Alberta Premier Ed Stelmach was in Westlock County Aug. 19 to commission the Severson Free Run Barn, one of the largest free-range egg farms in Canada.
Located just east of Highway 44 north of Busby, the state-of-the-art facility is designed to house close to 75,000 hens and when fully populated will produce close to 15 million eggs each year, said Muneer Gilani, president of Sparks Eggs, which runs the facility.
In fact, the system used to ensure the chickens are kept healthy and producing quality eggs has never been implemented on such a massive scale in Canada before, he said.
The technology used at the facility is ultimately designed to get the birds to do what they want to do, while at the same time making the birds do what the egg farmers want them to do.
As they mature and reach egg-laying age, the chickens are gradually trained to lay their eggs in the right place. They are also treated to a fully climate-controlled environment where the lighting is programmed to simulate sunrise and sunset so they can live a relatively stress-free life, Gilani said.
Throughout the whole process, however, the birds are kept as separate from human hands as possible, he added.
“The idea is that no human hand touches the eggs,” he said, explaining that that greatly reduces the potential for contamination.
For Westlock County Coun. Conrad Sehn, having the egg barn in the county speaks to how attractive the area is for new business opportunities.
“When you’re talking about the first facility of its kind in Canada and it’s in the county, it gives credence to the growing opportunities in Westlock County,” he said.
Sehn said having the egg farm in the county might also help attract other businesses to the county once they have seen how successful this one is.
“It shows that Westlock County is open for business,” he said. “I like to see these things happen.”
Although the facility was commissioned on Aug. 19, it has been in operation since April 2011 when the first baby hens, or pullets, arrived. Since that time, they had been maturing and only started laying eggs in July, Gilani said.
Another reason the company waited before opening its doors to dignitaries, he said, was that when the pullets are young, they are more susceptible to disease.
In a short speech to the assembled dignitaries, Stelmach talked about being excited about the technology in use at the barn. As a politician, he said he was most excited about how the barn dealt with the chicken waste, which drew laughs from the audience.
