Stalwart of the Scottish egg scene Dennis Surgenor has passed away following a short illness at the age of 90.
Mr Surgenor will be remembered best by most as the author of the Scottish Egg Producer Retailers Association (Sepra) report for 40 years.
Sepra was born out of the need for producers who marketed their own eggs and used the British Egg Marketing Board to offload surpluses.
With the decline of the BEMB, Sepra initially became a means for producers to clear surplus eggs and report any market price changes. It later improved its market data by including cost per dozen tables incorporating feed prices.
But many looked out for the weekly reports for the titbits of gossip picked up on the pages.
Sepra as an organisation grew quickly. By 1972 there were 75 members paying a £3 for an annual membership.
In 1977 Dennis was awarded a Nuffield Scholarship and toured the US and Canada to “find out how the other half managed to survive”, as he put it.
In 1992 he was awarded an MBE by Her Majesty the Queen for his services to the poultry industry in Scotland.
Later, in the mid 90’s, Dennis initiated the Poultry Club of Scotland, which each year hosts a very popular annual bash for the poultry sector at the Dunblane Hydro.
And in 1998, at the age of 70, he was asked by charity Edinburgh Direct Aid to go to war-torn Bosnia to help widows set up laying units on smallholdings and market their eggs.
In his last Sepra report, published in late 2011, Dennis said: “The egg industry over the years had been good to me and it has given me much pleasure, a living and found me lots of friends.”
His funeral will be held on Thursday 4 July at 12:15 at Falkirk Crematorium.
