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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

School hatching chicks

92 replies

frostedviolets · 13/03/2020 13:35

AIBU to really, really angry at this?

8 chicks hatched according to the newsletter, the ‘living eggs’ company coming to collect the chicks unless any parents want to rehome them 🤬🤬🤬🤬

First of all, there is no mention whatsoever of vetting, making sure they are going to parents homes with the correct equipment, knowledge etc, remember these are baby chicks, not young chickens.

Secondly, ‘living eggs’ claims the chicks are rehomed ethically on ‘free range’ farms but this is surely bullshit given that no farm, free range or otherwise wants cockerels so what exactly is going to happen to the unfortunate chicks who have been boys?
Presumably they are going to be gassed or minced?

Not to mention the appalling conditions of most ‘free range’ farms.

AIBU?

OP posts:
Alpacamabags · 13/03/2020 17:58

A teacher did this once at a school near me. She opened the incubator too many times to let the kids see and an egg literally exploded. Baby chicken everywhere. Disgusting stench and so, so cruel.

userlotsanumbers · 13/03/2020 18:29

Why is it that you call bullshit, if they state that they will ethically place the chicks at the end? What proof do you have, or is that your opinion? Simply curious to know how you know that this is BS.

Original poster
frostedviolets · 13/03/2020 18:40

Why is it that you call bullshit, if they state that they will ethically place the chicks at the end? What proof do you have, or is that your opinion? Simply curious to know how you know that this is BS

No proof of course, but how can they possibly?
They say they rehome to ‘free range farms’ but what does this mean exactly?

A commercial farm? Hobbyists? Petting zoos?
It doesn’t state.

And how many of these ‘free range farms’ welcome baby cockerels with open arms?

No working farm is going to want many cockerels surely as they don’t lay and aren’t used for meat, unless they are broilers, which seems unlikely?

How many small scale farms or hobbyists or petting zoos are going to want many cockerels considering they crow pretty much all day and loudly enough to be heard fair distance away?

I mean, I want to believe they are all ‘ethically rehomed’, living out their best little chicken lives in the fresh air outside with all their chicken friends but it doesn’t seem at all likely to me

OP posts:
LettertoHermoine · 13/03/2020 18:46

YANBU!!!

joffreyscoffees · 13/03/2020 19:01

Someone on my Facebook posted tonight that they've brought chicks from school for the weekend that have hatched. I wonder if it's the same school?!

Shortandsweet20 · 13/03/2020 19:05

Our school have them each year and I HATE it! Our ta always offers to take them but you don't know if they are male or female so she could be stuck with 9 cockerels! I hate it as I know what will happen to those poor chicks. I refuse to join in the awww let's go see the chicks

scrivette · 13/03/2020 19:19

The local animal rescue centres each year put out posters asking schools not to do this. Luckily our school doesn't.

Some of the male chicks end up being used for feeding birds in captivity, the last time I was at a bird sanctuary they told me the dead chicks were male.

Lilyamna · 13/03/2020 19:54

Are they really minced alive?? As a matter of routine? I can imagine there are some cruel practices in some parts of the world, but in the UK?? Are ‘western’ chickens minced alive? 🤢😦Shock

Concestor · 13/03/2020 19:59

Yes Western chicks are minced alive. It's called macerating and is considered a humane method of killing.

Original poster
frostedviolets · 13/03/2020 20:00

Are they really minced alive?? As a matter of routine? I can imagine there are some cruel practices in some parts of the world, but in the UK?? Are ‘western’ chickens minced alive?
Minced or gassed yes.
Think gassing is more common.
Jamie Oliver famously minced some day old chicks once.
Can’t remember what he was trying to prove now by doing it

OP posts:
Alsohuman · 13/03/2020 20:02

I’m assuming you’re vegan or at least vegetarian, OP.

Rhubarbpeony · 13/03/2020 20:03

Yanbu at all!

(#govegan)

Original poster
frostedviolets · 13/03/2020 20:05

I’m assuming you’re vegan or at least vegetarian, OP

No, I was vegetarian for a number of years though.
Considering trying veganism.

My objection to chicks in schools is based more around the perception that living, breathing animals are nothing more than ‘tools for learning’, brought into the world with no real responsibility for what happens to them next and are disposable rather than the meat industry

OP posts:
Windyatthebeach · 13/03/2020 20:06

Our school assured me they get female eggs only. Apparently this is a legit thing being able to tell as an egg...
I get eggs from a friend's very free range hens. Haven't bought from a shop in 7 years now.
In the awful scheme of our food industry I think it is a good introduction to dc to start to associate real live animals with what ends up on their plates. You read of dc not knowing where stuff comes from...

TheFuzzyStar · 13/03/2020 20:10

I worked at a nursery once that had chicks. A child squeezed one and it died ☹️

TheFuzzyStar · 13/03/2020 20:11

Wtf minced alive?! 😭😭😭 that’s terrible.

Lilyamna · 13/03/2020 20:12

The maceration has horrified me. I never considered what happened to the male chicks. That is utterly horrific. Who could work in a place like that every day and sleep at night? I feel sick just Thinking about it. I might have to go veggie Sad

Alsohuman · 13/03/2020 20:13

I’m really struggling to see the logic of a meat eater having qualms about this. I eat meat but understand that animals pay a horrible price for it. I honestly can’t see the difference.

Allaboardthemagicbus2020 · 13/03/2020 20:18

At one school they get all the children to have their photo taken with the chicks individually. It takes all day then the parents pay for the photo. the see it as a good fundraiser.

So, the chicks are handled by 360 children.

Oakmaiden · 13/03/2020 20:19

If you eat chicken or eggs anyway - the number of boy chicks hatched by schools as part of these projects is miniscule compared to the number generally produced (and killed) by the chicken industry.

I used to keep chickens. They were lovely. One of my hens got broody and we got her some eggs to sit on and had a nice batch of meaty chickens which were duly dispatched and eaten.

Also have hatched chicks in school - although these became school chickens, and genuinely did spend school holidays at a smallholding (owned by one of the teachers).

Stompythedinosaur · 13/03/2020 20:19

A teacher did this once at a school near me. She opened the incubator too many times to let the kids see and an egg literally exploded. Baby chicken everywhere. Disgusting stench and so, so cruel

I realise this isn't the point of the thread, but if an egg exploded then it couldn't have been one with a developing chick inside. It would be because the egg was rotten (and presumably the teacher wasn't skilled at candling the eggs to remove the ones that weren't viable).

Our school assured me they get female eggs only.

They are lying! That isn't possible to tell.

NervousInYorkshire · 13/03/2020 20:21

@Windyatthebeach - I knew they were doing this in Germany but didn't realise anyone in the UK was sexing eggs yet..

www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/dec/22/worlds-first-no-kill-eggs-go-on-sale-in-berlin

Stronger76 · 13/03/2020 20:27

We had chicks hatch in my school a few years ago. They were weeks and weeks old by the time they left us - not the fluffy yellow babies that do need round the clock, time-consuming, expensive nurturing and equipment, but fully fledged chickens who were eating adult pellets. Most of ours went back to the company who sold them to smallholders and families wanting them for domestic pets/egg producing.

It was an incredible experience for the children, a completely immersive project across the whole curriculum and there were lots of tears all round when they went. they didn't half whiff after a few weeks though

pelirocco123 · 13/03/2020 20:29

Many years ago my sons class hatched chicks ,or rather didnt as most of them died
There is no reason why schools should partake in this

LowcaAndroidow · 13/03/2020 20:35

I'm not so bothered by their eventual deaths, but by how awful their short lives are.

Chickens are creatures that have evolved to be "mothered" - they have a babyhood where the mother cares for them and they learn from her.
Chicks in a classroom are born in a bare box and live in a bare box occasionally being terrified by 5 year olds.

That isn't a psychologically healthy experience. It's cruel.