Battery Hens?

[OSUman]

Heres some information from the united egg producers site

Currently, the top ten egg producing states (ranked by number of layers represented in thousands) are:
1- Iowa 52,811 6 - Texas 13,639
2 - Ohio 26,846 7 - Minnesota 9,753
3 - Indiana 23,282 8 - Nebraska 9,716
4 - Pennsylvania 21,559 9 - Michigan 9,626
5 - California 19,476 10 - Florida 9,514


• The five largest egg producing states represent approximately 50% of all U.S. layers.

• U.S. egg production during May 2009 was 6.41 billion table eggs, which is up from 6.28 billion table eggs produced during April of last year.

• Presently, there are 62 egg producing companies with 1 million plus layers and 12 companies with greater than 5 million layers.**

• To date, there are approximately 205 egg producing companies with flocks of 75,000 hens or more. These companies represent about 95% of all the layers in the United States.** In 1987, there were around 2,500 operations.** (Number of operations in 1987 include some contract farms and divisions.)

• In 2008, the average number of egg-type laying hens in the U.S. was 281 million. Flock size for May 1, 2009 was 282 million layers,up from last year's 280 . Rate of lay per day on May 1, 2009 averaged 72.4 eggs per 100 layers, up 1% from year ago.​

 

[OSUman]

They would probably be the people to talk to, to get the chickens from.

 

[OSUman]

Also Check out this site it is US based ( i think)
http://exbatteryhens.com/index/

 

[Renee]

Thank you, OSUman, for doing the research and finding the Battery Hen site. It looks like anyone who is interested can contact them and volunteer.

Local action is also a possibility. If you live near an egg ranch, and the owners are willing, you may be able to organize a local adoption program.

Boy, Iowa sure produces a lot of eggs!

 

[OSUman]

The ex-battery hen site is from brittan i just checked.

 

[OSUman]

So i was bored and kind of started a site that we could use to chat about the battery cage hens and what to do.
(its really sloppy)

www.batteryhenhelp.webs.com

 

[Biddieacres]

Thats Great! Maybe we can work on this here in the USA. That picture is sad but good to see the reality of the before and after.

 

[Biddieacres]

Quote:

The statistics are overwhelming. Wow!

 

[babyspice35]

WOW really nice website!!!
So here's what Jane Howorth sent me:

Hi Kelsey

Lisa has forwarded your email about wanting to start up a similar initiative to ours here in the UK. The charity has grown rapidly here; the hens are the most wonderful ambassadors and we are really making a difference to caged production without upsetting the industry, which is key to our success. We have received several enquiries from overseas and below is a general overview on how we operate. I would be very happy to help you, but – hopefully without sounding pompous - would like to emphasise that it is incredibly time consuming and needs absolute commitment. I also think it would be helpful if you could give me a bit of info on your background:

your skills and strengths
do you have a network of friends to help you start
do you have any ideas as to how you can start
do you have facilities to hold hens albeit for a very short time whilst you re-home them
do you have any knowledge of the industry, what’s your view on the industry
… in short a broad outline of your intentions.

I only ask in order that I can perhaps guide you effectively, sorry if it sounds like an interrogation! Here’s the general info:

I started the charity in 2005 by placing one advertisement for 100 hens and since then have found good homes for 145,000+ (we do turn people down). Each year we have doubled the number re-homed, with over 60,000 coming out of their cages in 2008. Whilst good news for the lucky few, this number of course represents only a tiny fraction of those birds held in cages. We have 18,000,000 here in the UK. However, what the re-homing initiative has enabled us to achieve is significant:

· We have gained approved access to over 40 farms nationwide and built increasing trust and co-operation between us and farmers
· We have opened positive dialogue with the industry as to how improvements can be made to welfare (they approve of our re-homing initiative)
· We have been able, through a great deal of positive publicity, to reach millions of consumers encouraging increased support for the free range sector
· We have drawn some excellent celebrity support, including Charlize Theron, Prince Charles and Jamie Oliver, who is now our Patron and an advocate for free range farming

I definitely believe the initiative could be equally successful in the US opening up opportunities to save thousands of laying hens and, even more importantly, giving you an opportunity to educate consumers on how they can influence market trends which in turn would help millions more hens.

We don’t concur with extremist activities, believing consumers (not politicians, industry or extremists) hold the key to improving welfare for all laying hens. Our work is often seen as pioneering as we aim to build a bridge between welfare and commerce rather than judge the UK industry. By looking at the issues facing the industry, we have been able to build strong and trusting relationships focusing on how we can help increase free range production rather than the imposition of more regulation on caged production which often results in little welfare gain.

Through our re-homing initiative we circulate promotional material; we also give talks etc. However, without doubt, the hens themselves are proving to be the best ambassadors and every small group of hens we home (they often go in 4’s and 6’s), influences not only the adopters, but their wider family members, neighbours, friends and work colleagues thereby becoming a powerful way to spread a positive campaign message.

Nobody, as far as I am aware, has ever re-homed end of lay birds before on the scale we are doing and this in itself initiates extraordinary media attention – we recently filmed with a TV crew from South Korea. I understand there is a growing interest in S Korea in welfare and provenance. During the course of filming we interviewed a local battery farmer who was happy to give an interview on the history, present and future of UK egg production inside his caged unit … such is their trust that we work to mutual benefit. Breaking down these old barriers of mistrust is key to our success.

I’d be happy to help you try to get started, whilst it’s hard work (it’s taken over my life!) – I have never been happier and never ever get tired of hearing about happy ex-bats that are now enjoying a free range retirement! Did I mention the feedback from ‘re-homers’? It’s simply wonderful!

I look forward to hearing back from you and if you would like to follow our initiative, let me know. If you decide it’s too much, that’s fine too – I’m sure there are other ways we could work to mutual benefit for the hens. Finally I think Lisa mentioned that I have also been approached by Animal Place based in California; I will be hopefully talking to them later this week.

Kind regards
Jane Howorth
Founder
BHWT​

 

[babyspice35]

282 million here in the US
18 million in the UK

HOLY MOLY

Can you believe something like this hasn't been founded yet?!!?