LAS VEGAS (KLAS) — What came first, the chicken or the egg? A riddle that’s still hard to crack.
No matter what the answer is, we do know egg prices and supply are nowhere near what they were last year.
If you eat eggs, you know it’s been a scramble to find them in the stores, but now many people are resorting to having their backyard chickens, so they always have a supply of eggs.
“Our birds were for meat,” Amanda Banuelos said.
Banuelos is referring to the turkeys in her backyard, but the birds have a new purpose.
“This is the first year we are going to eat them for egg costs,” she said.
That is because the high egg prices are no ‘yolk’.
“My jaw dropped they were $1.50 a year ago and now $9 that’s insane,” Banuelos said.
Her turkeys lay eggs one month out of a year, but that wasn’t enough for her family so she bought chickens.
“It’s like having an animal but with a benefit, they are feeding my house,” Banuelos said.
It will be 10 more weeks until her chickens lay eggs but there’s a sunny side to look forward to.
“I have reliability all the time,” she said.
The Banuelos aren’t the only ones getting into the backyard chicken business, a Facebook group for Las Vegas residents has more than four thousand members in it.
At Jones Feed and Tack, they get two hundred chicks delivered weekly and they are gone within a day.
“It’s like toilet paper when COVID hit,” Hedi Lozoya, an employee said.
The demand is so high, their customers can only buy five chicks at a time.
“There will be like one customer trying to buy them all,” Lozoya said.
Each chick can cost around $5 and can live up to five years.
But before you start to buy a chicken coop, you must remember some parts of the Valley do not allow it, so check the guidelines in your area.
Those interested must also remember the maintenance cost associated with having chickens, such as providing food, a heating lamp, and purchasing a coop.