WICHITA, Kan. (KSNW) — We are getting an idea of how an explosion at an egg laying facility, in Harvey County, will impact prices.
Firefighters said a propane explosion leveled a barn that housed 20 thousand hens on Thursday. KSN’s Derek Lytle spoke to a poultry expert, who said the price of eggs locally will go up.
Scott Beyer of Kansas State University said this was a fairly new free-range egg operation. He said the farmer will now go through the hardship of starting from scratch, while prices of eggs at grocery stores will increase in a market already impacted by the Avian flu.
“It’s like a punch in the gut when you see something like that,” said K State Extension Poultry Specialist, Scott Beyer.
Beyer said the egg market, in the United States, is already weathered by bird loss from the Avian flu. He said 20 thousand hens is a big non-commercial operation, and losing it will have negative impacts.
“It will certainly hurt some local prices. We have about one hen for every person in the United States, so when we lose 20 thousand hens, that’s 20 thousand eggs short a day, it doesn’t take very long to lose that many farms, before the price of eggs in the grocery store goes up,” said Beyer.
He said 1.8 million chickens had been killed due to contracting bird flu in Colorado. The risk of the virus, means it is hard to acquire birds from an auction barn, meaning the farmer will have to wait for new pullets to grow.
“When you lose your birds, the big problem is, you have a big gap in income, it takes 18 weeks to grow a bird, many more weeks to get a marketable product again, but during that time, you’ve got bills to pay,” said Beyer.
The farmer KSN spoke with declined to comment about the loss of his property.
But Happy Egg, who purchases his supply, said in a statement: “At Happy Egg, we are committed to humane animal care, and this loss is a tragedy that is deeply affecting us. The suffering and loss experienced by these hens weigh heavily on us. Our hen and farmer well-being has, and will remain, a priority in everything we do.
This fire, caused by a gas leak leading to an explosion, is under investigation by the Newton Fire Department. We are grateful to the Newton Fire Department for their swift response and their commitment to investigating this incident. We trust their expertise to provide valuable insights to improve the safety of our farmers and hens.
We’ve been truly humbled by the response from our Happy Egg farmers and employees, who have come together to support the family, working through the night. We will continue to stand by them in the days ahead. It is a testament to the strength and compassion of our Happy Egg farmer community.
At the moment, our leaders are focused on supporting our farmer and his family as they navigate this incident. While we’re unable to accommodate a Zoom interview right now, we’re happy to provide a written statement.”