I've just been told that vegans don't eat honey. Is this true and if so, why?

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That's it really.

I'd always thought that vegans don't eat animal products that have been produced by causing pain or exploitation. Does honey fit with this? I'd have thought that bees can, well...buzz off ...if they don't like where they are.

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yes, you could open up a nursery in both senses of the word. at the back you could have the children's nursery, at the front you could have the plant nursery, with the plants all being cultivated using the "manure" obtained from the former.

Urine is a good source of ammonia, but you tend to let it 'mature' before you add it to the soil!

You also need to be sure that your soil has the right balance of decomposer and nitrifying bacteria present in it, or it will simply not break down.

and if only the first part of the process happens you are left with soil rich in ammonia, which is not nice, and can be toxic at high levels.

Just pissing on your carrots wouldn't cut it !

I used to work with someone who was vegan. she was one of the unhealthiest people I have ever met.

and she used to take her 1 yo baby to animal rights protests.

Yes. Somehow a carrot grown in baby poo would be less offensive.

I'm not vegan, but the egg thing does bother me. To have eggs, you need chickens (whichever came first) and so you end up with vast numbers of unwanted male chicks which are gassed on an industrial scale.

I'm soppy and sentimental I know, but I did cry when I saw footage of them being dropped from a shute onto a conveyor belt (alive)like grain, piled on top of each other, to be 'processed'.

Eggs are potential chickens, wannabe. Plus the exploitation of the laying hens, their slaughter at an early age, the killing of day-old cock chicks because they are of no use to the egg farmer. That's why vegans don't eat eggs in any form.

hmmm not sure about that one.

I mean shit is shit at the end of the day. I stil wouldn't wish to partake.

Thank you MB. I can stop peering into the neighbours' gardens now on the off chance .

but what if they buy a chicken or two.

could they not eat the eggs then?

Lots of countries use night soil extensivly for fertilizers. But they tend to have a lot of experience in handling it !

all chickens lay infertile eggs though.

And the day old chicks are sold to the pet trade, you know those freezers in the pet shops? .

wannabe. That's the problem, they often don't lay infertile eggs. There was a news thing recently about a boy who had hatched three chicks from supermarket eggs.

I know WannaBe, there was just something about seeing it on such a scale.

Free range hens are especially prone. Any passing....er....wild cock, can get at them.

but what about if they're in your garden and not around a cockrel?

do they need to be round a cockrel to lay?

This is about Waitrose duck eggs being hatched.

I'm no chicken expert but I think they lay anyway. I imagine in the same way that humans release an egg or sometimes more each month whether it will be fertilised or not.

So I don't really think that eating unfertilised eggs can be seen as exploitation or stealing eggs from hens. What would happen to the eggs if they weren't collected and eaten?

k, then, would a vegan who kept chickens eat their eggs, seeing as they're not round a cockrel?

the waitrose article says the hen will still lay if she's not round a cockrel, but she will lay infertile eggs.

I have more questions!

Are farmed chickens given hormones or something to stimulate egg production?

My mum had a friend whose daughter would only eat the parts of plants that the plants 'discarded' - mostly fruit - the idea being that the plant meant the fruit to be eaten so that the seeds were dispersed, though when you start talking about what a plant means to happen I think you probably need a reality check....

I can understand vegans not eating unfertilised eggs, frequently laid as a result of giving chickens the chicken equivalent of Clomid.

But I can't understand why eggs produced infrequently by a celibate chicken as part of it's natural cycle are out of bounds.

Someone responded earlier that honey isn't eaten by vegans as the honey has been stolen from the bees. But what use does a chicken have for an unfertilised egg?

Rusty. That is extreme.

No cups of tea as the leaves hadn't 'agreed' to be picked?

none. chickens need to produce eggs or they become egg-bound and can die.