Experience Matters
Newly hatched baby chickens are a surefire way to make most people in this world make all sorts of silly sounds or say even sillier words. Even I will admit that they’re kind of cute.
But I want you to look at something else in the picture (from our farm a few years ago). Take note of the fingers holding the chicks.
Those hands are my hands. It’s a rare image of Farmer Rob - the guy who prefers to share images of vegetables, trees, and most anything other than himself in a GFF article. These hands are dirty and calloused. The cracked skin is visible for everyone to see. I am certain there were various cuts and abrasions that are not readily visible in the image. And I can tell you these hands were (and still are) familiar with hard work.
Obviously, my hands did not get that way solely from holding downy-soft baby birds. As a matter of fact, it wasn’t just my work with poultry that led to my special farmer’s version of a manicure. There is a significant bit of farming that went into creating the masterpiece that you see here.
While we don’t like promoting ourselves, Tammy and I do have almost two decades of experience working with layers in flocks that average around 75 birds each. Typically we have one active laying flock and a second flock of younger birds through the Spring and into the Fall. Most years we also have broilers (meat chickens) and turkeys. We actually have a very good idea of what it takes to work with poultry and to have consistently successful production.
And that’s why I find myself rolling my eyes at the suggestion by our current US Secretary of Agriculture that people can solve the current egg shortage/price crisis by raising chickens in their backyards.
Actually, I wanted to do more than just roll my eyes. I wanted to break a few things. But I didn’t want to mess up my manicure.
So you want to raise laying hens?
Before I go too far, let me say - for the record - that I am fully aware of many people who have successfully raised a few hens to supply their own eggs. It most certainly CAN be done. In fact, I strongly believe it suits some people. And I am guessing, based on the increase in demand for chicks and feed, that many people are going to give it a try this year.
Just like they did the last time we had an Eggpocalypse.
I have nothing against anyone who wants to try raising some hens. Tammy and I have answered questions and lent aid to many over the years. And even if you don’t maintain a flock for very long, you can gain a great deal of useful and important perspective by working with these birds.
For example, you’ll actually fully realize that they don’t come with on/off switches so you can get eggs when you want them at the exact numbers you need for the deviled eggs you want to make for Thursday’s special event. You’ll also learn that it takes eighteen to twenty weeks (4 1/2 months) before hen chicks will start laying. And, you will discover that the first eggs they lay are often very small and/or sporadic.
On the other hand, you’ll find that they are quite adamant that you feed them and provide fresh water regularly. They will need you to provide adequate shelter and while you are at it, you must also be their cleanup crew. Chickens don’t have much skill with pitchforks and shovels and don’t seem interested in learning how to use them so they have a clean coop. And, of course, you will learn that hens poop where they are - wherever they are - whenever they wish. So you better figure out a reasonable waste management system.
People who raise chickens become familiar with the special grief that comes when a dismembered carcass is discovered half in and half out of the chicken run. It turns out that chickens are tasty treats for raccoons and are prone to becoming feathery, fun, chew toys for the neighbor’s (or your) dogs.
You will gain first hand experience as to how egg production will fluctuate depending on the weather and the number of hours of daylight. You will discover that not every hen will produce eggs as prolifically as the catalog says they will and some will decide they like pecking, breaking, and eating eggs. One day you will enter the coop to find that some of your hens have gotten broody and they’ll stop laying - preferring to raise a family instead of providing fodder for your fry pan.
It is good for people to learn that raising hens isn’t a cartoon fairy tale. Just as it is wonderful when people discover they can do it AND they like doing it.
But to push the idea that raising hens is the answer to high egg prices? That’s just special.
Raise you own and save money?
In the end, the people who are most successful with their own personal flock of laying hens either cross the line towards some level of professional production - as we have - or they cross the other line and start seeing their hens as pets.
Quick reality check. Pets are rarely the best idea if the goal is to save money. If it comes to that, you need to think of them as “pets with benefits” because they provide a few eggs, rather than a cost saving measure. If you think $6 a dozen eggs is expensive, just wait until you honestly calculate your own costs for your flock.
I estimate that an average start-up cost for a flock of 6 birds will be in the neighborhood of $750. This is with the assumption that a person does not already have some of the supplies and infrastructure already in place. If you are fortunate enough to live on a farm and have a room in an outbuilding that is ready to be used for a brooder and another as a hen shelter, your startup will cost less.
I am also making the - probably erroneous - assumption that people won’t be lured into over paying for things they don’t need. After all, it isn’t hard to convince a novice to pay for things that have questionnable value.
The monthly ongoing cost for this laying flock of six hens will primarily be based on food, supplemental calcium and bedding costs. But you should not ignore all of the sneaky things that happen over time. You’ll find yourself buying a new waterer or materials to patch fences. To make it easy, let’s just say it costs $30 a month if you can be frugal with your purchases.
So, for your first four and a half months you will have spent about $900 in order to harvest …
Zero dozen eggs.
After one year, your flock of six hens (assuming no roosters and they all lay at average levels) will have produced appoximately 72 dozen eggs at a cost of $15.42 per dozen. Of course, the longer you have hens, the lower that cost becomes - but you still have to remember that hens lay at their peak from about 6 months to about 24 months of age. After that, production declines.
Assuming your six hens produce around published averages over a two year time span - including their early development from chicks to adults - you could harvest 204 dozen eggs (I’m assuming 265 eggs per bird for a year). Your total cost based on a $750 start up from scratch and an average of $30 in expenses per month is $1470.
Congratulations. Your eggs only cost $7.20 per dozen.
Everyone build a coop is a logistic nightmare
In the end, telling people that they can “fix” or “address” the egg shortage/price crisis by raising their own hens is a simple solution for simple minds. It just doesn’t hold up as a real and viable solution for most of the population.
First of all, the logistics for the solution will not hold up. Aside from the fact that, if the crisis is now, a new flock won’t help (remember - 4 1/2 months!), there are issues of supply. Where will all of the chicks come from when “everyone” decides to take the Secretary’s advice? What about feed? Waterers? Feeders? Pretty little poultry pens that look good in the backyard?
And when the demand for these things go up (and they are) you take a guess what happens to the prices. Suddenly my estimate of $750 for a startup is going to be low. And my $30 a month probably won’t hold up either.
Never mind that. What do people do when they don’t have any space for their own flock? What if they live in a city or town that has an ordinance that doesn’t allow them? What if the adults work outside the home and the children are too small to take care of the birds? Or is this just a solution for people who are fortunate enough to have space to raise them (and probably enough money to purchase eggs regardless how high the price may get)?
And yes - what will you do when everyone in town has a backyard flock and the used poultry bedding starts building up?
Try some of these ideas on for size instead
So, the solution being proposed is a naive solution even if it is (perhaps) meant to come from a good place. After all, I have often written and talked about the need for people to have more connections to the land and to food production. Encouraging people to raise their own hens, cultivate their own garden or manage their own bee hive could provide a thread that pulls us to healthier food and farming systems in the end.
If we do that we have to acknowledge that only a portion of the population will be ABLE to do this. And of those that are able, only a portion of them will have the dedication and aptitude to follow through and stick with it.
The problem is that “build a coop” is being offered as a solution that is destined to fail. And, even if it was intended to encourage more people to regain a connection to the land, it will do the opposite as people become disenchanted with its failure to provide the promise of cheaper eggs.
If you want people to build that coop, you need to sell the better reasons for doing it. And then you have to recognize all of those who can’t or won’t get on board - because they’ll still want to eat eggs.
So, what are some things we COULD be doing on a national scale that might lead to a longer term solution to the problem? Here are eleven things to consider:
Move away from large confinement egg production operations. Put a moratorium on any new facilities. Put caps on flock densities and reward producers that provide lower densities and access to pasture.
Provide local facilities to support small, regional egg producers. This could include everything from cleaning/packing areas, the ability to “bulk buy” supplies, tools for promotion to customer bases, distribution centers and the use of tax and legal services.
Create “right-sized” regulations for small to very small egg producers. Typically regulations are written for scales of operation well beyond most small farms. These one-size-fits-all regulations alienate the small and local producers who would otherwise like to abide by common sense guidelines for health and safety.
Develop more local sales centers for local producers. Remove barriers that prevent small, local producers from selling in area groceries and convenience stores.
Fund contracts with food banks that pay fair market prices to local producers for product that will be distributed to those who need it. Or allow producers to deduct the actual market value of donated product without a cap (I prefer the former).
Develop/encourage more local feed producers that rely on a diverse set of local crops as their inputs. Make investment capital available for more on-farm feed production.
Promote the development of local hatcheries by providing funds to develop infrastructure and scaling regulations for smaller poultry operations. Encourage the development or refinement of poultry breeds that are best suited for the region.
Develop a insurance pools (health, workers comp, liability) for small-scale egg producers that provides coverage at a cost that is affordable. Perhaps even fund that insurance as a benefit that comes with working to produce healthy food for the community.
Create local food zoning areas where multiple small-scale diversified farms can coexist - encouraging equipment and facility sharing and reducing drift from larger, monocropped fields. Place these zoned areas near areas that could also be public park and wildlife reserves. Reduce the property tax burden on these areas in recognition of the food production capacity and build in farm incubator programs to help train in new producers.
Promote diversified egg production operations that rotate chickens with larger animals and/or crop production.
Address the decline of small-scale, local processing facilities. Adjust regulations for the size, help fund the development of new infrastructure.
This is just my first pass at it. I am sure I have forgotten some things and I suspect this is far too simplistic. But I feel as if I have already spent more time working on a solution to the problem than our current Secretary of Agriculture.
And that just might make me angrier than the suggestion that we all just “build a coop and raise a few hens.” We’ve got to do better.
So let’s do better.
Loved this one, Rob! Nothing like a math guy to accurately describe the true costs. (Thanks for not trying to quantify the cost of the sheer irrationality of chickens. One may try to reason with, cajole, argue with a chicken, but all to no avail.)
Thanks for this super clear explanation and these alternative proposals, Rob - I’m saving it to use in my class! It’s golden.