Episode 10 For the Love of Goats If you own goats, you only get one chance to get fencing right. One of the first things I learned about goats was that they were too smart for me to use a sub-standard fencing option. When we brought home our first goats, we thought that the existing single-wire electric fencing that had been installed for the former horse farm would … [Read more...]
A Beginner’s Guide to Chickens
Are you thinking about getting chickens or do you already have a flock? This post includes some of Thrifty Homesteader's most useful posts and videos about keeping chickens... Getting Your Chickens The first step to successfully raising chickens is to buy them from a trusted source. You could be purchasing diseased or old animals if you purchase them from a swap meet or … [Read more...]
Thinking about backyard chickens?
Whenever people hear reports of contaminated food and worry about the ethics of factory farming, they want to take control of their food in whatever way they can. For many this means starting a garden, and for more and more, this means having backyard chickens. However, myths abound! Sadly, this misinformation slows people down or stops them entirely from having their own fresh … [Read more...]
Keeping a Closed Flock or Herd
Even though I've had chickens since 2002, I really don't feel like I know much about sick chickens. We had them for more than a dozen years before it took more than one hand to be able to count the number that had not died as someone's dinner -- either ours or a predator's. The main reason our chickens -- and turkeys, ducks, and geese -- are all so healthy is because I've only … [Read more...]
Brooding Chicks
When you pick up your first chicks, they will need to stay in a brooder for several weeks. If a mother hen had hatched them, they would spend most of their time under her wings, being kept warm by her body heat. Because they were hatched in an incubator, you need to duplicate that warm environment by creating a brooder. “Brooder” is a fancy word for what could simply be a … [Read more...]
Need a chicken health reference book?
Gail Damerow's second edition of The Chicken Health Handbook has been sitting on my shelf for a few months. I was really excited when the publisher sent me a review copy, and I started reading immediately. By the time I was approaching 300 pages, however, my enthusiasm was waning. I was worried that people who read the book would suffer from the chicken keepers version of … [Read more...]
Preventing the Top 5 Causes of Chicken Death
Did you know that the top five causes of mortality in chickens can be mostly prevented by management? That's good news for those of us with chickens. At the Livestock Conservancy conference in November, Julie Gauthier of Chickcharney Farm in North Carolina led a workshop about managing poultry health. She shared many helpful ideas for ensuring the long term health of your … [Read more...]
Heat Lamps, Safety, and Livestock
Every winter I see articles like this about a barn fire or other structure that burns down because of a heat lamp. In fact, we almost had two fires here because of heat lamps. Yeah, not just one, but two! Many years ago we had a heat lamp hanging on a nail, and the goats knocked it down. That was definitely a rookie mistake made by someone who had no clue how curious goats … [Read more...]
Tips for Protecting Your Livestock from Predators
One of the biggest challenges for anyone raising livestock is preventing predator attacks. This is true whether you have 300 head of sheep in Wyoming or 3 hens in Chicago. Predators are not simply big scary animals like lions and tigers and bears. They can also be your neighbor's dog or cat. All carnivores have an instinct to kill animals. I'll never forget how surprised I … [Read more...]
6 Things Chickens Don’t Need in Winter
A few years ago I wrote a post about what chickens need in winter. But in recent years, I've seen a variety of things suggested online, which are either unnecessary or a downright bad idea. Some people have unfortunately killed their birds with kindness. So, today I'm going to talk about six things that chickens do not need in winter. A sweater I cringe every time I see a … [Read more...]