Published on April 20, 2023
Welcoming the Pettersson Family from Sweden to the Bovans 500 Egg Club
Last month we participated in the yearly feed meeting organized by our distributor, Swedfarm, in Sweden. The goal of this meeting is to stay in touch with the different feed suppliers that are active in the Swedish market, as this will help us to understand the latest developments in the Scandinavian egg markets, and to inform them on the latest developments and trends in the eggciting world of poultry breeding (Hendrix Genetics) and distribution (Swedfarm). From both sides presentations were provided, and there was sufficient room for discussions that allowed us to listen carefully to the feedback on our layer breeds (the representatives of the feed suppliers visit the commercial egg producers regularly and have therefor good insight in flock performance). The meeting took place at the office in Herrljunga, which is under the same roof as their main hatchery that Swedfarm acquired a few years ago. Swedfarm has been able to capture most of the Swedish market in recent years, this is not only because of the excellent performance of the Bovans birds that they distribute, but also related to the excellent technical support that they provide to their customers. We, as Hendrix Genetics, do our best to support the team of Swedfarm with technical training/visits, and help Swedfarm to support the Swedish egg sector.
Related to the Excellent performance of the laying hens, we took the opportunity to welcome the Pettersson Family to the Bovans 500 egg Club. In less than 98 weeks, they have been able to go over 500 eggs per hen housed at their family farm just outside of Falkenberg. The entire Pettersson family (Thomas, Inger, their son Jakob & daughter Elin) are active at the egg farm: day-to-day management, marketing & and sales of the eggs, or taking care of the farm when other family members are enjoying a day off. They are still active at the family farm, it where the parents of Thomas that started egg farming more than 55 years ago. In those days it was all small farm, consisting of many small free-range houses. During the agricultural revolution they converted to conventional cage housing. In the past decades they moved back to cage-free, and currently they have both barn and organic egg production.
The key to their success?
Their flock management is highly driven by data-insight, and they work with nice and robust laying hens! As Sweden has no large egg processing market, there is less flexibility provided by packing stations in moving from table eggs to industry eggs (like common in France or the Netherlands), as a result flocks are depleted at earlier age in the Nordic countries. This flock of Bovans clearly shows that they are very robust birds, resulting in robust results!
Many thanks to the inspiring and enthusiastic team of Swedfarm for organizing these yearly events and inviting us to participate once again in this years’ feed meetings. Special word of thanks to the Pettersson family.
