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The British Hen Welfare Trust
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The British Hen Welfare Trust
The British Hen Welfare Trust, which has a re-homing base at South Zeal, is to build a new centre at its headquarters in South Molton this year, thanks to the success of its Christmas Happy Hens Care Home Appeal 2017.
The BHWT has had aspirations for some time to build the UK’s first dedicated hen welfare and education centre. That dream is now close to becoming a reality. Not only will the building be a dedicated re-homing centre and a vast improvement on its current facilities, but it will also give the charity the opportunity to hold training courses, lectures, talks and much more. The centre will be built on a piece of land next to the BHWT offices at Hope Chapel in Rose Ash.
Before Christmas, the team of volunteers at South Zeal marked a huge milestone for the charity by re-homing the 10,000th ex-commercial hen, enabling her free range retirement.
Formed in 2005, the British Hen Welfare Trust has to date saved more than 600,000 laying hens from slaughter and has re-homing points across the country,. The hens are 18 months old and are being sent to slaughter as their egg laying has slowed down or become irregular. However nine times out of 10 they continue to lay.
The South Zeal team was formed in 2012 by Gaynor Davies, the charity’s head of operations and her sister, Andy McPhillips. Gaynor said: ‘These hardworking hens make wonderful pets, and I for one never tire of watching them head off on their way to a loving, free range retirement. Re-homing hens is such a rewarding thing to do, and something I have devoted my life to. I even went so far as to tattoo the BHWT logo on my arm back in 2015!’
The BHWT always welcomes donations to help with running costs and to put towards saving even more hens. In addition, retirement homes for ex-commercial hens are always wanted.
If you can help, please make sure you’re registered with www.bhwt.org.uk and then call Hen Central on 01884 860084.