This summer, though, they are hidden away in their vast winter-shelter sheds, protected from potential deadly contact with wild overhead flyers from somewhere the other side of the continent or the world that may be a source of avian flu.

This week a two-day conference all about birds has taken place in Rome, set up by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization. Experts from around 100 countries gathered to try and fathom whether the H5N1 strain of bird flu that has killed at least 127 people worldwide and ravaged poultry flocks in Asia, Africa and parts of Europe is caused by migrating birds or the commercial poultry business.

If avian flu reaches the Dordogne, it would decimate the economy of the 'd�partement' -- one of France's largest counties -- and ruin the P�rigord farmers dedicated to the art of making foie gras.

Yet the foie gras farmers seem particularly unconcerned about the possible threat. In familiar French fashion, they shrug their shoulders, let their muscled arms flap against their blue overalled thighs and make a dismissive popping sound.

They are following EU regulations over the indoor housing of all commercial fowl. But the foie gras farmers are far more anxious about the effect upon their business of California legislation last year banning the California trade from 2012 in breeding ducks and geese for their vastly expanded livers. And they are nervous that the other U.S. foie gras area of production, New York state, may follow suit. Will international legislation then force the French to do the same?

Animal-rights activists have been banging the drum for some time over the cruelty of the liver-fattening process. And the state of California caved.

In France called 'gavage,' the method involves pouring corn into the bird through a funnel set into its throat. It sounds a dreadful business.

Yet there are two facts that should give pause for consideration. One, these fowl apparently don't have the muscles in their throats that would cause us humans to gag at such an action. The other is the sight of the flocks when the old women, flapping in their black skirts in a manner not unlike their birds, enter their fields.

As soon as they appear with their three-legged stools, funnel and sack of grain, the birds come tottering across the grass, abandoning whatever activity had grabbed their interest till then. It doesn't seem the action of a creature in fear. Of course, this is foie gras production at its best: without machine intervention and with birds running free in the fields. Before avian flu, that is.

But whether or not it is a despicable way to treat any bird, given the small size of the foie gras market and limited number of people who can afford to buy it, it's a wonder that the force of the focus upon the practice has inspired the Californian administration to legislate for its shut down.

Why has it not focused first on the comfort of a bird we all eat, all the time -- cheap, mass-produced battery-farmed chicken? They live in excruciating circumstances pressed into cages with no room to move, standing in their own excrement. Some have their beaks removed to prevent them from attacking their fellow captives. Whatever they are fed, it certainly isn't fresh from the ground and can contain elements not produced in nature.

On the eve of the avian-flu conference, Samuel Jutzi, director of FAO's animal production and health division, said that so far, research had shown that wild birds were likely to introduce the virus in unaffected areas but that the disease became widespread "mostly through poor hygiene and through poultry trade."

Anti-foie gras campaigners may be crying 'foul' at the wrong bird.

Saut�ed foie gras is often served with this onion marmalade, which is good with any cold cuts or with chicken liver p�t�.

Makes just over 1 cup

-- 1 pound onions, thinly sliced

-- 2 tablespoons regular olive oil

-- 1 cup red wine

-- 3 tablespoons balsamic vinegar

-- 1 bay leaf

-- 2 tablespoons sugar

-- 1/2 teaspoon salt

-- freshly ground black pepper

-- Gently saut� the onions in the oil in a covered pan till wilted and loosing their shape, stirring regularly.

-- Remove lid to evaporate any remaining moisture and stir in salt.

-- Add the wine, bay leaf, sugar and pepper and keeping cooking over the lowest heat, stirring regularly, until it all becomes a glossy, syrupy shapeless mass.

-- Add the vinegar and stir, then cook it out, stirring regularly, until you are left with a syrup again.

-- Add a few grinds of black pepper, leave to cool, then pack in a sterilized jar and store in the refrigerator a few weeks maximum.

Related Links
-