We did not eat any of the chickens who'd just up and died, regardless of their status as pets, in case they were diseased or had gotten into something toxic. (Miss Aurora in particular, we suspected might have eaten a bad mushroom.) We were never in a financial/food situation where we would have had to consider it. I suspect that if we'd had a bird killed by a predator but not carried off, or road-killed, that depending on how dear the bird was, it might have become lunch. We learned our lesson about eating pet birds with 公鸡, because no one except for Mama would eat more than a few bites, and she was not happy with it either.
I would not have felt bad about allowing someone else to eat that stew, except for whatever problem that person might have had in eating a dish containing a former pet. If I knew that person would have a problem if they knew, I wouldn't feel right about serving it to them.
I would be perfectly okay with donating the body of a companion animal to science, in the same way I'd be okay with donating my own body or parts thereof. However, I suspect that there may already be enough unwanted/unloved/unclaimed strays/ferals being put down anyway to serve the needs of science.
Depending on the size of the animal in question, as well as the manner of death -- a hen is pretty small. A horse is pretty large. The larger and lower on the food chain the animal is -- say if my sister's horse had suffered an injury -- I probably wouldn't have wanted to know, but I would not have been upset at the idea of horse meat winding up in pet food intended for carnivores or omnivores. I don't think I'd be overly upset at it winding up at a restaurant either.
The problem I keep having is, that I was raised such that unless you know how and why an animal died, it's not suitable food. Pets die "of old age", but what specific mechanism of old age killed them? And on euthanasia -- I'm likewise Not A Vet, but my position is generally "Unless I know it's OK, don't eat it".
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syntheid
Re: (this one talks about hard stuff; the sensitive may want to scroll down.)
Date: 2010-12-06 08:38 (UTC)I would not have felt bad about allowing someone else to eat that stew, except for whatever problem that person might have had in eating a dish containing a former pet. If I knew that person would have a problem if they knew, I wouldn't feel right about serving it to them.
I would be perfectly okay with donating the body of a companion animal to science, in the same way I'd be okay with donating my own body or parts thereof. However, I suspect that there may already be enough unwanted/unloved/unclaimed strays/ferals being put down anyway to serve the needs of science.
Depending on the size of the animal in question, as well as the manner of death -- a hen is pretty small. A horse is pretty large. The larger and lower on the food chain the animal is -- say if my sister's horse had suffered an injury -- I probably wouldn't have wanted to know, but I would not have been upset at the idea of horse meat winding up in pet food intended for carnivores or omnivores. I don't think I'd be overly upset at it winding up at a restaurant either.
The problem I keep having is, that I was raised such that unless you know how and why an animal died, it's not suitable food. Pets die "of old age", but what specific mechanism of old age killed them? And on euthanasia -- I'm likewise Not A Vet, but my position is generally "Unless I know it's OK, don't eat it".