with other animals that would LOVE feed for those animals. Take yourself down to a local reptile expo, grab the business cards for a few people who have big snake babies (retics, burmese, anaconda, redtail boa, even BP) that say they'd be interested in taking culls, OR look up local bird of prey rescues in your area (or reptile rescues or big cat rescues if there are any) and ask if they'd be interested in culls. There is ALWAYS someone that can use what you can't/won't. You may have to jump through some hoops to donate to some kinds of rescues (health testing for example), but it's an option you can look into if you want to combat the feelings you're talking about.

As a last note- and I am saying this gently and holding your face in both hands: do not anthropomorphize animals in reality.

In YOUR eyes, you are culling them an illness or an injury or for food or for temperament or for poor quality or or or---- it does not matter to the animal why you are culling them. A death is a death, to them. They are here, and then a thing happens, and they are no longer. They do not understand life or death or afterlife or reincarnation or that they are here for a purpose or not a purpose or literally anything you as a human might impose upon them in your head. They live while they are alive, and then they are not. They do not "want to live" in the "avoid death" sense because they do not necessarily understand "death" as a future concept. Instincts that have worked well to preserve life have been encoded in their DNA to one degree or another, they can and do respond to avoid pain, but with little exception (like... maybe elephants and dolphins and a crows and a few others), it's unlikely that they understand the connection between doing those things and being alive/avoiding death.

So while TO YOU it may feel like telling the bird they are not good enough, and TO ME it feels like allowing the bird to move on in peace... the bird doesn't know either way, and honestly the reason hardly matters. It is alive in the present, and one way or another it will not be alive someday, and you are responsible for making sure that the one way under your control is so peaceful or quick that the bird hardly knows it is no longer alive. The bird doesn't care about (and cannot understand) the why of their death, any more than they understand their pain/stress and how it relates medical assistance; it's why animals often freak out, refuse meds, etc. They don't hate the vet or the car or the carrier or anything- they just simply don't understand human stuff and react according to instincts/what they do understand. If you treat an animal like the animal it IS rather than the person you imagine it to be, you will find yourself with a lot better relationship with them during life, and be able to frame their passing a bit better later on.

[chimericaldomicile]

feVow beforan cuVee here...WHAT'RE YOU IN FOR???

* it's a long story! i had to go back and ask my dad for the beginning. *

* basically, he wanted to try and raise a grub like a lusus would and was talking to the jadebloods about it...then he saw a tiny little rustblood grub that could barely move and looked half dead. that was yours truly! *

* apparently they wouldn't let him take a healthy grub, but he was able to sign up and become a culler to take me in! *

* ever since then, i've had really bad fatigue. some nights i can hardly get out of my recuperacoon! but dad takes really good care of me. i really lucked out on the culler situation. <3 *

[acti-veg]

There are only two groups who stand to benefit from the growing international move towards wolf culling, and they’re the same people lobbying for it: Animal farmers and hunters.

[r-adio]

seemingly thoughtless gesture, alastor happily buries staticky teeth into clothed arm -- right before bone bends into elbow, hearing as flesh crunches & bursts inside his mouth. he really gives it his best! thinks it fitting, respectful, even if it seems like anything but ( happy chewsday !! :> )

HE WOULD NEVER EXPECT ANYTHING LESS, taking the bite in stride. there is going to be bloodshed for this one, allowing his arm to remain in the other's jaw for a moment. leaning towards the other, he goes for a bite of his own, directed at the shoulder. he takes an equally hard chomp at him. the two of them know that there can be no holding back when it comes to one another. blood splatters from the wound into his mouth, dripping down his jaw. he doesn't feel any remorse for it.

[grldinnr-gone]

❛   ▌┊𝐑𝐄𝐐𝐔𝐄𝐒𝐓𝐄𝐃 𝐒𝐓𝐀𝐑𝐓𝐄𝐑 :   alastor  ( @culling ) .

            ❝   I'm  told  you  put  on  quite  the  show  during  the  confrontation  with  the  Exorcists.   ❞ 

           𝐑𝐎𝐒𝐈𝐄  𝐍𝐔𝐃𝐆𝐄𝐒  𝐇𝐄𝐑  𝐎𝐋𝐃  𝐅𝐑𝐈𝐄𝐍𝐃.  For  now,  the  Emporium  is  quiet;  so  she's  ushered  Alastor  into  the  back  parlour  to  catch  up.  While  she  had  lent  the  hotel  her  cannibals,  Rosie  hadn't  actually  been  present  during  the  battle  herself.  Her  focus  had  been  making  sure  the  stray  Exorcists  didn't  make  a  mess  of  things  in  Cannibal  Town.  Fortunately,  little  damage  had  been  sustained.

            She  leans  in,  inspecting  Alastor's  expression.  ❝   It's  a  little...  odd,  actually,  considering  the  one  giving  you  such  high  praise  is  Susan.  The  old  hag  doesn't  like  anyone,  let  alone  compliment  them. What  in  Satan's  name  did  you  do?   ❞

[passiverhythm]

>I swear, these cullin9s are s}o{ ann}o{ying. Shame they won't take }o{ut any }o{f the teals d}o{wn the street. At least I d}o{n't need t}o{ talk t}o{ }o{ne more useless s}o{}o{n-t}o{-6e technicians }o{n the ship I'll 6e helmin9.<

/<3<