Mayor Daley Repealed the Chicago Foie Gras Ban, MAY 15, 2008!!!!!!!!!!

On the left: liver of the healthy duck.
On the right: liver of the force-fed duck.

Foie gras, considered by some to be a delicacy, is produced by forcing a long metal pipe down the throats of ducks and geese and force-feeding them massive amounts of grain, resulting in their livers swelling to up to 10 times their normal size.

Two to three times a day, a worker grabs each bird, shoves a long, thick metal tube all the way down his throat, and an air pump shoots up to two pounds of corn mush into his esophagus.  The industry always refers to the dry weight of the feed, which is about one pound per feeding.  Adding oil and water doubles this weight, making it 20-30% of the bird's healthy body weight.  Picture 30 one pound boxes of dry pasta and then add water. This is proportionally how much a 150 pound human would be force fed using this formula.

A duck's liver naturally weighs around 50 grams. However, to qualify as foie gras, the industry's own regulations require ducks' livers to weigh an absolute minimum of 300 grams.

The vast amounts of feed pumped down the ducks' throats causes enormous internal pressure, and the pipe sometimes punctures the esophagus, causing many to die from choking on the blood that fills their lungs. Some birds literally burst, choke to death on their own vomit, or become so weak that they are unable to fend off rats from eating them alive (click to see footage from Sonoma Foie gras--requires Windows Media Player). Other ducks die a slow, painful, and premature death by suffocation from inhalation of regurgitated feed. In fact, because of the massive toll taken on the birds during the force-feeding process, the average pre-slaughter mortality rate is up to twenty times higher than on other duck factory farms, according to the European Union's Scientific Report on the subject.

According to the ASPCA, "The birds' livers become so enlarged%u2026that according to documentation by veterinarians, the animals must experience unspeakable pain and suffering. Birds have literally exploded from these forced feedings. The results of necropsies on dead birds that have been force-fed reveal ruptured livers, throat damage, esophageal trauma, and food spilling from the dead animals' throats and out of their nostrils."

The ASPCA has police power to enforce the animal cruelty law in New York State and has filed charges against Commonwealth Enterprises, now Hudson Valley Foie Gras, in the past for force feeding ducks. Because it is a multi-million dollar enterprise with a lot of political clout in rural Sullivan County, the elected District Attorney dropped the charges. The ASPCA wrote a letter to New York Attorney General Elliot Spitzer in late 2001 calling for him to take action, but thus far he has not.

In addition to enduring force-feeding, the birds also suffer the same neglectful and abusive treatment of other factory-farmed animals: overcrowding, mutilations (their beaks are cut off), all their natural instincts and desires-such as interacting in social groups, mating freely, keeping themselves clean, nurturing their young, exploring their surroundings-thwarted, and eventually being sent to a violent death by slaughter. Throughout the weeks of force-feeding, the birds are kept in either a group pen or an individual cage with only wire or plastic-mesh floors to stand and sleep on. Unable to feel the sun on their backs or ground beneath their feet, the ducks are held in cages so small that they cannot fully stand or stretch their wings.

To make matters worse, the ducks and geese are housed without access to swimming water even though ducks need to be able to immerse themselves in water to remain healthy. Access to water on these farms is so limited that the ducks cannot adequately clean their nostrils and eyes, which can lead to blindness.

This is all for an overpriced, unhealthy appetizer that anyone can do without.  Please navigate this site to learn more about this issue and what you can do to end this barbaric practice.

"Animals, too, are God's creatures...Certainly, a sort of industrial use of creatures, so that geese are fed in such a way as to produce as large a liver as possible, or hens live so packed together that they become just caricatures of birds, this degrading of living creatures to a commodity seems to me in fact to contradict the relationship of mutuality that comes across in the Bible."         -- Pope Benedict XVI