this post was originally posted on our older blog shortly before the end of 2013 but i thought i would re-post these thoughts since our chickens and their eggs are constantly on my mind.
also, a new thought: since winter is coming (and will be officially be arriving tonight when it gets down to 3 degrees), i am wondering how the chickens will fare. i’ve tried to seal/insulate their house a little better and i hope they won’t get too chilly. since it isn’t supposed to get above 22 tomorrow, i wonder if any of the eggs will freeze once they lay them? i guess we’ll find out soon!
originally posted on DECEMBER 30, 2013:
“we have 29 chickens. we started with 30 but one of our barred rock females died… no signs of a sickness or an attack so we aren’t sure how she died.
we have 2 roosters… one bantam rooster named roosty and a barred rock rooster named rex.
our hens are: 7 parts buff orpington, 8 parts barred rock, and 12 parts bantum (27 in all). we will post some images of our chicken tractor and fence set-up shortly, but in the meantime i would like to talk about one of the great gifts of the chicken: eggs!
the bantums, as a whole, lay only 1 or 2 eggs a day; they are older hens that my father has had for many years, and perhaps their egg-laying has been somewhat hindered by having to live with a bunch of slightly less-than-genius dinosaur-bullies (the standard hens).
for the first few months of our standard hens’ laying cycle we were only getting a few eggs a day. we were not concerned at first but after receiving feedback from others, we realized that maybe we were not feeding them enough food. so, we doubled their food and now supplement them with extra sources of calcium and also cooked meat. largely due to this change, we’ve been getting between 10 and 13 eggs a day for the last 2 months. which means… we need egg cartons to hold all of these ovular treats!
and yet… it has been difficult finding egg cartons at the store we frequent most. we have checked 2 store locations and were told that neither has had them in stock for the last 4 months! shocking! one theory of the staff there is that they are usually in demand in spring more than in winter and so their stores have not been shipped any new ones.
as i write this, jason is stopping at another store to pick up some cartons… finally! after much calling and question-asking, i was able to find at least one store in our 40-mile radius which carries them!
i’ve asked him to get at least 10 cartons to give us the chance to store the eggs that we currently have laying around or overflowing from little baskets in the fridge. soon, perhaps tonight, we are going to look into prices for egg cartons if purchased in bulk online. we are thinking this might be a cheaper bet. the cartons he is buying today run at 39 cents each, and we think that with a little more research we can find a more reliable source for carting our eggs!!!
we would love to hear any suggestions from fellow chicken owners and egg eaters. leave us a comment if you have any insights about places or websites to order cheap (and reliably in-stock) egg cartons!
as for me, i’m counting the minutes until he gets home with the egg cartons that i’ve been fantasizing about (no, literally!!!) for weeks!”
.:.