By JAN McLAUGHLIN
BG Independent News
After donating fresh eggs to the Brown Bag Food Project for years, local farmer Tom Mowen hatched an idea to put more eggs in the hands of more hungry families.
When he heard that the food pantry in Bowling Green had to turn people away recently due to a lack of food, he decided to go a step further. Why not create a Brown Bag Chicken Flock, with those hens producing eggs just for the food pantry?
Mowen of Wintergreen Family Farm of Grand Rapids, in partnership with Bylow Enterprises and Apollo’s Basket, will raise and care for 50-60 hens capable of producing more than 12,000 eggs a year.
A fundraiser is underway through Oct. 1, with the goal of having the Brown Bag Chicken Flock fully established and housed by that date.
There are two ways the community can participate and help bring this first-of-its-kind flock to life.
- The first is by making a $20 donation directly to the Brown Bag Food Project (brownbagfoodproject.org/donate). For each donation, the sponsors will place one hen into the flock.
- The second way to contribute is by subscribing to Wintergreen Family Farm’s newsletter and following them on Facebook. For each supporter who does this, the sponsors will also donate one hen to the flock.
Wintergreen Family Farm will raise, house, and feed every hen, and will collect, package, deliver, and donate every egg produced by each hen for the life of the hen.
“The nice thing about establishing an entire chicken flock for the Brown Bag Food Project is that it is sustainable,” Mowen said. “While almost every egg will be eaten, we can also hatch chicks, raise them, and add them to the flock generating more eggs with no cost to the Brown Bag Food Project or anyone else.”
Wintergreen Family Farms has a “Flock & Food Fundraiser Counter” on its website. As of Tuesday, the fundraiser was up to five hens. Folks who want to follow along to see how the project is going can go to https://wintergreenfamilyfarm.com/brownbag/.
“I’m building a new coop right now,” Mowen said Tuesday. “We’re pretty excited.”
Mowen has a couple motivators for creating the food pantry flock.
“I remember what it was like to be hungry as a kid,” he said, expressing deep concern about food insecurity facing many people.
As a sociology professor at Bowling Green State University, Mowen has written about food insecurity – but realized that his studies have not fed a single child. By using his farmland and expertise, he can help put food on tables.
“I can raise 50 hens. I can feed them. Every egg will go to Brown Bag,” he said. “I can make a difference in my community.”
Since egg prices increased so much last year and continue to be high, Brown Bag Food Pantry has not been able to purchase them from food banks. At one point, the food pantry organizers, Peg Holland and Amy Holland, sent Mowen home with 500 empty egg cartons to fill.
“We can probably fill those,” he said.
“We have not been purchasing eggs because of the cost,” Peg Holland said. That has been a real loss for food pantry patrons – especially with the number of families needing food hit 110 last week alone.
The inability to buy eggs, along with the lack of meat at food banks means far less protein available for local families in need. The Brown Bag freezers have been nearly depleted at times, Holland said. Oftentimes, the pantry relies on generosity of organizations, like the Wood County Park District which recently donated pounds of pork from a hog slaughtered at the Carter Historic Farm.
The chicken flock is an exciting prospect for the Brown Bag, with the hens expected to lay enough eggs to fill cartons for every family in need of food.
“We are very excited about the chickens,” Holland said.
