Of chickens and eggs

Location

Milk deliveries have finished many years ago, but Availles Limouzine and the surrounding area has an egg and honey home delivery service run by Guillaume and Nathalie Van Beers.

They live at Chez Blet on the left going from Availles towards L'Isle Jourdain, just at the top of the hill leaving the river valley, opposite Viewpoint house. Their farm is small by Agribusiness standards but they have developed a "red label" egg business which can compete on quality with the larger enterprises.

The farm is mixed in the classical sense of the word, having cereal crops, sheep (Texels), cows (Limousin and Normandy), poultry (Lohmann brown) and bees. Guillaume started farming here in 1998 and decided to add chickens for egg production, in 2003, as a complementary activity.  The chickens are now a main part of the business producing 3200 eggs per day and with plans to increase this in the near future.

The eggs are classified as "red label" which is a French classification that certifies that the hens are kept in the fresh air and do not exceed a certain density. They are not kept in cages as you can see from the photo. They are fed with cereals grown on the farm so that Guillaume and Nathalie can guarantee the food intake of the chickens.  They  have recently acquired a veterinary agrement which together with their conditioning centre allows them to sell their eggs to other professionals, such as restaurants, hotels and shops.

Guillaume is a third generation farmer of Dutch origin.  His grand father moved into the area in 1955 when Guillaume's father was just 10 years old. As well as running the farm Guillaume is a keen apiculturalist, making about a tonne of honey every year from his 25 bee-hives.

Nathalie is from Dunkerque where she was a teacher.  She decided to swap this a few years ago to become a farmer's wife and farming partner. She does not seem to have regretted this decision, when we spoke in the shop that they have created on the farm.

The picture above shows them individually examining eggs and sorting them by size prior to placing them in trays of 30. They also mark them with their own label prior to putting them into the traditional egg boxes if their are to be sold in shops.  Look out for the label L'oeuf des blet.

You can buy their eggs in the shop or get a home delivery by calling 0549485690 or emailing them at guillaume.vb@hotmail.fr