Year of the chicken

For December, I made -$22.84 for the month on an average 27 hens laying. I had $84.09 in expenses for feed (450#) this month (all my expenses this month were in food).  We collected a total of 395 usable eggs (6 more than last month) averaging 12.7 eggs/day collected. The chickens ate 1.14#food/egg. In December it cost $0.21/egg or $2.52/doz for feed.  As an added bonus the two quail have laid 26 eggs this month.  My feed costs have been rising for the last two months, just over 24%.  I may have to raise my egg prices.  I am sure that will go over well...


Here it is the Year of 2010 Chicken Financials!!  This is why you should run out and start raising chickens.  I averaged 22.7 hens/day.  Collected on average 12.2 eggs/day.  My productivity for the year was 52% for the hens (this is actually pretty good for the whole year).  My chickens ate on average 0.68 # feed/egg.  My average cost per egg is $0.15 or $1.80/doz.  My total net income for the entire year is -$128.04.  So not exactly a bumper year.  I am hoping to break even this year.  I will give it one more month and see if the price of feed comes down.  If not then I am going to have to raise the price of my eggs to $3/doz.  I still want to get another 12 hens.  I am hoping to get them the first part of Spring.  

I went out today to see the twins.  It was 50 degrees and sunny.  Hard to believe it is really January.  The little girl is the black one on the left.  Hard to believe that both babies were born less than 8 hours apart.  Look at the size difference!!  I went out and bribed the sheep with bread.  They love to eat it and we have several of them trained to eat it out of our hands.  It helps tame them down and make them much easier to be around.  Now this mama did head butt our chocolate lab when she got too close.  She also tried to run over our Brussel Griffen.  He (Sprout) almost ended up in the creek trying to get away from her.  

Annmarie finished some more booties and has just started adding baby hats to her collection at the fabric store.  She sold out the first batch last year.  My favorite is the tangerine pair in the center.