Feedlot Cows Fed 1 Billion Pounds of Chicken Waste Yearly

If you eat feedlot meat, chances are you may be eating chicken waste! Cattle in feedlots across the United States are routinely fed waste from the floors of commercial chicken houses. In fact, 1 billion pounds of feces, feathers, spilled feed, straw, dirt and anything else on the floor under the cramped birds are shoveled in front of cattle on feedlots across America each year.

Life on today’s modern, industrial farms has changed drastically. Today, many farms are dealing with 30,000+ animals with one simple goal: to fatten animals as cheaply as possible. So what exactly does that mean? While corn makes up 70-90 percent of the diet of feedlot cattle, the other 10 to 30 percent are often made up of floor waste.

Because cows eat what is in front of them and because chicken farmers have more waste than they know what to do with, feedlot owners have come up with a simple cost benefit. But where does consumer safety fall in to this relationship?

Humans are at the top of the food chain and are vulnerable to pathogens, drugs and contaminants consumed by the animals we eat. Put simply we are what we eat, which means that if we eat beef that is fed garbage and animal waste, then we in turn are eating the same.

According to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), processed feathers and feces are considered an acceptable source of protein in cattle feed. Additionally, chickens are fed meat and bone meal from cattle, which in turn increases the risk of infecting cattle with mad cow disease when the cycle revolves and the cattle are fed chicken wastes.

Regardless of your dietary choices, no one (animals included) should be allowed to eat floor waste. It’s disgusting, unsafe and inhumane. Urge the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to ban the practice of feeding chicken waste to cattle — sign the petition today!

Read more: animal welfare, cattle, corn, cows, farm animals, feedlot, meat, vegetarian

Disclaimer: The views expressed above are solely those of the author and may not reflect those of
Care2, Inc., its employees or advertisers.

Jeani J.

8:40AM PDT on Apr 3, 2011

The POOR COWS! Not only are they USED to extremes, they are fed SHIT too!! Do you know they GLUE meat together also so they can feed people ALL that they can scrape out of the bottom of the pots! And the glue is made out of pure crap that is poison to you.
THE FDA DOES NOT DO ITS JOB! :(

send a green star

Haley S.

7:19AM PST on Jan 16, 2011

A very powerful but disturbing documentary about what's in our food is "Food, Inc." I reccomend it to anyone who wants to learn about what they're eating. Here's the official site: http://www.foodincmovie.com/

Linda M.

1:55AM PST on Dec 15, 2009

gross! i simply don't understand.

Jusstin R.

1:04AM PST on Dec 3, 2009

I didnt knew or expected that. Thats really weird and bad.
Why would anyone do such a thing?
this should be a criminal case and not some fda guys thing.
Cops should raid these guys.
suddenly i am not that hungry any more.

Wanda P.

12:54PM PDT on Oct 13, 2009

USDA needs to get it together.....Write to your representatives and Senators, make them do their job....

Mandi T.

11:17AM PDT on Oct 1, 2009

Thank you Andrew for an informative post:-)

Sunny R.

11:54AM PDT on Sep 26, 2009

May I remind Genevieve H. (who posted on Sept. 24, 2009 at 9:02 a.m.) that China is the country which knowingly put melamine contaminant into pet food and killed thousands of dogs and cats in the United States. China is also the country which out of greed put melamine into baby's milk and TEN THOUSAND Chinese babies became ill, some of whom died of kidney failure. (God only knows what residual effects the living will have to suffer.)

China is the country which skins dogs alive (have you seen the video Humane Society Of The United States got on that?), first bashing their heads onto the concrete in the market place, in order to sell them for their racoon-striped fur? These same dogs are born in cages and are never let out for the rest of their lives until their brutal, agonizing death? I saw the video of the doggie dripping rivers of blood , still alive and quivering, all of the skin stripped from his entire body and lying on the ground beside him.

And may I remind you that China is the country which brought us Tiananmen Square where they shot human the way some country kids shoot squirrels?

rita b.

3:17PM PDT on Sep 25, 2009

The corn the cows eat is also very bad for them. Cows were designed by nature to eat forage which means grasses. The corn explodes thier rumens which causes disease and eventually death. That is why CAFO cattle are given anti-biotics and rarely allowed to live in the CAFO for more than six months before being killed. Because of these practices cattle suffer agonies and one of our most important disease fighters antibiotics are being undermined by over use. One would think the medical establishment would be on the forefront of protesting this kind of abuse but for the most part they are strangely silent.

If you must eat meat buy from small farms where the animals are raised humanely without antibiotics and hormones and are fed the food that is proper for their species. Yes, it will be more expensive, but you can even things out by consuming alot less but much better quality meat.

P H.

10:38AM PDT on Sep 24, 2009

Cecelia,

CAFO's are some of the most secure facilities that exist at least in the US. THey do not want the general public to know what goes on inside. And large scale agriculture is just as horrendous from an ecological standpoint. Habitat & ecosystems are destroyed, pesticides are used, GE & GMO crops are grown, cross contamination with non-GMO crops occurs, and the depletion of the water supply by agriculture is a world wide problem.

Large scale farming, be it for vegetable or animals is not sustainable and both are as damaging ecologically to the environment. Both also pose serious threats to public health.

There are no easy solutions, buy locally and know your food source.

cecelia h.

9:25AM PDT on Sep 24, 2009

Sometimes I have to wonder if people who eat meat can read.... This is the age of information- it is hard to be ignorant with so much knowledge seconds away on a computer screen... It breaks my heart- not only for the animals- but my fellow human beings as well- who are either too ignorant or heartless to change.