Cassie
Cassie’s early life was spent at an egg farm in Tasmania — crammed into a little cage with a few fellow battery hens, with barely more space than the size of an A4 sheet of paper to move, let alone walk around or stretch her wings. Likely having fallen off a transport truck en route to her slaughter, Cassie was rescued from the side of the road by a concerned passer-by and brought to Brightside Farm Sanctuary. She was skeleton thin (weighing barely 1 kg), looking sickly pale, and very quiet — utterly depleted of energy.
A couple trips to the vet, a generous diet, and lots of love turned Cassie’s life around. She is healthy and strong, full of silky feathers, and indeed full of beans — no longer the timid bird who entered the sanctuary but rather an adventurous, curious hen who spends her days with her human best friend Emma, or her feathered one, Rose the turkey.
There’s no telling how many eggs Cassie churned out for humans before her farm decided she was ready to become pet feed. But it’s clear the battery cage life had taken its toll on her body, as well as her spirit. While her outward appearance led her farm operator to believe she was ‘spent’ — in fact the only thing she was sick of was constantly laying eggs from the monotonous confinement of a cramped battery cage. And she’s since proven she’s got plenty of vibrant life left in her.