Sustainable egg farm on Oahu to provide local cage-free eggs

WAIALUA (Hawaii) — Do you know where your eggs come from?

Waialua Egg Farm by Villa Rose wants to put local eggs in the fridge of every Hawaii resident.

“The first eggs should be in the stores the first week of December,” said Michael Sencer the Executive VP of Hidden Villa’s Ranch. “We feel like there was a huge need in Hawaii for a modern egg ranch all cage-free.”

Sencer said he was surprised that most of the eggs sold in supermarkets on Oahu come from the mainland — something he wants to quickly change.

“90% of the eggs consumed in Hawaii are coming from the mainland and that is the market we are trying to replace,” Sencer added. 

Sencer also said one of the first things they had to do after purchasing the land eight years ago was to bring on an architect to help them bring their idea to life.

“We haven’t had anything of this magnitude in the state for a long time,” said Dean Sinco, the architect for this farm. “Some people didn’t realize that most of the buildings are not inhabited by humans; they are all animals.”

Sinco stated that he worked closely with their mechanical and electrical engineer, Michael Chong, to make sure the farm had enough solar panels to sustain their equipment. 

“There wasn’t enough power here to support a farm like this, so the folks at Villa Rose decided that they wanted to be completely off the grid,” Chong said. “So, they wouldn’t have to worry about how they would bring the power over.”

Chong said now that things are up and running, they are eagerly waiting until the first week of December to start selling these eggs.

“We have about 150,000 chickens in three barns, and we will have the fourth barn filled Friday night,” explained Sencer. “So, we will be at a population of 200,000 layers in four different age groups.”

Sencer said the size of the egg depends on the age of the chicken. Younger chickens lay smaller eggs and older chickens lay larger eggs. 

Sencer added he eventually wants to ship his eggs to the other neighboring islands and will soon start looking for employees to work at their egg farm located in Waialua.