Grocery store shelves are being emptied all over the country...

Had to bring that photo up again?

I suppose it is lest we not forget...so good for us to remember, no matter how painful.

Despite the fact that my hip is in severe pain and I am wondering why I ever gave back my walker to the nursing home, the pack of hounds is baying. They need their 4-mile jaunt. So, had better shove on my boots and get moving.

 

Yeah eggs and milk were "2 per family".

 

Two eggs do not even feed ONE of my dogs.

 

We get two dozens eggs from our back yard every day. Milk... that's a different story. But local dairy farmers are dumping fresh milk they can't sell.
U.S. dairy farmers dump milk as pandemic upends food markets - Reuters

 

Very cool.

 

We ordered more chicks from the hatchery than we have in the past few years. Looking like we will both have more time to tend the flock.

Having a go with some barred rocks & california greys this time.

Not enough room for a cow; I'll have to swap eggs for cream.

 

Hen berries are more scarce this year.

You'll get more cream for them.......

 

How much is organic free-range chicken eggs selling in your area? We sell some of our excess production to friends and neighbors at $3/doz.

 

Here? I've seen them between $4.50-5.50. We've given a bunch away but never taken money. It's been a very small operation so far, with relatively little excess production.

Mind you the plain old eggs are still very cheap when they have them. There's a massive concentration of egg production within 40 miles of me. Millions of hens in battery. Southeastern PA & Northern DE are blanketed with egg producers.

 

The "fresh squeezed" ones down the street WERE running about $3 but the no-name white ones in the local groceries WERE running $1.50 a flat (2-1/2 dozen.)
Now they're all sold out by hoarders.

Hippie eggs at Wally (Nellies, Eggland's, etc...) are running about $4 a dozen...when you can find them.

Brown eggs will probably level out at $3.50-$4 per dozen once all of the hoarders have to start throwing out the ones that fail the float test......

 

Factory farm produced eggs from battery caged hens are not edible for us. They are ... so yucky! And so inhumane. We had a few white Leghorns we raised from the chick. The breed is a prolific egg producer for sure, but that's all they are good for. Large number of not so testy eggs even when raised free ranged and organically fed. And they are so short-lived. A sad consequence of selective breeding.

 

I recently lost my favorite leghorn to a red-tailed hawk. One consequence of ranging them.

 

Besides the obvious benefit of having a supply of fresh eggs right in your backyard, having chickens offer other benefits.

 

my neighbor has chickens, and the most beautiful flowers

 

Wifey has gotten a bit of hoarder fever and I hate her going to market/grocery lately. She has overbought way much of everything and she is going today and I hate to see what she comes back with.

BUT, one big change is that she was always pushing for buying bulk organic produce -- the stuff displayed in big open tubs and you use tongs (or are supposed to) to shove it into a plastic bag.

First, I am not sure they even sell that now because of health concerns -- I know the local Kroeger got rid of their "bulk bins" of various grains, legumes, etc.-- posting on them that they would not return for the foreseeable future.

Anyway, now she is fixated on buying only produce that comes "sealed" in plastic bags.



And she is all hot about her own garden this year. We gave that up some 20 years ago -- calculating that the labor, time and water we used make it quite expensive vs buying the stuff from the market, harvested by exploited farmworkers.

So, while I am not really excited about becoming farmer Steve, I guess I will pull down my toque and learn to reuse a hoe (hmm, there's a joke there, but this is a family forum -- I think).

 

Bulk bins are a worry. It's a thing here (and has always been) that people push their hands through the rice etc. I know it gets cooked, but dang.

 

Apparently wifey got freaked by the lack of traffic, the empty -- sort 0f -parking lot and decided to forego shopping.

Rather, went for a walk on a local path. Meanwhile, I mucked through the mud and tried to create a seed bed for our upcoming vegetable garden.

I tried to talk her into growing "hemp" -- you know -- for the "war effort," but she just glared at me. Honestly, it has been so long, I am not sure I remember what to do with "hemp."

 

My neighborhood has a fairly large community garden. Past years, I've been too busy to get involved much.

This season could be different, but when I emailed the county a couple weeks ago to find out whether they had even thought out the risk/benefit on community gardens under the circumstances (Is it a Good Thing and the community gardens should be a valuable resource? Is it a Bad Thing and the gardens should be avoided? Is it a Useful But Only If People Follow Such-and-Such Guidelines sort of thing?), I got a really, really noncommittal reply.

"Any activity you are engaging in we advise the social distancing per CDC. Since this is an activity that can be done and include social distancing. There is no regulation for the gardens at this time there are no additional guidelines we can give."