FOOD FOR THOUGHT Treated with respect, domestic turkeys are friendly birds who enjoy human companionship. Like their wild relatives they are avid foragers who thrive on grass and a healthful outdoor life. They are not suited to the harsh turkey confinement systems in which 5,000 or more sensitive birds are forced to sit and stand jammed together in filthy litter breathing burning ammonia fumes and lung-destroying dust. The develop respiratory diseases, foot ulcers, breast blisters, and ammonia burned eyes. They are dosed with drugs, vaccines and antibiotics to prop them up till marketing time. These turkeys are bred and fed to become pathologically obese. Their skeletons are so weak under their bloated muscles ("meat") that many birds collapse, unable to stand. The modern turkey muscle is undergoing degenerative changes reflecting the birds' forced rapid growth and overblown body weight (Turkey World, 1994). Oxygen deprived and grossly overburdened, many turkeys' hearts explode. Consumers could eat a diseased turkey or turkey part for dinner: "Researchers are looking at ways to keep afflicted birds alive long enough to get them to market" (Associated Press).

Turkeys are brutally debeaked. As a result, they cannot eat or preen properly. Research has shown that the hot debeaking blade cuts through the sensitive beak tissue causing lifelong pain and suffering in the mutilated, disfigured bird.

Modern turkeys are so heavy and misshapen they must be artificially inseminated to reproduce. Obscenely, the males are "milked" of their semen by phallus manipulating teams who stick it in the upside down turkey hen's vagina with a hypodermic syringe or the operator's breath pressure blown through a tube. The U.S. does not even provide humane slaughter protective legislation for turkeys.

Try Mrs. Gobble-Good's Golden Brown Pie and other wonderful dishes, plus complete menus, in the highly acclaimed cookbook, Instead of Chicken, Instead of Turkey: A Poultryless 'Poultry' Potpourri. Order from United Poultry Concerns, P.O. 150 Machipongo, VA 23405-0150 $11.95

• Uncooked pie crust for placing on top of pie
• 2/3 C lentils
• 8 C water
• 2 to 3 carrots sliced
• 2 celery stalks, sliced
• 1 medium onion, diced
• 2 packets George Washington Gold or other vegetarian bouillon
• 3 to 4 potatoes, peeled and diced
• 1/2 tsp sage
• 1 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp parsley
• 3 T margarine
• 3 T flour

Cook lentils and 2 C water on low heat till tender. Put prepared vegetables in a large saucepan with 6 c water plus bouillon. Bring to a boil and cook for 10 minutes. Add prepared potatoes to cooking vegetables. Cool all vegetables for 20 minutes while seasoning the lentils with sage, salt, and parsley.

Prepare a thickening by melting margarine in a frying pan, adding flour, then 1 C water from cooking vegetables. Drain vegetables and put in an oven-proof bowl. Add lentils and thickening. Stir. If mixture is too thick, add more water from the cooking process. Place pie crust on top and bake till brown (about 1 hour).

United Poultry Concerns is a non-profit organization promoting the compassionate and respectful treatment of turkeys and other domestic fowl.

(Food for thought - Turkey Brochure)