Hey there from a vegan who ate an egg.

[PsYcHo]

Hello!

This time of year South Carolina is a great place to visit, unless you enjoy the Colorado winters. (Snow is pretty to look at, but the driving in it..... Chains are for fences, not tires! )

Welcome aboard!

[John]

This is something I have been really curious about. Why wouldn’t vegans eat eggs? As an outsider it is hard to understand.

Of course my take on eggs in particular would be coloured by my experience.

Now up front my starting point is not some vegan ideal. I would be buying free range eggs at the supermarket if I didn’t harvest them in the back yard. The backyard ones are cheaper, taste better and no fossil fuel is burned when I walk them into the house so it is my preference.

I have had different breeds over the years but I don’t see the bulldog thing. None of these breeds are all that different from the jungle fowls (apart from less wandering into other yards) and I haven’t noticed any breed specific health issues. Currently I just have a fluffy headed hen and a classic cross breed egg machine hen. Ironically, while they are both reasonably young, the one bred for looks lays often and the one bred for laying hasn’t layed in months.

I don’t buy fertiliser and do in a sense grow grain exclusively for the chooks who also eat any bugs they can find. I am not sure what the grain is -sorghum or something. It had a beginning like the cherry tomatoes but also like them has grown wild for some time. It isn’t farmed to feed humans and no humans are missing out. I also think the chicken poop is a natural and healthy catalyst for soil and vegetation to thrive. The cycle of life.

I get why someone wouldn’t want to support battery hen production but I can't see a negative across the board with eating eggs.

[Jebus]

This is something I have been really curious about. Why wouldn’t vegans eat eggs? As an outsider it is hard to understand.

I assume you mean it hard to understand why a vegan wouldn't eat an "ethical" egg. I'm sure that you are aware that 99+% of all eggs come with a great deal of suffering.

I don't have a major problem if people, who treat their backyard hens well, eat their eggs.

However, here are the reasons I would never do that myself.

Eating eggs would be detrimental to my health (eggs are just really bad for you).
Eating eggs is very disgusting (I think I would rather eat a piece of meat than an egg).

[John]

Thanks Jebus

[brimstoneSalad]

There are some animal products, like milk and eggs, that can in theory be taken without harming the animals even if in practice that's not the case 99.999% of the time.

Of course milk has the added burden of methane production from the cow.
Chickens, if feeding on local pest insects and slugs, may be pretty benign in environmental terms.

I have had different breeds over the years but I don’t see the bulldog thing. None of these breeds are all that different from the jungle fowls (apart from less wandering into other yards) and I haven’t noticed any breed specific health issues. Currently I just have a fluffy headed hen and a classic cross breed egg machine hen. Ironically, while they are both reasonably young, the one bred for looks lays often and the one bred for laying hasn’t layed in months.

I think you're dealing with a pretty small sample size. There are anecdotes about purebred dogs with no health conditions too. It doesn't happen 100% of the time.

I don’t buy fertiliser and do in a sense grow grain exclusively for the chooks who also eat any bugs they can find.

Are there any inputs at all? If the grains are not perennial then you may have to plant them every year. Beyond that there may be irrigation costs.
Sometimes people just use kitchen scraps for fertilizer and that may be pretty neutral. We are getting into opportunity cost territory, though. What else could be grown with those land resources?

I am not sure what the grain is -sorghum or something. It had a beginning like the cherry tomatoes but also like them has grown wild for some time. It isn’t farmed to feed humans and no humans are missing out.

I don't think there are any grains that aren't sometimes farmed to feed humans, sorghum is. That said, the question is whether something to feed humans could be grown on that land, and the answer is almost always yes unless it's heavily contaminated by heavy metals -- although in which case it may not be prudent to eat eggs from chickens feeding there either.

I think perhaps if you got into gardening you'd yield more nutritious food on the same amount of land with the same resources.
Of course, we could compare this to the waste that is a grass lawn and perhaps you're doing better than that.

I also think the chicken poop is a natural and healthy catalyst for soil and vegetation to thrive. The cycle of life.

Animals aren't a novel source of fixed nitrogen, the nitrogen came from what you fed them and compost would be better. Grow legumes to improve the soil, they actually fix nitrogen from the atmosphere. The only thing chickens provide is biological pest control against slugs and some insects and spiders.

Anyway, @Jebus answer on health is pretty relevant too. Might not apply if just eating the whites, though.