Eggs are expensive

[janiedoe]

Hello and welcome to BYC!

As stated above, there is a big initial start up cost, chickens need a lot of room and need to be protected from predators. It's not cheap. However once you get past the building stage, chickens aren't incredibly expensive. Feed costs continue to rise however, honestly, you need to keep chickens because you enjoy them, eggs being a secondary enjoyment.

Very well said!

 

[muddy75]

 

[WilderSkye]

Since I am a natural math nerd, I am always factoring in cost and dividing it out, etc. it comes from growing up on a cattle and cotton farm. Us kids always knew the marekt price of beef and cotton bales and costs to produce it.
Eventually, if you keep at it, you start coming out ahead.

Eggs were secondary to our chicken use. Or at least for me, I need them to work for me bugging and composting. Hubby wants eggs. So, what to do with all those eggs? Initially, I thought we would give them away, then realized, with our upcoming June future flock, if we end up with 8-11 hens and one roo, that is gonna be a lot of eggs. And we are sitting on a gold mine. I can sit outside Tractor Supply or Runnings or Gebo's and unload them quickly and make a little money. Which can fold back into chicken feed or gardening stuff. Keep at it, and I have justified a flock of chickens, which initially were for entertainment and helping me work our acre of land. Now I am stoked to get eggs. I ordered a chocolate colored egg laying Marans, which is where the roo will come from and Alchemist Blues, long range plans, their offspring, produces an olive egg. Now I have chocolate, olives, and blue eggs to sell as a rainbow dozen and hatching eggs. All of a sudden, the initial outlay of $510 for 12 well bred proven birds seems worth it. Not to be wordy, but think long range and down the road and you can get pretty excited about that. And here I thought I could not sell water to a dying man in Death Valley.

But, if we can't find a market, we plan to give them to our local soup kitchen, SNAP program, or food bank, and that makes me feel very, very happy and less selfish. And I get to still use my nerdy farm math skills.

Skye

 

[CombNWattles]

Owning 7 laying chickens means more than a dozen eggs every two days. Now, if I’m recalling correctly, when I did the math I was pretty much breaking even because of feed. But, if you like to eat or bake with eggs, it’s great!

^I’d estimate that this is about a week’s worth of eggs.

 

[Jener8or]

Hi! There are very few storebought eggs I've gotten that compare with ones that you can raise yourself. I can definitely tell the difference whether it's the freshness or the blood, sweat and tears that have gone into them (sometimes literally) that makes them taste better. My chickens do free-range, though, so that probably does make a difference.

You're asking this question on a chicken site, though, we may be a little biased, justsayin'.

Please let us know how we can help make preparations or anything like that go smoothly for you! Thanks for joining and welcome to BackYard Chickens!

 

[WilderSkye]

Owning 7 laying chickens means more than a dozen eggs every two days. Now, if I’m recalling correctly, when I did the math I was pretty much breaking even because of feed. But, if you like to eat or bake with eggs, it’s great!
View attachment 4040884
^I’d estimate that this is about a week’s worth of eggs.

Please do not show this to my husband.

 

[BigBlueHen53]

and welcome to BYC! Like others here, I have to say there are MANY good reasins for having chickens. Saving money on eggs ... ain't one of them! My main reason for getting chickens was that when I moved here to SE MO from NW NM, I discovered that ticks are a fact of life here. Oh, noooo! Momma don't do ticks. Give me snakes any day! So, chickens it is. The eggs are a beautiful bounty. We sell some, give some away, and have all we could passibly want for our own needs. I don't even think about the cost of feed, scratch, mealworms, grit, oyster shell, or anything else. They're worth whatever they cost. Because .. when momma's happy ... everybody's happy!

 

[WilderSkye]

and welcome to BYC! Like others here, I have to say there are MANY good reasins for having chickens. Saving money on eggs ... ain't one of them! My main reason for getting chickens was that when I moved here to SE MO from NW NM, I discovered that ticks are a fact of life here. Oh, noooo! Momma don't do ticks. Give me snakes any day! So, chickens it is. The eggs are a beautiful bounty. We sell some, give some away, and have all we could passibly want for our own needs. I don't even think about the cost of feed, scratch, mealworms, grit, oyster shell, or anything else. They're worth whatever they cost. Because .. when momma's happy ... everybody's happy!

We moved from a three year stint in Minnesota, where you would rather have snow than summer as it rains ticks from the trees up there. So happy to be back in New Mexico. Guineas are nice tick solution, too. We had them when we had horses back in Texas, they will kill snakes, also.

Yeah, feed bill is not even on my radar. Last year I was going to get back into horses, but realized my aging hips can't do it anymore. The cost of chickens and set up is still less than a good saddle and tack. We had been buying 35 lb bags of bird seed weekly for sparrows and doves. And I am not sure whether this was necessary or not, but when we decided to get chickens, we went ahead and eliminated backyard feeders due to bird flu.

Skye

 

[BigBlueHen53]

I miss my horses too, but this is not horse country. Did you ride English or Western? I rode English on my half Arabs. Sigh, I miss them. Chickens are a lot cheaper, you're right!

 

[SourRoses]

Main expense with chickens is getting a proper setup.

^ This.
The expensive part is housing chickens in a way that prevents predator losses, prevents social disorder in the flock, and makes tending them non-frustrating enough for the humans to continue the hobby.
Getting that money back isn't really a thing, in my experience.
But, it's easy enough to cover the expense of feed and bedding with the savings on eggs.

I think the main plus to keeping a flock during times of market stress is the potential prospect of NO eggs in the supermarket. Unlikely, but possible.
Like with Covid TP, there came a point when no amount of money would ensure supplies on hand, and there was a distinct lack of anything premium. If there's anything in particular you require for your household eggs (organic, free range, etc.) a lack of supply is more possible.

But when we got started, I most appreciated knowing my chickens have a nice life.