When a chicken lays an egg

[*crikey*mate*]

does it hurt?

[izabsmiling]

Crikey , chickens have their own natural function...part of that is laying eggs .Do you think that they suffer to be and do what nature intended them to do ?

If they are kept in poor conditions and have never known better ...that doesn't make those conditions OK .Does It ?

and if everyone stopped eating eggs... chickens would still lay eggs 

[cherry*135]

The caged chickens suffer, not us. People buy their eggs because they are cheaper. Any animal/bird stuffed  into a small cage with several others isn't going to feel happy.

There is no reason not to eat all eggs.. shele posted she buys eggs from a farmers market, from a farm with 1500 hens/hectare... the ideal maximum.

There is a HUGE difference in what  caged hens suffer (never seeing daylight as well) and free range hens, that spent most of their time in daylight, even if there is 10 000 hens\hectare.

A human could have the freedom to walk around their house with others or be stuffed in a wardrobe with others and never let out.

[*crikey*mate*]

AM3, I was watching The F Word the other week and on there they showed how they pluck chickens in the big places.

I don't know if that is just an English thing, but that was just feral.

Also saw the incubators where they raise the chicks - they're just like this big cabinet of drawers, and they just shove them in there in layers!

[cherry*135]

About animals/birds not knowing any better.. that would cover treating a baby animal/bird or even a human baby badly/cruely right from birth and saying we aren't being cruel to them as they know no better.

[freddie*rooster]

Tas, I didn't see your chicken picture I was off searching ebay for ruby red glass in any case it wouldn't have bothered me, i'm not thin skinned.

As for the preference over caged eggs or free range eggs, think of it this way crikey wouldn't you prefer to eat a happy egg then a sad egg? Even if the chickens don't know any different we do, and our choice should be gauged by what we know. So my choice is a happy egg sunny side up poached with a runny yoke.

Crikey, that picture wasn't a sad picture it was a happy picture, (1) that treatment had finally ended. (2) Happy to be fortunate enough to have such wonderful people administering the treatment. (3) Happy to be alive.

OK?

[izabsmiling]

CM wrote:Then I was thinking that a woman giving birth usually hurts (apparently) and a chicken also has to get that egg out of a small place and they have to do it every day!

you've not done it yourself ?

[cherry*135]

A thing for me also is, when (what decade?) did they start cramming hens in cages to get hens eggs.

At the time I was a child, hens were free range, for eggs and meat. I lived in a rural area, we had 2 nearish neighbours that had chicken farms..

VIC chicken farmer: He said free range chickens were more vulnerable to disease and had higher mortality rates as their environments could not be controlled.

Again chickens would have been free range on chicken farms decades ago, so why is it a problem now?

[tasfleur]

Thanks Freddie (and Crikey) ...   The mod has taken the picture off already, that was quick but now I understand xx

We don't buy eggs from stores anymore, we're fortunate to have friends who have chickens and are always bringing them along, so we make cakes for them too in return.

[cherry*135]

 Part of nature for hens to lay eggs, not part of nature for humans to factory farm them by cramming them in metal cages.

[*crikey*mate*]

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@izabsmiling wrote:

Crikey , chickens have their own natural function...part of that is laying eggs .Do you think that they suffer to be and do what nature intended them to do ?

If they are kept in poor conditions and have never known better ...that doesn't make those conditions OK .Does It ?

and if everyone stopped eating eggs... chickens would still lay eggs 

---

Iza, does a woman suffer when she gives birth to a baby? (I had c - sections, I have never even experienced labour) Apparently it hurts a fair bit, isn't that suffering? That's natural. That's what a woman's body is designed to do.

If everyone stopped eating eggs, then none of those farms would exist. and there wouldn't be as many chickens specifically bred to be kept in those conditions and the chickens that were born would be living naturally.

I think that chickens were supposed to lay eggs to reproduce, I think that's what nature had intended for them, not for us to eat them before they had a chance to hatch.

In China, they eat eggs with the chicken formed in them! (I saw that on the F Word too)

I can't see how it can be justified to keep eating eggs cos chickens lay them anyway.

suffering is suffering.

Same goes for all animal products really.

*note* I'm not knocking anyone who eats eggs or animal products.

I am not a vegetarian.

but I have gained a healthy respect for the hard core ones who choose that way for their dedicated principles, rather than go at it half cocked and pick bits and pieces from here and there iykwim.