Is this true?

[The Quail Guru]

Could this be true? I found it on a Facebook and couldn't get any information to clarify it.

 

[newhenintown]

Im gonna say no its not true. Looks like someone posted it just to get a response because they said "she was bred to lay over 300 eggs a year". What? You don't have to breed a hen to get eggs, hens are gonna lay anyway even if there's no roo present. And they did say specifically to eat the eggs not to hatch them so im calling BS. Not saying that they can't die from over breeding even though I've never seen it but this post just seems like BS. And I have no experience with "wild" chickens but I would assume they lay more then 12 a year.

 

[The Quail Guru]

Thanks for the response. I think it's fake as its on a vegan page so of course they're going to use fear to get control. And I think they meant that chickens have been bred over years to lay the amount of eggs they lay now.

 

[Ravynscroft]

'Wild' chickens are a completely different breed... domestic chickens are called 'gallus gallus domesticus' for a reason...

Sex links are bred for high egg production in their first year, but doubtful that the laying of that egg is the actual cause of her death... more likely it was inadequate calcium, nutrition or or an underlying cause such as a respiratory issue or a reproductive one...

Properly cared for and free of health issues, simply laying eggs won't do that... I'm all for keeping animals from being abused, but there's a line extremists cross in their enthusiasm to support that...

 

[GingersHuman]

That's silly. You don't make a hen lay eggs. You can humanely keep chickens and eat eggs guilt free.

 

[Ridgerunner]

They are excellent at trying to make you feel guilty, aren’t they? That is called “spin”. People make a living doing that.

Originally chickens were wild. A hen would lay a clutch of eggs (not a specific number, could be more or less than a dozen), hatch them, raise the chicks, and then do it again, maybe 3 or 4 times a season. Chickens were prey animals like rabbits, squirrels, and mice so they had to reproduce a lot just for enough to live and reproduce the next season.

Then mankind domesticated them. Mankind started protecting them from predators, supplementing their food, and eventually learned to breed them for specific purposes. They may have bred chickens for extra egg production, meat, both meat and eggs, or as decoration and pets like Silkies or Polish. The same kind of thing happened to dogs, sheep, cats, goats, cattle, horses, and many other animals that are now called “domesticated”. If you release these animals back into the wild like that article wants a few would probably revert to their wild ways and reproduce enough for their descendants to survive, but the vast majority would starve to death, die of thirst or exposure, fatally injure themselves, or be eaten by a predator. To me the thought of releasing these domesticated animals into the wild, if you could even find that much “wild” to release them into, is extremely cruel.

Did that chicken die because she was bred to lay a lot of eggs? Not really. If you gather thousands of chickens, horses, dogs, or people in one place some will die. It could be disease or something like an internal defect like heart failure. That’s the cycle of life. The hybrid chickens developed for meat production or egg laying are specialized, without proper feeding and care they are more susceptible to medical problems. They are highly domesticated and do require special care. What that article fails to mention is that the vast majority don’t die from producing a lot of eggs per year.

It is true that chickens bred specifically for meat production will be slaughtered when they have reached the point where they are ready to be butchered. After hens have passed the point in their egg laying life that they are no longer commercially viable to keep as egg laying hens they will be killed. The bodies may be used for something like pet food. Around here we have a lot of commercial poultry production. A lot of the dead bodies are used to produce compost. Some do go to landfills.

To me the important thing to remember in all this is that if it were not for the commercial uses those breeds (actually hybrids) would never have been developed to begin with. Those chickens would have never been hatched to start with. While some dual purpose or bantam chickens may have a small chance to survive in the wild, the specialist meat or egg hybrids would have no chance at all. They are too specialized.

 

[rebrascora]

As with any propaganda, there are elements of truth in this but it has been portrayed in such a way as to over dramatize it.

Most production chickens have been selectively bred over numerous generations to produce more and more eggs. Birds do not naturally lay an egg every day or 300 plus a year.... the purpose of laying eggs is to raise chicks from them....a bird will lay a clutch of eggs and then incubate them and raise the chicks that hatch from them to fledging and then start laying another clutch. Chickens are birds and therefore this would be their natural cycle if humans had not selectively bred them to increase production and decrease broodiness. Production hens are fed a high protein feed and kept in artificial conditions (lighting etc) to encourage them to be as productive as they can be until about 18 months old when they are usually culled and replaced if they don't burn themselves out first. Production hens are more prone to reproductive tract problems because their system doesn't get any down time. This is modern egg farming practice and it is all about producing as much food as possible as cheaply as possible with maximum profit. It is the same with most animal farming. Look at the hideous double muscled calves that are now being bred. Pity help the cows that have to give birth to them.

This is perhaps one of the main reasons why many of us here on BYC, choose to rear our own hens, so that we can ensure that they live a happy and healthier life. It costs us probably 10 times more to produce eggs from our own backyard flock by the time you factor in coop and run costs, feed, litter and management products like lice/mite treatments wormers etc. without taking into consideration any vets bills that may be incurred and many of us keep them as pets for life rather than cull them when they are no longer productive.

There is little doubt that most chickens in the farming industry have a rough life and a short one and they are treated more like machines than creatures. That doesn't mean to say that we should all become vegans but it is important to be aware of where our food comes from and how animals are treated in order for us to eat meat/eggs/milk/cheese etc and to campaign for better welfare standards for them.

So yes, there is some truth in that advert and therefore we should not totally dismiss it as BS, but see it as a reminder of the cost of cheap food and learn to make informed choices regarding what we eat and where it comes from and what sacrifice an animal made to provide it if we are not vegans. If you buy animal products then you are complicit in how that animal was farmed in my opinion and should therefore be knowledgeable about the facts so that you can make decisions that you are most comfortable with.

I should point out that I am a meat eater and I butcher my excess cockerels.....something I find very difficult but it makes me much more aware of the sacrifice that animals make in order for me to eat animal products.