April 2025 | Vol. 25 Iss. 4
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First legislative session
State of the City Mayor proclaims city ‘strong’
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Former PTA member helping shape education policy Page 6
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More families are raising chickens for fresh eggs and sustainability By Julie Slama | j.slama@mycityjournals.com
Demand for chickens similar to Covid era as more families are embracing the trend of homesteading.
A
few years ago, Barbara Ingebrigsten’s adult daughter, Heidi, was hiking near the mouth of Little Cottonwood Canyon when she spotted three chicks abandoned in a plastic container near the trailhead. Heidi brought them to her Sandy home, and after struggling to find anyone willing to raise them, she built a chicken coop. Together with her mother, they began raising the hens. “We didn’t set out to do this, but we’ve loved the fresh eggs which have more Omega-3,” Ingebrigsten said. “It’s been quite a process to learn, but the hens love people. I open the back door, and they know I’m coming; they can recognize 100 different faces. We can hold them, one hops up and down for treats and they’re funnier than heck. Each has a different personality.” Ingebrigsten isn’t alone. There are more than 85 million backyard chickens in the United States, with 17 million households owning an average of five chickens, according to the National Institute of Health.
The organization reports this trend grew during the COVID-19 pandemic. IFA-Draper Assistant Manager Elizabeth Maycock isn’t surprised by the rise in chicken ownership. “More people own chickens than you think; in my circle alone, four households have chickens,” she said about her Magna neighborhood. “This morning, we got 160 chicks with our weekly delivery at 11 o’clock and they were gone within 40 minutes. It reminds us of COVID, when we were selling out within an hour. Everybody wanted the chicks to kind of start their homesteads then and we're seeing the same kind of a demand.” Maycock believes the current bird flu, which has reduced commercial egg production, plays a big role in the trend. “Egg prices have skyrocketed and there’s a push where people want to go back to homesteading and providing their own food. That movement has slowly risen over the last five years, but the panic surrounding the egg prices has really been an issue over the last three or four weeks and I've seen it getting worse. I've Continued page 21
Raising chicks into laying hens is a growing trend in light of raising egg prices and a desire of more people wanting to know what they’re eating. (Julie Slama/City Journals)
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