Free Range Eggs – What does it really mean?
May 19th, 2010
You are currently browsing comments. If you would like to return to the full story, you can read the full entry here: “Free Range Eggs – What does it really mean?”.
Posted in 
Tags: 3 Responses to “Free Range Eggs – What does it really mean?”
Leave a Reply
Although we are pensioners with a careful food budget I do always buy “Free Range Eggs”, but the article and especially the videos certainly destroy the myth.I am so looking forward to picking up my girls and boy on 28th May and then watching them enjoy as free range a lifestyle as I can safely give them. Foxes prevent the ideal, even in daylight hours.
Whilst I would agree that chickens in a ‘dome’ don’t meet our conceptual ideal for ‘Free Range’, I do think that we can lump this sort of husbandry into the free range mix. OK… admittadley they can’t go anywhere they want, as there are walls in the way, and they are reliant predominately on us for food but I think that the chicken dome/tractor idea supports being called free range from a couple of different perspectives.
1) The animals are not maintained at a rediculous stocking density leading to pollution and anti-social behaviour.
2) The chickens have unlimited access to sun, shade and fresh air.
3) The chickens source a great deal of their food from the beds they are grown on via digging and hunting (which is normal behaviour for chickens)
4) Most importantly, the chickens can behave as chickens without artificial intervention from humans such as beak trimming or de-clawing.
I think that the idealised picture we have in our heads of a flock of birds picking over a lush green field is nice, but it isn’t the only form of ‘Free Ranging’ available.
Thanks Shane. I like your concept.My dome is all set up except for the perches which will happen tomorrow morning before we collect the chooks.I am confident it is secure, with the rim and the extended wire skirt all pegged down and then the skirt weighted down as well with hay bales on top all the way around the dome.Unless foxes can dig “The Great Escape” type tunnels from a distance outside the dome and up under then I think it should be OK.I do so hope so – my hubby sees foxes almost daily on his early morning walk and we often hear one announcing “this is my territory”.