[spandit]

This is a theoretical question, as don't have chickens yet...

If one of my chickens was mortally injured by a fox, would it still be safe to eat, assuming bowels hadn't been punctured etc.?

Does anyone here eat their own chickens on a regular basis or are they only kept for the eggs? My wife would like to keep bantams in an orchard

[chrismahon]

Wouldn't risk it Spandit. The mouths of foxes are filthy as they eat carrion -rotting meat. Who knows what diseases you could catch?


We eat our excess cockerels from 20 -26 weeks old. Not much on a bantam though. About the size of a pigeon.

[doganjo]

No I wouldn't either.  To be honest I haven't even eaten any the dogs caught.

[F.CUTHBERT]

I don't see any problem health wise, I assume you are intending to cook this imaginary bird properly.
It wouldn't be all that different from eating a pheasant or duck that had been shot and retrieved by a gun dog or even a bird that had been pegged by a dog on a shoot.
I think the problem would be unlike a soft mouthed gun dog the fox would crush and bruise the meat resulting in internal bleeding turning it black.
I suppose it all depends on how hungry you are, hungry enough and maybe even the fox would start looking good

[sh3ph3rd]

I personally wouldn't because even stress alone can ruin the meat, never mind pain with stress. When an animal is distressed enough its kidneys release toxins which pollute the meat and in some cases actually turn it effectively poisonous. Dogs can thrive on diseased and damaged corpses, but we don't have the stomachs of dogs.

However you can try it, of course, some people (certain asians etc) quite like traumatized meat, through slow death or whatever it be. It is distinctly different from calm meat, I've tried both and won't ever cull a bird for meat if it was distressed, the damage to the flesh is so noticeable.