Dear Reader
“We need conventional, chemical, toxic, GMO and soil destroying agriculture to feed the world” – This used to be the biggest lie in agriculture but only the presstitute media, tertiary education agricultural institutions and those working for the agricultural chemical companies are stupid enough to still believe this. Today we are producing enough food to feed between 11 and 14 billion people yet at the same time we are losing 20x more kgs of topsoil in erosion than kgs of food produced. Equal amounts of people are dying of obesity and starvation…The wrong food (read GMO corn and soya) is being produced by the wrong people in the wrong places using the wrong methodology.
Back to the title of this rant. You, dear reader, see free range on your eggs supermarket shelf and imagine rolling green hills, clucking hens and perhaps some bees buzzing around whilst they take the nectar from the flowers growing in the pasture. A bit like the photo below.
The photo above was taken on our farm. One of only two truly free range laying operations in the country. These guys, click here, have recently started too.
The truth is that the hens producing your “free range” eggs are raised in barns with occasional access to the outside. A few metres from this rarely opened opening in their barn there is a fence that stops them from ranging too far.
Why do the retailers market a product that is blatantly not free range? Is it because they know that the consumer will believe anything they are told. More likely it is because if these eggs were honestly named i.e. barn raised then the non free range eggs would have to named cage raised and who would want to buy a cage raised egg?
The elephant in the room is that 24 out of 25 million laying hens in this country are cage raised. Less than an A4 page for the hen to “live’ on. The egg industry wants attention diverted from this and so they have fed the consumer the free range bone. Yet another example of the problems the national chain retailers cause for agriculture. Click here for an elaboration of the role of the retailer. The retailers are complicit in these two crimes of consumer fraud and of animal cruelty.
The photo above I took when visiting a cage farming operation. The hens are only 4 layers high (in South Africa we go up to 9 levels but in Japan 19). They “live” on a sloping metal floor with slightly less space than an A4 page. Sloped so that the egg rolls out onto the conveyor belt.
Our hens live in Eggmobiles. Here is the explanation. You can enjoy produce off our farm which also includes the only grass fed beef produced and butchered on the farm in the country by clicking on BUY MEAT & EGGS at the top of the page.
Angus.
11 Responses
I enjoyed visiting your blog and I am so inspired to start raising chickens for meat and eggs. Where can I buy the pasture seed for plants you use to feed your chicken?
Nditsheni
Call me on 082 379 4391 then we can talk in more detail about your chicken questions.
Angus
Oh my word I always feel like vomiting when I see stuff like this. Yuck. Can’t believe people treat animals like this. And 19 layers?
I want to share this with my newsletter subscribers, it is very powerful.
Hi. I am looking for organic tallow. Pls can u assist me.your help will be greatly appreciated. Thank u kindly.
Angus! Thanks for all the effort you put in your produce!
I really enjoy every product – eggs, meat etc….
Your critical attitude is great and brings a lot of
information to the consumer….especially this ‘free
range’ lie……Annette
You do not a dress consumers as you do. The consumer do not believe what they are told blantly. They rely on information given to them. If the producerstorm my and you know it, you are at fault for failing to denouncing them.
Great article as usual Angus! Just don’t forget that Red Barn Farm in George, also produces PROPER free range eggs and chicken! Completely free to roam our chickens never see a cage. We also use the indigenous hens called Boschvelds. They are like Nguni cows, tough, clever and really South African. We are also working towards non gmo. However, we realise that our customers will not pay the “extra” for non gmo eggs. Pity! Please feel free to visit. Keep up the great work.
Red Barn Farm, do you state on the egg box that your eggs are fed a GMO feed?
Good eggs are both cage free and GMO free. Right?
Hello
we don’t feed our hens a GMO diet
Angus