If you have been wanting to try our eggs, now is a great time! Our hens are in full production and eggs are readily available in the following Bellingham and Seattle area grocery stores. In Bellingham: both Community Food Co-op locations and at all Haggen stores. In the greater Seattle area at PCC Natural Market stores, the Port Townsend Co-op, and at all Haggen stores. If you’d like to try our eggs combined with other local, organic foods, ask for meals prepared with our eggs from these restaurants and caterers: Cafe Culinaire, Canliss Restaurant, Ciao Thyme, Great Blue Heron Grill, The Herbfarm, Hotel Bellwether, Semiahmoo Resort.
Proven to be nutritionally superior!
In 2007, our eggs were tested by a nutritional testing lab as part of a study sponsored by Mother Earth News magazine. Misty Meadows Farm eggs had 3 1/2 times the vitamin E, four times the heart healthy Omega-3s, a third less cholesterol, and a third less saturated fat than eggs from factory farmed birds. Across the board, pasture raised eggs are nutritionally superior to eggs from confined birds. Check out the full text of the study.
Free Range vs. Pasture Raised
We consider our eggs pasture raised, not free range. The term free range has lost all meaning. In conventional agriculture, it now means that the barn door is opened a crack and the 50,000 chickens crammed into the barn could get out into the small yard if they could fight their way through the crowd. In contrast, pasture raised means chickens raised on pasture. They are on the ground, with grass, whenever they want to be. They can go inside to escape the heat or cold, but are not stuck there.
How We Got Started with Chickens
We started with three hens as pets. The first day we found an egg, we wanted to throw a party! Immediately, we were struck with how much more flavorful they were than store-bought eggs. We were hooked. We now maintain a flock of 3,000 birds.
We were even more amazed when we began studying the nutritional benefits that result from feeding, housing and treating animals the way they were meant to be treated. So many of the nutritional problems we face today come from mistreating the animals.
We love to watch our chickens’ antics as much as other people enjoy their dogs or cats. Be careful when you talk to us about chickens, we just may talk you into starting a backyard flock of your own!
How We Treat Our Chickens
Our chickens have continuous, year round access to the outdoors. They have homes to keep them warm and dry, but they spend most of their time outside. We rotate their pasture over several acres so that there is always enough ground to keep them happily scratching away.
We feed our chickens a certified organic, locally milled grain daily ration and all the bugs they can catch!
We use only the highest organic practices. We do not debeak our birds, confine them, starve them, force them to molt, and never feed our birds unnecessary medicine.
Anyone can put a picture of a chicken on grass on a package, but how many of those chickens get to see the light of day and live the way they were created to live?
In 2010, The Cornucopia Institute rated organic eggs producers throughout the U.S. on humane animal husbandry standards. We were rated the top producer in Washington State and one of the highest in the nation.
