Dekalb White - a proven track record in UK free range!

For the last few years, producers lucky enough to have negotiated contracts for white eggs, and brave enough to order white flocks, have been almost evangelical about the combination of welfare and financial advantages their white birds deliver. Almost without exception, they have declared their intention to reorder white birds.

Flock after flock of Dekalb White layers are achieving the magic 500 eggs per cycle, recording excellent feed conversion, low mortality, excellent feathering, and generally demonstrating the ease of management that so endears them to producers.

However, until recently consumers, and consequently the retail sector, have stuck to the myth that brown eggs are somehow healthier, and more natural than white eggs.

Indeed, until recently, launches of white egg brands, trialled by supermarkets, have seen consumers leaving white eggs on the shelves.

Despite this, for many in the egg production chain the case for white birds has seemed unassailable, and the consumer resistance unsustainable. Finally, this may well be about to change. Consumer resistance is dropping away, retailers are now actively stocking white eggs, and there are signs that the white revolution is here. So much so that in a highly challenging market, white bird placings are rising month on month.

That sounds like good news for producers with white flocks, and excellent news for breeders such as Hendrix Genetics, with proven white birds. But, as Nick Bailey of Joice and Hill, UK Distributor of the world beating white breed Dekalb White, points out “We are delighted to see sales of our white layers take off. However, it takes two years to build a supply chain and so we fear supply will now lag behind demand, in the short term, whilst we bring more of our UK parent stock farms on stream. In the meantime, we have some uncommitted production, and we advise our customers to place orders as soon as possible”

In the 1930’s and early 1940’s the newly formed poultry division of the Dekalb Agricultural Association set out to experiment with hybridisation of laying hens in pursuit of hens with superior egg-laying performance, for the nation’s farmers and layer producers.

Today, as part of the Hendrix Genetics Layer Division, the Dekalb White has been described as the most productive layer in the world. Furthermore, it is the only bird proven by flock data, gathered over the last two years, to thrive in UK free range conditions. Joice and Hill are the only hatchery, managing their own UK based Parent Stock farms, with full Lion Code verification.