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[cleggy]

We were so disgusted with the conditions that battery hens are kept in, and seem not much better with the new legistration that we only bought Free Range, but the description applied to eggs are dubious ( Caged, Barn, Free Range). The age of the eggs is also suspect.

The solution was to keep three hens, they are well cared for, fed on quality pellets, and corn, plus they get the veggie scraps. They are able to free range in the part of the garden,  are a delight to watch with their antics, and easy to look after.

We are rewarded with three fresh eggs every day, which look, and taste better than any you buy.
Daz knows

We do sell any surplus to friends at £1 a half dozen, which hardly covers tha cost of the straw, but it is better than having excess.

Sue wants to get chickens!

Here's a decent forum to lurk around to get some ideas
 http://forums.thepoultrykeeper.co.uk/.

PM me with any questions you may have   

[Marks DTM Calib]

For me, I dont really worry about the farming methods but I did notice that the cost of eggs has doubled in the last 2 years.

I do try to buy localy though so there is an opportunity for farmers.

[Kevin Wood]

We were so disgusted with the conditions that battery hens are kept in, and seem not much better with the new legistration that we only bought Free Range, but the description applied to eggs are dubious ( Caged, Barn, Free Range). The age of the eggs is also suspect.

The solution was to keep three hens, they are well cared for, fed on quality pellets, and corn, plus they get the veggie scraps. They are able to free range in the part of the garden,  are a delight to watch with their antics, and easy to look after.

We are rewarded with three fresh eggs every day, which look, and taste better than any you buy.
Daz knows

We do sell any surplus to friends at £1 a half dozen, which hardly covers tha cost of the straw, but it is better than having excess.

Sue wants to get chickens!

I've visited 2 friends / relatives in the last week or so who have started keeping chickens. Both said they don't get round to eating all the eggs and give them away. They both said they make good pets, though.

There is an old chap in our village who has a huge field full of chickens. No battery farming there. Always has an honesty box and a shedload of eggs outside.

[tunnie]

As long as I can get 16 eggs for £1.60 odd I pay at the moment, I'm not fussed!

[cleggy]

As long as I can get 16 eggs for £1.60 odd I pay at the moment, I'm not fussed!

And with all due respect this is the problem people don't care. I am certainly not into animal rights, but I do have some respect for them, how would you like to live in an unatural enviroment, and live in a cage.

[Marks DTM Calib]

As long as I can get 16 eggs for £1.60 odd I pay at the moment, I'm not fussed!

And with all due respect this is the problem people don't care. I am certainly not into animal rights, but I do have some respect for them, how would you like to live in an unatural enviroment, and live in a cage.

You mean like a Romanian orphan?

[tunnie]

As long as I can get 16 eggs for £1.60 odd I pay at the moment, I'm not fussed!

And with all due respect this is the problem people don't care. I am certainly not into animal rights, but I do have some respect for them, how would you like to live in an unatural enviroment, and live in a cage.

There are far, far worse things happening in the world. Libya, Afghanistan, Robert Gabriel Mugabe in Zimbabwe, Japan Earth Quake, Ivory Coast massacre's

From Foie gras, to boiling crabs alive for food & electrocuting cattle, battery hens don't really feature that high.

Take battery farmed salmon, its basically same principle, don't here much of that?

[bigegg]

how would you like to live in an unatural enviroment, and live in a cage.

we call them "call centres"

[cleggy]

Funnily enough I don't give two poos about the countries you mention, I care about Japan but there isn't anything I can about it. Personally I would nuke the others you mention ... no problem.
What I can  is do something about is animal wellfare, in the small way I can.
Foie Gras I won't touch, neither farmed Salmon, or Tuna, only line caught for me. Lobster, and Crabs can now be humanly killed by electocution, and I ask in a restaraunt how they dispatch them. Cattle are stunned with a bolt gun before bleeding, sheep, and pigs are electocuted before bleeding. Halal is inhumane but our supermarkets, and food chains pander to Muslims in a Christian contry.
Chickens are due the same respect as any other animal. 

[cleggy]

how would you like to live in an unatural enviroment, and live in a cage.

we call them "call centres"

So my son tells me 

[Dishevelled Den]

how would you like to live in an unatural enviroment, and live in a cage.

we call them "call centres"

  Splendid.

[Dishevelled Den]

I wouldn't mind having a chicken or two about the place but I'm not sure how the resident cats would react - in addition, I get quite a few visitor cats from the surrounding farms.

[cleggy]

I wouldn't mind having a chicken or two about the place but I'm not sure how the resident cats would react - in addition, I get quite a few visitor cats from the surrounding farms.

The cats never bother ours I think the chickens are too big for them. Foxes can be a problem it's just a case of making their run vermin proof. The labs get along fine with the birds, and don't forget there are plenty of feral cats around farms that don't bother the chooks.

[albitz]

When I went to buy my Shovitt HS (many years ago) they owners father was a chicken farmer. They took me for a look around the huge sheds where the chickens were kept.
There were 4 or 5 of these sheds with (iirc ) approx 100,000 chickens in each one. They were in cages so small, they couldnt even turn around. They looked in an awful, miserable state, and although I wasnt an animal rights activist, I was pretty stunned and sickened by the sight od the poor creatures.
I have been anti battery farming ever since. Living in a rural area we only have to travel a mile. at  most, to buy free range eggs and put the money in the honesty box - thankfully.

[Varche]

Interesting thread. As Nick keeps pointing out , the thread keeps deviating off the original subject!

It is nice to see a few folk interested in the welfare of animals. To me it is absolutely gross what we have done in the interests of "efficiency" to animals. Sadly most folk live in their own form of battery existence and either don't give a damn or don't even know where and how food is produced.

The humble cow is a good example of how we have lost the plot. They now through breeding, produce so much milk each day that they can hardly walk so best to keep them indoors (and that is in Britain with its lush grass!). Their lives are shortened by the demands placed upon them. Then the farmer gets so little money for the milk that they might as well give up. The supermarkets however make a good profit as usual on any farm produce.

We keep chickens that free range and the eggs taste superb. The only problem we find is from freking, freking dogs.We have had maybe 2 dozen killed in the last 3 years.

back on topic. There was plenty of notice of the forthcoming changes. What do we do? Sit back and let the industry descend into deeper hell holes in animal welfare (like feeding ground up animals to cows in their feed - we all know where that end CJD). The blame that ought to be apportioned in my view  is that producers ought to have had some form of EU grants to move over to better production.
IMO by the way, the new welfare of intensive chickens is still WAY to poor. They are creatures that need to scratch in the ground, take a dustbath etc. Just making the cages a bit bigger isn't much to trumpet about.