Baby chicks are born

Our broody buff has hatched her first eggs. The kids discovered the chicks had made small holes in the egg shell after church this morning. We checked again after church tonight and the first chick was completely out of the shell but still wet and cold.

It is truly amazing that an egg can turn into a chick in 21 days. We have been trying to hatch some eggs in an incubator and i am amazed at how much has to go right to get an egg to hatch. The eggs do not start hatching until all the eggs are laid and the hen starts to sit on them. They lay in a suspended state until somehow all of them knowing exactly when to start growing so they all hatch the same day. The temperature has to be exactly right. If the incubator is off just half a degree the chicks will not hatch yet the hen gets it just right. If the humidity is to high the chicks will drown in the egg or to low and they dry out. Again the hen knows exactly what humidity level the eggs should be at. The eggs also have to be rotated a few times each day. If they are not rotated the chick will stick to the egg shell.

Struggling with all these rules in the incubator leaves me amazed that God can create a hen that instinctively knows how to do it all without any training. The miracle of life is truly amazing!

From Our Farm

We are getting eggs again

We have started getting eggs again. We had the one hen that was laying and then went missing earlier but now our baby hens are laying. We are only getting two eggs a day but I think it will pickup as the days get longer and warmer. I have my nice nest boxes but they seem to prefer laying them on the ground. I hope they are just new at it and have bad aim!

Giving the Chickens a hair cut

Our chickens have learned to fly. At first we thought it was cool. They would fly out of the pen and scratch around the woods. The dogs seemed ok with it and it was not unusual to see the dogs asleep with a rooster sitting next to them.

There must have been some type of falling out between the dogs and chickens because one of the dogs decided to start killing the chickens. We lost one a day for a few days. The only solution we could come up with was clipping the chickens wings so they would not fly out. Like any good techno family we searched you tube for videos that showed how to clip the wings. After a few reviews I went out with the kids and some scissors. It turned out that the hardest part was catching the chickens. All you do is clip one side up to the shorter feathers and you now have chickens that can jump but not fly.

You would be amazed at the looks you get when people ask you what you did this weekend and you reply we gave the chickens a hair cut.

Ordered Hens Nest

I ordered two 6 hole nest boxes from Hen Pals. These are handmade in east Georgia by a couple that started their own farm

I plan to put them about 18 inches off the ground to keep a passing chicken from pecking eggs.

Johnnie is missing!

We finally starting getting eggs and today Johnnie has left us. We think she flew over the fence? The kids spent the day looking for her and found scratch signs but those could be the turkeys.

Rest In Peace Johnnie!

We got our first eggs!

Johnnie, Our Golden Polish hen laid her first two eggs. We ate them for supper and they were great. We compared them with the store bought eggs and the yolks were much brighter colored yolks.

From Our Farm

Building a Chicken Run

Clearing the Spot
We selected an area near our barn to build our chicken pen. We marked off a 100 ft by 100 ft area in the midst of some hardwood trees. The tough part was clearing all the undergrowth and honey suckles. The whole famiily pitched in and we got the area cleared in one weekend.

The Hen House
After much research I decided to build a 6 ft x 12ft hen house with a 6ft x 12ft porch. The ceiling is 10ft tall to allow for plenty of vertical roost area. On the inside I cut some 6 foot sections of oak trees for the chickens to roost. The roost start at ground level and go up every 1.5 feet. There is 1.5 foot horizontal spacing between each roost. For windows we used rabbit wire(hardware cloth) for the windows. As it gets colder I will put plastic over them to prevent drafts. There is plenty of ventilation for winter due to the 3inch gap around the top of the walls. The house is designed so half is for roosting and half is for nesting. I don't have nest boxes yet. I don't think the hens will be old enough to lay until spring.

Putting up the Fence
I have never put up a fence before. I cemented in my corner post and drove in metal post every 8 feet. This was easier than I expected due to all the ran we have had. I first tried to put up poultry wire as my fencing material. It was almost impossible to get this stuff to stand up rigid for 100ft. I pulled it so tight I pulled my anchor tree down using the come along. I decided to take all the poultry wire back except the one roll I used. I went with 48in 2x4 welded wire fence instead. I have a friend that used this and knew it would work. When in doubt just go with what you know works. I had the whole fence up in the amount of time I wasted on the one section.

From Our Farm

Starting our chicken farm

We decided to start raising chickens. We order 35 chickens from McMurray Hatchery. The first shipment went to a man in New York. He found our name on the inside label and called. He couldn't reship them so he now has 35 chicks. We got our second shipment in the mail today.

From Our Farm