Daniel Obrien
At 15 years of age, Daniel Obrien left high school to pursue his passion, chicken farming. He spent time working on several meat-chicken and free-range egg farms in NSW.
During this time, he learnt that hens are happiest and healthiest, not just when they have plenty of space to roam but when they are given fresh pasture regularly. He also learnt that when layer hens are happy and healthy, they produce the most delicious eggs.
In 2011 Daniel purchased 2000 layer hens, leased some land from a grazier, and set out on a mission to produce the most delicious egg in Australia. He would regularly move the flock to fresh pasture and underwent a process of tweaking his management practices to improve the nutritional quality and taste of his eggs.
Throughout this process, Daniel and his brother developed six mobile coops for use on the farm. They were optimised to make the pastured egg farm as efficient as possible. The design included solar-powered auto rollaway nesting boxes, a conveyer belt for egg collection and, of course, the ability to move the coops to fresh pasture easily.
They called them "Chicken Caravans" and, in late 2011, launched them for sale at a local ag expo. Soon, the brothers were selling these Chicken Caravans to farmers all over Australia.
Meanwhile, Daniel knew they had come pretty close to achieving his goal of producing Australia's most delicious egg when some of the country's top restaurants wanted to use their eggs. Rockpool Restaurant Sydney was using their eggs exclusively, as was Agape Restaurant Botany Bay, the largest certified organic restaurant in the country.
Since then, Daniel and his brother have developed the Chicken 600, capable of housing 600-layer hens and an array of smaller mobile coops and chicken farming accessories. Today there are Chicken Caravans in use across all states and territories of Australia, as well as in America, Europe, Canada and Asia.
Daniel now offers consulting and advisory work to help farmers run prosperous businesses and implement efficient pastured poultry systems.
