Welcoming Devo-ei to the Dekalb 500 Egg Club

Devo-ei is managed by de van Gog-van Deursen Family, consisting of José en Ron, their 3 children Jenna, Shania and Sem, and special mentioning of the parents of José, as her father (who is turning 80 this year) can be found every morning at the egg belt, supporting with the sorting of the eggs.

It is impossible to mention all egg producers around the globe that are reaching the 500 eggs in 100 weeks with their laying hen flocks from the Hendrix Genetics chicken breeds, but Devo-ei has contributed a lot to our global success. They have participated for many years in our field-testing programs, allowing us to collect breeding data under field circumstances and linking this data to the Pure Line cockerels in our breeding program. They have counted for years the eggs of thousands of chicken families day-in, day-out. Back in 2018, they switched from conventional to organic egg production, and they have also been very successful with this. Their dedication and hard work, their know-how of egg farming (focusing on data, details and the wellbeing of the laying hens), the good quality Dekalb White pullets from ‘Het Anker’ Hatchery, as well as great technical support from the different suppliers, all contributed to reaching the impressive milestone of 503 eggs for every hen that got housed in 98 weeks of age.

At the moment of our visit, the laying hens were still kept inside, as of the flockdown that is still in place to protect the hens against HPAI. So, we were not able to see chickens. But fortunately, we were able to see their alpaca’s. They started off with a few alpacas to protect their free ranging hens against predators (alpacas do not tolerate buzzards and foxes). They run a very successful alpaca breeding program, which has resulted in a herd of 15 alpacas now.

We’d like to thank Devo-ei for their hospitality, and wish them all the best with reaching this sustainable milestone once again with their new flock of Dekalb White laying hens.