WANT EGGS?

Looking to pick up a dozen at Shelby’s Happy Chapped Chicken Butt Farm? Call Shelby at 303-883-4427.

Short of which came first, Broomfield-area farmer Shelby Grebenc can answer just about every question one might have about chickens and their eggs.

For instance, contrary to popular belief, she said, the color of an egg does not denote if it was laid by a free-range chicken or cage-raised chicken. It actually depends on the breed of chicken. On her farm, Shelby said her Rhode Island Red hens lay the brown eggs, while white eggs come from her white leghorns, and she even collects a few naturally blue or green tinted eggs, mostly from her Ameraucana hens.

While this is knowledge that could be reasonably expected from your average egg farmer, Shelby is far from average. At age 12, Shelby is the youngest farmer in the country whose product bears an Animal Welfare Approved seal, meaning her animals are treated to the highest levels of industry welfare standards.

“They give me eggs that I sell, so I believe in humanely raising them as payback,” said the motivated 12-year-old, who gets up at 6:15 a.m. daily to let her estimated 130 chickens out of their coups, and feed and water them.

Despite sleeping in a coup at night and sometimes being kept in a long, wire-enclosed chicken run to avoid being eaten by foxes, coyotes or owls, Shelby’s chickens live pretty close to a natural life, walking around her back yard during the day, and giving themselves dust baths. Shelby’s Happy Chapped Chicken Butt Farm, as her business is named, comes from the fact that she has been given many neglected chickens whose tail feathers have fallen out and nursed them back to healthy, egg-laying form.

To be certified Animal Welfare Approved, Shelby not only had to fill out a 75-page application, but her farm had to pass an inspection by one of the nonprofit’s ethical farming practice experts, which it did with flying colors.



“What we’re saying to you the customer is this farmer is who she who she says she is,” Animal Welfare Approved program director Andrew Gunther said. “When Shelby said I practice high-welfare farming, one of my experts has been to her farm and said, ‘Yes, yes she does.'”

Shelby is by far the youngest farmer to be approved by the organization, which even had to revise some of its rules to certify her, Gunther said. In his opinion, Shelby, with her ethical, sustainable farming practices, could be the future of the industry, he said.

Shelby started her farm two years ago as a way to supplement her family’s income when her mother, Nancy, was in a nursing home receiving special care for multiple sclerosis. Her dad J.M. said if they family kept to a strict budget during that time, they would end up with $36 left over each month after food and medical expenses.

“Since pretty much everything we got was going to that, I thought it would be good to have a little extra money going in,” Shelby said. “Since then it’s been doing pretty good.”

Shelby collects about 15 dozen eggs per day from her 130 hens, though egg counts tend to dip in colder months. She said she sells around 50 dozen eggs each week, at $3.50 a dozen, mostly at area farmers’ markets or to her neighbors in the area of 152nd Avenue and Huron Street in north Broomfield. Any profit she turns after feed and other expenses goes to her college fund.

The Meridian Elementary school alumna will deliver eggs to customers within a mile of her house and, when she is home, also hangs a big yellow sign in near her driveway to make sales. She set up the business with a $1,000 loan from her grandmother, which she has since repaid, and runs the operation pretty much start to finish by herself, her dad said, including washing, sanitizing and packing her eggs in sterilized, recycled egg cartons.

“People end up talking to Nancy or I (about eggs) and we say, ‘Talk to Shelby,'” J.M. Grebenc said. “It’s her business, she writes her own checks. Shelby works her tail off and she always has, and we’re very proud of her.”

Nancy Grebenc said she knew Shelby could handle the egg farm, because she grew up on a 4-acre plot with chickens, cows and lots of other animals, but at the same time was concerned running a business would interfere with her daughter’s school work. Mom said she has been extremely impressed — Shelby’s business has taken off, she maintains honor roll grades at Rocky Top Middle School and still finds time to help clean the house and play with her 9-year-old brother, Conner.

Even at 12, Shelby is not content to rest on her laurels. Her next mission is to become a Colorado Department of Agriculture-approved farmer, so she can sell her eggs at grocery stores and restaurants. She has plenty of reason to believe she can accomplish that goal.

“The good thing is Animal Welfare Approved has even higher standards than the USDA,” she said with a smile.