Oklahoma chicken farmers unsure of future after lawsuits

Farm owners watch, wait

In Colcord, another small town near the Arkansas state line, ranchers Al and Bev Saunders wait to see if they will continue to work as contract growers for Tyson Foods Inc., the world's largest meat producer, also named in Oklahoma Attorney General Drew Edmondson's lawsuit.

The couple have almost $750,000 tied up in their chicken operation, which in turn provides fertilizer to grow crops used for feed on their 560-acre cattle farm.

“If (the lawsuit) breaks the back of the small farmer, it's going to break the back of a lot of other people too, and we have so much invested,” Bev Saunders said. “The dollar amount is one thing, but this is our home, this is our way of life, this is our culture.”

IN THE AREA

The lush, million-acre river valley that spans parts of Oklahoma and Arkansas is dotted with 1,800 poultry houses. More than 55,000 people in Oklahoma and Arkansas work in the poultry industry in one of the largest areas in the U.S. for producing broilers, or birds raised for meat. Together, they raised more than 8 billion pounds of turkeys and chickens last year.