We know that vegans don’t consume eggs, but what about eggs from backyard chickens? Why would that be a problem? After all these hens live a good life, right?
These are questions vegans encounter all of the time, and at first they seem reasonable. After all, most of the problems associated with egg production don’t exist with eggs from backyard hens, so what would the problem be?
The first thing to consider is where the hens have come from. If they have been bought from a farmer or a breeder, then by buying hens we are still contributing to the problems associated with commercial egg production, such as the male chicks being killed at birth, normally through being macerated or being gassed. Other hens who are instead used or sold into commercial egg production are also killed in slaughterhouses, at only 18 months old.
However, if we adopt hens from farms or slaughterhouses, then what could possibly be the problem?
Firstly, it’s important to recognise that hens wouldn’t naturally lay 300 or more eggs a year, but have instead been selectively bred to do so. Wild red jungle fowl, the ancestor of the modern day egg laying hen, only produce around 10 - 15 eggs a year and will lay in clutches, rather than producing eggs on an almost daily basis. This means we have bred these animals to produce up to 30 times more eggs than they are naturally designed to do so.
This takes a huge toll on their bodies, especially as it also depletes a lot of vitamins and minerals, including calcium, which is taken from their bodies to produce the egg shell. This is one of the reasons why osteoporosis and broken bones are such a huge issue within commercial egg farms, with it being reported that as many as 86% of egg laying hens in the UK suffer a fracture.
However, this loss of nutrients can also have an impact on backyard hens, with egg binding being an issue where an egg becomes physically stuck inside the hen, which can ultimately lead to the hen dying.
This is why one of the best ways to protect hens from nutrient deficiencies and health problems is to feed their eggs back to them, which will help the hens replace their lost nutrients, and they also really enjoy it.
Other health complications exacerbated by a hen’s excessive egg production, include egg yolk peritonitis, where the yolk of the egg gets stuck in their body and becomes infected by bacteria, such as E-coli. When peritonitis becomes widespread, it almost always leads to death. Egg laying hens will also suffer from prolapses, where the cloaca, the area of the body where the egg comes out, is pushed outside of their body.
Hens will often eat their eggs themselves, without their owners having to break the eggs or specifically feeding them back to them. However, this is viewed as being negative by people who keep hens just for their eggs, with it even being advised that hen owners cull the hens who are eating their own eggs, as those hens aren’t serving the purpose the owners want them to, and they can also teach the other hens to eat their own eggs, further amplifying the perceived problem.
This really highlights the wider problem of backyard eggs, the intention of why someone has hens in the first place. If the intention of having hens is only because you want the eggs, then that means we are viewing the hen as a resource and viewing their worth of life as being dependent on what they produce for us. This is why it can be seen as normal to kill a hen because they are eating their own eggs, as it means that they are no longer seen as being worthy of life, simply because we can’t take their eggs. In effect, we deny them their autonomy.
This can also be shown through hen owners who, instead of paying the vet bills to save their hen from any health complications, will instead have their hen culled, as it is often cheaper to do that, and simply purchase a new hen instead. Furthermore, because the number of eggs that hens produce declines over time, many hen owners will kill their hens when they stop laying eggs, or have reduced their production to the point they are no longer seen as worth keeping.
To draw a parallel, when we rescue a dog we don’t do so with the motive that the dog has to provide anything for us. We want them in our families and we want them to live as long, healthy and happy lives as possible. However, with backyard hens, we compromise their health because we want to take their eggs, when it would be more preferable for the hens if we fed their eggs back to them.
Furthermore, to protect the hens even more, they can be given a tiny hormonal implant, which stops their bodies from producing eggs, similar to how a hormonal implant for female humans stops their body from ovulating as well. And whilst this may seem unnatural, it is simply an effort to alleviate the problem that has been caused with how unnatural we have made these hens in the first place by selectively breeding them to suit our own financial and personal motivations.
Ultimately, reducing the number of eggs that a hen produces in a safe and effective way will provide the best outcome for the hen, who will feel less strain and be less at risk of health complications.
And from a more philosophical perspective, hens don’t produce eggs for us, and their bodies aren’t ours to use. Rescuing hens from farms and slaughterhouses - or from a school project, is a wonderful thing to do, precisely because it gives these hens a chance to live a happy and long life, but having hens because we want their eggs is akin to rescuing or buying a lactating dog simply because we want to drink their milk.
So ultimately, the most ethical way to look after backyard hens is a way that provides them the best opportunity to live a long, healthy and happy life, and by taking their eggs we compromise that, meaning that taking their eggs is less ethical than feeding them back, or taking safe steps to reduce the number of eggs they produce in the first place.
And even more than that, veganism is about redefining our relationship with other animals, and acknowledging that their right to life is not predicated on what we can take from them. To view these animals as needing to provide for us is to view them as a resource, as opposed to viewing them as individuals deserving of their own autonomy.
And even though it may seem abstract, the reason we have commercial egg operations now is because over time we went from backyard production to industrialised production as a result of us viewing animals as resources and denying them the right to their body. We didn’t wake up one day with large scale animal farming, we created it over a period of time by telling ourselves that these animals are here to produce for us, and kidding ourselves into thinking that we had the animal’s best interests at heart whilst simultaneously maximising their use for our own personal gain.
And as long as we see animals in this way, we will continue to exploit them in ways that come at a detriment to their happiness and wellbeing. So let’s give these hens the life that they deserve, not so we can take anything from them, but because we want them to express their natural behaviours and live a long, happy life.
