One of our 4 pullets has begun to lay! This is our first experience with chickens. We started with 4 one month old ladies back in May 2012. On December 13th the Barnavelder/Cochin cross laid her first egg: that wonderful $500 egg! She has been laying every other day since then. Each egg is a perfect brown egg just slightly smaller than a "grocery store" large size egg. Pumpkin's eggs are delicious!! With 3 eggs to date the cost-per-egg is falling rapidly. Just hoping the Spangled Hamburg girls start to lay soon.
from West central NJ and congratulations on the egg. One of the first rules is "Never try to figure the cost of your eggs."
Actually, the $500 figure was a standing joke between my husband and myself. Neither of us knew anything about chickens but I had always wanted to have a backyard flock (if you can call 4 girls a flock.) We are enjoying them as we let them roam the yard andwe care for them. Since we purchased our girls, each time we had to purchase a dozen eggs my husband would point out the price of eggs with a wry smile and a laugh, then say he was awaiting "that first $500 egg" from one of our girls. I bought my small coop second hand from a Craigslist advertisement. My husband built the small, solid run and we added an inexpensive portable run using step-in fence posts and 50 feet of plastic fencing with netting across the top. The girls can only free-range when we are outdoors with them to make the hawks stay away. Otherwise, they must content themselves with the 2 run areas. I hope to add 2 Buff Orpington girls in the Spring to complete our little flock.
There is more to a backyard flock than the cost per egg. That's for certain. As for how many chickens is too many? I think there are too many when you name them, "One, Two, Three, Four.......!!!!!"
