At our farm, we raise our chickens on grass, rotating them about once or twice weekly to new pasture. We have built two chicken houses on wheels: one for roosting and one for laying eggs. This means the chickens have a dedicated house for daytime egg laying which is much cleaner than where they are sleeping (and pooping) all night long. The laying house has removable boxes we can take out and wash off. Outside the coops, we surround the yard with a solar powered electric fence which is mostly meant to keep predators like foxes and coyotes out of their yard. We even have a solar powered door that is set to open at 6am and close at 9pm! We like to range our sheep on grass first, and then follow with the chickens which will eat any worms the sheep might leave behind, keeping our population parasites and flies to a minimum.
More Ethical: This technique mimics their natural diet, which includes fresh bugs and greens. They get fresh air and move around as they please. The chickens are less crowded so less “arguing” occurs, which means the animals are less stressed than confined chickens. Feather-pulling and pecking can occur when chickens are in close quarters. Our pastured chickens get a variety of seeds, grass, insects, worms and I’ve even seen them eat mice!
Better for the Environment: As the birds are scratching at the ground and leaving their “droppings” this fertilizes the soil. CAFO (Confined Animal Feeding Operation) chickens pollute the air, water and soil with the large amounts of waste produced. The air inside even “cage free” operations can be very thick with the stench of urea. As we rotate our chickens often, there is never a toxic build up of waste.
Higher Nutrient Content: According to a study done in 2007 by Mother Earth News which tested 14 pastured flocks and compared it to the USDA “conventional” eggs, pastured eggs contained on average 2/3 more vitamin A, 2 times more omega-3 fatty acids, 3 times more vitamin E and 7 times more beta carotene. Other studies mentioned in the Mother Earth article show up 13 times higher omega-3 fatty acid ratio, 50 percent more folic acid, and 70 percent more vitamin B12. I’m currently looking into a grant which will pay for me to test my pastured eggs against conventional eggs from the grocery store as USDA nutritional data can sometimes be outdated.
Know your terms: There are lots of different ways to raise chickens and some of the terms can be confusing to the public. The typical eggs sold in most grocery stores come from chickens raised in cramped cages and usually given antibiotics. Artificial lights are often used to increase egg productivity. Conditions are stressful, cramped, and the air in these facilities is thick with dust and ammonia. In some areas of Europe, this technique is banned.
“Cage Free or Free Roaming” doesn’t really mean much. These chickens simply were not in small cages but are typically raised indoors in crowded conditions. Also there is no guarantee they weren’t given antibiotics or fed anything other than grain.
“Free Range” can mean they’re pastured eggs, or it can mean that there is a little door available to the chickens, whether or not they go outside.1 There might be grass or concrete on the other side of that door. There is no guarantee that they are getting any different food than CAFO birds.
“Fed Vegetarian Feed, All-Natural, Farm Fresh” just means they were fed grain and possibly other vegetable matter but they did not get access to the outside. In fact, these words mean nothing as far as the care of the chickens and most of the time, they are raised in cages just like the classic grocery store eggs.
“Omega-3 eggs“ might have more omega-3’s from some additional flax seeds in their grain mix, but beware of thinking these are eggs from birds who saw the outdoors.
One interesting fact is that it’s difficult to peel hard boiled eggs which are freshly laid. The longer the egg sits, the larger the air sack between the white and the shell. Our fresh eggs are extremely difficult to peel because they are so fresh. You’ll also notice that our eggs have a deep orange yolk, the yolks are rounder and firmer, and the taste is richer. Our egg’s shells are also very firm, indicating that the chicken has good mineral stores.