# Cage Free Eggs



## Vol (Jul 5, 2009)

AgWeb...

Regards, Mike

http://www.agweb.com/article/cage-free-eggs-may-be-golden-goose-for-retail-profits-blmg/


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## luke strawwalker (Jul 31, 2014)

What rubbish...

All the article "proves" is that there are a LOT of VERY STUPID people willing to pay twice as much for eggs as they have to...

It reminds me of all the crap they put out a few years back about "identity preserved" stuff... whether it be corn, beans, grains, cattle, or other livestock...

Sure there's "big premiums" for doing it when it's a novelty or a fad and there HAS to be premiums offered to attract enough production to pay for the additional hassle and production difficulties/added expenses... BUT, when "everybody" is doing it that way, those premiums will evaporate like the morning mist... because then you don't HAVE to pay somebody "extra" to get it, you can get it from "anybody"...

That's just fundamental human nature... just how the game is played.

If guys can make a buck off nutters who'll spend twice as much for the same thing, more power to them. But implying that EVERYBODY is that STUPID is ridiculous...

Oh well...

Later! OL J R


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## Swv.farmer (Jan 2, 2016)

Well be for I would pay for eggs i would just do without.

Many people would be better off to just use powdered eggs.


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## Vol (Jul 5, 2009)

luke strawwalker said:


> What rubbish...
> 
> All the article "proves" is that there are a LOT of VERY STUPID people willing to pay twice as much for eggs as they have to...


So, you do not think that free range chicken eggs taste any better than processed feed fed chicken eggs? I have been eating farm chicken eggs for several years now and I enjoy them much more that the commercial eggs at the grocer.

Oh well...

Regards, Mike


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## deadmoose (Oct 30, 2011)

After having chickens, I found it hard to eat grocery store eggs. Luckily, I meta neighbor with a nice flock and a shed that always has eggs for sale.

I have no problem paying him a nice premium over a 99 cent dozen from the store. Eggs are cheap.

Great thing is someone who only wants to pay the bare minimum can get whatever Wally World sells.


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## TJH (Mar 23, 2014)

There is nothing better than an egg or meat from a yard bird raised the old fashioned way of letting them do what they do naturally. I have not problem paying 3 or 4 dollars a dozen as long as it's to the little old lady selling them down the road.


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## Uphayman (Oct 31, 2014)

We started raising our own broilers and layers a few years back. No comparison on taste versus store eggs. We raise the Cornish cross to 10+ pounds dressed. Do our own butchering. When we see chicken in the store we laugh. Looks like sparrow. Do we save money.....nope. Are we trying to ......nope. There is something incredibly satisfying, producing food that you've raised, processed, and then turning into a meal fit for royalty.


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## mlappin (Jun 25, 2009)

Call em free range in England. Seems to be all the rage, surprising since land is a premium there. Free range pork and beef as well.

Does that make it right here if they do it there? Long as people don't mind spending extra so be it.

They have a lot of good ideals over seas. Queues with one line then as a register opens up you goto the register so no one is standing behind you trying to get your credit/debit card data. In France petrol is taxed at one rate, food at another, their equivalent of snapple is one rate while a soda is taxed much higher along with other junk food.

Seems to work well there, but I can't even take my pocket knife with me that has a under 3" blade when we go as it locks and therefore is a "lethal" weapon, the poor thing gets locked in the Jeep's glove box when we hit the airport. After a few weeks I'm more than ready to come home, as I miss my pocket knife desperately.

Like I said, if people don't mind paying extra so be it, not an egg eater myself so whether free range/cageless tastes better is for others to decide.


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## prairie (Jun 20, 2008)

In most cases cage-free eggs will not be any different than caged hen produced eggs. They will both get very similar feed, it is just in the way they are housed.

Free-range eggs are whole different thing. We have chickens that free range around the farm year round. As soon as green vegetation is available, ground feed consumption starts to drop, and by the time spring is fully here, feed consumption is about 25% of winter. Although the eggs are much better than grocery store eggs in the winter, there is no comparison once they have greens and bugs available. Green season eggs have very yellow/orange yokes that stand up in the pan, and the whites are less runny. Unlike grocery store eggs, which are almost flavorless, they have strong robust flavor.

A neighbor claims she has "free-range" eggs, but they are locked in a large pen that is dirt. the only free-range thing they get is if an insect ventures into the pen. Those eggs are only slightly better than grocery store eggs.


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## IHCman (Aug 27, 2011)

Mom had layers for as long as I could remember. She quit about the same time the parents quit milking. We had store bought eggs for a few years and I kinda forgot how good free range farm fresh eggs were. Started buying em from guy and love the dark yellow yolks and flavor. No more store bought eggs for me.

Do know of a farmer who lives east of me that has a few layers mainly cuz his wife likes them as pets. They won't eat the eggs from them as they don't like the dark yellow yolks. I told him he doesnt know what he is missing.


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## luke strawwalker (Jul 31, 2014)

Vol said:


> So, you do not think that free range chicken eggs taste any better than processed feed fed chicken eggs? I have been eating farm chicken eggs for several years now and I enjoy them much more that the commercial eggs at the grocer.
> 
> Oh well...
> 
> Regards, Mike


No, I didn't say that...

I said the ARTICLE was rubbish (or perhaps I should have spelled it out and specified... my bad I suppose).

The whole thing was written like it's a "done deal" and there won't be ANY market for ANYTHING *BUT* "cage free" eggs in the 'near' future... at double the price of course...

Yeah, right...

I like yard eggs fine, they're some better than "store eggs" but there's not a HUGE difference...

I certainly wouldn't pay twice as much for them as I would for the standard cheap-o eggs at the store... And honestly I only know 1 person who would, and she's a "Whole Foods" shopper and constantly filling my wife's head with the latest stupid food fad ideas that come along...

It's more about selling "feel good crap" than about any real or meaningful difference... but of course we live in a country filled with people that don't know anything but want to 'feel good' and I guess enough of them are willing to part with double the money to "feel good" so, cest les vis...

Later! OL J R


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## Vol (Jul 5, 2009)

luke strawwalker said:


> I certainly wouldn't pay twice as much for them as I would for the standard cheap-o eggs at the store... And honestly I only know 1 person who would, and she's a "Whole Foods" shopper and constantly filling my wife's head with the latest stupid food fad ideas that come along...
> 
> It's more about selling "feel good crap" than about any real or meaningful difference... but of course we live in a country filled with people that don't know anything but want to 'feel good' and I guess enough of them are willing to part with double the money to "feel good" so, cest les vis...
> 
> Later! OL J R


I agree about the price....it is ridiculous, but there are many out there want that feel good, I am a responsible earthy person feeling. Hole Foods does just that, leaves a hole in your wallet. We have a honey producer not far from me that is 100% capitalist. He is buying 55 gallon drums of honey from china and re-packaging it with his label and selling it as organic. I saw it in the Hole Foods grocer and I thought....if only they knew. Supposedly a lot of chemicals in chinas honey due to their practices. A fool and his money are soon parted.

If these Hole Foods people actually knew more about what organic really is, then they would get to use their favorite word...outraged! Right now organic is in its infancy....it will become more regulated for honesty and higher priced.....I can see myself growing organic hay(some) in the very near future($$$$$). I actually want to take the three year step now on some smaller tracts. Easy to do, easy to sell. Get a great stand of thick grass....lay-off the chemical fertilizer and herbs/pests for three years...and probably double your per bale price.

Only in America!

Regards, Mike


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## somedevildawg (Jun 20, 2011)

Curious what kinda yield do you expect, if it's half what it currently is.......
If I did that, I wouldn't have a stand after three years because my neighbors would have me removed from the program, via roundup.....i like my neighbors, they don't deserve the stench. 
About 30 years ago a fella "started the craze" of spreading chicken litter on pecan fields.....since then, a lot of folk use chicken litter. I grew up in a pecan grove (800 ac) and the stench is tough to deal with on a daily basis......


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## Vol (Jul 5, 2009)

If you have a relatively young dense stand of grass like Orchard and fertilized "au natural" with beef or bird you should get at least 2 1/2 to 3 ton per acre.....according to fert amounts.

Yep, the bird is really stout....the key is to get it on the ground right before a sure rain.

Regards, Mike


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## luke strawwalker (Jul 31, 2014)

Vol said:


> I agree about the price....it is ridiculous, but there are many out there want that feel good, I am a responsible earthy person feeling. Hole Foods does just that, leaves a hole in your wallet. We have a honey producer not far from me that is 100% capitalist. He is buying 55 gallon drums of honey from china and re-packaging it with his label and selling it as organic. I saw it in the Hole Foods grocer and I thought....if only they knew. Supposedly a lot of chemicals in chinas honey due to their practices. A fool and his money are soon parted.
> 
> If these Hole Foods people actually knew more about what organic really is, then they would get to use their favorite word...outraged! Right now organic is in its infancy....it will become more regulated for honesty and higher priced.....I can see myself growing organic hay(some) in the very near future($$$$$). I actually want to take the three year step now on some smaller tracts. Easy to do, easy to sell. Get a great stand of thick grass....lay-off the chemical fertilizer and herbs/pests for three years...and probably double your per bale price.
> 
> ...


Hey if you can make a buck off it, go for it...

Kind of a rotten louse there repacking Chinese honey as "organic"...

Somebody run some test somewhere and find out and he'll be in VERY hot water... lose everything he owns and might face jail time or something, depending on what it is and what happened...

Chinese EVERYTHING is suspect... my hobby is model rocketry, and the biggest model rocket company in the US, Estes Industries, had over the years farmed most of their production of kits out to Chinese firms... Then the gubmint passed all those new lead regulations, where "toys" had to be specifically tested and meet much more stringent requirements (and since a lot of school kids buy rocket kits and fly them, that put Estes squarely in the crosshairs of all these tests...) Turns out the Chinese ink used to print patterns on the little plastic parachutes was too high in lead, so for a year or two Estes reverted to using plain white plastic (no printed on orange, red, blue, or black checkerboard parachute patterns). There was some issues with their plastics as well... Estes basically reverted from using mostly plastic nose cones to going back to machine-ground balsa nosecones and fins and parts, laser cut. They have also moved most of their kit production back to the USA where they can actually have some quality control instead of "whatever is cheapest" finding itself in the manufacturing chain, regardless of lead levels or whatever else... which is a good thing...

Chinese seafood, hell virtually ALL Asian seafood is suspect now... lots of heavy metal contamination, chemicals, bacteria, you name it... not good stuff at all...

Thankfully we can get fresh Gulf seafood down here...

Later! OL J R


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