As I've said in the past I have about 40 hens, I was selling eggs at the roadside for $2.50 a dozen, Sometimes I dident have enough eggs, as they were selling so fast. Well this year I have plenty of eggs and hardly any are selling, so I took 55 dozen to the local auction on Tuesday, got a check today for $35.82! They sell them 5 dozen at a time. I just dident have fridge space for that many eggs now that the weather is warming up, can't leave them in the garage like a month ago! Cost me way more than that to feed these hens. I think the freezer is gonna be there next home!
- Thread starter JayinNY
- Start date
Jay do your eggs need to be inspected there in NY? Down here in Illinois you don't see hardly anyone anymore selling fresh eggs, maybe just to friends.
We use to sell them when I was growing up. Many people wanted only brown eggs. Once they were opened you couldn't tell the difference. But customers said they tasted better...LOL
We use to sell them when I was growing up. Many people wanted only brown eggs. Once they were opened you couldn't tell the difference. But customers said they tasted better...LOL
No they don't need to be inspected, and they are brown eggs. There were 2 guys on my road selling eggs for the last few years, last summer and this year I haven't seen them selling eggs anymore, so I thought I would get more buyers, but that hasent happened. I can't figure it out, $2.50 is less than supermarket eggs. Lol.
Chris Jones
Member
Apparently around here folks are buying those little chicken coops with runs built onto them to keep a few chickens in their back yard. I see the coops beings sold every where now. All those backyard pre-built shed places are selling them. They aren't cheep either. I think you have to sell them as organic now to get anyone to buy them.
I think it is a time thing. Many people are just not going to make an extra stop just to buy eggs. We quit raising them thirty years ago. I could buy them way cheaper than what it cost to raise just the ones we eat. I sometimes will buy them off some of the farmers where we deliver feed. Most of the time I just pick them up at the Kwik Trip stores when I am getting bread and milk. $1.99 a dozen and butter for $1.99 a pound.
john in la
Well-known Member
I had about 30 brown leghorn layers (white egg) years ago. Got to the point I was giving eggs away.
Took the chickens to the auction and got twice what I was expecting to get for them.
Seems anyone that wants fresh eggs raises their own these days.
With the new regulations on how long a store can keep eggs on the shelf I just as soon buy them.
Took the chickens to the auction and got twice what I was expecting to get for them.
Seems anyone that wants fresh eggs raises their own these days.
With the new regulations on how long a store can keep eggs on the shelf I just as soon buy them.
fixerupper
Well-known Member
Store bought eggs seem to have a lighter colored yolk than our farm eggs. Probably because of the feed. We've had a few layers off-and-on for a long time but it's mainly a hobby more than anything else. They cost us more money than they save. We'll never make enough money off of eggs to pay for the remodeling I did to that coop even if we live to be a hundred. The chicks we have now are a 4-H project for the granddaughters. It's like going fishing. You can buy the fish cheaper in the store.
When I was a kid we had around 250 layers and I was the designated egg gatherer. I hated those old setting hens that would peck the back of my hand. I remember one of them pecking dad and we had chicken soup the next day. I still remember taking them to what we called the 'produce' store in town and seeing the lady in the back room candling eggs. Jim
When I was a kid we had around 250 layers and I was the designated egg gatherer. I hated those old setting hens that would peck the back of my hand. I remember one of them pecking dad and we had chicken soup the next day. I still remember taking them to what we called the 'produce' store in town and seeing the lady in the back room candling eggs. Jim
Randysouthmississippi
Member
We got 100 or so total poultry, some rare breeds and some common breeds. We get from 2.50 to 18.00 per dozen depending on eating or hatching eggs and cant keep them on hand. The bad thing is now with this @#$^%*&( cold spring they have quit laying only getting 5 or so eggs a day now, and we got orders for dozens of the high dollar eggs.
But thats my luck....lol...If i could corner the market on gold it would be worth horse poo by daybreak.
But thats my luck....lol...If i could corner the market on gold it would be worth horse poo by daybreak.
Chris Jones
Member
Yea, 20 years ago I used to have some chickens like that. I'd kinda like some again some day. Mine were small bantam and other mixed little pretty chickens. I figured the eggs were two thirds store egg size so just adjusted recipes accordingly. They were quite tame pets and I never ate my chickens. Always had at least two roosters as well. I knew a fellow a couple years back who took in a hen that somehow fell of a truck to the processing plant and ended up at his place. He fed it and it hung around his house for a few years until I think a dog killed it.
I keep 6 hens and one rooster, 3 hens are brown leghorns, with white eggs, and 3 are rohde island reds with brown eggs. We give the kids familys eggs, and keep some for our own use. I can see the color difference in the frying pan between the white and brown, The brown are much oranger and the white are more yellow. I hate the wildness of the brown leghorns. go to gather eggs, and think the house is empty, and a leghorn explodes from the next nest, goes between my legs and out the door. Doesn't help the heart!
Heres why brown eggs are sold for more money in New England.Leghorns cant take the cold like the Reds and Barred Rocks.Brown eggs were local and fresh,White were shipped in and not as fresh.White eggs were discounted in the Boston market.Eggs can be 30 days old and still be called fresh.Some are reboxed in new cartons.Some people think fresh eggs taste funny because they have never had a fresh egg.I keep a few hens because I cant stand eggs that are a month old .Walmart ships in truck loads of white eggs from the south.Ive seen large white eggs selling at a Sav A Lot store for 1.30 a dozen.People are plain lazy and like to buy every thing in one place.My mother always bought her eggs from a neighbor.Old eggs have a large air space and will try to float in a pan of water.Boiling and peeling eggs will prove their age.Feed has doubled in price.Most people who like fresh eggs keep hens.I worked at hatchery for 3 years in the early 60s, by then most of the small poultry farms were gone.Shovel snow to get to the hen coop when the hens are not laying will shut down the tiny hen coops.
Leghorns are too wild and crazy.I was in the henhouse putting shavings in the nests.An old black hen was in the nest.She just looked at me ,didnt get excited.I have 3 hens and a rooster.They are tame and get underfoot.Buff Orpingtons are nice quiet bird very nice looking.
You need a good sign. Most home egg sellers have lousy signs you cant read.I had a small refrigerator in my shop for eggs.Kept a few sodas and a bottle of beer in the back.Friend gave me the refrigerator after he bought a larger one.I used to sell eggs in a cooler along with vegetables roadside.Business is in a decline now in the rural areas.One store just closed that had decent prices.I used to buy grain, fertilizer, shingles, lumber,lime.On large orders they had free delivery.Customers are fickle, they will drive 20 miles to save 5 cents on a bar of soap.I see pickled eggs selling for 89 cents each in general stores around here.That may the best way to sell eggs.
90% of eggs are produced by caged layers.Hens are put in a small cage.They stay there until they die or quit laying.My hens get out in good weather.They eat grass and bugs.Theres a tick problem here, many people keep a few hens just to keep ticks cleaned up.A pair of brown jersey gloves with the finger tips cut off takes care of the problem of hens nipping.I find it hard to blame hens for defending their eggs.Try getting close to a foal, the mare will bite you.
Just had my garden tilled with a tractor tiller.We can get planted much faster than when I plowed and harrowed.Fellow that tilled the garden says every body is broke.Regular customers are putting it off because they just dont have the money.Much less traffic on the hiway here.Every thing I did has dropped off.Used to fix a lot of fence chargers.Did do 5 last week,before that nothing.Good thing Im on SS now,never saw business so bad.I know 2 fellows who had to sell their homes because of increasing real estate taxes.One friend said I had to sell or lose it to the town.If I were alone I would have to sell.Bought and paid for this place in 1967.
OldFarmTractor
Member
Would it help if you had an "egg route?" If a customer would buy a dozen or two on regular intervals, might be worth the trip.
I'd be good for a dozen a week, if I was closer. been having a scrambled egg sandwich for lunch most days since I am home, quick and easy, calories not too high, given the regiment I'm keeping to lose weight, seems to work, well that and staying busy, almost 20lbs off now, and about the same to go.
I'd love to have some hens and have em free range, put a dent in the deer ticks but with the fox, coyote, weasel and similar, I'd have to invest in more than just a coop, same purpose, for our own needs, be great to let em loose here, the ticks are thick around here at times. I can't imagine even if penned in 3 sides, (top too) what would show up trying to get after them at night.
I'd love to have some hens and have em free range, put a dent in the deer ticks but with the fox, coyote, weasel and similar, I'd have to invest in more than just a coop, same purpose, for our own needs, be great to let em loose here, the ticks are thick around here at times. I can't imagine even if penned in 3 sides, (top too) what would show up trying to get after them at night.
T in NE
Well-known Member
- Location
- Cambridge, Nebraska
I used to haul groceries out of a Walmart warehouse. They claimed that if delivery to the warehouse got cut off, they would be empty in under a week. Add on two days stock that they keep in most stores, and once the eggs hit Walmart property, they will be gone within 9 days of arrival. That goes for most of their perishables.
gtractorfan
Well-known Member
We have a new "Rulers" grocery store (affiliated with Krogers) that opened near us a month or so ago. Nice store. They've been having unbelievable prices, NICE LARGE EGGS for 49 cents a doz., milk (incl. whole milk) for $1.49 a gallon and whole wheat bread for $1.49. Can't produce any that cheap.
Paul from MI
Well-known Member
Dad was a poultry farmer long before cages were invented. He would darken the yolks in the eggs by increasing the alfalfa meal in the feed in winter. With 2,000 leghorns on nests, no wonder the backs of my hands are mostly scar tissue. Flighty old leghorns would all be in the air if anyone made sudden move, nothing tame about them.
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