2013 Eggs & Rain by the numbers

We like to keep pretty good records of things on the farm.  It gives us an idea of costs and revenues and production figures.  This information is helpful in reassessing what we're doing to determine if we might need to adjust our management practices.  I'll show you a good example of what I'm talking about.  The chart below was cut & pasted from Excel and the formatting didn't carry properly, but I think you can get the idea, even though it is very rough.

The Y access shows the day of the month and the X axis shows the month of the year.  The bottom lines show totals by month and cumulative egg production figures for the year.  I apologize again for the quality of the table below.

Our Maker's Acres Family Farm
Egg Production Records
Year: 2013
	Jan	Feb	Mar	Apr	May	Jun	Jul	Aug	Sep	Oct	Nov	Dec
1	14	16	20	21	24	19	18	7	9	13	3	0
2	14	20	5	14	32	36	14	9	17	17	4	0
3	16	13	18	17	34	33	21	9	5	18	4	0
4	11	23	2	28	19	36	24	5	18	25	7	0
5	10	22	16	30	40	32	13	12	0	20	6	0
6	17	15	9	27	15	33	21	3	11	22	0	0
7	15	19	17	32	20	30	18	3	0	20	0	0
8	10	15	12	27	13	22	20	6	11	17	0	0
9	9	19	21	29	22	28	22	3	7	19	5	0
10	16	15	21	37	16	21	19	5	9	19	7	0
11	12	21	28	38	17	20	18	2	8	19	8	0
12	11	16	20	35	15	16	20	6	7	20	5	0
13	13	13	29	40	29	15	21	2	9	18	12	0
14	18	14	22	39	28	16	15	5	9	16	7	0
15	8	14	21	34	29	16	13	2	7	12	6	0
16	14	12	26	44	32	16	16	5	8	18	10	0
17	8	13	32	36	32	13	8	4	8	0	4	0
18	12	13	33	39	32	18	12	3	7	9	8	0
19	11	11	26	39	36	19	5	6	6	14	8	0
20	9	13	36	26	36	13	20	8	20	9	5	0
21	12	12	31	39	30	12	6	11	12	7	7	0
22	10	10	33	29	32	10	18	9	20	3	6	1
23	10	9	33	36	37	15	7	9	11	8	0	1
24	10	10	27	27	26	15	12	8	19	1	0	1
25	8	9	32	27	26	8	9	14	15	4	3	1
26	13	12	28	31	36	10	13	9	16	6	0	5
27	11	15	25	22	28	12	13	0	17	3	0	1
28	13	13	18	30	28	14	11	13	13	3	0	7
29	20	0	16	33	25	14	9	12	12	4	0	3
30	20	0	22	29	26	15	12	13	22	4	1	5
31	18	0	13	0	28	0	14	11	0	9	0	4
	393	407	692	935	843	577	462	214	333	377	126	29	by Month
	32.8	33.9	57.7	77.9	70.3	48.1	38.5	17.8	27.8	31.4	10.5	2	Dozen
	393	800	1492	2427	3270	3847	4309	4523	4856	5233	5359	5388	YTD
	32.8	66.7	124.3	202.3	272.5	320.6	359.1	376.9	404.7	436.1	446.6	449	Dozen YTD

This chart showed some interesting information.  Our little flock laid a total of 5,388 eggs in 2013 or 449 dozen eggs.  That seems high at first glance, but a we have about 60 hens.  That means on average, our hens laid 89 eggs.  If you do a quick search, you'll see that on average a hen will lay an egg every 26 hours or 265 eggs per year.  Yikes!  What happened?

As we discussed in a previous post, we have a nutrition problem and need to supplement with feed to give the birds the nutrition they need.  Good record-keeping bears this out.  As the chart indicates, during the Spring and early summer, the birds are able to forage for bugs and worms to supplement the grain we're feeding them and egg production is at its highest.  However, in winter months, when the bug and worm population falls off, we need to begin supplementing with feed, as their egg production falls off sharply. 

This is interesting data for me - News I can Use!  

We also do the same thing with rainfall data, tracking it day by day on a similar chart.  What we show below is a total of 63 inches of rain for the year in 2013, averaging a little over 5 inches per month.  Disclaimer: we may have missed a day or three during the year, but the figures should be pretty close for our area.  We'll continue to keep detailed records which help to show interesting trends to assist us in farm management. 

Jan	Feb	Mar	Apr	May	Jun	Jul	Aug	Sep	Oct	Nov	Dec
14.35	6.2	2.9	8.8	5.2	3.4	2	2.5	6.6	3.7	2.7	4	Rain by Month (inches)
14.35	20.55	23.45	32.25	37.45	40.85	42.85	45.35	51.95	55.65	58.35	63	YTD Rain (inches)
												5 Avg Rainfall/Mo.