Compare the chickens pictured here with those in the video below...
Which hen would you prefer your eggs come from?
Regardless of whether or not the recent salmonella that has caused MILLIONS of eggs to be recalled came from contaminated feed, rodent feces, or the deplorable conditions that many of these hens are subject to during their egg laying years in battery cages on factory farms... it is my hope that this has been a HUGE wake-up call to the American public.
Local farm fresh eggs at the grocery store have been selling out ...fast. Many of the local producers that buy their feed at the farm cooperative where I work have expressed a dramatic increase in egg sales since the salmonella outbreak. Many of whom have added more hens to their flock to attempt to keep up with the demand.
Just in case you haven't been convinced that you need to start asking about where your eggs are coming from (not to mention your other food), here's a video depicting yet another factory farm exhibiting complete lack of concern for the health of the hens and the public who buy their eggs. I'm not sure about you, but just the thought of one of the eggs that I feed my children coming from a factory farm where dead hens are left to decompose right beside my egg has been enough to convince me to pay $3-$4/dozen to local suppliers until my happy hens are producing their salmonella-free eggs!
After all the salmonella recall news blows over and the grocery stores start selling carton after carton of 99 cent eggs again, just remember, you get what you pay for ... 99 cents gets you a dozen eggs that may have been collected next to the corpse of a rotting hen OR $3-$4 gets you a dozen eggs collected from a hen being treated humanely in a place where she has a space much greater than a standard-size sheet of notebook paper to roam!
