to eat eggs from caged hens?

[ChickenWashingDilemma]

Trying to distract myself, thought AIBU was as good a place as any to hide from real tasks of the day! Warning: Very middle class, having-the-money-to-be-able-to-choose problem.

I am lucky in that I can afford free range eggs. I don't eat much meat as I would prefer to eat higher welfare less often than cheap meat more often. But in the supermarket I managed to pick up eggs from caged hens. I never buy these, don't know how I did it, but noticed when I got home.

I talked to OH about them and he said he would not eat them. But I cannot bring myself to throw them away as to me that seems worse than using them. At least the produce is being used. I would never buy them again through choice but what to do?

I have already eaten 2 so it is a bit of a moot point but what would you have done? I just want to get rid of them as quickly a possible without throwing them away. (I have since been told that I might have been able to return them but had not considered that you can return foodstuffs just because you pick up the wrong thing)

So if the choice was between eat them or chuck them, AIBU to eat them?

I agree with your gold just because it says free range doesnt mean hens are running about a field it usually means they are in a barn not in a cage,

eat them now, but just be careful in future.

it makes no sense to throw them away, even though it's cruel to keep hens like that.
because if you did, it's like you're saying "i pretend to care about you, but i don't"
if you eat them, you're making those hens matter just this once.

and you have thought about them.

like the mistake has made you think about them again.

so what if you need a bigger area to house free range eggs?
it might give business to local producers.

we keep our own hens, and it's ridiculously cheap to keep them (it would have been cheaper had we not bought an expensive run, but i couldn't be arsed to make a house and run on my Bodge skills)
If you convert an old shed and use weldmesh panels, you can keep 3 hens for all the eggs you need, for at least 2 years.
(when they slow down, you can get new hens in the same set-up)

chicken food costs 3 hens about £10 for 6 weeks.

Eat them and consol your guilt with the fact that the checkout person is likely to have judged you

Nickel not every body lives somewhere that they can keep hens people live in flats rented houses I would love to have some hens clucking about I really would but where I live isnt really ideal for chickens

this is very self-indulgent isn't it? Not to say nonsensical. All those horrified at battery eggs are hypocritical unless they avoid all bought cakes, biscuits, take aways, custards, quiches, and a hundred other things.
It's more ooh look at me, aren't I all ethical, I have such a quandary. You really don't.

Seriously? My family would eat them.

I eat meat, so how is eating animals bred for consumption different to eating caged hens eggs.

YANBU That's all I can afford and don't waste food.

Do you realise how many male chicks are killed every day so you can have your eggs and eat them?

just eat them.....

wow, almost asleep here

I wouldn't buy them intentionally and DH would refuse to eat them. But if I bought them accidentally I wouldn't balk at eating them, and I wouldn't refuse to serve them to DS either.

Hi GOLD

I subscribe to Farm Animal Voice, which is run by Compassion in World Farming, a major animal welfare charity set up over 40 years ago by a British farmer. They're a major authority on caged-vs-free range systems, and what I've read persuades me that free range is clearly better for the animals.

CIWF is concerned with promoting animal welfare, and I can't imagine that they would push for a system which is worse for the hens.

It's hard to imagine that any system that routinely stops hens from displaying their natural behaviour (dust bathing, flapping wings etc.) could possibly be better than one that allows them to do just that.

Things may have been different a while back, when many farmers were only just starting out in free range and didn't know how to manage/care for the birds.

MrsJay - oh, no, I wasn't suggesting that everyone should keep hens!

I just meant, if you're able to, it's a very rewarding thing to do :)

(and maybe someone in a flat could try to get an allotment. :) )