A German farm that has embraced organic practices to result in healthy profits is bringing new perspective to the term "pastured egg production".

Lazy brown and white cattle lounge in lush green grass as you head up the gravel driveway.

There are young white chickens to the left housed in home-made portable coops, alongside the centuries-old stone piggery.

It is bucolic in the true sense of the word. An agrarian idyll in the countryside less than 100 kilometres north of the old West German capital of Bonn, not far from the Dutch border.

White chickens destined for meat are moved around in coops made of tin and timber. ( ABC Landline: Prue Adams )

In this part of the world — where the soil is rich, the rainfall plentiful and the European Union subsidies generously — a 42-hectare organic farm growing a range of products from potatoes to pork not only survives, it can thrive.

It is difficult to imagine such a place could exist in Australia, where scale and concentration on one commodity are the norm, and organic farming is still niche.

But this is Germany, where about 23,300 farms (8 per cent of all farms) are run organically — without the use of synthetic pesticides or herbicides.

Christoph and Beate Leiders started converting their farm — Stautenhof — from conventional to organic production in 1997, beginning with 100 breeding sows.

The farm now boasts an array of other farm foods, they process in an impressive display of vertical integration.

Christoph and Beate Leiders sell their productions from their organic farm at an on-site cafe and shop. ( ABC Landline: Prue Adams )

The pigs are killed and butchered in the on-site slaughterhouse and the meat is sold at the on-site organic shop and cafe.

About 150 tonnes of potatoes are produced each year and they grow maize and rye and wheat which are ground and baked into bread in the on-site bakery.

In the stone barn above the large wood oven where the bread is baked, the warmth is not wasted — this is where the Leiders grow out their chicks for the separate flocks of meat and egg chickens.

Pastured eggs trend transcends countries

The Stautenhof farm has 800 chickens in each of the five "animal stables". ( ABC Landline: Prue Adams )

In the paddock beside the piggery, the white-feathered chickens, destined for meat consumption, flap about in clover grass.

Their tin-and-timber coops are on wheels so they can be moved on, when they peck out the best of the pasture.

Mr Leiders said the retail price for his organic free range chicken meat was 15 euros ($22) per kilogram — about five times the price of conventional chicken meat.

Australia is not the only place where egg producers are looking at alternatives to layers en-masse in huge sheds or cages — Europe is also into "pastured eggs".

Five years ago Mr Leiders began with a few small "animal stables" as he calls them, each housing 225 laying chickens. Now he has three large stables, each housing 800 chooks.

The houses are moved weekly to greener pasture, and surrounded by portable fencing.

Their organic grain feed and water are housed inside the shed. The hens roost inside at night and are free to come and go as they choose during the day.

He produces 2,000 eggs a day on the farm` and sells them for 6.50 euros a kilogram.

Egg laying chickens peck and move around a field of grass while outside their mobile "animal stable". ( ABC Landline: Prue Adams )

Customers come for farm experience and shopping

While eggs produced this way in Australia are increasingly being labelled "pastured" or "pasture-raised" or "paddock-raised" eggs, in Germany Mr Leider's eggs are labelled "organic from mobile stables".

"Because consumers here understand the advantages of mobile stables," Mr Leider said.

Without dogs to guard the chickens like in Australia, the German farmer said a handful of chickens get taken by hawks each week, and if the doors of the coop are left open at night, foxes will wreak havoc.

With the shop turning over an impressive 3 million euros ($4.5m) annually, and with a staff of 50, Stautenhof has been growing at 10 per cent a year.

More than 2,000 customers a week come through the gates to see the farm operation and to buy from the shop.

Even in Germany, this scale and this level of integration is unique.

"Not many others do such a wide range of products," he said.

"It's great, but it is also very hard."

The Stautenhof farm produces about 2,000 eggs each day. ( ABC Landline: Prue Adams )

For more on pastured eggs and the Australian take on the growing trend in the egg industry, watch Landline this Sunday on ABC TV.