Re: Free range eggs

LFS wrote:
I have just been tidying the fridge (displacement activity: there are
more important things that I should really be doing but don't want to)
and noticed that there is more to free range eggs than I had hitherto
suspected.

Eggs from ASDA come in a box marked: "laid by hens that are *free to
roam* on *British farms* in the *fresh air* from dawn to dusk". (The
asterisks indicate words printed in a much larger font.)

Eggs from Sainsbury's are "Woodland" eggs: "free range eggs from hens
free to roam in the natural shelter of trees". Inside the box we are
told:

"Like their wild ancestors, hens still prefer the shelter of trees.
These eggs come from hens with access to established woodland or where
trees have been planted to enrich the range and provide natural cover.
This encourages them to range more and live fuller and more active
lives exploring and foraging beneath the trees. A more natural free
ranging life means healthy hens and high quality eggs."

I do wonder how the preference of hens for ranging under trees is
known. And why does it matter whether the trees are established or
newly planted? "Dawn to dusk" suggests that the ASDA hens get called
in at night but presumably the Sainsbury's ones sleep out under their
trees.

Obaue: range is used by the Sainsbury's marketing people in both verb
and noun form. It seems to me that the noun form is relatively unusual
in this sense. Except of course in the song, which mentions free range
bear and antelope but not hens.

You can see from their behaviour that they like being among trees: as
young Sainsbury hints, they're descended from Asiatic jungle fowl.
Established trees presumably means not foot-high seedlings, which
wouldn't provide much insect life or shade --or protection from birds of
prey. It's certain that the Sainsbury birds retire to a house at bedtime
and to lay: you don't want the foxes helping themselves, after all, and
the egg business requires the use of some sort of nestbox.

There can be great PR virtue in the expression "free to roam", as the
birds will actually tend to hang about near the sources of food and
water. I've even heard that if the houses don't have enough entrances,
some birds will make it difficult for the weaker sistern to come out
when they want to. But it's still a good idea.

Dear departed John Seymour wrote: "To confine, whom nature has given the
urge to scrap, to perch, to flap her wings, to take dust baths, in a
wire cage in which she cannot do any of these things, is revoltingly
cruel and I cannot bring myself to talk to anybody who does it, nor
would I, on any condition, allow such a person inside my house." Amen.

--
Mike.



--
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