Queensland's true free range eggs, approved by RSPCA. Our chooks get to do what chooks love best... eat fresh grass, chase bugs and have dust baths in the sun. Our girls are never confined to a shed so they are truly free to roam.
Cows
So let’s be honest... We’re cattle farmers from way back (we just LOVE cows and used to do a nice line in stud Bulls in fact). But a few years ago we got to thinking more about our grass, our soil and what we could do to improve it in an environmentally friendly way. Ours is a family farm you see, so things like providing the best grass for our cattle and doing all we can to enhance the health of our land and ecosystems is pretty important to us. Layer hens (and their great natural fertilizing and composting abilities), came to mind and from there Silver Dale Eggs was born.
Carbon Neutral
We must admit, we DO have a few other passions in addition cows and farmland sustainability. We think farming in a Carbon neutral (or better than Carbon Neutral) way is really important too. To this end, we utilise farming practises such as biodynamics and cell grazing to build soil carbon, and we only ever buy locally grown grain (to keep food miles low).
Free as a Bird – and RSPCA accredited too
We’ve also come to be very fond of the humble layer hen. They’re great girls to watch with all their dust-bathing, bug-chasing and general chookie shenanigans. It saddens us that the majority of Australian layer hens are kept in cages, deprived of sunshine, fresh air and space to stretch their legs. Not so for our chooks though. One of the key aims at Silver Dale Eggs (in addition to all those happy cow and environment-related aims we talked about before), is the health and happiness of our hens.
Our chooks roam freely all day long. They’re never confined but they do have free access to shelter, perches, grain and cosy nests in our purpose-built mobile chook-houses. These chook-houses are regularly moved so that our chooks always have access to fresh grass (and new bugs and new bathing spots).
Our chooks have it so good, we’re RSPCA accredited. In fact, we’re just one of three labels Australia-wide accredited as being truly Free Range by the RSPCA.
Nutrition comes from proper farming
It’s also our long-held belief that human nutrition is not just related to the food we choose to eat, but also to how that food was grown. We put a lot of time and effort into ensuring our chooks have an excellent, balanced diet. To keep our hens extra healthy, they are supplied with grass, bugs, shell grit, grain and sea minerals. We are also continually improving the species composition of their pasture to include more legumes (for more omega 3s). This coupled with their natural lifestyle makes for highly nutritious (and delicious) eggs.
- Category:
- Farming/agriculture