4m x 3m Omlet pen, cube, new auto door still boxed and coop light

[xsoggyx]

Can anyone advise how long the Hens will lay for?

 

I remember reading somewhere their expected life is around 5 years but do they leay eggs upto the end? Stupid I know.

 

My wife (Country Girl from Slovakia) wants to kill them and eat them as soon as they stop laying. I have tried to convince her we dont eat family but it is not working.

 

Also, does anyone eat their girls ?

[Egluntyne]

Their laying tails off in their latter years, but many lay one or two a week after 3 or 4 years.

 

I have got a couple of freeloaders who are not in their first flush of youth, but I wouldn't dream of eating them.

 

In anycase. elderly layers are quite a different proposition to a 38 week old table bird.

 

They are tough and can't be roasted successfully.

 

The need long slow casseroling.

 

As you say....you don't eat family.

[Lesley]

We don't eat layers - although my son's Hungarian girlfriend thinks we are strange to raise table birds but not eat the older layers

 

As Egluntine says, they would be very tough and chewy and need very long, slow cooking..........

[frenchlayer]

Morning ladies.

 

Had to laugh at this one. No such sympathy here in France. They kill old layers and eat them. We are don't think we will be able to eat ours though.

 

My neighbour had a large cockerel which recently jumped on his back and pecked him, rather than just giving it a kick which seems to be the norm here he got his knife and bobs your uncle. No mercy, no pussy footing around. ewe

[BeckyBoo]

We don't eat our free loaders (we have a couple) and we won't eat our old layers but only because they would be so tough. We've got eggs hatching at the minute and intend to eat any boys we end up with, apparently the breeds we're hoping for are not the best eaters but the alternative for most boys is worse as far as I can tell.

 

Mrs Bertie

[Cooks]

I wouldn't dream of eating any pet/family member of mine whether they lay or not.. it'd be like eaten hubby becuase he doesn't cook/ or iron... no no no..

[cathybc]

I don't think I could ever eat mine. I did think I wouldn't be able to eat chicken at all after I had got my girls, but ready meals seem so far removed from the chooks that I still manage the occasional chicken madras

[*mummy_hen*]

I wouldn't eat my sister, daughter, OH, Dog, Cat, etc. when they died......so point blank NO WAY!

[Phonix]

No no no!i find it odd that anyone could eat a pet - not got my chucks yet but id never consider eating my cats and the chucks will be pets so they DEF won't get eaten either - as you've all said, they'll be family!

[daj198]

The thought of eating them makes me feel ill. It's different if they don't have names and you've never met the chicken, but if they're your pets it'd be like eating a cat.

[Rhapsody]

I think its totally different if you have a biggish flock that are not backyard pets in any way- I dont think elderly layers would taste very good though! If you lived in an environment where meat is expensive and hard to come by then it makes economic sense, but backyard chickens are a luxury and a hobby. I am a comitted carnivore but wouldnt eat a stringy tough old layer just for the principle..

[..lay a little egg for me]

My neighbours used to make chicken soup with the boys. They got their hens from the school after they had done the yearly hatching eggs project, so of course they had far too many boys. I don't think they named them though. I would consider making soup/chicken stock from an old layer, but can't tell you what the answer would be as, hopefully, it will be a couple of years yet!

[The Dogmother]

I wouldn't, not because I'm squeamish (which I'm not) but because there's not meat to speak of on a tough old bantam (and that's just me we're talking about )

[Tessa the Duchess]

We haven't eaten chicken since we got chickens. I don't have a problem with eating chicken that has been kindly reared, but DH just wont even consider it, so we never have it I couldn't possibly eat a pet

 

Tessa

[xsoggyx]

Ahhhhh good so it is not just me that does not want to eat family. It does seem to be the norm on mainland europe tho.

 

So for the laying years am I correct in saying after about 3 years they begin to slow down then become freeloaders? I guess I will have to buy eggs and sneek them in to protect them from the wife. My god I feel like Schindler now.

[Gallina]

The best way out is to have so many chickens you can't be quite sure which ones have stopped laying.

 

I think hens would only be good to eat if you culled them before they stopped laying, as commercial breeders do, rather than wait for them to get seriously old.

 

But I don't think I could kill, pluck, and draw a pet, let alone eat it.

[Guest]

maybe we'll all have to consider eating 'family' in the future with this global food crisis!

 

I keep thinking about films like 'Soylent Green' and 'Delicatessan' (dealing with themes of over population, pollution and foot shortages) and books like Philip K Dick's 'The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch' (amongst others, deals with themes of over population and global warming) and how prophetic these tales are turning out to be.

 

Currently though, I couldn't and wouldn't eat my little girls

Edited May 28, 2008 by Guest

[Olly]

I guess I will have to buy eggs and sneek them in to protect them from the wife. My god I feel like Schindler now.

 

... er, you don't think she will notice the little red lion stamp on them?

 

I think Gallina's idea is best - have so many that you don't know which ones are free-loading. It's definitely a mainland Europe thing - my Romanian cleaner said very seriously 'ah, yes, you have to cook them very slowly' when I said my older hen had stopped laying.

 

I eat chicken (as long as it's free-range) but really an old laying bird wouldn't make much of a meal, and I couldn't pluck or draw a bird, even one I didn't know. Tell your wife that DEFRA has banned the consumption of garden-reared birds or something!

[Rachel F]

Apparently, on heresay, I have been told about a butcher in Surrey who will kill your bird for you, but then give you someone else's ex-laying bird for a small charge. So that you are eating someone else's pet, instead of your own.

But, when a hen is old and virtually stops laying, they are known as broilers (according to my mum). The bird needs to be killed, de-feathered and de-gibletted, and then put on a stove in boiling water for about 6 hours. Only then can it be roasted successfully.

Havent tried it myself, but apparently it was all the rage in the war!!

Rachel.

[Guest]

Apparently, on heresay, I have been told about a butcher in Surrey who will kill your bird for you, but then give you someone else's ex-laying bird for a small charge. So that you are eating someone else's pet, instead of your own.

 

i think that's worse! If anyone must eat my babies then it's going to be me. I'd hate to think of somebody else tucking into one of my girls and perhaps not doing her justice

[Ana's flock]

I think it's not a mainland Europe thing... more of a poverty consciousness. As someone said if there's a meat shortage people would eat anything. We are very fortunate we're not in that situation and can afford to treat our girls as pets. I've got a few freeloaders (and a couple of cockerels) and we wouldn't dream of eating them. Yet we eat steak, chicken from the farm shop etc etc...

 

I suppose it's also a cultural thing... in China dogs, cats, and even snakes get eaten!

 

...and in France they eat horse - to me that amounts to cannibalism!

 

I suppose if we were in a dire post-war situation we'd think differently.

 

I was talking to a woman from Zimbabwe a couple of weeks ago, and yet again conversation turned to chickens (fancy that! ). She was extremely surprised when I told her mine had names and we won't eat them - for her the only purpose of keeping hens was to slaughter them and cook them for the family!...

 

Personally: we don't eat friends nor family...

[beach chick]

I couldnt eat the girls... but if we raise some eggs via a broody as we hope to, I wouldnt have a problem eating the boys. BUT, I need someone to show me how to do the deed properly (or ideally OH how to do it) and then OH says he will do the preparation. I know people who know, so am hoping that as and when the day comes I can bribe them to get OH to do the task! otherwise I guess we'll end up keeping them...

[owenofj]

ZOMG, no... that's like eating the dog because it stopped wagging its tail

[Gamebird]

No, I would not eat my laying chickens. What's the point? They won't be particularly meaty. They will be old and stringy.

 

I would much prefer to eat the free range chickens I buy from my local village butcher which have been bred for the purpose.

[Stevie]

I delibretly named mine so i could never eat them.