To ask if eggs can ever be vegan

[GloryforGloves]

Before I discuss, let me share the definition of veganism from the Vegan Society website:

Veganism is a way of living which seeks to exclude, as far as is possible and practicable, all forms of exploitation of, and cruelty to, animals for food, clothing or any other purpose.

So, I understand fully that the egg industry is rubbish. Hens are confined, even if the box says free range; male chicks born as potential breeders are culled; old chickens are slaughtered. As a meat eater who buys into this, I get it’s shit. So I was wondering about alternatives.

Based on the definition above, I think it could be considered vegan to eat eggs from a rescue chicken who was keep in a happy, free range environment - a large back garden with a suitable setup. You are not breeding the animal for a specific purpose and I wouldn’t consider that exploitation as the chicken would lay regardless - in fact you are saving an animal that would have otherwise be slaughtered.
Instead you provide the chicken a comfortable, safe place to live and you enjoy it’s waste product.

I know some (most?) vegans say no animal product at all - but I think there has to be a reason for that stance - if it’s for ethics, then is this unethical?

What are your thoughts? Could rescued, well loved chicken eggs be considered vegan?

Not a vegan myself but I don’t think it counts as a “waste” product even then: chickens do eat them sometimes, and even if not it’s not humans to take from animals as though it were our commodity... does that make sense?

@thecatneuterer I agree with you, cats need meat. I fundamentally disagreed with my friend on this.

But the purest form of veganism is that no animal should be in captivity.

I don't agree with it, which is why even when I go through long periods of not eating animal products, I would never call myself vegan.

My MIL who is the Chicken Whisperer tells me broody hens are actually pretty rare now. These are hens that stay on the eggs with the aim of hatching them out. If you get a broody one you'd be wise to hold onto it. You can put baby chicks in with her at night and she'll adopt them. Probably all kinds of non-ethical but very neat.

@Juells our chickens lay and don't get any mash or altered products. They get wheat, cracked maize, dried peas, seeds and veg waste from the kitchen. There favorite food is mouse.

If you have rescue hens and they lay eggs as a vegan you should not eat them yourself but give them to someone who would otherwise have bought eggs via the "system" that way you decrease the demand (very slightly).

I’m vegan and I do sometimes eat dog’s eggs. They’re a bit dry but I force them down.

Maybe we need a vegan version of the flexible vegetarian (flexetarian)!

A vegan by definition imo doesn't eat eggs, however if I was in that situation I would probably say I'm mostly vegan but occasionally eat rescue eggs, nothing wrong in this but if you are about the label then it's no animal products. Alternatively many people prefer to say they mostly follow a plant based diet rather than use the term vegan if they are consuming a few animal products.

These kind of threads often end up in vegan bashing, glad to see this thread didn't manage to go that way.... and nobody went as far to say 'well should vegans be walking on grass'

Also;

OP in answer to your why vegan question ;Also many people are vegan for health reasons and choose not to eat eggs due to this.

By eating eggs the cycle of suffering will go on. You could eat you rescue hens eggs until they die but those hens have already been replaced.

You may have helped those particular 3 hens but not the 10,000 that are slaughtered every hour in the slaughterhouse near me.

If you don't buy the product, the product line will cease.

By eating eggs the cycle of suffering will go on. You could eat you rescue hens eggs until they die but those hens have already been replaced.

Is that really true of rescue hens though? I get that’s true of buying and eating eggs in general, but rescue hens are really just a by-product that would exist whether you remove them or not. So by not rehoming then (regardless of whether you do or don’t eat their eggs) they will still exist but end up slaughtered instead. You would need everyone to give up eggs from the industry entirely to have a serious impact.

I'm vegan, I would eat those eggs in the OP's scenario if they were truly waste to the hens and they weren't nesting them. It's not exploitative is it? Like the examples of eggs found in flowerbeds etc. Otherwise I'd maybe compost them instead to prevent waste.

To me, the whole point of being a vegan is to minimize harm to animals as much as possible that is within my control. I don't eat them, wear them etc. In this case, I can't see the harm.

I don't agree with the "cycle of suffering" comment. If you had the occasional egg from a shop then yes, but these are random eggs layed by hens who aren't bothered about them (as far as I can tell from the description :))

I liked the idea of giving/selling them to someone who would otherwise go and buy some anyway, that sounds like the most ethical stance.

My DM frequently has rescue hens from a local farmer, once they get loose from his flock (?) he wont reintegrate them in case of contamination. He gives them away. If kept in right conditions they lay very well but dont try to roost; all the local family are well supplied so none need to buy farmed eggs.

The hens that you rescue have already been replaced. It is not solving the problem,you are just making space for new hens to take their place on the production

The male chicks have already been killed.

The method of barning even free range eggs means that they will be slaughtered at 72 weeks. The only way to stop this hell for them is to stop buying eggs.

Eat the backyard hen eggs by all means but even by purchasing free range egg once your own hens die is condemning a whole new batch to death.

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/jan/30/free-range-eggs-con-ethical?CMP=share_btn_link

But if you are happy with eating dairy and meat, the egg argument really holds no water. Why care? You are free to enjoy what you like.

No. You'd still be exercising ownership of another being, and the spare eggs a chicken produces are a result of human selective breeding. Also an enlarged size. Its highly likely its painful to lay, and we force it through selection to happen almost every day, shortening the lifespan of the birds.

Just out of interest, a way has just been devised in Germany of being able to determine the sex of fertilized eggs at a very early stage (I think 9 days) which means the male eggs can be destroyed then before the chicks are ever born. It certainly won't make eating eggs more acceptable to vegans, but I think it will make a difference for vegetarians and people who want to reduce cruelty in farming. The way the newborn chicks are got rid of presently is absolutely gruesome.

I'm trying to think of the name of the new eggs sold using this method - have a horrible feeling it's some sort of pun on 'egg'. Eggstra possibly.

The hens that you rescue have already been replaced. Yes but they would have been replaced anyway. They are all hens that have reached the end of their economically productive laying and so are destined for the abattoir. The rescuers normally take 100 or so from a lorry load of thousands that are off to be killed. The rescuing of them doesn't in any way contribute to more being brought in to take their place, that was going to happen anyway.

But they wouldn't be replaced if there was no demand for eggs.

Fun fact, the Vegetarian society (so not even vegan) would not put their logo of approval on Quorn products until they switched to using free-range eggs exclusively.

Now, as a human being who wants to eat a byproduct that causes no harm c.f. the rescue hens above, that's actually pretty logical and rescuing the hens is reducing suffering. You just don't really get to call yourself properly vegan. But one might argue, if you're not intolerant to eggs and they're "no suffering", does it even matter if you're vegan or not.

Vegans not only eat no meat or fish, they won't eat any produce.

Milk, butter, eggs, cheese, yoghurt are all animal products.

Many go further and will not use or consume products that have had animal byproducts used in their manufacture.

Many condoms contain caseinates, proteins derived from milk, they'll ask for coins rather than use the plastic notes that have been manufactured using animal fat lubricants and won't drink wines, beers or ciders that have been clarified with isinglass (a gelatinous mass made from the swim bladders of sea fish).

won't drink wines, beers or ciders that have been clarified with isinglass (a gelatinous mass made from the swim bladders of sea fish).

Or egg whites... Isinglass fined drinks aren't even considered vegetarian. Egg white fined wine is often considered to be vegetarian though, but not vegan even though laboratory tests have shown they get rid of 100% of the findings (well, as close as is possible to be undetectable to sensitive lab equipment).

I have vegans in my family.

They do not eat “store bought” eggs but do eat “home laid” eggs from my parents chickens.

They are all “rescue chickens” (from commercial operations) who don’t lay many eggs.. perhaps 2 a week (some don’t lay at all).

They have 5 acres to roam around on during the day, and just wander back to their coop when it gets dark.

If the eggs were not removed from the coop, they would turn bad and rot - or attract snakes (we’re not in the UK.. what eats eggs over there, foxes?). So if the eggs weren’t eaten they would have to be taken away and disposed of. My parents are very vigilant about removing eggs since a neighbours chicken was killed by a snake!

So OP you might find someone like that to source eggs from... good luck

Also to clarify, the rescue chickens would have been killed unless my parents took them in. The commercial operations get “fresh chickens” whether the old ones are killed or rescued.

Technically my “vegan” relatives are probably “vegetarian” due to eating these eggs. But as it’s the only animal by-product they consume it is easier to call them vegan - otherwise someone will book a vegetarian restaurant and then get miffed that they can’t really eat anything!