Foundation for happier hens

From the archive, first published Tuesday 6th Dec 2005.

RESTAURATEURS are benefiting from battery hens being nursed back to health in Wool.

The chickens are close to death when they are brought to the centre, marked out for slaughter after reaching what is considered the end of their productive life.

Within months on a healthy diet and being allowed to roam freely they are like different chickens, and start to lay better quality eggs.

Zoe Brodie James, 35, started up the project for the Bill Jordan Foundation, which has featured in the Daily Echo before for its animal rescue missions.

Volunteer Zoe - also an animal behaviourist student - said: "When the chickens first arrive here the majority can not walk and they have lost all their feathers.

"They don't show any signs of normal behaviour - we have to teach them how to be chickens again."

The organisation is told by national charity, the Battery Hen Welfare Trust, where there are hens to be rescued.

Since Zoe started about three months ago she has brought in and looked after 25 chickens, most of them coming from battery farms in the South.

It takes about three months to nurse them back to health, after they have lived in a cage smaller than the size of a sheet of A4 paper.

Zoe said: "When they are healthy the eggs are totally different - they taste much better, are much bigger and the yolks are brighter."

Jimmy's Bar and Restaurant in Bournemouth and Gossips Brasserie in Canford Cliffs have started to buy the eggs for their kitchens.

Zoe said: "They are so popular we can't produce enough eggs to keep up with demand."

The Bill Jordan Foundation is looking for more land to hopefully take on extra chickens. It is also involved in the campaign to ban cages used in farming.

The money from the sale of the eggs goes to the upkeep of chickens and any profits will go back to the foundation, to help save animals around the world.

Factfile

Seventy per cent of eggs in the UK are produced by battery hens. That is more than 20 million battery hens.

Six per cent of our eggs are produced by barn-reared and 24 per cent by free-range hens.

The chickens enter the cage at 20 weeks and will remain there for an average of 52 weeks before slaughter.

On average a battery hen lays about 15 more eggs a year than barn or free range chickens.

The advantage for the battery farmer is that it is easier and more convenient to keep the hens in this way.

First published: December 6, 2005

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