Why do we do this?

This is where most peoples chickens come from at a store

Well we have around 34 lambs the last count I had did and 7 didn’t make it because of either complications or the mother rejected them. I tried to save one of them with some special milk from my next door neighbor but after 3 days of trying to keep it alive and getting up every 4 hours to feed it, it just didn’t make it.

It died in my daughters friends arms she was trying to feed it she was devastated about it. I didn’t want to put my kids through that again, plus we had lost so much sleep. Some of my family don't seem to understand that nature will keep the strong and the weak will not survive its just the way nature works.

They don't understand that we need the genetics from the stronger sheep, why would we want to keep weak sheep in our herd?
They wanted me to go out there every day to try to save any that were rejected, they say why have them if I am not going to go out there and save them all? Sigh....One of the ones they wanted me to save they kept telling me to go after it because the mother hadnt claimed it yet. After a few hours she finally did what would have happened if I took it from her overreacting?

My family/friends have a kind heart I don't blame them at one time in my life I might have been like that too, especially when I had the energy.
However when you become a farmer/rancher you see a lot of births and deaths and you have to know the difference between pets and food. Do people actually think their meats grow on trees? At least we try to be humane about it and give them a good life till its time to butcher a lot better then the factory animals.

It’s hard for outsiders to understand our life, they think we are a hobby farm, just doing it for a hobby. I try over and over to explain to them but they don’t seem to understand, they won’t eat a chicken egg from my chickens because ....well I don’t know ...I guess the chicken in the factory who has never seen natural light and its beak is chopped off and injected with who knows what to keep from getting diseases is a much taster egg ???
They just don't want to really know where the food comes from...or they might say...well let someone else do it why do you have too?

They want me to over feed them, To give them more food then what the experts say to give them. This gives us a profit how by over feeding them so they won’t breed because they are too fat? Then there is the people who really understand our way of life that we have been doing for over 8yrs now, the ones that buy our products the ones that come to our farm once a year to show their kids where food comes from, the ones that care what goes into their body’s.

I have to keep remembering these people most I see seasonally except for like my eggs. The people who get my egg are always so thrilled, each week as I clean the many many eggs I get I think why am I doing this? Then I see the smiling faces of my customers coming from miles to get my eggs and products telling me how thankful they are for me doing this because not many do.
I smile yah it’s worth it