# Down on the homestead



## HozayBuck (Jan 27, 2010)

Thought I'd mention something besides guns and politics for a change,,,,

All of our poultry are free rangeing which is good because the eggs you get are so much better tasting and free!! it's amazing to watch the way they form groups...flocks.. bunch's whatever.. each rooster has about 6 hens and they all stay apart more or less, lots of fights between the head rooster and the poaching bachelors...

At night they all get together and fly up into the trees around the front door yard where the "BIG" dog is...they ain't dumb!! the ones that survive that is... 

Being free rangers your never going to find all the eggs, and they move their nest every few days when you collect the eggs a time or three..

They can hide really well!! day before yesterday I set out to find the hidden nests as opposed to the ones that never seem to move...I found some, collected them today and yesterday, float checked them for bad ones, all were good..

I put up 7 doz in cartons...the fridge is over flowing with eggs.. just the ones that don't move around are bringing in a doz a day..

The ducks are laying also, but the Lady of the Manor is deathly allergic to duck eggs so... I asked why have them, she said with the sweetest smile..."Because I like them...as I like you".... was there a message in there?

The turkeys ..well we are down to one hen and the Tom, but we did have two, one is MIA...the other is sitting a clutch of a few eggs, I'm not sure Tom has been doing his job but we will see, we also have 7 in the incubator...but the turkeys are only about 10 months old so...maybe, we will see... be cool!! to see babys following mom around...

We had a red hen sitting and she hatched 10.. which are now starting to lay...picture eggs about the size of a ping pong ball... but they are young too...

Anyway, it's all good, and fun and relaxing.. I one day while feeding the dogs tossed a hand full of dog food to the ducks..now when I go out to feed there is a stampede of all the birds... 

The dog food bill is a tad bit higher but I enjoy it..the LOtM gets pissie about it because they demand it of her too...

Sometimes life here in the jungle is pretty laid back... naaa, it's always laid back...anybody wanna come for breakfast? fresh eggs!!


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## faithmarie (Oct 18, 2008)

How many chickens do you have?
We have to keep them penned at night . We have raccoons possums coy dogs 
coyotes. And they are all just waiting around for dinner when we go in for the night.


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## HozayBuck (Jan 27, 2010)

faithmarie said:


> How many chickens do you have?
> We have to keep them penned at night . We have raccoons possums coy dogs
> coyotes. And they are all just waiting around for dinner when we go in for the night.


Hi FM, I have no idea the number,but it's in excess of 25 for sure, we have the same bunch of chicken rustlers you have plus all the Hawks and Owls, but they were all raised right here and put out as soon as they could be, the survivors are pretty smart! and as I said at night they are all in the trees up by the house where the big dog is, shes a great pere and has all the right herd protectiveness of the breed.

We do lose chickens,t more to Hawks I think but that's just the younger ones, all in all it seems to work out, the tree roosters seem to make it and the dumb ground lovers don't....

The main thing with free ranger's is that your never going to find all the eggs, but right now we have 12 doz. in the fridge with at least a dozen coming in today... I do take walks into the woods just to see if I can locate the hidden nests if for no other reason then to not give the egg stealers a reason to come around..

In tough times we could live on eggs and tree rats ..


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## faithmarie (Oct 18, 2008)

I forgot about the hawks! My daughter has 50 chickens and they are going to get the meat chickens for the first time.


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## Asatrur (Dec 17, 2008)

We are at 9 chickens, but no roosters  due to our stupid regs and stupid neighbor who believes we should not have chickens all people should by food from the store. There is no way describe the taste difference between home grown eggs and store bought eggs. We just harvested our first Asparagus of the year last night and mmmmm.


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## faithmarie (Oct 18, 2008)

Yeah neighbors.... have to live near like minded people. My daughter is going to come over when the time comes and show them how to do the meat chickens. 
A lot of people get angry when you say you want to be prepared. Even if you say for natural causes. They look at you like sideways. Like they have sheep eyes.


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## sailaway (Mar 12, 2009)

We have an over abundance of protected Canadian Geese, green poop everywhere. In a survival situation they wont be that protected. I am surrounded by like minded bird hunters.:sssh:


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## Asatrur (Dec 17, 2008)

faithmarie said:


> Yeah neighbors.... have to live near like minded people. My daughter is going to come over when the time comes and show them how to do the meat chickens.
> A lot of people get angry when you say you want to be prepared. Even if you say for natural causes. They look at you like sideways. Like they have sheep eyes.


Yeah, in my perfect world that would be no one, but for now I need to live near people, but the upside is that she is the only real burr. That could change if I let on about my prepping and such.


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## HozayBuck (Jan 27, 2010)

mn_homesteader said:


> Yeah, in my perfect world that would be no one, but for now I need to live near people, but the upside is that she is the only real burr. That could change if I let on about my prepping and such.


Ya know, if they can reattach a mans package, or create a sheep from a dish or put arms back on, why can't they develop a Rooster that instead of crowing politely taps on your bed room window? or even rings the door bell?...

Inquiring minds wanna know?..... 

Actually for now your getting eggs you just can't hatch them... but in a SHTF I'd have all I could get and to hell with the hood..

one day people will wake up to the fact that feeding yourself is too important to allow stupid rules...ok, no pigs, I can understand unless you keep their pen clean..like a cat box, they only smell is you allow it..

I've seen housing developments build up around an established riding stable and the screaming starts..usually from the developer who actually just wants the land and to hell with the horses...

We actually are in the city limits by about 10 feet but the city don't bother ..almost everybody have live stock..hell we have 9 goats a horse and about 30 or so chickens....11 ducks and 2 turkeys...

We have a few too many Roosters but that's an easy fix... oh!! and 10 more turkey chicks coming...

Life in the jungle is pretty damn ok!!


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## Asatrur (Dec 17, 2008)

Too true on the rooster part. I love my eggs and could never go back. I look forward to the day when need and necessity overrules stupid "rules" that actually hurt people.



HozayBuck said:


> Ya know, if they can reattach a mans package, or create a sheep from a dish or put arms back on, why can't they develop a Rooster that instead of crowing politely taps on your bed room window? or even rings the door bell?...
> 
> Inquiring minds wanna know?.....
> 
> Actually for now your getting eggs you just can't hatch them... but in a SHTF I'd have all I could get and to hell with the hood..


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## UncleJoe (Jan 11, 2009)

HozayBuck said:


> Being free rangers your never going to find all the eggs, and they move their nest every few days when you collect the eggs a time or three..


I let ours out to free range last year. I learned real quick that egg quantities drop dramatically as well as the number of birds that lay those eggs. The horses and goats seemed to find the hidden nests before I did and they aren't very careful with them. 

This year I'm going to try something different. Since egg production has kicked into high gear, I've been watching what time of day seems to produce the most. It looks like mornings are when everyone likes to lay. After about 1:00 we only get 1-2. So I'm going to open the door and let them out for the afternoon hours and lock them back up when they come home to roost. Maybe I can get the best of both worlds. Time will tell.


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## mosquitomountainman (Jan 25, 2010)

UncleJoe said:


> I let ours out to free range last year. I learned real quick that egg quantities drop dramatically as well as the number of birds that lay those eggs. The horses and goats seemed to find the hidden nests before I did and they aren't very careful with them.
> 
> This year I'm going to try something different. Since egg production has kicked into high gear, I've been watching what time of day seems to produce the most. It looks like mornings are when everyone likes to lay. After about 1:00 we only get 1-2. So I'm going to open the door and let them out for the afternoon hours and lock them back up when they come home to roost. Maybe I can get the best of both worlds. Time will tell.


That's what we do with ours. We let them out in the afternoon. The other problem (besides chicken poop) is when they find the compost pile. A few chickens can level a compost pile an an hour or two when looking for bugs.

I put all of our new compost piles farther away now.


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## faithmarie (Oct 18, 2008)

UncleJoe.... That is what my daughter does. They have 50 chickens so far. The kids are hatching a few more. And their pen is quite big to begin with. 
They are getting 50 meat chickens next month. And I guess we are going to have a chicken killing party about 5 weeks after. Sounds awful doesn't it. I told them they should change their farm name to slaughter house farms. Their name really is slaughter.


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## UncleJoe (Jan 11, 2009)

And here I thought I had an original idea. :nuts:


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## HozayBuck (Jan 27, 2010)

HEY!!! Big news..the MIA Turkey hen came back this am for a few, drank a bucket of water and gobbled down everything she could find then did a real slow round about back to the woods... so she's still here and both are sitting eggs, I still doubt we will get any chicks...the ones in the Incubator should start tomorrow if they are gonna...


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