#pasturedpoultry

On Saturday morning, still laid up with a bum knee, I started working on the stats for the old layer flock. Generally I don’t do the layer stuff until after January 1, but this year, the whole flock was

On Sunday night when my husband went out to do chores in the pasture pen (which had not gotten moved) he found this. We couldn’t measure it but a guess is about 14” – 16” long. The fence is set up so the

We’d missed our anniversary trip to the Fair this year. Last year I had gotten a Fair t-shirt, one of the older style ones. I was messing around on the internet and went to the Fair’s FB page. They’d mentioned

On Tuesday I was very busy. I had dehydrators to unload, laundry to finish, peppers to prep for the dehydrators, dehydrator trays and liners to wash up, farm chores to do, house plants to fertilize, and

On Monday morning when he drove by, there was a hen in the nestboxes. She was twisting and turning all around in there. There were several curious onlookers. Apparently there had been 2 in the boxes, one

The old prototype nestboxes we had attached to this coop when we built it disintegrated last year. He just took them off and covered the hole back in June. Fortunately, the pullets started to lay while

I had 4 more of the pullets scheduled for pickup on Tuesday morning. These were 4 Barred Rocks. My helper friend was here and he cleaned the cold room. I had taken all the equipment out of it while I waited

Tom, our chicken wizard, had brought his drone to the chicken processing on Sunday. He got a couple short videos of the farm. Here are the highlights. Above is the layers pen and the snake fence coming

CAUTION: Graphic photos!

I didn’t get out to the barn until 6:30 but I managed to finish just as the kids arrived to catch chickens. The butchershop is clean! My husband had managed to get one more storm window up before they

An acre of starlings My husband got these shots of a huge flock of starlings in the middle pasture. There were easily a thousand birds, if not more. They’ve been gathering for a week. We first saw them

While I was doing laundry and inventorying freezers he went up and started cleaning out the brooder and dismantling it. While I was at the barn inventorying the running freezer, I wiped out the empty freezer

First thing Sunday morning we moved the pasture pen. We decided to move it closer to the house (we do so love the 7 roosters crowing at 4:15AM – NOT!) as it would save time next Saturday when we must move

The 87 birds, 7 roosters and 80 pullets, have grown well. Freezer Camp aka chicken processing, is scheduled for September 6th. As is usual by this time of year, we are so done with tending so many birds.

We made the 3rd move of the pasture pen on Sunday morning. You can see how the birds’ scorched earth policy affects the pasture. But in 1 month you won’t be able to tell. The broilers are 12 weeks old

Saturday morning we went out and moved the pasture pen north to the edge of the pasture. We knew there would be an 18’ overlap from the previous position. It starts between the 2 trees and runs left. One

On Sunday morning we got out early and started dragging the pen parts from the far end of the pasture back towards the house. We are starting in the area where they were in the beginning, the second week

Saturday morning I got out early and got this bed for the azalea cleaned out. I put some compost around it and dumped the 4½ totes of mixed mulch over by the steps. Then I started on the 4th walkway in

It was cool but very humid on Monday morning. I got out there early to start moving the pasture pen before it got hot. My husband did the chores and soon joined me. From this angle you can see the last

A couple days ago when I was making this for frozen treats for the broiler chicks, my husband mentioned he didn’t think I’d hung the fan for the layers. And possibly their window wasn’t open yet. On Wednesday