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Angels4

The Life of a Battery Hen

By Angels4, in Chickens, Eggs and Hatching

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Angels4 Chatty Chicken

Angels4

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Copied from www.upc-online.org

 

 

Prologue

 

Sound of a Battery Hen

 

You can tell me: if you come by the

 

North door, I am in the twelfth cage

 

On the left-hand side of the third row

 

From the floor; and in that cage

 

I am usually the middle one of eight or six or three.

 

But even without directions, you’d

 

Discover me. We have the same pale

 

Comb, clipped yellow beak and white or auburn

 

Feathers, but as the door opens and you

 

Hear above the electric fan a kind of

 

One-word wail, I am the one

 

Who sounds loudest in my head.

 

The Incubator

Deep inside an industrial incubator filled with thousands of chick embryos, a baby hen is growing inside an egg. During the first 24 hours after her egg was laid, the chick’s tiny heart started beating, and blood vessels formed that joined her to the yolk which feeds her as she floats and grows in the fluid of her encapsulated world. The baby hen has had feelings since her 21st hour of life inside the incubator, and since her 24th hour of being there, she has had eyes. By the fourth day, all of her body organs are developed, and by the sixth day, she has the face of a little bird. Her beak has grown, and with it the egg tooth she will use to break out of her shell – the shell that was formed by her mother hen’s body, in a breeding facility somewhere – to protect her from harm.

 

The baby hen has comforting exchanges with the other embryos in the incubator, but a forlornness is felt inside each bird that passes from shell to shell. The two-way communication between themselves and a mother hen – the continuous interaction which they are genetically endowed to expect, and which they need – has not occurred. The mother hen’s heartbeat is missing, and she does not respond to the embryos’ calls of distress or comfort them with her soft clucks. The reverberation of something continuously running outside the eggs does not spark meaningful associations, as, for example, the crow of a rooster or the sensation of the hen shifting her eggs with her breast and her beak would comfortingly do.

 

Still, by the 20th day, the baby hen occupies all of her egg, except for the air cell, which she now begins to penetrate with her beak, inhaling air through her lungs for the first time. The air isn’t fresh, and the baby hen rests for several hours. Then, with renewed energy, she cuts a circular line counterclockwise around the shell by striking it with her egg tooth near the large end of the egg. With this tooth, which disappears after hatching, she saws her way out of the shell. Twelve hours later, wet and exhausted, she emerges to face the life ahead.

 

"As each chick emerges from its shell in the dark cave of feathers underneath its mother . . ." But this is not the baby hen’s birth experience. Start over: "As the mother hen picks the last pieces of shell gently from her chick’s soft down . . . " But this is not part of the baby hen’s story, either. Try again: "As soon as all the eggs are hatched, the hungry mother hen and her brood go forth to eat, drink, scratch and explore, the baby hen running eagerly within sight and sound of her mother, surrounded by her brothers and sisters." In reality, none of this happens, except in memories that arise in the baby hen’s dreams as she grows and stares through the bars, in the cages that await her arrival.

 

The "Servicing" Area

 

The baby hen and her fluffy yellow companions are being wheeled down the hall in the incubator cart. When it stops, three workers remove each tray of newly hatched chicks. They toss, sort and dump the discarded shells, the half-hatched chicks, the deformed chicks and the male chicks into the trash. They smoke cigarettes between the arrival of each cart, and the tobacco fumes along with other odors and gases produce a sickish, burning sensation in the baby hen’s eyes, chest and stomach. One of her companions hops onto the edge of the tray and falls to the floor. High-pitched screeches occur as the carts, which now include hers, wheel into the next room, crushing and half crushing the fallen ones, plastering them in blood on the floor.

 

One by one, each chick in the tray is grabbed by a hand and pushed up against a machine blade. Now it’s the baby hen’s turn, and as her face is pushed against the blade, an agonizing crunch and pain shoots through her beak and her body causing her to flap her wings, cry out, and lose her bowels. Smoke and stench mingle, as the traumatized chicks, each with a stumped red hole in front of her face, are sprayed with something chemical, and the baby hen blanks out. She jerks awake upon feeling herself being grabbed and jammed in a cage in a dark place.

 

The Pullet House

 

Throbbing pain in her head and her beak, jostling of others around her, wires hurting her feet, air that makes her sick. The hen can never get comfortable. She cannot obey her impulse to walk and run. She is in a cage in the "pullet" house, where she and the other young hens, thousands of them, will eat mash from the trough, excrete into the manure piles, and grow until, five months later, they are moved to the layer house and into the smaller egg-laying cages. The hen and rooster who created her in the breeding facility were slaughtered while she was still in the incubator. Her brothers were suffocated at the hatchery, and she has sisters somewhere, perhaps in the same building that she’s living in.

 

She suffers excruciating pain when she accidentally bumps her wounded beak several times against the metal trough when she tries to eat the mash. Her body aches, her heart beats in fear, her face is disfigured, things crawl on her skin. There is no earth to bathe in. Healing, her beak develops small bulbs, called neuromas, and in time the pain almost stops, just a dull ache there, but the young hen can never preen herself properly, or eat right, although she tries, and when she and some other hens appear in a magazine picture, people who never knew her think that she and her sad companions are ugly by nature.

 

 

The Layer House

 

One night a hand flings her out of the pullet cage, into another cage, and wheels her to another cage. Feelings pass between herself and the other hens pressing against her, as their combs grow white and lumpy, and hang over their eyes like dough, but no words exist for these feelings, just as there is nothing in the natural evolution of hens to prepare them for this situation. When a cagemate dies and rots, the hen stands on top of her to get off the wires. Her cage is somewhere among stacks and rows of cages. She is in a universe of cages. Eggs form in her body, are expelled with difficulty, and roll away. Rats whisk through the troughs leaving pellets in the mash. They whisk in and out of the cage bars, even brush through her feathers, which are mostly broken spines now. Flies suck stray yolks in the isle in front of her cage, and one day the troughs are empty.

 

The End

 

Somehow the hen has managed to get her head and one spiny wing stuck between the bars of her cage, and she can’t free herself. Ignorant people say that a chicken doesn’t know she is going to die, but the hen knows that she is going to die. When a hand – the most brutal, cruel thing she knows – opens the cage door and pulls her backward from inside, yanking her almost in two, she shrieks as she is dropped into the bucket where other hens, oozing eggs, pieces of shells and blood await her. They absorb her into themselves, as something heavy and soft plops on top of her that moves just a little, or so she feels, in being carried away.

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Angels4 Chatty Chicken

Angels4

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Hi Aaron,

I found the article on http://www.upc-online.org (UPC = United Poultry Concerns) Also I have signed up at Chicken Out as you requested. :D Thank you for that. I've been researching how to adopt ex-batts here in the US and UPC was one of the groups I've found. I recently joined the BHWT in the UK and recieve their newsletter and am hoping someone there can direct me to a like organization here in the US.

Honestly until I joined the OmletUK forum and started keeping chickens of my own, I really didn't give much thought to where my eggs came from and have since had a hugh awakening. I'm now making up for lost time and will do most anything to ensure I get the message out about battery hens. The next time I'm in a grocery I'm planning on inserting the article in a few dozen egg cartons. My small part to help.

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Egg Lou Chatty Chicken

Egg Lou

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Monday morning.. sat at desk.. tears flowing :(

 

I'm sorry Egg Lou...That was me yesterday when I found the article.....After I composed myself I posted here.

 

Check out Jackiepoppies post in "The Nesting Box" for a Monday Morning Smile.

 

Don't be sorry... this is true facts that we are already aware of its just brings it home in full.. makes me want ex bats even more

 

I 'll have a look at the post above thank you!

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pistachio Frequent Layer

pistachio

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I don't think a chicken feels everything that is mentioned in that piece but in terms of the process of "rearing" I think it's useful to spell out what goes on in battery "farms" (ridiculous word to use for these factories). I've always bought free range - as long as I've been buying food. Even if a chicken is proved to have no feelings at all - i just couldn't treat such a glorious animal in that kind of way - or even be a part of it. I'm really pleased that people like Hugh.F.W and Jamie Oliver are highlighting the fact that many products contain battery eggs and that people need to be aware it's not just our egg buying habits that need to change. great news about hellman's mayonnaise and M&S using free range eggs now. Any more updates on this campaign anyone?

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Suzy Chicken Eggspert

Suzy

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I personally think it is attaching human emotions to chickens - so I agree with Pistachio and you would have to be heartless to not feel sad when you read it. It does make me want to go and cuddle my three ex-batts, still quite lacking in feathers but eating well and laying loads 3 weeks into their new life.

 

Now, if I could just get them to share the cuddle sentiment and not run away each time I try and make friends I'd be happy! I only get to stroke them at night when they're roosting, or the ex-bat excuse for roosting - yes, they haven't quite got the hang of it yet.

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Angels4 Chatty Chicken

Angels4

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Reading that article really made me stop and think about life. I had seen pictures of the ex-batts adopted by my fellow forum members and thought those poor little souls. Again I have to honestly say I never really gave much thought about where my eggs came from, they were just an item I picked up at the grocery.

Being on the forum and reading the posts about the BHWT, battery hens and the conditions in which they are kept opened my eyes to something I wasn't aware of until I started keeping hens. I guess my girls came into my life to make me more aware, which makes my forum name so much more meaningful.

I've been in contact with Jane Howorth of the BHWT as well as Dr. Karen Davis of United Poultry Concerns http://www.upc-online.org here in the US in hopes to start a similar program here in the States. Below is a copy of the email I sent to Dr. Davis.

 

Dear Karen,

I am a long time animal lover who has just started on the wonderful journey of keeping pet hens. Until recently I never really made the connection between "supermarket" eggs and the terrible plight these wonderful animals suffer. What has opened my eyes and the eyes of my family is an organization called the BHWT (Battery Hen Welfare Trust) based in the UK and founded by a wonderful women named Jane Howorth. Since 2003 the BHWT has rehomed 115,719 hens who would have otherwise been destroyed because they had served their purpose. Below is an excerpt taken from the BHWT web site http://www.bhwt.org.uk

 

About my feathered friends

 

When I re-homed my first 100 ex-bats in October 2003 I had no idea that within just two years thousands of spent hens would be given the extraordinary opportunity to free range the UK countryside; an opportunity of which most battery hens can only dream.

 

Each year the number re-homed grows and our perception of the humble hen steadily changes as more people realise just what endearing creatures they are.

 

There is not a single hen I have encountered who hasn’t flourished and blossomed when human kindness has entered her world, likewise not a single human I know whose life has not been touched and enriched by the company of their feathered friends.

 

Every hen on this site melts the heart or brings a smile to the face, they are at once endearing and extrovert – as those who are privileged enough to care for some will know.

 

Those amongst us bold enough to confess that we love our hens just as we love our dogs and cats have, in my opinion, the greatest of opportunities: the wellbeing of millions of hens, just like our very own Henriettas, Mabels, Hennypennys and Pollys, is in our hands – we can either sit back and allow millions more to exist and expire unseen or we can unite and quietly and carefully work our way towards improving their quality of life.

 

I hope you are inspired to join us and help these enchanting, endearing, delightful creatures; so many have brought me the greatest joy … so many await.

 

Jane Howorth

Founder

 

I first heard about the BHWT on a chicken keeping forum I belong to which is based in the UK called http://www.omlet.co.uk Omlet makes a wonderful coop for the Urban hen keeper and donates $15.00 of every Eglu or EgluCube sold to the BHWT. The Eglu has been available in the US for some time and the EgluCube will become available in the US at the end of February 2009. I already have an Eglu pictured below andI am patiently awaiting the arrival of my EgluCube and will soon have room for 6 more girls. I would like to rehome some ex-batts and was hoping you might be able to direct me.

Kind Regards,

Mark aka angels4

 

I sent a similar to Jane who I heard back from and she is going to contact Dr. Davis to see if we can start a similar program here in the States.

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speckled hen Frequent Layer

speckled hen

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I found this really upsetting, especially as before getting my girls I never really thought about it, well other than buying free range eggs. I look at my girls and can't imagine them in cages. I would like to think I could give an ex batt a new life but arent sure I have the skills yet. Hopefully in the future xx

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mostin Feathery Fanatic

mostin

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I sent a similar to Jane who I heard back from and she is going to contact Dr. Davis to see if we can start a similar program here in the States.

 

That is such good news, wouldn't it be wonderful if the BHWT became world wide.

 

What a fantastic dream that we can make become real.

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SnowWhite Chicken Eggspert

SnowWhite

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Whilst I'm inclined to agree that using human emotions doesn't reflect the actual thoughts and needs these poor birds have, I have been totally shocked and amazed at how many people still do not know the full battery hen reality. There are people out there who are blissfully ignorant of the plight of these dear girls despite the work that Hugh FW and the likes have done to highlight the cause. This type of article can only help raise more awareness and concern for the welfare of all animals.

 

Thank you for posting it!

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The Brown Clan Frequent Layer

The Brown Clan

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Rescuing my ex batts was something I just had to do after i saw the programme on the television when they gassed the cockeral newly hatched babies. They showed all those hens squashed in the cages...... made me sick to the stomach.

 

 

 

I know what you mean that programme had me in floods of tears I have NEVER brought battery Eggs and since then have been very concious of the other egg containing products on the shelves , and it was this programme which made me decide to get chickens of my own, although the 2 i have are not ex bats , as did not have the experience i felt needed to keep them they are the next on my list now i have experience of hen keeping and can't wait to get a bigger garden to get them out in the freedom they deserve :cry:

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