Eggs...slight rant.

I think companies that use marketing schemes that fatten their pockets by taking advantage of shoppers are bottom feeders.  I stumbled on one today.

Chickens are omnivores.  Mature egg laying chickens need about 16% of their diet to be protein.  Given their choice...this would be bugs and meat (think of animals they can kill and eat; mice, snakes, skinks etc) if they can get it.  So...if your eggs come from vegetarian fed chickens where do you think that protein comes from?  Soy.  What agriculture product in the US has the most plantings of highly genetically engineered product with herbicides (roundup) and insecticides??  Soy.

Where can chickens get their protein?  Soy, meat products and alfalfa meal.  I am sure there are others...but those are what I researched.  Most commercially prepared chicken feed uses soy for the protein.  Most organic feed...uses soy for the protein.  So, chickens who live in little boxes and do nothing but eat and lay all day...they eat a commercial type feed.  So, what does this mean?  Aha!  Those chickens are vegetarian fed too. 

Chickens little bodies (like ours) are designed to filter out toxins.  Since eggs are not a waste product...they will have had the benefit of the chickens cleverly designed filtration system. 

So, if you want to spend more money on eggs or are concerned with how chickens are treated..please choose cage free or free range.  Don't waste your money on vegetarian eggs...the biggest contributing factor to the nutritional value of the egg comes from the health of the chicken.  Chickens living in a box aren't going to be as healthy as a cage free chicken.

Disclaimer thoughts...There has been a hubalub about chickens in mass farms being fed the culled older chickens to give them the protein they need.  I believe...that most of the byproduct goes towards dog food and such these days but couldn't find any sources to the contrary.  However, chicken tidbit, chickens will kill and eat each other in the free range environment.  I have also seen them eat a mouse and a snake.  Then a day later fight over a skink.  No joke.    

When you see 'no animal byproducts' on the package...recycling chickens who aren't producing is what they are referring to.   Also, the vegetarian eggs pictured above...do not say that they are cage free or free range.  So, those chickens who are being fed a vegetarian diet were living in little shoe boxes laying and eating all day.