Showing posts with label battery cages. Show all posts
Showing posts with label battery cages. Show all posts
12/14/09
"Recycling chickens"
Kent Porter / PD
CLICK HERE TO READ ENTIRE ARTICLE
Thank you Rob M for sharing this link with me.
?When Jim Stauffer of Petaluma saw a chicken crawling out of a mound of compost like the living dead, he knew something had changed at the egg farm next door.
"We called them zombie chickens," Stauffer said. "Some of them crawled right up out of the ground. They'd get out and stagger around."
What changed was the method used to get rid of "spent hens," which are chickens that no longer produce eggs. And the change isn't just in Petaluma; it's throughout the country..."
CLICK HERE for another story on "Spent Hens"
12/10/09
"Old-hen meat fed to pets and schoolkids " - WHAT
"Pets might like it, but among most consumers, "spent-hen" meat isn't very popular.
It's tough, stringy and far less appealing than the more tender meat of broiler chickens. But that didn't stop the government from using the National School Lunch Program as an outlet for egg producers struggling to find a market for 100 million egg-laying hens culled each year.
From 2001 though the first half of 2009, USA TODAY found, the government spent more than $145 million on spent-hen meat for schools — a total of more than 77 million pounds served in chicken patties and salads. Since 2007, 13.6 million pounds were purchased.
Newsletters of a trade group representing egg producers regularly note the need to find new markets to "dispose" of spent hens. The primary options: pet food, compost — and schools.
Campbell Soup, for instance, stopped using spent-hen meat more than a decade ago. The reason: "quality considerations," company spokesman Anthony Sanzio says."
From USATODAY
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE
It's tough, stringy and far less appealing than the more tender meat of broiler chickens. But that didn't stop the government from using the National School Lunch Program as an outlet for egg producers struggling to find a market for 100 million egg-laying hens culled each year.
From 2001 though the first half of 2009, USA TODAY found, the government spent more than $145 million on spent-hen meat for schools — a total of more than 77 million pounds served in chicken patties and salads. Since 2007, 13.6 million pounds were purchased.
Newsletters of a trade group representing egg producers regularly note the need to find new markets to "dispose" of spent hens. The primary options: pet food, compost — and schools.
Campbell Soup, for instance, stopped using spent-hen meat more than a decade ago. The reason: "quality considerations," company spokesman Anthony Sanzio says."
From USATODAY
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE
12/2/09
Bill Maher asks IHOP To Cut The Cruel Cages!!
"You may come hungry to IHOP, but you shouldn’t leave happy. Not as long as they only use eggs from hens crammed into tiny cages where they can barely move an inch. This is so cruel that IHOP’s home state of California has made it a crime…Forget pancakes, IHOP now stands for ‘The International House of Pain.’”
FROM ECORAZZI
11/4/09
6/11/09
Factory Egg Production - From FarmSanctuary
The Welfare of Hens in Battery Cages:
A Summary of the Scientific Evidence
A Farm Sanctuary Report
"After reviewing the scientific evidence relating to the welfare of hens in battery cages, Baxter (1994) concluded that hens housed in this way experience both chronic and acute suffering, as well as other threats to their welfare. The cage inhibits the performance of virtually all aspects of hen behavior (Rollin, 1995, p.120) due to the severe confinement and barrenness of the environment"
READ entire article here
Click here to see video
A Summary of the Scientific Evidence
A Farm Sanctuary Report
"After reviewing the scientific evidence relating to the welfare of hens in battery cages, Baxter (1994) concluded that hens housed in this way experience both chronic and acute suffering, as well as other threats to their welfare. The cage inhibits the performance of virtually all aspects of hen behavior (Rollin, 1995, p.120) due to the severe confinement and barrenness of the environment"
READ entire article here
Click here to see video
4/24/09
Virtual Battery Cage
This makes me so sad I think I need to focus on happy birds and how to prevent this.
4/10/09
Humanity Even for Nonhumans
“The question is not, Can they reason? nor, Can they talk? but, Can they suffer?”
4/7/09
The Humane Society Campaign to Ban Battery Cages
Arguably the most abused animals in all agribusiness, nearly 280 million laying hens in the United States are confined in barren, wire battery cages so restrictive the birds can't even spread their wings. With no opportunity to engage in many of their natural behaviors, including nesting, dust bathing, perching, and foraging, these birds endure lives wrought with suffering.
With Colleges and Universities
More than 350 schools have enacted policies to eliminate or greatly decrease their use of eggs from caged hens, including Harvard, University of Minnesota, Dartmouth College, University of California-Berkeley, University of New Hampshire, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Tufts University, and Georgetown University.
Facts
- U.S. factory farms confine nearly 300 million hens in barren battery cages that are so small, the birds can't even spread their wings. Each bird has less space than a single sheet of paper on which to live. The European Union has banned barren battery cages, effective 2012.
- Cage-free hens generally have better lives than birds confined in battery cages. While caging is not the only animal welfare problem in the egg industry, it is a significant cause of laying hen suffering. Cage-free hens generally have approximately 250-300 percent more space per bird and are able to engage in more of their natural behaviors than are caged hens.
- There is a snowballing national movement against battery cages. Wolfgang Puck is ending his use of cage eggs. Burger King is beginning to use cage-free eggs. Several grocery chains, including Whole Foods Market and Wild Oats Natural Marketplace, have stopped selling cage eggs. Companies such as AOL and Google have ended the use of cage eggs in their employee cafeterias. And local municipalities in Maryland, California and Florida have condemned battery cage confinement.
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