How about those egg prices lately? I know they are a bit crazy. So today i'm gonna talk a little about chickens. Chicken's, ladies and gentlemen is one of the most important an easy animals you can raise on almost any size homestead or property. Provided your areas laws permit having chicken's.
Chickens can be raised in many different ways. You can buy as chicks, pullets (young sexed hens) or as fully grown layers. After getting your chickens they will need different types of care depending on age. If you buy chicks they must be kept very warm for a while depending on your location and its temperature. This can be accomplished with a heat lamp or a chick brooder plate added to their brooder box or home of some sort. Their home must be kept clean. They will need chick starter feed and clean fresh water in which you can add Apple cider vinegar or a chick electrolyte to. It is lots of fun to raise you own but will take a bit longer to get you rewards (EGGS). You can also take it a bit further if you'd like and hatch your own chicks in an incubator. This is always a nice addition for kids who homeschool also. Hatching chicks doubles as a science lesson, as does so many homesteading projects. Lots of life lessons are learned on the homestead. These chickens can be kept in a chicken coop with run, moveable chicken tractor or even left to free roam with a shelter if predator's are not a problem.
Chickens provide a homestead with an egg a day except in the winter in which they will slow down. This is caused by a lack of daylight hours. You can supplement artificial light to keep up their egg production. We here at Silver Lining do not do this. We believe our ladies deserve the slow down winter break. If you are concerned with not having enough eggs in winter. You can store eggs up during your summer abundance by freezing, drying waterglassing or even freeze drying. Homestead chickens are a nice source of meat if you raise a dual purpose breed. They are also very good workers at turning compost and keeping fly larvae at bay if raised with other animals. Did I forget to mention the nitrogen rich fertilizer they provide for your yard or compost! How about those calcium rich egg shells you can dry, grind and add to your garden plants to combat blossom end rot. Those bones from that leftover chicken bone broth can also be dried and ground for garden rich bone meal.
Having chickens is a very rewarding animal with minimal care. Cost for shelter and care can be as expensive or as cheap as you wish. You can upcycle many things for chicken shelters and nestboxes. Feed can be lessoned by the amount of grass you have and food scraps to give them. They will gladly eat all the weeds you pull from you landscape or garden too.
All in all folks chickens are a great animal to get you on your way to providing a sustainable source of food for you or your family. Not to challenging and rewarding. This is a way for us to use God's resources for ways he intended. Amazing sustainable resources we can love and care for all the while they will provide for us for as long as we wish to keep the cycle of life going. Fertile eggs and broody hens or an incubator will keep you in chickens here on out. I hope you enjoyed the read and maybe learned a little something. Never stop learning until the lord calls us home. God Bless
Leigh Ann Martin
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