Smart farmer

With lots of “horsepower” to create colorful eggs

Susanne Rauch with unusual friends: Horse and chickens

(Bild: Sepp Pail)

White, almost red, chocolate brown, olive green, bluish, spotted - it's unbelievable how many natural egg colors there are! The Styrians love this variety. And the East Styrian farmer Susanne Rauch has perfected her range in this respect, adding cute mini eggs and enhancing them even more with the "help" of PS.

No two eggs are the same in the colorful box in which the part-time farmer at "Sepplhof" offers her products from the farm and the surrounding area, "they are also filled differently, there are bigger ones in there, smaller ones. So I don't have any waste eggs," says the clever East Styrian. She sells one kilo at a time, which is about 16 or 17 eggs. Her concept is very popular: "It's not just the children who are excited and immediately look into the box with wide eyes to see what colors and sizes the eggs they have bought are."

What a great variety of egg colors!

(Bild: Sepp Pail)

And the variety of eggs produced by her 100 or so hens is truly extraordinary: pure white, brown, but also unusual ones such as blue, olive green and dark brown. The 36-year-old experiments herself: "No purebred chicken can produce such unusual colors. I try all kinds of different mixes, and that leads to the unusual colors." Her flock of chickens is as colorful as the products: There are really smart ones with a funny mop of hair, speckled, imposing roosters, "every single animal has its own personality".

(Bild: Sepp Pail)

And of course, very importantly: "My chickens have to be happy! That's very important to me, and that's the only way to get a good yield."

The farmer has an ace up her sleeve, or rather, four-legged friends of a different size in the pasture: she keeps eight horses herself. "And this combination is simply a hit. The chickens live together with the horses and go out to pasture with them. This allows them to venture further out and expand their radius because they feel protected from predators such as birds of prey by the large animals." The hard-working egg producers definitely benefit.

Cute! A small, cheeky quail

(Bild: Sepp Pail)

The mother of two also has another mainstay, namely adorable little quails. Here, too, customers snatch the spotted mini eggs out of her hand. Rauch: "Children, for example, love them as a snack, but they are also very popular for raclette or fried eggs."

Incidentally, no "egg producer" ends up at the butcher's as soon as she stops producing eggs. They all have their deaths here, "they've earned it and I owe it to them".  

Susanne Rauch's eggs are sold from the farm (Grabersdorf 5, 8342 Gnas, for 4.90 euros per kilo, 12 quail eggs cost 2.90 euros), they are available at Spar in Gnas, Kaufhaus Summer in Dietersdorf and in the restaurant "Die Mühle" in Grabersdorf.