No such thing as free range eggs

[runsw/scissors]

These are hatching eggs, right?!

Wow! I should be charging way more as mine are out and about every day... Talk aboput crazy!


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[gritsar]

I feel morally okay with calling the eggs from my hens free range. My flocks are let out first thing in the morning. They can roam anywhere they want to on 80 acres. They return voluntarily to their coops at dusk, when they are locked up for safety.

If my birds were kept in any type of enclosure, even a mobile tractor I wouldn't feel right about calling them free range; perhaps pastured, but not free range.

 

[Illia]

I think the article is trying to mention that "Cage Free" is not free range.


And yes, commercially sold "free range" don't have much but a rangy flat fenced area.



But that doesn't make free range eggs impossible. My girls can escape their fence easily but otherwise stay in a fenced area of about 2 acres, complete with stomach-high grasses, (berry producing) shrubs, some very tall coniferous trees, and a small orchard.

 

[jpcode]

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No, these were for eating, like grass fed beef these were grass fed eggs,

Like organic, cage free, free range, etc I don't know if grass fed is just another label to charge more or if these chickens only eat grass.

 

[gritsar]

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No, these were for eating, like grass fed beef these were grass fed eggs,

Like organic, cage free, free range, etc I don't know if grass fed is just another label to charge more or if these chickens only eat grass.

I'd bet it's just a label to sell more eggs. Do my hens eat grass? Sure, when they're bored. They also eat fruit, berries, veggies, bugs and rodents, you name it.

Yesterday they ate a large bowl of leftover spaghetti with meat sauce. I can see the label now "Italian Fed Eggs".

Every time I see eggs from "Vegetarian Fed" hens in the grocery store I have to laugh and surmise that the people feeding the hens are vegetarians, because chickens most definitely are not vegans.

 

[KBlue]

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Where's the "Like" button?

 

[Ducks and Banny hens]

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Have you noticed all these companies now claim to have free range chicken and eggs. From where!!! How can Moes afford that? It's like they're stretching the meaning of free ranged.

Yes, 'Free Range' now means they pick up the battery cage and move it outside!

 

[Ducks and Banny hens]

I don't feel right with any conventional label on my eggs. You see, 120 yrs ago, there was no such thing as 'Free Range' or 'Organic', or 'Battery Raised', there was just:


- Chickens walk out of coop in morning - Chickens forage - Hens lay an egg - Someone piccks the egg up, and stores it or eats it -


The criteria that constitute 'Free Range' nowadays sure doesn't sound like the traditional way of keeping poultry.
There is no term for that way anymore, as the criteria just keeps slipping and slipping.
And that's why I have trouble bringing myself to cal my birds 'Free Range'.

 

[Ducks and Banny hens]

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In the commercial chicken and egg businesses, free range means that they could possibly go outside because an access has been created. It doesn't mean the birds are actually outside at any point in their life; just that the option is there.

This might be interesting...
http://www.cornucopia.org/organic-egg-scorecard/

See, I'm even more extensive than the 5-eggs, and I know their are alot of people who keep like me, and it bothers me in some way that they don't seem to think that their is aanother way to raise poultry beyond that.

 

[Chicken Man Dan]

Sorry guys, this was a tongue in cheek comment posted below a news story about the annual banned words and phrases. The author of the comment was just having fun with using Free Range Eggs literally.

Here's the full article: http://www.cbc.ca/news/offbeat/story/2011/12/30/banned-words-list.html