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Pastimes : Let's Talk About Our Feelings!!! -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Ish who wrote (90114)	12/1/2004 12:58:45 AM
From: Grainne	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 108807

Well, not exactly true, Ish. By American organic farming standards, free range means the chickens get SOME sunshine and fresh air. They are not cooped up like factory farm egg layers, who spend their entire lives confined in a tiny, horrible space. So while free range chickens do get to fluff their feathers and play, they are not exactly free to forage for their own food. Organic farmers feed them a high quality vegetarian diet, without antibiotics because they have enough room to move around to stay a little healthier than their poor factory farm friends. Here is a little information I found on the net: Layer Chickens There are about 250 million hens in U.S. egg factories that supply 95% of the eggs in this country. In these facilities the birds are held in battery cages that are very small with slanted wire floors which cause severe discomfort and foot deformation. Between five and eight birds are crammed in cages only 14 square inches in size. Since the birds have no room to act naturally, they become very aggressive and attack the other birds in their cage; to help combat this behavior, the birds have their beaks seared off at a young age. The chicks are sorted at birth and newborn males are separated and suffocated in trash bags. The layer hens are subjected to constant light to encourage greater egg production. At the end of their laying cycle they are either slaughtered or forced to molt by water and food deprivation, which shocks them into another layer cycle. Many birds become depleted of minerals because of this excessive egg production and either die from fatigue or can no longer produce eggs and are sent to the slaughterhouse. idausa.org