After the sun goes down each night, Peter Crane goes into the darkened coop and walks among his sleeping birds. Surrounded by hundreds of chickens, the scene is surprisingly peaceful.
So peaceful in fact, Crane can hear the sound of a single chicken wheezing or coughing or sneezing. On the odd night he hears a chicken in distress, he collects the sick bird and brings her into his house on the Kaliko Farms in Malibu.
“We probably have fifteen birds that have something wrong with them right now and they’re all in the kitchen,” said Crane’s wife, Kaliko Orian who also shares a roof with the sick birds. She refers to her husband as the ‘chicken whisperer.’ “He puts them on his lap. He will hand feed them if they’re not eating. He will sit there with an eye dropper and make sure they get water because he wants to give them the best possible chance for recovery. He’s kind of crazy.”
Needless to say, few chickens in the United States raised to lay eggs receive the loving care Crane gives on his farm of about 1,000 birds. The birds are free to roam the pastures and watch the sunset every night over the Pacific Ocean. They eat grubs and a diet free of corn and soy.
As a result, the eggs have a marigold yolk, look beautiful and taste delicious. Costing about $1 per egg, it’s not unusual to see customers at the Saturday Downtown farmers market carefully selecting their purchase one by one, gently placing the eggs in their cardboard cartons. Each weekend, chefs and foodies flock to Omma’s Garden’s booth on Arizona Avenue.
“We hand collect everything,” Orian said. “Nothing on our farm is automated. Everything is done as if we were living 200 years ago.”
Orian had no farming, marketing or selling experience when she suddenly rescued 300 chickens from slaughter four years ago. A farmer who was planning to retire planned to simply kill the pullets (chickens too young to lay eggs). Orian saved the birds, gave up her desk job and became a farmer.
“Our birds get to do whatever the heck they want,” Orian said, explaining she does not force the birds to molt like a typical farmer in order to ensure consistent egg production. Instead, Orian and Crane let the process happen naturally, meaning there are times the farm has no eggs. It’s one of several details that lead to the expensive price tag, which is about four times the cost of a generic egg from a factory farm.
Some customers buy the eggs for their superior quality. Others come back week after week to subsidize the kindness the farmers show their flock. For example, Crane recently nursed a bird with a broken back in the kitchen. On any other farm, the bird would have likely been killed.
“We have to be respectful of the animals that are feeding us,” Orian said “You do end up having to cull some of your birds but you don’t have to do it in a way that’s stressful or inhumane to them. We always want to be good shepherds to our animals.”
Santa Monica has four weekly farmers markets including the Wednesday Downtown market on Arizona Avenue between 4th and Ocean from 8:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m., the Saturday Downtown market on Arizona Avenue between 4th and 2nd Streets from 8:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m., the Saturday Virginia Ave. Park market at 2200 Virginia Avenue from 8:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m., and the Sunday Main Street market at 2640 Main Street from 8:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m.
kate@www.smdp.com
