Egg shortage caused by bird flu impacting Petaluma poultry farmers
The current egg supply shortage from the bird flu is causing difficulties for those farmers who produce eggs in the North Bay.
It is impossible to go out to breakfast or visit a supermarket and not notice the massive leap in the price of eggs.
Petaluma was once known as "the egg basket of the world." That's changed over the years, mainly for economic reasons, but it's still an important industry in Sonoma County. Those Petaluma egg farmers are being hit as hard as anybody by the avian flu epidemic.
When you enter the McIsaac family dairy and egg farm, you don't go far until you reach the end of the line for visitors.
"We're looking at the buildings just beyond the hillside to the left there," explained Jessica McIsaac, pointing at the top of a barn in the distance. That was as close as CBS News Bay Area cameras could get.
The avian flu is forcing McIsaac to take biosecurity very seriously. In January of 2024, the virus was detected at Sunrise Farms, a large Petaluma egg producer. That discover forced the business to euthanize its entire flock -- more than half a million birds -- to keep it from spreading across Sonoma County.
"As both a poultry producer and dairy farmer, having the bird flu present in California, it's very stressful on a daily basis," said McIsaac. "Very stressful to keep our animals healthy and to keep our business viable."
But it's the price of eggs that has everyone talking. A supermarket in Petaluma was selling a dozen eggs for more than ten dollars. At Mac's Deli and Cafe in Santa Rosa, customers were still ordering egg dishes despite a two-dollar surcharge on each order.
"Eggs are really important. We go through a lot of eggs," said Mac's manager Tatum Soltani. "They're usually $46 a case. And right now they're $146 a case. So we're spending about $4,000 on eggs alone every month."
"You have to kind of adapt to the situation," said customer Mike Mullins. "I don't really understand, I guess, why people would be so angry about something restaurants don't have any control over."
But McIsaac said they don't have much control either. With the huge drop in the laying-hen population nationwide, egg producers are also paying much higher prices for everything, including replacement stock. Supply has dropped, but demand hasn't, and it's having an effect on all aspects of the food chain.
So what can be done? On Tuesday, the USDA unveiled a five-point plan that includes more money for biosecurity, cutting regulations on egg production and raising of backyard chickens, and temporarily importing 70 to 100 million eggs from foreign sources.
But missing from the list is any plan for a vaccine. Chickens are currently being vaccinated in Mexico, but Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins said the federal government wants to study it more closely.
"It isn't a proven vaccine yet. So I was hesitant in rolling anything out that would require more vaccinations without understanding first exactly would it solve the problem," Rollins said. "So instead, we're going to put some significant funding into researching how we get to that point."
But McIsaac said she thinks bio-security can only go so far when the virus can be spread by wild birds flying overhead.
"The problem isn't caused on the farm," she said. "Farmers have figured out where the disease comes from, so I feel the only way that we're going to see a change is if a vaccine is implemented."
So far, bird flu has not made the jump to the human population, but consumers are certainly seeing its impact on a daily basis. And those who produce eggs in the North Bay feel like they're on the front lines of a battle with few weapons to fight it.
