Families flock to Rheged to see chicks hatching

The Lakes Free Range Egg Company (The Lakes) has provided what has proved to be a star attraction at the Rheged Centre near Penrith this Easter – hatching chicks.  ‘The Lakes’ installed incubators for soon to hatch eggs and a heated chick run for the new arrivals. Carefully planned to hatch one a day during the Easter holidays the chicks have helped make The Rheged Centre a destination visit for the holidays.

The Lakes Free Range Egg Company has been working with Rebecca Skelton, Events Manager at The Rheged Centre during the Easter holidays to enhance the visitor experience. Their vision was to create a fun and entertaining way to create more interest in the food chain – especially focusing on eggs.  For the past few years the team has refined what they do, in order for visitors to see more and learn more about chick and egg production.

Rebecca Skelton, Events Manager at The Rheged Centre said “It’s lovely working with local companies like the Lakes Free Range Egg team at Stainton. We have been in partnership for 3 years now and we love seeing the chicks hatch each day.  It’s always so popular; children come in their crowds to see the incubators and eggs and come back time and time again to see them hatch as chicks, they’ve always got lots of questions and its great fun to watch.  We work hard to try and ensure there is at least one new chick hatched each day during the holiday period.”

With egg packing station just down the road, the Lakes team are able to call in to Rheged on a daily basis to checListening to eggs hatchingk the chicks and hatching progress.  Something they are well qualified to do. 95% of their free range egg producing flocks start life as day old chicks reared by sister company Performance Pullets, ensuring their hens start life as healthy as possible.

The Lakes Free Rang Egg Company has won awards for animal welfare and environmental provenance and are always keen to promote their ethos to the public. Roger Gill, Head of Agriculture at the Lakes Free Range Egg Company said “We like to support Cumbrian businesses and this is on our doorstep. As a key visitor attraction in Cumbria, the hatching unit is a great showcase opportunity for the public to find out what chick rearing and egg production is all about – perfect at Easter. And if it inspires more people to buy free range eggs, that’s a bonus.”

During the two week Easter holidays, it is anticipated there will be around twenty thousand visitors at the Rheged Centre, most of whom will flock upstairs to see the chicks.

Rheged is running a competition to name a chick – it runs until April 8th when the winner of a £10 voucher will be announced.