Chicken challenge

From the WeeklyTimes:

PETA has written a letter to an egg producer offering to give charity up to $3400 if he confines himself to cage.The animal welfare group’s proposal has been made to egg producer Andrew Postregna who owns Tamarix Egg Farm in Dandenong South and states that PETA will donate $100 per hour to charity if Mr Postregna confines himself to a cage of similar proportions to his body, as the chickens' cages are to theirs for 34 hours, the time it takes a chicken to produce an egg.

PETA's Australia campaigns director Jason Baker said the group made the proposal to Mr Postregna after a statement he made on the Australian Egg Corporation Limited website.

Mr Baker said that Mr Postregna wrote on the website: "When there's a few birds in a cage they tend to know each other. They're happy. Their stress levels seem to be a lot less than what it is in free-range [chickens]".

Mr Baker said maybe after Mr Postregna gets a real feel for being caged, he'll stop claiming that caged hens are "happy".

Mr Postregna had not received any letter from PETA when the Weekly Times Now contacted him.

PETA's campaign co-ordinator Claire Fryer said the letter had been faxed and posted.

She said it was the first time PETA had made such a proposal.