PHOTO: These Snow Birds Just Won’t Chicken Out
(Photo: Karen Davis, United Poultry Concerns)
United Poultry Concerns founder Karen Davis submitted this week’s snow photo, featuring three of her sanctuary birds. “We got hit with lots of snow this winter, but our sanctuary birds have braved the elements with fortitude and good cheer,” she reports. “Some of the white hens in these photos were flown by private jet from California battery cages in 2013 following their rescue by Animal Place, yet here they are, tramping about in winter wonderland in Machipongo, Virginia!” (Published March 9, 2015)
A very efficient Learjet 36A burns about 600 pounds of fuel coast-to-coast direct .
For once, a private jet may have been used for something beneficial (rescuing battery hens rather than trotting Donald Trump, Tiger Woods, or a capitalist icon de jour to their “important” events). Battery cage farms pack egg-laying hens so tightly into tiny wire cages that they can’t even spread out their wings or engage in any of their natural behaviors. This archaic practice is illegal in the entire European Union and several states in the US. Companies like Unilever, Delaware North Companies, Sodexo, and more have made commitments to phase out the purchasing of all eggs from farms that use this practice. For once, it’s an issue where food service leaders, environmental organizations, food safety organizations, and animal welfare organizations have all been saying one thing.
Just 600 pounds of fuel to save some innocent birds from a horrific death? So worth it.
Try 6000 pounds of fuel. At 6.7 pounds of fuel per gallon, it works out to about 895 gallons.
Mr. Schaum is probably correct about the number of gallons of fuel to “save” a few chickens. What is the point of all of this? Why do chickens or any other animal or insect need to be shipped 3000 miles to be “saved”? We are aborting more than a million unborn or about to be born humans per year and we are worried about chickens?
Animals should never be unduly mistreated. Mistreatment is in the eye of the beholder. To some just being the owner of a pet dog or cat and a human being the master is mistreatment. Some may believe that restraining a pet to the owner’s property is mistreatment or to keep a dog on a leash is nasty. Some believe animals are the equal to humans and should have all the same rights as people.
Do you know how nasty chickens are to each other? Do you know that if a chicken is hurt or sick the other chickens will peck the ill one to death? As a former teacher I saw the same conduct with my 8th graders. If one was a little different the others picked, teased, and bullied. Now with emails and Facebook the taunting is 24/7 and in some cases the end result is tragic.
Again, it is wrong to mistreat animals and there are laws and people are prosecuted but most of us are meat eaters and we depend on farmers and processors for a large amount of our food supply. We enjoy milk & eggs and someone needs to provide this. On any farm the livestock must be confined, and how much space do you give to each cow, to each hog, to each hen? A rancher in Nevada needs 320 acres per cow while in Iowa an acre can perhaps graze two cows. For an egg business to be viable how many hens are necessary? How large should the hen house be and how much would it cost to build such a house? What would it cost to maintain such a house and how many workers to care for the operation. The bottom line — what woud a dozen eggs cost?.
Sounds like there’s no place between California and Virginia to save a few chickens.