The Canadian Federation of Humane Societies says consumers want information about how the eggs they buy are raised, including the living conditions of egg-laying hens. Here are some terms:
- Free Range: Hens live in a cage-free environment and have regular access to outdoors for foraging, dust bathing and time in the sun.
- Free Run/Cage-Free: Hens live in a cage-free environment indoors but do not have access to the outdoors or natural sunlight.
- Enriched-Cages: Hens live in group cages about the size of a broadsheet newspaper with nests, perches and foraging space.
- Battery Cages: Hens live in cramped wire cages the size of a magazine page. Crowding prevents them from walking or spreading their wings for their entire lives. This causes extreme stress.
- Most hens lay about 320 eggs per year -- about 16 times the natural laying cycle.
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