Keeping Chickens

Walking In Circles – Battery Hen Song

I’ve just stumbled across Walking In Circles whilst researching a chicken keeping idea…

Folks, you’ve got to go and check out Walking In Circles - A Song About The Sad Life Of A Battery Hen.

This beautiful, but sad song tells the true story about the hellish life of a battery hen.

Every year more than 20 million normal healthy chickens in the UK are sentenced to lifelong imprisonment, crammed into a tiny cage with no room to move and express their natural behaviour.

# The price I pay’s too much to bear hidden from the public glare… #

You can hear a clip of the song Walking In Circles and if you wish you can download a mp3 of it for 79 pence or get a copy sent to you home in the mail for £3.49.

All proceeds will be donated to the charity Compassion In World Farming.

In my opinion with Easter coming up, this would make the perfect Easter gift substitute to giving a chocolate egg… So go on, check the song out and if it doesn’t make you think, then you shouldn’t be keeping chickens!

Walking In Circles

Battery Hen Song Press Release As Below.

BATTERY HEN SONG EASTER EGGS FROM HELL March 2010

“Walking in Circles” is a song written to provoke a perfectly timed Easter Egg debate.
Philip Lee-Woolf, a chicken breeder, has written a song about the plight of the caged hen. Most people believe battery egg production is a thing of the past. Sadly, millions of hens are still legally caged, and as some die, the corpses are not always removed from the cages, so egg producing hens, can be forced to live alongside the carcasses. The dark side of egg production is kept behind closed hen house doors. The industry does not want you to see the sadness of the birds who mass-produce eggs for the UK market.

Phillip Lee Woolf breeds rare breed chickens, and he has kept hens since childhood. “There is no doubt in my mind that cage egg production should be totally banned, because it is a barbaric, inhumane way to produce food and there is no good reason for cramming nearly 20 million hens into a tiny cages, with less space per hen than an A4 sheet of paper, in artificial light, and forced to lay eggs until they are slaughtered. Enriched cages are just another form of imprisonment as they only offer each hen additional space the size of a beer mat. “ (Ref. RSPCA)

In 2004 Philip started the Legbars of Broadway business breeding Cotswold Legbars (blue eggs) & Burford Brown hens (chocolate brown eggs) for garden pets and domestic egg production. These hens, are free to roam, and produce tasty quality eggs; in total contrast to bland, pale, thin-shelled factory farmed eggs. Phillip says, “If you observe a hen, she doesn’t walk, she runs everywhere. Free Range hens, allowed to live a normal active life in the open air, produce superb healthy eggs.”

January 2012 should be a month of muted celebration for the 244 million battery hens of the EU when the ban on conventional cages comes into force. Several European countries (31% of EU caged hens) are applying to delay the ban which would result in no significant ban at all! The new, so called enriched cages are being enlarged by a mere 50cm2 per hen so 47% of eggs will continue to come from battery hens.

Philip wrote a poem to illustrate the plight of the prisoned bird, and this was set to music.
The “Walking in Circles” CD is available on Amazon or the Legbars of Broadway Web site
All profits will be donated to Compassion in World Farming. www.ciwf.org.uk
www.legbarsofbroadway.co.uk – please click here to listen. Thank you.

Some facts about the “Eggs from Hell”
2009 We consumed over ten billion eggs in the UK. 65% were from battery hens
2009 there are 39 million laying hens in the UK 30 million eggs are consumed daily in the UK
Caged eggs 58% Free Range 38% Barn Eggs 4%

The British Egg Information Council (BEIC) claims that the Lion Quality Mark on egg boxes and egg shells symbolizes that the eggs have been produced to higher standards of hygiene and animal welfare than required by EU or UK law. This is despite the fact that it permits the use of conventional battery cages that only meet the bare minimum standards of the EU legislation. The public are clearly being misled about hen welfare kept under the Lion Quality code scheme.

A Mori poll in 2005 found that 87% of consumers think battery cages are cruel and yet only 38% of the eggs available for us to buy are from free range hens, showing that retailers and the egg industry are not listening to the consumers’ needs.

45% of laying hens in cages break a bone at some point during their lives. (Webster 2004/Viva )

In summary:
Consumer power can make a difference. Simply refuse to buy battery hen eggs.
The shopper has the power to initiate change in production methods. The farmer and suppliers will only respond to market forces and will respond to our demand.
An egg produced by a free range hen only costs 25-30p – a very cheap & nutritious meal!
Chocolate Easter eggs cost pounds, with comparatively negligible food value.

Contact: Phillip Lee-Woolf Tel/SMS 078 318 490 36
Lee-Woolf Limited, (Registered in England 1984), Lammy Down Farm, Russley Park, Baydon, Marlborough, Wiltshire. SN8 2JY
www.legbarsofbroadway.co.uk

Song lyrics are on the website.
When choosing your eggs, think of The Song, and spare a thought for the hen- she has a life too.

Phillip Lee Wolf: “Anyone who has kept a few hens in the garden will be aware of their need for a busy life, and offer graphic and amusing descriptions of the different characters, the love of space, running, flying, foraging, dust bathing, and an incredible fondness for human company.
Short of giving every person in the Country a conducted tour, or an uninvited visit to a battery hen farm, we may never alter the egg eating habits of the average UK consumer. To appreciate a hen as an individual, rather than a faceless component of a massive flock, prompted me to write a poem that has now been turned into a song which we hope will strike a chord with the unconverted, and help persuade consumers to put an end to the intensive factory farming of egg laying hens. Why?…Because cage eggs still account for more than half of all eggs consumed in the UK. This cruel and shameful trade will only stop, if we the consumers start to buy a free range egg, rather than these cruelly produced and inferior eggs.”

With music and vocals by Dominic, ‘Walking in Circles’ is a small contribution this coming Easter, towards smashing our addiction to the ‘eggs from hell’, and hopefully, lots more people will think of the hen, its feelings, sensitivity, and the most basic need of all – its liberty and choose to eat heavenly produced eggs. ‘Walking in Circles’ – In short, the message is simple, when choosing your eggs – spare a thought for the hen, she has a life too. Think of The Song, and buy only organic or free range eggs.

Walking In Circles

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