Will we have more eggs available soon?
We’re getting asked all the time now if we’re going to increase our flock. Our egg fridge is most often empty- they’re selling like hotcakes, and we don’t have enough eggs for everyone who would like to buy them.
There are several different factors that we look at when it comes to flock size.
OUR FARM ECOSYSTEM- The number of eggs we are able to sell is based on the number of birds that can be a balanced part of the human-managed ecosystem that is our farm. We want our chickens, ducks and geese to have a fantastic quality of life. We keep our birds to regenerate our soil, but having too many of them does the opposite- too much manure in any one place isn’t a good thing.
COVER CROPS- We plant cover crops that provide some of the nutrient needs for our birds, but the more birds we have, the more cover crops (and therefore labor hours) are needed.
SMALL FAMILY FARM- We’re a small family farm. There are just two of us adults. Our primary focus is regenerating our land for the production of food for people while increasing sustainability and decreasing our inputs. The more birds we have, the more often we need to move them. Moving our birds takes all of us several hours, in addition to their daily care. We’re constantly striving for balance- too many birds for our land creates a lower quality of life for them and more labor for us- working 14 hour days for too many days in a row doesn’t equal balance, either.
BIOSECURITY- For biosecurity reasons ( avian flu) we’ve made the decision to close our flock. That means we’ll breed from the stock we already have, but not add any new birds from hatcheries or breeders. This is a slower way to an increase in production, as birds don’t start laying for 5-6 months.
THE ANSWER- We hear that our customers want more egg availability. The short answer is this; we’re increasing our flock, but only by as much as what we can to keep the balance in our human-managed ecosystem, and it will take time. We have this year’s small batch of pullets getting close to laying age- they’ll probably be laying in 6-8 weeks, which will increase our egg production. In the meantime, we’re also doing everything we can to keep our hens healthy and thriving, and our egg production high.
