Keeping Track of Egg Production

7:39 AM in Aqua, egg, keeping, of, production, track

If you keep your chickens to lay eggs rather than as pets, you probably want to keep track of how many eggs theyre laying.  You probably also want to keep track of how much food, grit, etc. theyre eating and how quickly they need their bedding replaced so you can calculate how much each dozen eggs is costing you.  And if youre shameless nerds like we are, you might want to put everything into a spreadsheet that automatically tracks production and costs.

Today we wanted to share our system for tracking chicken data in case any of you might find it useful or have suggestions for how to improve it.  So, without further adieu, here is EggSpreadsheet.xlsx, version 1.0, (kindly hosted by OpenDrive).

This is the general layout.  To use it, just make an x in each cell corresponding to which dates each chicken lays an egg.  Up on top, input your costs for feed, grit, etc. The part in the upper left counts how many eggs each bird laid and the total (for the most recent seven-day period and since the beginning), and calculates the cost per dozen based on your inputs.  It doesnt include the bedding costs for now because the bedding works double duty as garden fertilizer once we compost it.  The part to the lower right tallies up each birds egg count for each week and puts it into a graph so you can track the cycle.

The trends are kind of interesting.  The open symbols correspond to times when we werent around to collect eggs forthe whole week, and we didnt want to rope our chicken-care volunteers into our goofy data collection experiment. From the left, the eggs/week started increasing as more chickens reached laying age until mid-November, when production started to fall off, probably with the decrease in day length.  Then the chickens went on a tear in mid-December before shutting it down for most of January.  But this last week shows a real up-tick again, so we better get ready!  Were not sure why the big boost in mid-December, but they seem to lay more when theyre outside more and the weather is warmer. 

Also, our Ameraucana was a real good layer up until two days before the day length dropped below 10 hours (November 18), then she didnt lay a single egg until last week, two days after the day length crossed the 10-hour threshold again (January 24).  Now shes laid five in the last week.  Thats consistency!

Since we dont always fire up the spreadsheet computer every day, we made a non-electronic version on the chalkboard in our kitchen that we have to walk past to put the eggs in the fridge.  That makes it way easier to remember things day-to-day.  Now, as long as we update the computer spreadsheet once a week, well have data as accurate as our immediate guesses as to which egg belongs to which chicken.

In other chicken-related news, our well-traveled, but previously injured, Rhode Island Red has rejoined the flock.  She let us know she was fully recovered by escaping from her tote, making messes around the house, and eating our newly-sprouted avocado tree.  Also, weve been trying to figure out what type of chicken Big Chip is.  She was a mystery bird (a.k.a. free rare breed) from McMurray Hatchery that looks like a Partridge Rock in terms of coloring and size (she kept pace with the Pioneer meat birds last spring), but her comb isnt quite the same, and she was a chipmunk-striped chick, which Rocks typically arent (nor are they a rare breed).  Any ideas?  Maybe a mutt from their top secret new meat breed program?

How do you keep track of your egg production and costs?  Let us know in the comments section below!

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Aquaculture sees surge in worldwide production

11:44 AM in Aqua, aquaculture, in, production, sees, surge, worldwide

A new report by an international team of researchers, published September 07 in the online edition of The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), states that Aquaculture now accounts for 50 percent of the fish consumed globally.

Once considered to be a fledgling industry not so long ago, "Aquaculture is set to reach a landmark in 2009, supplying half of the total fish and shellfish for human consumption," the authors wrote.

Way back when, 20 or so years ago, I entered the field of aquaculture after witnessing first hand the ever increasing year to year decline in the traditional fishing industry. Back then we all felt to be on the verge of something new and big, today we can look back and see just how far the industry has come. The growth has been tremendous but it has certainly not been without challenges.

The report states that between 1995 and 2007, global production of farmed fish nearly tripled in volume, in part because of rising consumer demand for long-chain omega-3 fatty acids. Oily fish, such as salmon, are a major source of these omega-3s, which are effective in reducing the risk of cardiovascular disease, according to the National Institutes of Health.

This growth has placed ever increasing pressure on marine resources due to the need for large amounts of feed made from wild fish harvested from the sea. "The huge expansion is being driven by demand," said lead author Rosamond L. Naylor, a professor of environmental Earth system science at Stanford University and director of the Stanford Program on Food Security and the Environment. "As long as we are a health-conscious population trying to get our most healthy oils from fish, we are going to be demanding more of aquaculture and putting a lot of pressure on marine fisheries to meet that need." Sourcing sustainable feed ingredients is one of the largest challenges faced by the industry today.

One way to make salmon farming more environmentally sustainable is to simply lower the amount of fish oil in the salmons diet. According to the authors, a mere 4 percent reduction in fish oil would significantly reduce the amount of wild fish needed to produce 1 pound of salmon from 5 pounds to just 3.9 pounds. In contrast, reducing fishmeal use by 4 percent would have very little environmental impact, they said.

"Reducing the amount of fish oil in the salmons diet definitely gets you a lot more bang for the buck than reducing the amount of fishmeal," Naylor said. "Our thirst for long-chain omega-3 oils will continue to put a lot of strain on marine ecosystems, unless we develop commercially viable alternatives soon."

Naylor and her co-authors pointed to several fish-feed substitutes currently being investigated, including protein made from grain and livestock byproducts, and long-chain omega-3 oils extracted from single-cell microorganisms and genetically modified land plants. "With appropriate economic and regulatory incentives, the transition toward alternative feedstuffs could accelerate, paving the way for a consensus that aquaculture is aiding the ocean, not depleting it," the authors wrote.

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