Adding to the Flock

When I retired I had received a gift card to Wilco Farm Stores from the chiefs and other staff members. The card was for $150 - a very generous gift. It didn't take long for me to decide what I would use it on - CHICKS! Wilco starts making chicks available toward the end of January and continues through to late spring. Then they have more during the month of September. 

We need to back up here a little...

My M.O. has been to add pullets in September so that by the time Spring rolls around, they will be ready to start laying. Last September I added six Buff Orpingtons and six Sapphire Blue Plymouth Rocks. As of today we only have two of the six Buffs, but all of the Saffies. I'm a little disappointed, but those little Buffs decided to explore and didn't get into their house one night. Farm life right? We usually lose at least one once they are outside full-time, but to lose three at once? That was new.

One Buffy and One Saffy

The young hens are getting close to laying. They have been making the laying hen sound which is kind of a There's-Something-I-Gotta-Push-Out sound. In the next week or so we'll be moving all of the hens to the back of the property where it is nice and clean and not yet poopy or muddy. The young hens will be joining them out there as well. 

Okay, so yesterday Tom and I went out to Wilco in Battle Ground and I picked out a couple of breeds that I have been wanting to add, but either didn't want to spend the amount that they were priced at or they were not available. So, to give myself an idea of what might be available I checked out what they might have in stock starting this month. The breeds that I decided on were the Speckled Sussex, Cuckoo Maran and the Delaware. Of the three I really wanted the Speckled Sussex, but they didn't have that one. However, they did have the Cuckoo Maran (the most expensive of the three). The other breed that I decided on was the Easter Egger, which was listed as an Ameraucana Easter Egger on the receipt. I'm not sure what that means, but I wanted to add another color of egg to the mix. As the name implies, Easter Egger, they lay blue or green eggs. The Maran's eggs should be a dark brown - I've been wanting dark brown eggs!

The BEST part - during this month Wilco has a deal on chicks, buy two get one free. Score! Before I knew about the sale I was thinking that I would pick out three different breeds and get six of each. After I read through the last Wilco email that I got I decided to go ahead and get a dozen - which means that I would only pay for eight chicks. After my purchase I had to study the receipt to figure out how they charged me. This is the weird part, the Ameraucana EE's price was posted at $3.99, but the receipt showed $3.89. The Maran's were $5.99, but were $5.89 on the receipt. There must have been some other crazy deal that I'm not aware of, I'm not complaining. Just confused. Meh...In the end I got four of the Ameraucana's at no charge and paid for the remainder. Now, I have quite a bit left on the gift card, so I might just wait until fall and add more layers. We'll see.

A little vid from their ride home from Battle Ground...

These littles were quite lively yesterday afternoon I swear they grew!

So, why are we adding to the flock? Well, many of the girls are from our original 2017 flock and the average egg laying cycle of a hen is around two and half to three years. Rather than continuing to feed hens that are no longer producing eggs, we would rather add to the flock and process the older hens and use them as stewing hens. Yep, a purpose for everything. We are a little behind as far as culling the flock goes, but that should happen sometime this spring. Well, that's what I'm hoping.

Just how many laying hens do we have? The simple answer is that I don' know. I think a year ago we had around 30-ish hens. This number included the 10 hens that we received from one of the captains at the fire station. Currently I think we have maybe 25 hens, but 7 of them are not producing anything so the new buffs and saffs are their replacements. Once the new pullets are ready to join the flock we may be up to 30+ hens. 

In a way I'm ready to have eggs coming out of our ears and running out of space to store all of them! Since our last sale of one dozen eggs last month we have had enough eggs to meet our own needs. 

My goal is to have plenty of eggs available for those friends/neighbors who have been coming to us to buy eggs. Once all of the hens are laying we'll be able to use the egg money to offset the feed costs. Winter is not our favorite time as the hens are not laying much, if at all. There have been a few days when there were NO eggs. Fortunately, we haven't been totally out of eggs because the ducks are still laying. It would kill me to actually buy eggs at the store. Especially since we haven't bought eggs since the summer of 2017!

Farm Life, Best Life!

Daily Note for April 9, 2020

Okay, so we'll see how long this lasts - my track record here hasn't been very good. However, since I am stuck at home during this COVID-19 crisis, I may as well record some daily happenings.

Probably the cutest thing from the day had to be one of our itty-bitty American Guinea Hog piglets was getting a full-body massage.

From our experience with his big daddy, Rex, it didn't surprise us that this little dude enjoyed a good belly rub. With Rex sometimes all we would do is barely touch his side and he would totally plop down for a full-body massage like his off-spring.

Yep - the CUTEST!

Yesterday, the meaties finally were transferred out of the livestock tank that we used for a brooder and into the new and improved Stress Free Chicken Tractor.

This is definitely a deluxe living space for the meaties! The first build was almost to the specifications in the Stress Free Chicken Tractor book. Almost because the bending of the metal conduit was not going well and Tom ended up using miscellaneous copper joints to make the frame that would be the roof. This one features plastic electrical conduit and instead of a tarp, wavy plastic panels. The other plus about this is that I can stand upright in this one and there is a lot of head space to boot. The meaties were very hesitant at first, but were convinced after I brought them an extra portion of food for the day.

The work that I did today was mind-numbing, but at least I have the piglets and the chickens and ducks to visit throughout the day. I have decided to take a day of vacation tomorrow. Even though I am home, I am supposed to be doing work stuff and not farm stuff. Tomorrow I'm gonna be a farmer!

Farm Life - Best Life!

2019 Freedom Ranger Project

March 5, 2019

In the last few months I have been reading different books and watching documentaries and YouTube vids on food. I am realizing how messed up the food is that you can buy at your local store. Sure I knew that organic food choices would be better, but until now I couldn't justify paying so much more for food that is not only certified organic, but non-GMO on top of that. I'm not going to go into the perils of the food that we put into our shopping carts and then onto our tables. I'll leave that to anyone who is reading this. This all started with Nourishing Traditions a cookbook with a very compelling introduction. Then came In Defense of Food by Michael Pollan and then to really top things of we watched a documentary called Secret Ingredients. If you have ever seen the "dirty foods" list this film will really make you think. As I mentioned before I will not go into any of the things that are so compelling in regards to our (or anyone's) food journey. That will be up to you - I have included the links for your convenience.

We try to make better choices and we also grow a portion of the food that ends up on our own table. At first it was just a variety of favorite vegetables that are always best fresh from the garden (or the Farmer's Market if you don't garden). I also subscribe to Imperfect Produce to fill in the gaps here and there. Last year we added Butcher Box to have some meat choices in the freezer.

Then in the spring of 2017 when we added our first flock of supposed laying hens and found out by the end of summer that half were cockerels. We had to put a stop to that. We butchered our first chickens the fall of 2017. It wasn't a great experience, but we (or I) decided that maybe we could do this. Raising chickens is quite easy, why not raise chickens for meat?

In 2018 we took our first step toward growing meat for food to fill our freezer and it was not a bad experience. We still have one chicken left in the freezer from our September harvest. The only thing that was not good about last year's harvest...our own inexperience. Growing laying hens isn't much different than meat chickens. A chicken is a chicken and they will eat if there is food to be had. We made a big mistake and fed the meat chickens an evening ration (although not quite equal to their morning ration) and it was not necessarily a good thing. We had a big fail in that the chicks grew so fast that their little bodies would grow like crazy, but their little hearts couldn't keep up. We ended up losing nine chicks to over-feeding. Imagine that! HUGE fail. Even with the fail we were pleased with the outcome. We had put homegrown meat in the freezer!

The changes that we made:

FEEDING SCHEDULE

First we did not over feed the chicks. They received two feedings a day for the first few weeks, up until we put them outside full time. That worked out great! Once they were big enough to handle a little extra food in the evening - which really was a bedtime snack of some scratch. We would throw some scratch into the chicken tractor as a way to get them to go in for the night. Yeah, chickens will naturally put themselves to bed - even the meaties, but it was just easier to do it while it was still light out so we only had one flock to deal with later in the evening. They got used to that routine in no time flat! Extra food for a growing meat chicken, they will not turn their beaks up to that. Also, this year's meaties were able to run around and eat grass and chase after bugs to help fill their bellies throughout the day (spoiler alert we got them a special fence).

GROW-OUT TIME

The other thing we did was give this batch of chicks an extra couple of weeks to get good and fat. So instead of harvesting them at 11 weeks old we did the harvest at 13 1/2 weeks. Even then, in the last few days I thought we would have some fatty's for sure and I was a little surprised that there wasn't a chicken that was six pounds! There was one that was close though. They really were quite large too. Our two littlest meaties were both 3lb 15oz. and the largest at 5lb 13oz. Not too shabby really. All in all we ended up with 115lbs 8oz of meat in the freezer.

Chicks first day on Grass

FREE TO ROAM (sort of)

The last thing that really made a difference would be the Shock or Not fence from Premier1 Supplies. First saw this on the Justin Rhodes channel last year. I saw how they could get their chicks out on grass much sooner than norm. This netting is a real game changer! The chicks were relocated from the Brooder to the chicken tractor at not quite 4 weeks old. They enjoyed days out on grass and evenings in the chicken tractor with the heat lamps on. It was still pretty chilly at the end of March so we kept the lights on them for a few more weeks. During the day they were free to explore their enclosed area and were happy to be outdoors. Last year's poor littles didn't have that opportunity. They had a teeny-tiny space that was more of a courtyard, a tiny one, to come out and look at something other than each other and to pick at some clean grass. They couldn't even get away from their own stinky poo. It would have been nice to have this fence last year, but it wasn't in the budget.

Processing day was fairly uneventful and we were able to finish the job with the help of our neighbor/friend in about two and a half hours. It took two hours for Tom to complete the killing, scalding and plucking and a few minutes longer for Julie and I to finish up the evisceration. I had a couple of other people who said they would come, but they didn't show. Which is fine, but it would have been nice to know that they would not be coming. In the end just having the three of us was nice as we didn't have to do any sort of instructions at the beginning - that would have definitely slowed us down. We'll be ready next year for new peeps though. Last weekedn I chatted with a friend of mine who asked me if this was something that she should do. I told her it's not for everyone, but at least knowing how the chicks are raised and observing the process wouldn't be a bad idea. We'll see - next year might be the teaching year.

With the changes that we made from last year's big fail, we ended up with 24 plump chickens. All brined, bagged, weighed and sitting in the freezer for a future meal. HUGE WIN!

Twenty-Four Chickens ready for the freezer.

Having no meaties to take care of in the evening is both good and bad. Good in that we are now not spending the extra money to grow them out. Bad because I got used to hanging out with them and watching them while they were out in the field. I'm not going to lie, it is bittersweet. The first kill is a little sad, but then as you move forward you have to remember that these chicks were raised for a purpose. To put good, clean food into the freezer and then onto our table.

June 8, 2019

The Harvest of...

animals....more specifically ones with feathers.

A few people are aware that we raise chickens for meat and that the piglets that may come will also become bacon and ham.

The reactions are varied, but mostly whoever we might be chatting with will undoubtedly say "Oh, I couldn't do that!" Well, we usually aren't asking anyone to participate in our crazy ways unless they show a little bit of interest. Also, we try to steer the conversation away from the chopping the head off of a chicken and try to explain the humane way of doing the deed. Still no one wants to hear that there is a better(?) way.

You know, I have to say that I probably would be that person too. However, when you grow up with chickens and ducks inevitably one or more of those birds will end up in the soup pot. Which they did and my mom was tricksey about it and didn't say so ahead of time.

OH MY GOODNESS....

Well, the old chickens have to go sometime right? I imagine that his one had outlived it's productive tendencies and was just taking up space. Back then I never thought about it. It was just something that my mom did. At that time I don't think that I had much to do with the process. I think I may have been present for one of the slaughters...but I don't remember.

So fast forward a lot of years and here I am growing my own food. We (Tom and I) are growing a lot of our food. Not all though and I will be the first to say that we could do better, but we are growing more than we ever used to.

We are more that halfway to the next Freedom Ranger harvest date. On June 8th we'll be harvesting our 24 Meaties. Over the next several weeks I'll be testing the waters and looking to see who we might recruit to help with the big day. I already have a couple of people who are interested, but more hands is always a good thing.

There is no delicate way to ask someone to join in the experience. When we do just ask out right it's fairly easy to tell which camp someone is in. If we hear "Ummm...no...I couldn't do that." or just a adamant head shaking. Okay, that's probably a no. Then there are those who say "Yeah, that would be interesting I'll come watch." I also know who NOT to ask - I do want to keep certain friendships intact.

You get the idea.

So I do have a couple of neighbors who I hope will be able to come help. One is a woman who helped us last year and she was all over the evisceration of the chickens. The other is a neighbor down the street from us who is very curious about raising chickens for meat and would like to come and learn. If he has done what I suggested, maybe he'll have a couple of his own birds to harvest also.

I'm very excited that we have gotten to eight weeks with 24 chicks. I am optimistic that we will get through the next five weeks with 24.

Farm Life - it's not so bad...in fact it's awesome!

April 1 - 6, 2019

We just love these two pigs!

This week was Washington's Spring Break. So my week at work was pretty slow and kinda tiring in a way. I would much rather be at home doing my farm stuff than sitting at work trying to get to the end of the day. Here are some of the happenings from the last week.

The Freedom Rangers:

The Freedom Rangers have been doing quite well out in the Chicken Tractor and have had a few opportunities to forage in their fenced area - which is new this year. Last Sunday - after we returned from church I relocated the two chicks that were injured to the outside area. They spent a full week apart from the others, but blended right in pretty quickly. So that's a happy thing.

Today was their first move while in the tractor and we are heading out toward the field now. This spot will be so much better for them - they started their first week on the spot where the ducks were before we moved them out near the pigs. So there was a lot of straw and nearly bare lawn ready for them to poop it up.

As of today we are at nine weeks to go. The time will go by quickly and before we know it we'll be off to pick up the poultry kit at the Conservation District in Battle Ground and getting ready to set up the processing area. We will move part of the processing into the garage - the evisceration area. I doubt that it will keep the Yellow Jackets away more, but I think it will be a cleaner area overall. I have a couple of people who have already said that they will help and I might have one more person. I really want to make sure that we get this done efficiently and more hands will help in that area. We'll see. In the end we need to be flexible and just go with the flow.

The PIGS:

Well, we had hoped that Fiona would be bred again, but she had a heat cycle toward the end of March. We don't know if Rex was able to get the deed done, so we are watching to see if she has another cycle this month. However just earlier this afternoon I was observing the pigs and Fiona has a look about her than might suggest that she is pregnant. Her teats are starting to look elongated and her belly is starting to sag.

Now, I don't know if pigs are like humans in that their bodies go into pregnancy mode after a few weeks in anticipation of starting to carry a baby or piglets in this case. So, as we are unsure of her status we'll just have to wait and see if she goes into heat again this month. Hope, Hope...

The Shelter:

We have a plan to revamp the old parking structure into a pig/storage shelter. With all of the other projects that has been put on hold. So Fiona could wait on being pregnant again so that there will be time to get a more appropriate area ready for her and Rex.

Here is the structure in all of it's dilapidated glory - this was in February. At some point we'll be able to circle back around to this project and get it going again. Like how I said "we'll?" hahahahaha. I'm only qualified to pass tools or hold the ladder or whatever. My hope is to turn the left part of the structure into a swine condo along with a farrowing room for Fiona. We have no idea what the room was used for, but it is perfect for our princess pig to give birth in. I also have a vision to incorporate a couple of stalls to try to keep the adults separated from the littles. They would also have easy access to pasture behind the shed to get out and graze a bit. There are a couple of other things that are happening that actually is more important and this project will be on hold for the rest of the month - most likely. That and it is April and the rains have started up this past week. Welcome Spring...Indeed.

The Garden:

Last weekend I thought I would broadfork the big garden. After a couple of passes I was over it and decided that the rototiller would be best. The garden is very compacted right now for some reason and it was difficult getting the broadfork to go very deep at all. Tom was planning to rototill anyway so he started with the garden and I dragged the silage tarp out and it is now covering the garden until it's time to plant.

In going through and ditching some of my old seeds I found an old package of peas that are the bush variety. They were from 2017 and unopened. I decided to see if they would germinate and now that it is nearly two  weeks later and still nothing. Okay, I'll have to figure something else out and plant the seeds that I saved from last years pea crop. They are one of the first seeds that I decided to save so I'm excited. In fact I'll plant the bean seeds that I saved from last year's beans as well. Both seeds came from Seed Savers Exchange.

Tomorrow I will be working on starting seeds again. The flower seeds that I sowed several weeks ago are doing alright so that's a good thing. There is one tray in which nothing germinated - which in itself is a frustrating thing. I think the soil that I chose wasn't a good choice as some of the seeds were from last year and should still have been viable. Other things did okay, but not great. So, I think I will be coming up with a new plan and see how it goes. There are a two or three other veggies that I want to grow, but I need to get the seeds first. I will probably spend some time in the hoop house tomorrow afternoon and maybe start a few extra tomato seeds and get some lettuce seeds sowed somewhere else in the hoop house bed. Maybe April will be a better month.

I always look forward to the days that I can spend time at home working on projects. One day this will be my everyday thing. One day.

Farm Life is My Favorite Life!

Then There Were Twenty-Four

Over the weekend we got the Meaties out into the yard and within the new Premier 1 Shock or Not fence. They actually had two field trips out of the garage!

On Saturday we transferred them by carrying the brooder out - it needed to be dumped of the shavings anyway - and then grabbed them and plopped them in the yard. They didn't know what to do of course and there was some peeping, but within a couple of minutes they started getting active and started poking around.

It didn't take long for them to start spreading out

These two were not convinced

After about 3 hours in the morning we gathered them up again and returned them to the brooder. Only then did they realize that they were tired and needed to rest.

On Sunday after we returned from church we promptly got them out again and let them have some more outside time. The fresh air was really what I wanted them to have. They stink up their brooder pretty quick. This time they got busy right away and were running around and looking for natural treats in the grass. There is a good sized divot near the far corner and most of the them were crowded in it looking for bugs and such.

Things were going pretty well and I was in and out of the house several time. I think after about an hour I was coming back outside when I looked to the chicks and they were not moving and in complete high alert mode. As I walked over I noticed a couple that were sitting together on one side and then across from them on the other side one of the chicks was dead. Just like that...I don't think that I was in the house all that long a few minutes at most.

After alerting Tom and getting the dead chick out I went to check out the two that were together and one of them moved on, but the other one was extremely still. Upon closer examination I saw that he/she was still alive so I picked it up and there was blood - insert colorful language here - I wanted to cry because now we had an injured chickie on our hands. Tom was still messing around with the dead one when I informed him of the injured one and that we needed to get a bin set up with water and some pine shavings.

A few minutes later as I was observing the chicks some more I noticed one that had some blood on it AND some of its friends were picking its body. Okay - so more than two of the chicks were affected by the attack. 

Long story short we decided the crows that were hanging around tried to get a free meal and tried to make off with a couple of the babies. I think that the one that died must have had a little heart attack or something - that one had no wounds on it. It also seems that the chicks are at a size that makes it difficult for a crow to carry them away in their beaks. If they were a true predator they would swoop down and pick them up using their claws. I learned that crows are opportunistic creatures and will sit and watch until the moment is just right. 

The remainder of the chicks spent the rest of their time out in the yard in their fenced area underneath a bird netting. We may have to install bird netting over their area when they are outside full-time, but I am hoping that they will reach a size that will not be so appealing for a crow to try and get one again. 

As much as this makes me not enjoy having the crows around...they do tend to keep the hawks at a distance by being annoying to them.

The Twenty-Two Healthy Chicks

Our two ICU patients

Overall, getting them out was a success and they really did enjoy getting to stretch their wings and spar with each other along with looking for things in the grass. The fact that we only lost one is amazing...it could have been so much worse. The two chicks will be isolated until they are nearly healed up again - even if they have to stay indoors while we get the rest out of the garage this weekend.

Farm Life Isn't the Easiest.....but Baby Chicks!

Graduation Day #1

The meaties will be moving out of the Brooder and into the Stress Free Chicken Tractor hopefully right before April arrives.

They currently live within a box that is approximately  2' or 3' x 4'. With each passing day they are steadily filling in the space - with growing chickie bodies and poo. We have removed the heating plate and one of the lamps. As their feathers start coming in they need the heat lamp less and less. Last night I took one last look at them and they were all bunched at the opposite end of the brooder away from the lamp. While I would like to take the lamp down, I think I'll let it stay in the event that we have some cooler nights ahead of us still.

Before we can move the meaties out, we have to come up with a new house for the Magpie Squad. They are currently in the Chicken Tractor and have become quite accustomed to the spacious accommodations. They'll have to adjust naturally and they will get a new not as large home, but one that is custom made by Tom!

The beginnings of the new duck condo

Hopefully more work can be done on the duck house and we can get it in place sooner than later. I'm pretty sure that they will protest a bit, but they adapt fairly quickly. They may even like the smaller house rather than the tractor:

The Stress Free Chicken Tractor being put in service

The dimensions of the duck condo is one pallet wide by 2 pallets long...that's all I know. Much smaller than what the duckies are used to.

The twenty-five meaties will have lots of room to experience fresh grass and with the fence - they will even have the opportunity to explore outside of the tractor.

Premier 1 Supplies has a newer poultry netting that is specifically designed for chicks. I first saw this on the Justin Rhodes channel - he and Premier have a pretty good relationship and he is the reason we use Premier for all of our portable fencing needs. This is the video that he published when he put the fence out for the first time:

The first thing Tom commented on is how tall the fence is. I think the regular fence is the same, but maybe those fence are 42" either way this one seems taller.

Tom went to run an errand so I decided to work on getting the fence set up. It was easy, just like the regular fence, but the prongs would get caught up in the small mesh portion of the fence. 

The meaties will get a preview of outdoor life hopefully this weekend. It would be nice to clean out the brooder and freshen it up for their last week or so in the garage. It's hard to say how they will react once they are on grass. However, I'm sure that they will be curious about the grass and maybe even start looking for things to eat in the grass. The trick will be gathering them back up to get them back into the box.

This fence will change the way our chicks grow up - maybe they will be even MORE meaty than last year's bunch. Last year I really enjoyed hanging out with the meaties and taking photos daily and some video here and there. This year will be no different.

Soon enough they will be out of this:

They have space now, but soon they will be totally on top of each other

Last year the meaties had a small courtyard

In eleven weeks we'll be graduating the new batch of Freedom Rangers to the freezer. Until then we'll enjoy watching them grow each and every day while moving them around the field every couple of days to new grass.

Farm Life is the Best Life - with new(ish) chicks.

March 2019 Vacation

Today is my last day of vacation before the weekend. What did I accomplish this week?

On Monday we spent the day doing stuff around the house and enjoying the REALLY nice weather. I don't think that it was terribly warm, but it wasn't cut to the bone cold. We did have a dinner invitation to our friends house - it started with a suggestion to go have coffee - to us bringing dessert to said friend's house to them providing dinner. It's hard to one-up that one, so dinner with friends it is!

Tuesday was pick-up day at Jenk's - or rather at the pick-up location for Jenk's which is a gas station a couple of miles away from the hatchery. The drive to Tangent was uneventful as was the drive back - although there were more cars going toward Portland which is not unusual. Anyway, the little Freedom Rangers came home on Tuesday and there have already been changes just three days later. Today I noticed that their little feathers on their wings starting to develop.

Other than those two things, the week has been pretty quiet and relaxing. Felida Bible as a church doesn't observe the Lenten Season, but our Small Group has decided to observe this year. This is the first time that we have been a part of a group that is observing a practice that is mainly connected to catholics or lutherans among others. I had been thinking about doing something anyway as a way to refocus time that I spend playing games on my Kindle. I suppose the Lord has been gently nudging me to give up the games and other time wasters. I felt even more convicted when another player on one of my games announced via a group chat that she would be deleting all the games she plays for Lent. So, I hopped onto the chat and announced my intention to remove my games and here we are. So far I don't really miss the games and I have been spending more time reading my bible and have even made some progress in a couple of my books. Definitely the right decision. 

The only other thing that is worth noting is that we went to the movies on Thursday. We haven't gone to a movie theater in a while and Tom has been wanting to go. It's always been something he has liked to do. Me - not so much. Since he is willing to see anything that looks interesting to me I got to choose the movie. I decided that Green Book looked interesting. There was only one showtime yesterday at 4:10 at the Vancouver Mall Cinetopia. There were only two other people in the theater so it was kind of nice. Good movie too.

Overall this has been a relaxing week and even though I didn't accomplish a lot as far as our farm, I'm okay with that. I needed rest and relaxation.

One more video for fun.

Rest and relaxation on the farm is best.

Why I Take Vacation

In the years before we started our farm we would take vacations - like to places. For a football or baseball game or one year we flew across the country to participate in a running event. Other times we used vacation time for church missions trip to Tijuana.

These days my vacation time is spent hanging around home and doing farm projects. Whether is starting seeds or planting the garden or getting ready to add some feathered critters my time is spent here at home.

Today, March 5th, we are heading out to pick up our Freedom Rangers at Jenks Hatchery near Albany, Oregon. I choose to pick-up because today is the actual hatch day of our chicks and I know exactly how old they are and how long to let them grow-out before they graduate to the freezer.

Last year was our first time growing Freedom Rangers and it was successful - for the most part. We ended up losing 9 chicks in the process, but there has to be loss and learning at the same time. Otherwise we would get too full of ourselves thinking that we got this down. Farm life is not like that. We learn something new everyday or every week at the very least.

Choosing to grow our own food isn't easy, but we can't always rely on commercially grown food for good quality, nutritious food. We do subscription meat via Butcher Box and we do get a few organic vegetables from Imperfect Produce. But to make up the rest of good food we have to grow it ourselves. Well, we don't have to, but we choose to.

Since we raised our first batch of meat chickens I don't think that we have purchased chicken at the store very many times since September. We make do with what we have and really...a whole chicken does go pretty far when it is roasted and eaten in a couple of different meals during the week.

So this week, while I am on vacation, I am working on farm projects and will be setting up a couple of seed trays in the Living Room. If our morning temperatures are in the 20s our seeds will never germinate outside! The pig palace will be worked on some more and garden spaces may get worked over with the broadfork.

Today though, we are going out of town to get our chicks!

25 Meaties!

Farm Life is the Best Life!

Less Than One Week

The Freedom Rangers all smooshed in the box.

The hours old chicks in the big brooder

The Meaties are coming back to the farm in less than a week! Actually, we are going to Tangent next week and will pick up our second batch of Freedom Rangers. As soon as that happens and we get them home, the countdown starts.

This year we are letting them grow out for just under 14 weeks. Our last batch was right around 11 weeks and the smallest was 3.5 lbs and the biggest may have been 4.5 lbs. I would like the smaller ones in this year's batch to have a chance to get just a little heftier by harvest day.

My other goal is to get to harvest day with a whole lot less loss than we had last year. Due to our inexperience we lost 9 chicks around week 4-ish. We should have started withholding food and keeping them to only daytime feeding. It was a huge lesson learned and now we know better.

Farm Life!

Less Than A Month...

In less than a month we'll be heading back to Tangent, OR to pick up...

Twenty-five Freedom Rangers

I'm so excited!! We are down to 4 or 5 chickens in the freezer right now so it's time to fill it up again!

This year will be better and we'll reach processing day with more meaties. Last year we ended up with 16 after losing 9 of them due to our inexperience. We are in the know and I'm confident that we will have more on processing day than last September.

I do love me a project and so I'll be posting their progress here weekly and by then we'll be in full swing getting gardens planted and more chicks and a couple of goslings as well. It's almost go time!

Farm living is the life...

Ultimate Harvest of 2018

July 5, 2018

September 22, 2018

Okay, so we are four days past the ultimate harvest of the year. I have had a chance to think about the importance of growing and processing our own birds and to do a little research of the method that we have seen over and over again on YouTube from other homesteaders (which I still do not claim to be).

When first mentioning that we are growing meat chickens the first thing that people ask after we say that this is a DIY project is, " Are you going to cut their heads off?"

Now I understand that's how many people see home chicken processing. I know that my mom did that, but I think...I'm not positive, but I am almost sure that she cut the head and then placed the chicken in a big metal drum while it was slowly dying it's awful and inhumane death.

The method that we went with is called Halal or can also be considered Kosher. Which in the simplest terms means that the kill is done quickly with a slit of the jugular and left to bleed out. From my research this is the Muslim tradition. If done correctly, there shouldn't be need for a second cut, but sometimes that happens. Like when I decide it's time for me to get one kill in and there are only three chickens left. All afternoon I was thinking how I should probably do at least one kill...and I kept meaning to, but was distracted with other tasks to hopefully make clean-up a little easier. In the end, clean up was the hardest...but I digress...I tried and Tom had to make another cut. While I did do one last year - sort of. This was easier, but still not enough for the bleed out to happen very quickly. I should have known better as they chicken was looking at me as if to ask what he or she had done to me to deserve a not so swift bleed out. Oh well, I'll have other opportunities at future processing times.

Three of the Rangers in Restraining Cones

After lots of google searches we decided that the birds would benefit from resting in the fridge overnight. This was to allow the rigor to leave the body. We let the birds sit overnight in the refrigerator and then placed them in a tub to brine the following day. Several people online had said that the brine would help make the chicken tender. Tom thought we should try half brined and half not, but in the end it was just easier to brine all of them.

On Monday it was time to drain and rinse and let the chicken dry...

Before bagging the birds we had to take the Poultry kit back to the Clark Conservation District and get our deposit money back :) The gentleman who helped us pointed out the "ring" around the top of the scalder and surmised that maybe we were not informed to be on the look out for that and to make sure that it was totally cleaned. Notes for next time - clean, clean and then clean some more. To be honest, the plucker was the most difficult to clean as the feathers got stuck underneath the rubber fingers. They did NOT want to come out very easily. There really is no way to avoid that unless we want to hand pluck. I will gladly spend the time getting the feathers out of the bazillion plucker fingers.

Once we returned we went ahead and started the process to bag the chickens. Oh My Goodness...I think that the shrink wrap bags is like the best thing EVER! Slide a chicken in the bag, place the tube in the cavity and get a zip tie on. Then a very short dip in boiling water and there is your perfectly bagged chicken!

This is just an overview of the weekend process. Would we do anything different? Sure...there is always room for improvement.

First, knives...a variety of sharp knives would have been better. Processing day came up pretty fast and we knew that the knife selection would be limited. In the end it worked out, but I suggested a trip to Good Will yesterday to see if we could find anything that would work. Luckily we found a set of kitchen knives (forged knives) that included a small clever and some shears for $6.99 (plus tax). That was an excellent find! Those will be easy to hone using the steel  or a bench grinder (if needed).

The other thing that we would do is place the scalder in the garage to protect it from the wind. At some point the pilot light went out because of the wind and the water temp dropped about 15 degrees cooler than it should have been. Tom figured out that the pilot light is not easy to see. Nothing a blow torch can't fix.

We will need to rethink the chill chest for after the birds have been eviscerated and ready to go into the refrigerator. Maybe an old refrigerator or a giant cooler. There is time, BUT now I'll be checking out craigslist for all sorts of stuff in the months to come.

The whole operation could be moved onto the lawn or maybe even directly in front of the garage. That way, when we are spraying stuff down or even emptying water out of things it will go into the lawn. That is something that we will explore next year.

Also, we might let the birds go one more week before processing them. That means more food for them, but that would also mean that the 3 pound birds that we had might weigh a little more.

While we are on the subject of weight - we ended up with 56 pounds of chicken from 15 birds - that averages out to 3.7 pounds per bird. I think that's a pretty awesome harvest at 11 weeks old.

Yep, I'm pretty excited about this chicken processing experience. I am ready to do this again...

Next Spring.

Farm Life Baby!

August 27 - 31, 2018

This week. Not the best week on a personal level.

From a medical fiasco to a death in the family - we have been kind of going through the motions where our farm is concerned. Maybe that's just me. I haven't been able to focus on much this week and while I have spent some time working outside, I found that I had very little joy in my heart this week.

What did happen around the farm?

Well, I harvested a few itty-bitty tomatoes called Mexico Midget:

Probably the cutest tomatoes I have ever seen! This was earlier in the week, I plucked some off the vine lastnight as well. Ate them right away too...SO GOOD!

The Freedom Rangers are now 7 weeks old and getting chubby! We have been able to pick up a chick here and there to get them used to be held and to show them that we aren't that bad.

So far, so good we end the week with 16. They are doing really well and they are crazy crazy! Four weeks from today we'll have the equipment ready to set up and get started bright and early on Saturday the 22nd. Can't wait!

Now we have another broody hen. She was pretty mad at me yesterday when I was collecting the eggs and she was sitting on all of them in one box. Seriously - a little scary.

This was last weekend when there were two broodies. The day after this they both went into jail and fortunately for them they only got one days as it started raining and they had no roof.

Since then the hen on the right has changed her attitude and possibly the one on the left. However, the current angry broody hen might be the same as above. We really don't know.

Tomorrow she is going back into jail. It might take a couple of days to break her, but  it's her own fault for thinking she can sit on eggs and get chickies. I've got news for you lady...no rooster!

This week hasn't been that fulfilling for me. I feel down on top of frustrated. At least this weekend isn't all full of activity. I won't feel bad about being a little lazy at some point over the next three days.

Even though my heart wasn't 100% into the farm this week, Farm life is still the best.

There's always tomorrow.

August 18, 2018 Evening Chores

Did some chicken and pig chores after dinner and got some more video...this time I got the Freedom Rangers. They finally decided to use the bucket waterer after their evening snack.

I thought I would start using our old Canon Point and Shoot camera that is from I don't know how long ago. The pictures/videos are still good, so I might as well. I can't say that it will make a difference with my videography skills.

ANYWAY...

We put together the bucket waterer for the original chickens that we started with and they just could get used to it. So it sat in the garage until this past week. The rangers immediately started to mess around with it and got even more excited when they got water out of it! We had to let the traditional waterer go dry so they would go back to the bucket. Success!

Another thing that was a first (for me at least) was seeing the Hooligans allowing Little Miss Phylis to eat the meal worms with them. It was amazing - Lenny is so food-centric that he doesn't like having other ducks around. Perhaps he is happy that Mr. Shelly has a girlfriend and that he is no longer jumping on him and riding him like he's in the rodeo. 

It's been a pretty relaxing day and I'm happy to have stayed home most of the day to rest and relax. I still didn't nap, but at least I didn't over exert myself earlier today.

Here's to another great day on the farm!

Life and Death

The harsh reality of farm life.

Out of 25 Freedom Rangers we are now, nearly 6 weeks into this adventure, down to 17 eating machines.

Let's break this down. Of the 8 chicks that were "lost" one decided to fly the coop (for lack of a better explanation). That one was totally our bad.

To make going in and out of the chicken tractor easier on us during feeding time. I  suggested that a piece of fence be installed - kind of like when the Magpie Squad was living in the tractor.  Otherwise those tricksey little birds would get out and run around as they already had done on more than one occasion. Also, every now and then we let them get out and check out the courtyard - but only under our supervision.

Yeah, I'm a hardass.

Rightfully so, the Sunday before this last Sunday, when it was a bazillion degrees outside. We had gone out to check on the critters. I decided to open the tractor door to let them roam a little and then after a few minutes I decided I needed some AC time. Yep, the Rangers were still out.

When I remembered it must have been at least an hour later, maybe more...I immediately went out and shoo'd them back in and called it good.

Later on, while doing the evening chores, both of us at separate times tried to take a head count. Most of the time I landed on 24, but there were a couple of times that I came up with 25. When Tom gave them their food and their were somewhat stationary, he came up with 24.

DANG!

Oh well, I guess he/she wanted to live up to his/her name...Freedom Ranger.

We have been diligent since then with the time that they get to leave the safety of the tractor to the fenced courtyard right outside their door. They get to come out and forage a bit, but once the food goes in so do they.

On Thursday or Friday of last week Tom discovered that a couple of the Rangers had died.

Oh...hmmm...what happened?

Since then there were a couple more, but on Monday not only were there dead chicks there were a couple of sickly chicks. So we quickly took them away from the seemingly vibrant and healthy chicks and put them in the brooder overnight. They were no longer in the poo, but then they also were not doing well.

The next morning we were surprised to see that they made it through the night. That was short-lived as the more sickly one finally gave up in the morning and the not so sickly one late afternoon.

The remaining 17 are pretty lively though, so we have hope that they will make it to processing day let alone, 6 weeks. I knew that there would be loss, but 7 of them dying, that was surprising.

Oop...hold the press I just did a quick google search...

Evidently around the 5-6 week mark high protein feed diets start to catch up with the little stinkers. So in essence, we have overfed the birds and their little bodies couldn't keep up. I was kind of right then thinking that their little hearts could not keep up with the rate of their growth. Also, I had read in a couple of places where other folks had a problem and that they experienced loss at a time that didn't seem right.

So, I think what we'll need to do with the next round of chicks is start restricting feed around 4 weeks and only feeding during the day. With this batch we were allowing 24/7 feeding up until the deaths started happening. Now that it has been a few days of taking the feeder out, we have noticed that the stinkers are doing better.

This morning I was trying to decide if continuing to raise Freedom Rangers or even the Cornish Cross would still be the right thing to do. I even explored the heritage breeds, the slower growing chickens and decided on the Orpington. However, I think that we can still do the Freedom Rangers and still order from the hatchery that is not far from us. The Freedom Ranger has a grow out rate of 11-12 weeks, which is quite predictable. The Cornish Cross grow out in 8 weeks, but that's just too soon.

Yes, I am THAT confident that the next batch will be better.

Oh how I hate this type of learning experience. However, if we don't have a fail here and there, we'll never learn anything.

Despite the challenges that we have had the past week I am still convinced that this life is the best and I wouldn't want it any other way.

Friday!

This week had to be the longest week ever! Maybe because I have been looking forward to this weekend! It's Mother Earth News Fair - Oregon this weekend :) YAY...

But first what happened this week?

Well, Miss Fiona is now 5 months old!

Fiona is still as sweet as ever and......hungry. I suppose that is never ending. This week we had a little bit  of  a situation. On Tuesday instead of having dinner and then going out to take care of the critters I had a Click List order ready at Freddy's. So I got home, Tom got into the car and we were off to pick up our groceries.

Well...for some reason ALL of the critters were extra hungry - don't know why. We got home, put the groceries away and ate some dinner. By the time we got out to feed everyone, it was much later than usual. I had already let the ducks and Lenny out...fortunately, they aren't a problem. They'll just forage until we feed them for real.

The problem was Missy pictured above...

I was in the garage getting food ready for them. They can totally see all of this going down, so they are squealing with hunger moreso than usual. I look out toward their enclosure and it's quiet and then I see Fiona and she is basically at the edge of the lawn and coming toward the garage. Guess who was a few steps behind...

Yep - Mr. Rexy decided that making a break for it was a good idea too. So he was trotting along behind Fiona.

It was a little shocking to see them NOT in their pen...but it was easy getting them back since they wanted FOOD!

At first Tom thought that they had broken part of the fence, but as it turns out they just popped the cap off the cornerpost and it was easy to put back together.

Lesson of the day....always, Always, ALWAYS turn the fence back ON.

AAAANNNNDD...

The Freedom Rangers are now FOUR weeks old!!

These littles are nearly feathered out now. They still are sporting a little bit of fuzz on their heads though. They were moved to a new spot in the yard and also have a "courtyard" area like the Magpies had. I had suggested that as a way to not have to chase them around after they escaped their house. Earlier this week Tom had to chase a couple of the chicks down - so the solution is a win. They are happy to pick at the fresh grass right outside of their door. Next time I think maybe a fence around the chicken tractor would give them the option to "play" on grass and scratch for bugs and other tasty items.

The mystery of Cleo - after more observation last night I still was not convinced of her supposed Rangerness. So I sent one of the photos to Jenks to get a final answer...

This morning I saw that there was a response and it said:

"I see your picture as attached, but I do not see which bird you are referring to. Could you please send me a         different photo?"

Ummmm...what? It's kinda obvious to me. Okay - so I sent this one:

REALLY? This isn't different enough?

After a couple of additional emails, I learned that there Cleo definitely is a Freedom Ranger. She just happened to develop some of the characteristics of the other breeds that were crossed to come up with the Freedom Ranger. Very interesting. He was appreciative of the photos and I am now a little smarter than before.

Lucky us huh...we are definitely going to keep Cleo. She doesn't necessarily like us coming after her, but once she is caught she settles down.

Our big thing this weekend is the MOTHER EARTH NEWS FAIR in Albany!!

This will be our third year going to this fair. A few weeks ago, I wasn't sure that I really wanted to go. I had looked at the different speakers and thought that maybe there wasn't anything that would be that interesting.

However, once I looked at a grid of the schedule when I could see ALL of the seminars I was able to see how we would be able to check out three different presentations starting at 10 AM and ending around 3 PM. Actually there would be time for another, we'll see how things shake out.

So much going well at home with the birds and pigs! The garden is doing well...flowers and veggies! I'll post photos soon.

But first...Mother Earth News fair!

Three Weeks Old

 

This is one of the 25 Freedom Rangers...just look at those feathers coming in. Those legs are HUGE...bigger than I would have expected actually.

This particular little one lets me hold him/her and is perfectly calm while I check them out. Kinda weird as this one is pretty spazzy and I'm pretty sure that this is the one spazzy chick from the brooder. Maybe they are trying to endear themself to me so they won't have to give up their life for the freezer and then eventually the dinner table.

It's too late little one, we have already decided on the ONE that we are keeping for the flock.

Cleo

This one has had a unique look since the very beginning and she continues to stay very different than all of the others. She seems to have a little more mottled coloring on her feathers and overall, she is generally pretty docile. She is developing well and seems very robust.

I guess if we keep her it would be like a token of the first batch of meat birds on our farm.

Here's to hoping that this she is really a she and that her stay with the current flock will be for a long time to come.

Farm Life is the Best Life!

Graduated

Even though the Freedom Rangers are not yet three weeks old, we moved them out of the brooder box that they have been housed in since we brought them home on the 5th.

Having them in the Brooder hasn't been bad, but they are eating machines and they are really good at converting food into poo...and quick! This brooder is fine for 6-10 chicks or ducks, but 25 meat chicken babies...NOPE.

It was so bad that the garage stunk really bad too! 

I didn't like the idea of them living in their own waste - which is hard to keep up with btw - so it was time to get them out. Up until Saturday they were extremely active - sparring with one another jumping on the waterer and just being crazy. I keep thinking that maybe we could make a brooder area out of the small room at the end of the parking shed. We'll see, it's just an idea right now. There are too many other things to tackle and the box is fine.

Anyway, in order to make the chicken tractor available the ducks needed to be moved first. The easy part was just letting the Magpie girls out of their enclosure and letting them do what they do. Which really was just foraging and exploring the back yard. 

The electric netting was gathered up and carted over to the new area and then it was time to start moving the tractor to the yard. Which was a chore in itself. I am able to pull it - but it is a slow process. The route we were taking to get the tractor back into the yard was the same route we took to get it out of the yard...so down the driveway through the yard in front of the garden and through the field to the side yard past the garden boxes and then finally under the cherry tree. 

The good thing is that we won't really have to cart it anywhere else after this batch of chicks are done. We are only planning on one batch of meat birds this year. So, wherever the tractor ends up when it's time to harvest is probably where it will stay until next spring.

So, once the tractor was in place we got the baby meat chickies out of their stinky brooder and out on grass!

This was Sunday morning - all is well with the littlest creatures on the farm

We ended up having to get them a new feeder as they were too big to huddle around the little yellow feeder anymore. Now they can all eat at the same time. Also, they got into this whole being on grass thing down pretty quickly and were scratching and tackling a mole hill in no time flat! Since they are still just under three weeks old we have a heat lamp on in the corner for them and we are using the brooder box as a wind break so they will be somewhat protected at night. 

When I woke up on Sunday I was concerned about them, so I went out to look at them early in the morning and they were doing pretty well. Happy Happy! So, I don't need to worry about them too much. 

The Twenty-Five will fill this tractor out in now time!

What we have observed so far. Freedom Rangers are extremely active! They have been jumping the two feet to the top part of the frame - crazy - and have been able to maintain some sort of balance for about two seconds...if that long. They have been stretching their wings...A LOT! "Flying" from mid-tractor to the door. Their aim is okay, but the landing is pretty rough. They like to jump on top of the bin that we put in with them as a little shelter and then taking kamikaze dives off of it to the ground. Since they enjoy jumping so much I decided that they could have the perch that Tom made for the Javas. The FRs figured that thing out in like a minute. It took the Javas a day or two. The other thing that has been constant is the sparring between what I'm guessing are males. Not sure how many there might be, but a good rule of thumb for straight run chicks is ten percent...maybe a few more. I guess we'll see in a few weeks.

Seriously, these littles have been a lot of fun to watch and I am looking forward to seeing how they progress over the next few weeks. Trying to take photos and post them on Instagram so I will have a good record of their growth and progress during the time that they are with us. 

Farm Life is the Best Life!