EGGS FOR ALL

Dominion, Volume 9, Issue 2864, 31 August 1916, Page 3

EGGS FOR ALL

THE HENS' BUSY SEASON PRICES FALLING _i Eggs, guaranteed new laid, were being retailed in' Wellington at Is. 4d. a dozen at the beginning of the week, and since then they have appeared on many tables from which they have been absent while the price soared in the inaccessible regions round half-a-erown. "There has beon a great rush for eggs," said one rotailer. "Everybody seems to want them. The fact is that peoplo don't like breaking eggs if they cost much more than a penny each. They havo been costing moro than twopence each for a long time now, and so buyers havo been oautious." The enjoyment of cheap eggs is marred for many a suburban resident by tho fact that after remaining, inactive and 'unprofitable through the season of high prices, his own liens have begun at last to lay. It is one of the trials of the amateur poultryman that his fowls lay only when laying is fashionable, and are firm in their refusal to produce threepenny eggs. Ho can take some consolation from the reflection that his professional rival has the same trouble. In fact, the tendency tho hen to concentrate her efforts on'a particular season of tho year has been the theme of debate at many a poultryinen's congress, and a satisfactory solution of tho difficulty created by periodic famines and gluts has still to be discovered.

The professional view was explained to a Dominion* reporter yosterday bv a, local dealer. "The public rejoiccs when eggs aro cheap," said this authority, "and there is a rush to buy. That is natural enough. But really it would be better for everybody if the poultry industry were so organised as to enable the producers to maintain a fairly regular prico all tho year-round. When eggs are selling at 14d. to 18d. a dozen retail, the pouitrvman is making very little profit indeed. He is likely to be making an actual loss at the present prices of wheat, pollard, and bran. He has to make his profit in the off season, when the eggs aro sold at as much as 2s. 6d. a dozen. Now the proposal mado bjr the organisers of some _ 'egg circles' is that we should establish a standard price, say, about Is. Cd. a dozen, and stick to that throughout the year, the surplus eggs being stored in tie seasons of plenty and brought out of store when the hens aro not laying." .... Perhaps this state of affairs will be attained some day. But in the meantime the breakfast e"g has its seasons of scarcity and of plenty. There will be eggs for everybody during the next month or two.