Cage free eggs...

[Whistling Badger]

...are up to almost $5 a dozen at the grocery store!!!

Come on, little bator eggs...

T

 

[Colored Egg Farmer]

wow i though selling my commercial eggs at 2.50 would be high... wow am i wrong. and there brown, antibiotic free, and cage-free

 

[bigzio]

Yep, free range eggs are not only superior in their content, but the hens have a real life, the way God ment it to be for them. That is worth quite alot in lifes scheme of things.

I copy this article on the good egg and give copys to all my new egg customers. http://www.motherearthnews.com/Do-It-Yourself/2005-08-01/The-Good-Egg.aspx

bigzio

 

[dacjohns]

Is there a difference in egg production between cage free and other than cage free?

I thought I saw something relating to less protein in a "free range" diet than in a formulated chicken feed diet. Don't quite grasp that though with chickens eating insects, etc. Because of less protein in the diet there is a corresponding decrease in egg production.

 

[Davaroo]

The trick is reaching your market.

I'ts obvious someone is paying for such things. The trick is to touch them BEFORE they get to the store and motivate them to swing 'round to you.

 

[bigzio]

My experience has been that happy chickens lay more eggs. If you ever have the chance to see how happy these free range birds truly are, then you would never cage a chicken for production again.

Dusting holes, resting and preaning places, eating living feeds (grass,bugs,worms,) are somethings, plus chickens are a flock bird and love to cruise around together....open the door on the coop, and when they realize what's out there, they will be waiting daily for their freedom.

bigzio

 

[Whistling Badger]

I'm not really thinking about going into business, but I don't want to spend that much money every time we need some eggs! And I don't want to resort to eggs from caged chickens, either.

Come on, little eggs! Hoping more than ever that they hatch.

Tom

 

[SeaChick]

Well, your own "cage-free" eggs, if they're really from free-ranging hens, are a lot better than the ones marketed as "cage free" by the big egg producers in the grocery store!!! My understanding is that the designation simply means the hens are not in the traditional egg-farm set-up of stacked miniscule wire cages.... but in most cases they're still crowded into huge indoor barns with no sunlight, little space, and definitely no free-ranging.

Guage your market. How educated are they about this stuff? Around here, people are getting saavy enough to want not just "cage-free" but "pastured" or "free range" or "from hens who forage in grass and sun" or something like that. I'd say put "cage free" but also a description of what your hens life is really like, so folks know. I know that on the few occasions when I've had to buy eggs (lazy girls!!) I have sought out the one store that sells local eggs from hens who actually run around outside.

Even really mainstream magazines like Cooking Light have been running articles about the egg-carton labels and what they mean, so I think that people are becoming more educated about it, however slowly.

 

[Davaroo]

Seachick is right about the whole designation/labeling thing. "Free range" can mean anything from tradtional free ranging to paddock rearing to barn rearing with a tiny door to an outside yard.

There are some people who are purist enough to buy the high dollar eggs - but not many. If you look at just the numbers on the shelf, most people are still unwilling to pay $5 or more per dozen for eggs. There are a hundred dozen "regular" eggs for each dozen of the "purist" product.

I see self-production coming to the fore in the future, although I doubt it will supplant the commercial product anytime soon. It's still true that economy of scale in the commercial caged egg business will win out, most of the time.