from the ground up
A Second Life for Hens in the Agricultural Reserve
by abby johnson
When I was a child, I used to sit quietly in the chicken run for long stretches of time, watching hens scratch through leaves or settle themselves into warm patches of dirt. Even then, I sensed there was something deeply calming about them— their routines, their small dramas, their unmistakable curiosity. Chickens were never background animals to me. They were companions. And I was rarely without one on my lap.
Years later, I found myself volunteering with the British Hen Welfare Trust, a UK charity that has rehomed more than one million commercial laying hens over the past two decades. Every few
PHOTO: Sophia Roma
months, I helped collect hens from large-scale farms and place them into adoptive backyard homes across the English countryside.
It was there that I began wondering whether the same model could take root here in the United States, beginning where I grew up, in Montgomery County’ s Agricultural Reserve.
Commercial laying hens are typically removed from production at around 18 months old, typically entering a pipeline for pet feed processing or simply composting. In the UK, I watched hundreds of these hens leave barns for the first time and discover an entirely different world: sunlight, grass, insects,
dust baths, space to roam. Some adapted cautiously, others with immediate enthusiasm. Nearly all seemed transformed within days.
But what surprised me most was not only the hens’ response— it was the humans’.
This spring, HenPals Network held its first rehoming event in Boyds, MD, placing former commercial laying hens into backyard homes across the region. In the days leading up to the event, working with an amazing group of volunteers, we cleaned transport crates, coordinated adopter pickups, answered questions from nervous first-time chicken keepers, and prepared housing for the hens arriving from the farm.
There was a quiet sense among all of us that we were building something meaningful together, even if none of us yet knew exactly what shape it would take.
The day the hens arrived, volunteers stood waiting in muddy boots and work gloves beside stacks of straw and feed buckets. One by one, the hens emerged from transport crates blinking in the daylight, uncertain at first, but alert. Some immediately stretched their necks toward the grass. Others stood perfectly still, absorbing the
PHOTO: Sarah walker
For children, caring for hens often becomes an instant bond.
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