The Homestead Poultry Flock

*Table of Contents for Poultry Section is at bottom of this page.*

Order Harvey's Book There is a lot of information on this website about poultry. There is even more in my new book, to be published by Chelsea Greenpublisher of authors on agriculture and sustainability such as Gene Logsdon, Eliot Coleman, Toby Hemenway, and Derrick Jensen around mid-September, 2011. See a full description of the book and what noted writers are saying about it, or click on the thumbnail of the books cover on the left for links for ordering your copy.

I write on this site disproportionately more about poultry than other livestock not only because I have more experience with poultry, but because they are the entry level livestock par excellence. A homesteader with no prior experience will find it much easier starting a small flock of chickens or ducks than starting to care for and milk a dairy goat. If her property is small, she might well have space to keep that small flock, even if a couple of lambs are out of the question. And if she has a busy life requiring her to be away from home periodically, she will find it much easier to find a neighbor to pinch-hit on chicken feeding and egg collection duties than to find one who is able or willing to milk her goat. If you are new to poultry husbandry, the Poultry Overview section has a couple of general introductions. My approach to poultry is a homesteading approach, steering a course between keeping pet chickens and seeing the home flock as an analog in miniature of huge commercial flocks. If you would like to know how to put the flock to work in various homestead applications; pasture the flock safely so they can forage more of their own food; make your own feeds; work with broody hens (natural chicken mothers) in lieu of electric incubators and brooders; protect your birds while staying on good terms with the animal friends in your neighborhood; practice easiest, most efficient and healthful manure managementthen spend some time exploring this section in depth. If youve never butchered your own birds for the table, I hope the article on butchering (with step-by-step illustrative pictures) will be of assistance. Slaughtering ones own birds for the first time is typically fraught with anxiety; but I promise you, if you do try it, you and your family will be saying with heart-felt gratitude, Man, chicken was never like this! Perhaps those feeling really adventurous will join me in reviving

the almost-lost art of caponizing (surgical castration of male chickens to produce prime roasting fowl). Note the addition in late January, 2009 of a Small Markets subsection. It is important to note that my interest in market production is oriented to the low end of the scale. I believe the homesteader who has mastered the challenge of producing all the familys eggs and dressed poultry will have the requisite skills to make selling to small local markets more a stepping up in scale and complexity, rather than a radical switch to a wholly new enterprise. (The major difference may be the necessity of dealing with regulations and regulatory agencies.) Please note that more ambitious homesteaders, even if they have no interest in producing for sale, may find parts of the new section useful. For example, if they raise the fast-growing meat hybrids, they may be interested in alternatives to the vitality-challenged Cornish Cross. Or they may want to experiment in the production of capons for fabulous roasters on the familys table. Since its inception, I have been writing regularly for Backyard Poultry Magazine, a great resource for flock owners at all levels of experience. Check it out and consider subscribing.~July, 2011

Table of Contents for Poultry Section

Poultry Overview o The Home Flock for Beginners o Poultry 101: Starting a Small Flock of Chickens o Poultry Husbandry in a Changed Energy Future o The Homestead Flock: Pets or Partners? o Moral Puzzles in the Backyard Feeding the Homestead Flock o Feeding the Homestead Flock: It Ain't Rocket Science! o Making Your Own Poultry Feeds o Feeding the Flock from the Homestead's Own Resources o Alternatives to Soy o Sprouting to Enhance Poultry Feeds o Current Feeding Practice o The Challenge of High Feed Costs o Raising Earthworms to Feed the Flock o Protein from Thin Air: Breeding fly maggots for poultry feed o Cultivating Soldier Grubs to Feed the Flock Housing the Flock o When Life Gives You Lemons. . . o Making a Dustbox for the Poultry House o Discouraging the Rodents o Chickens in the Winter Greenhouse Pasturing the Flock o Managing Poultry on Pasture with Electronet o Designing a Pasture Shelter o Building a Pasture Shelter o Going Mobile at the Small End of the Scale

Mobile Shelter: The Classic Polyface Model Chicken Tractor: A Tribute to Andy Lee Pasture Shelters for Market Layer Flocks A Drown-Proof Waterer Waterfowl o The Homestead Waterfowl Flock o The Silver Appleyard: A Great All-Round Duck Breeding the Homestead Poultry Flock o Brooding Chicks: Two Options o Brooding Chicks on Deep Litter o Working with Broody Hens: Let Mama Do It o Selecting for the Broody Trait: The Boxwood Broody o Working with the Cock(s) in the Flock o Breeding Your Backyard Flock o My Long Goose Breeding Saga o Making and Using Trap Nests Dealing with Poultry Predators o In the Shadow of the Hawk o You Think You Have Predator Problems? Butchering Poultry o Homestead Poultry Butchering o The Whizbang Homemade Poultry Plucker o Building the Whizbang Plucker Producing for Small Markets o Stepping Up to Production for a Small Broiler Market o Serving a Small Broiler Market: Three Examples o The Cornish Cross: What is wrong with this picture?! o Alternatives to the Cornish Cross o Caponizing: Reviving a Lost Art o Serving a Niche Market for Started Birds o Game Birds: A Niche Market Opportunity Poultry Miscellaneous o New Kid in the Flock
o o o o

Poultry Overview
*Table of Contents for Poultry Overview Section is at bottom of this page.*
This section presents two introductions to poultry husbandry, keyed to experience level. The Home Flock for Beginners is the most beginners-level guide to our approach to keeping poultry. My Poultry 101 article, Starting a Small Flock of Chickens, as a more expansive overview for beginners. Readers who are ready to move beyond the basics will find a wealth of information on specific subjects throughout the Poultry section. Of course, the best overview of our poultry husbandry is my book The Small-Scale Poultry Flock. This section also includes pieces of a general, speculative naturefor example, Poultry Husbandry in a Changed Energy Future, The Homestead Flock: Pets or Partners?,

and Moral Puzzles in the Backyard, all originally published in Backyard Poultry. ~Harvey, July 25, 2011

Table of Contents for Poultry Overview Section

The Home Flock for Beginners Poultry 101: Starting a Small Flock of Chickens Poultry Husbandry in a Changed Energy Future The Homestead Flock: Pets or Partners? Moral Puzzles in the Backyard

The Home Flock for Beginners

This article is the most beginner-level introduction the site offers to our system of poultry husbandry. It is the original version of my article Incredible Homestead Chickens, published in the December 2007/January 2008 issue of Mother Earth News. It was added to the site December 30, 2008.

Table of Contents for This Page

The Home Flock Selection of Breeds Feeding Housing Pasturing the Flock Putting the Flock to Work The Integrated Flock

The Home Flock

Most natural ecologies feature complex communities of both animals and plants. If the homestead is to imitate natural systems, it should ideally include both livestock and plants if possible. Poultry are likely the best starter livestock for most homesteads, since their needs are more easily and cheaply met, and the homesteader can start on a smaller scale, than with other species. Eggs from the backyard flock are of a quality and nutritional density those dependent on the supermarket can only dream of. Necessary culling of the flock (of excess males and no longer productive females) graces the table with poultry like our grandparents used to eatin lieu of the insipid imitations from high confinement, industrialized flocks. As we will see, however, the homestead flock can contribute to the self-sufficiency enterprise elsewhere than on the family breakfast and dinner table. Be on guard against the common fallacypromulgated by the agricultural colleges, and likely your local Extension Agentthat the backyard flock is an analog in miniature of big commercial poultry operations. In almost every way, our homestead flock should diverge

from the high-confinement commercial modelswith their limited genetics, stress, constant outside inputs, and pollutionas we constantly seek more natural paradigms. Top of page

Selection of Breeds
Recent poultry breeding has been geared toward ever greater specializationfast-growing meat hybrids, ready to slaughter in as little as 44 days; or egg hybrids that begin laying at seventeen weeks or less, and lay impressive numbers of eggs (at least for a couple of seasons). Such souped-up hybrids, however, are less hardy and long-lived than traditional breeds, and are apt to succumb to disease or environmental stresses more readily. They require more purchased inputs, of both feeds (since they have lower foraging skills) and medications (to compensate for weakened immune systems). I much prefer the traditional farm breeds of earlier generations, many of them dual purposethat is, good layers, usually of large brown eggs, with good rates of growth to table fowl size (though they do not match the super-hybrids in either separate category of production). Such breeds represent a priceless part of our agricultural heritageWyandottes, Buff Orpingtons, Plymouth Rocks, New Hampshire and Rhode Island Reds, Buckeyes, Delawares, Dominiques, Jersey Giants, and more. Check out American Livestock Breeds Conservancy for more information on these traditional breeds, many of whom are in need of preservation. You may want to go back even further, to historic breeds out of which the modern breeds were developed. Dorkings, which hark back all the way to Roman times, are gentle, elegant birds that are a joy to work with. Old English Games have a thousand-year history as utilitarian fowl. Though rather small, at one time they were considered the stardard against which all other table fowl were judged. If given enough space in which to forage, they feed themselves almost entirely on their own. And the hens are among the best chicken mamas on the planet. Consider joining Society for the Preservation of Poultry Antiquities, dedicated to the preservation of the older breeds. Dont forget other domestic fowl as well as the more common chicken. Ducks, geese, turkeys, guineas and more are a colorful and useful part of our agricultural legacy. Top of page

Feeding
It is of course convenient to buy a bag of feed for our flocks, and wed like to believe that such scientifically formulated feeds are the best diet we can offer our birds. Ask yourself, however: What would the Natural Chicken eat if completely on her own in a natural setting? Though we do not think of chickens as grazers, actually she would eat a fair amount of grasses, clovers, and broadleaved weeds. She would eat wild seeds of all sorts. And she would eat live animal foods such as earthworms, slugs and snails, insects, etc. What are the defining characteristics of all three classes of foods? They are alive, and they are raw (unprocessed). Commercial feeds are anything but alive or rawthey are made from highly processed (with heat and pressure) ingredients, often byproducts of other food-processing operations, in many cases already stale when formulation begins (as with recycled deep-fryer oils from fast food

restaurants) or possibly containing residues from industrial processing (as with hexane residues in soybean meal left over from oil extraction). I urge you to take the feeding of your flock into your own hands. There is nothing especially mysterious about the processaside from a willingness to experiment, a bit of research about nutritional needs of poultry and access to primary (whole) ingredients available in your area are all that are required. I have made all my own feeds for years, starting with whole corn, small grains such as oats and wheat, field peas, and natural mineral supplements such as kelp meal. Whether you buy prepared feeds or make your own replacement mixes, however, the heart of your feeding program should be: maximizing your flocks access to whole, natural foods. If you pasture your birds (about which more below), they will find a lot of high quality food on their own. If you practice vermicomposting to recycle kitchen wastes or manage manure responsibly, you can harvest the worms to feed your flock. If like me you live in an area blessed with lots of Japanese beetles, you can collect them (in the cool of the morning or evening, when they are less likely to fly, shaking them off plants into a bucket with water in the bottom) to feed your eager birds. (Other options will be considered later.) Top of page

Housing
One reason poultry are the easiest of all livestock is that their housing can be simple and inexpensive. All domestic poultry are hardy, and will do well if given protection from predators and the extremes of weather. Any housing that protects the birds from the wind and from getting wet in the harshest conditions will be adequate for your flock. (Remember too their need for shade on the hottest summer days.) You should allow a minimum of three square feet per adult bird (twice that allowed in even so-called free range commercial laying houses)four or five would be even better. All the common gallinaceous domestic fowlchickens, guineas, turkeyshave an instinct to roost at night, and will be more content if given perches to do so. Roosts need not be either high or complicatedany structure that allows them to sleep perched above ground level will satisfy their urge to roost. I make what amounts to a wide ladder from 2x4s, and lean it against the wall at about a 60 degree angle. Since I leave it unattached, it is easy to move aside for cleaning. Waterfowlducks and geesedo not require roosts, and will be happy to bed down at night in a corner of the house. Nests should be provided if there are laying hens in the flock. Though nest box units can be purchased, I make my own12 inches high and wide, 16 inches deepand fill them with straw or other clean, soft organic material. I recommend flooring them with -inch wire mesh (hardware cloth) rather than solid bottomsbroken-down straw and the occasional dried dropping sift through the wire mesh, keeping the nests cleaner. Avoid egg eating in the flock by mounting the nests above floor level (to keep the cocks of the flock from pecking at them curiously), providing enough nests (one for every eight hens or so), and collecting eggs regularly. (As for egg care, we never wash eggs if they come from the nest absolutely clean. For cleaning up those with a smear or stain, we use a paper towel dipped in a half-and-half mix of water and white vinegar. Fresh eggs do not need to be refrigerated if eaten within a week or so.)

Many people starting a flock convert an existing outbuilding to house them, and almost any structure can be made to serve satisfactorily. If you are starting from scratch, however, I strongly advise leaving an earth floor in the coop, and covering it with a deep layer (up to twelve inches) of organic matterthe best possible arrangement for safe, pleasant, and less labor intensive manure management. Chickens, forever scratching, quickly work all their droppings into the litter, where a decomposition process takes place driven by billions of microbes of the sort at work in a compost heap. Metabolites of the microbes (byproducts of their life processes) include vitamins B12 and K and immune-enhancing substances, which the chickens ingest as they peck up little critters they find in the litter to eat. The manure, otherwise a potential source of pathogens, thus becomes a substrate for health. Materials for litter should be as high in carbon as possible (to balance the high nitrogen in the droppings), and include leaves (oak leaves are my favorite) and wood shavings. Sawdust and woodchips can be used, though they should be aged first, never used in their green state. I avoid straw because it can support growth of Aspergillus molds, whose spores do the lungs of neither you nor your birds any good. I read reports, however, of folks who use straw over an earth floor with satisfactory results. As in a compost heap, the decompositional microbes use the nitrogen in the droppings as energy (food) source as they break down the litter into simpler elements. As the carbon in the litter is used up, the nitrogen can no longer be utilized efficiently by the microbes and begins outgassing to the atmosphere as ammonia, a compound of nitrogen and hydrogen. Breathing ammonia is bad for your birds delicate respiratory tissues, so that first whiff of ammonia is your signal to clean out the litter, or add fresh high-carbon material. Materials higher in nitrogen such as hay and threshed soybean vines are not appropriate for litter, since they decompose too quickly, and release ammonia. In addition to providing more wholesome manure management, deep litter is also laborsaving. Rather than having to make frequent attacks on hardened layers of accumulated droppings, then laboriously compost it, you might need to shovel out what amounts to finished compost once a year or so, and use it in the garden without further processing. If you need to use an existing building with a wood or concrete floor, thats okay. You can still make a deep layer of organic material the foundation of proper manure management. Use of straw in this context is fine, since it stays drier and doesnt support growth of Aspergillus. In this case as well, the litter does not break down as completely, and will need to be composted before use in the garden. Set off against its many benefits, there is one potential problem with deep litter over an earth floorthe exposure of your sleeping flock to digging predators such as dogs or foxes. Its a grueling initial chore, but it is imperative to dig into the ground a barriermetal roof flashing or -inch hardware cloth works wellto eighteen inches deep around the entire perimeter of your poultry house to deter such predators. One of the most frequently asked questions about poultry housing is whether provision should be made for heating it in winter. All domestic poultry Ive worked with (chickens, ducks, geese, turkeys, even guineas, which evolved in the central and western plains of Africa) are quite cold hardy. They do not need any added heat in the sort of winters I experience here (Zone 6b), so long as they are well protected from the wind in the coldest weather. I therefore

ensure that their house is tight against drafts, while at the same time providing essential ventilation. Occasionally cocks such as Old English Games or Dorkings will suffer frostbite to their large combs and wattles, though they soon recover with no problem. If you live farther north, you might want to consider breeds such as the Chantecler, bred in Canada, which have minimal combs and wattles and are almost impervious to frostbite. Another winter care question concerns the use of artificial lighting in order to mitigate the natural drop in egg production in the dark winter months. My own practice is not to use such lighting. The early winter is the time of the molt, when the bird sheds all her feathers and grows new ones. Since feathers are almost pure protein, thats a lot of resource required to replace them; and I feel it is ungenerous to push the hen to keep up egg production at the same time. We simply adjust to a greatly reduced egg supply in the winter. However, if your flock is in good health and you are feeding them well, you can certainly keep lights on them in the winter without ill effect. It is most convenient to put the light on a timer, since erratic photoperiods could be confusing to your birds circadian rhythms. Set the timer to provide earlier light in the morning, and later light in the evening, for a total of fourteen hours. You dont need strong light to trigger photoperiod responsea single 40- or 60-watt bulb should be adequate. Top of page

Pasturing the Flock

I strongly urge you to avoid the conventional paradigm of the homestead flock, with the birds confined to their coop and a small, static chicken run. Such a run is quickly denuded of the last vestige of green, and then accumulates droppings that breed flies and pathogens, and toxic levels of nitrates and phosphates in the soil, becoming a point source for serious runoff pollution. Please, let us home flock owners not join the big boys of the poultry industry in their appalling and irresponsible pollution of our groundwater and streams. It is far better to get the birds out onto healthy, growing pasture. The birds enjoy the sunshine, fresh air, and exercise, and forage a significant part of their diet. Their droppings are a valuable source of fertility for the sward, rather than a nuisance or potential source of disease. Some flock owners have good results allowing their birds to free range during the day, then closing them up at night for protection, since most predators are nocturnal by preference. For others, however, different levels and types of predation (and remember that your neighbors dog, or even your own, could be your most devastating predator)or proximity of neighbors gardens or flower bedsprohibits such a laissez faire approach. Does that dictate a return of the flock to their wretched static run? Not at all. Though I am a decidedly low-tech guy for most homestead strategies, electric net fencing (electronet) is a technological solution that has been a fundamental management tool for me for many years. I cannot recommend it highly enough for providing the benefits of pasturing the flock, confining them where you want them, and protecting them from the heavy hitters of the neighborhood. Electronet is a plastic mesh fence with interwoven spiked posts for standing it up, the horizontal strands of which are intertwined with almost hair-fine stainless steel wires. Attached to a good fence energizer properly grounded, the fence carries an unpleasant surprise for unwelcome curiosity seekers. It does not provide protection from aerial predation, of course, but it will stop almost anything on the ground with a nervous system. I purchase all

my electric net fencing and equipment from Premier Fencing Supply, and give them my unqualified recommendation. Friends whose judgment I trust give Kencove Fence Supplies an equally high endorsement. Top of page

Putting the Flock to Work

There are many ways we can enlist the natural behaviors of the flock to achieve key homestead goals. Use of electronet often enhances opportunities to utilize their services while keeping them secure from predators. Before the era of Monsanto and Cargill, with their toxic arsenals for a lunatic war on the insect world, free ranging farm poultry flocks helped control excess insect predation in orchards. We can utilize our flocks in the same way, confining them to their work if necessary with electronet. Another useful service the flock provides in the orchard is the cleaning up of dropped fruit, which can be a vector for disease or overwintering insects. Geese are especially efficient (read greedy), seeming to vacuum up fallen fruit. Geese are grazers to a greater degree than any other domestic fowlwhy not take advantage of that trait? Geese have been widely used as weeders in appropriate crops (potatoes, garlic and onions, tomatoes, carrots, blueberries, strawberries and brambles, vineyards). For three years now, we have rotated our ducks and geese over four or five areas of our lawn. The grazing birds greatly reduce mowing chores, fertilize the grass with their droppings, and convert all that lovely grass to special winter dinners and high quality cooking fats. Though chickens could destroy an established garden with their constant scratching (and they like ripe tomatoes as much as you do!), I usually precede the garden season by netting the flock onto the garden for two to four weeks. The birds eat sprouting weed seeds, as well as slugs and snails. It takes several months for the slug population to reconstitute itself to potentially damaging levels. Though ducks would not be appropriate with all crops, with careful design and garden layout they can coexist with some growing crops and provide slug and snail control throughout the season. Guineas do little scratching, so I use a few in my winter squash patch each year. I allow the squash plants to grow until I see the first squash bug (which spreads serious viral diseases and is difficult to control without resort to toxic sprays), usually about the time the vines start to run and to blossom. At that point, I net three or four guineas into the squash patch, and leave them there until frost closes out the season, for complete control of the squash bug. For years I have taken an increasingly no-till approach to garden care. What tilling I need to do I usually assign to my chickens: To till in heavily weed-grown plots or cover crops, I net the chickens onto the plot as long as necessary for them to do their work. Often I will allow the cover cropsmall grains like wheat or barley, cowpeas, buckwheatto mature its seeds before introducing the birds, offering them even greater opportunities for self-harvesting their own food without additional effort or expense on my part. If I need to develop new ground for garden, you wont find me out wrestling a stinky, noisy, bone-jarring power tillerI net a flock of chickens onto the plot and let them do what they love to do best, scratching away at that tough grass sod until it is killed and turned into the top few inches of the soil, in the process boosting soil fertility with their droppings. (Such shallow scratching of the top layers

does not have the destructive effects of deep tillage and inversion of soil layers so frequently practiced in todays agriculture.) I then move the flock elsewhere, grow a mixed cover crop in the new plot to loosen the soil and increase its biomass, then return the flock for another tilling session. At that point the new ground is ready to be planted to garden crops. Top of page

The Integrated Flock

There are so many ways our flocks can be integrated into the effort to develop more food selfsufficiency on the homesteadthe examples I have given only hint at the possibilities. The key is liberating them from a separate, isolated corner, making them part of broader, interwoven patterns in the homestead endeavor. Note how many services we gain from the integrated flock: Instead of being closely confined to boredom, stress, and unsanitary conditions in a coop and static run, they enjoy the benefits of sunshine, fresh air, exercise, and engage in interesting natural behaviorssocializing and satisfying their abundant natural curiosity. Their manureotherwise a repellant part of the enterprise for us and a potential vector of disease for the birdsis exposed by the birds scratching to oxygen and sunlight, natures sanitizers, and worked into the grass sod of the pasture or into the most bio-active part of our gardens soil profile, its fertility captured to build our soil, not squandered as runoff pollution of groundwater and stream. The flock offers nurturing alternatives to expensive, stressful (for both us and the soil), fossil fuel dependent power tillage. They help control insect populations that can damage our crops if they rise to excessive levels. And in the process of all these activities, they self-feed on a variety of live, natural foods of a quality and nutrient density unmatched by any dry, dusty meal from a bag. Please do give poultry a trytheyre the ideal starter livestock for the homestead and small farm. But make them a part of the big picture from the beginning.

Starting a Small Flock of Chickens

I have been giving the following articlean overview of our approach to flock management as the handout for my poultry seminars for several years. I am now writing a replacement which will address the same issues, but will emphasize five areas: Pasturing the flock (using electronet fencing), putting the flock to work in various homestead endeavors, deep litter for best management of manure in the poultry house, using natural mothers for incubating and brooding new stock, and feeding issues. I will eventually post the new version on the site. ~February 2007

Table of Contents
1: Basics2: Management3: Questions and Answers

1. Basics
Getting Started

Chickens are the easiest of all livestock to raise. Their needs for feed and shelter are easily met. The eggs and meat you can get from a home flock will be superior to anything you can buy. And a flock of chickens is an endless source of fascination for the whole family. Give them a try!

Choosing a Breed
If your main interest in chickens is egg production, you might choose one of the Mediterranean class breeds - Leghorns, Golden or Silver Campines, Buttercups, Hamburgs, Blue Andalusians, Minorcas, etc. These breeds tend to be somewhat smaller and lighter in weight, as they put more of their resources into egg production rather than larger frames and greater muscle mass. They usually lay white eggs. Some of these breeds can a bit high-strung. Meat breeds are typified by the Cornish Cross, a very fast-growing hybrid with a broad, plump breast, easy to dress out. These birds can be ready for slaughter at seven or eight weeks. (If slaughtered at 12-14 weeks they produce excellent roasters.) Because they grow so fast, they are not as vigorous or resilient as others, and easily expire from episodes of sudden stress. [Some breeders in the "pastured poultry" movement are trying to breed new broiler crosses especially for production on pasture that are considerably more robust than the Cornish Cross. Typically, such birds require a little longer grow-out than the Cornish; but exhibit better vigor, none of the leg and heart problems of the Cornish, yet dress out with the sort of plump, broad breast the market has come to expect.] Many people prefer a compromise between the meat and the egg "specialists": The dualpurpose breeds, which lay well (usually brown shelled eggs) and grow fast enough to serve well as table fowl (though they are not as broad breasted as the meat-production hybrids). Birds of this type are ready for slaughter at about 12 or 13 weeks of age. They are usually more gentle and easy-going than the Mediterranean group. Among these breeds are New Hampshire and Rhode Island Reds, Barred Rocks, Buff Orpingtons, Brahmas, Cochins, Wyandottes, and Ameraucanas (which lay pastel-tinted eggs). Usually the discussion of breed choice ends here. However, I urge you to consider also the historic breeds, such as the five-toed Dorkings, which originated in Rome before the time of Julius Caesar. While not as productive as modern breeds, the historic breeds have other virtues to recommend them. For example, Old English Games may not be ready for slaughter until five months old and may lay only 200 eggs a year - but they can virtually feed themselves if given enough space to forage; the hens are devoted and fiercely protective mothers; and their meat was once the standard against which all other table fowl were judged.

Sources for Stock

Just-hatched chicks can be sent through the mail. Many people turn first to one of the megahatcheries such as Murray McMurray. They feature large selections and illustrated catalogs. My own preference is to seek out smaller, family owned regional hatcheries, which I have found may provide more personalized service and superior stock. You can get both chicks and started stock from the local farmers co-op, though the choice of breeds is very limited. You can also connect with local enthusiasts who have stock to sell through classified ads or a publication such as the Valley Trader.

Finally, of course, you can breed your own. This may not be a realistic option if you're just starting out. But at some time in the future, you may find that it is quite a thrill to "hatch your own." You might try your luck with an artificial incubator. Or, if you're lucky enough to have a broody hen, you can just "let mama do it."

Brooding
If you start with day-old stock, you will have to be a surrogate mama to your baby chicks. Set up an enclosed brooder which is free from drafts and protected from rodents, cats, etc.; and which contains an absorbent litter such as wood shavings and a source of heat such as a 250watt lamp or two. The waterer should be designed so that the chicks cannot wade into it and get wet. Temperature should be maintained so that the chicks are neither huddling under the heat source, nor huddling in a corner as far as possible from the heat. If they are scooting around the brooder like a bunch of little water bugs, all is well. Frequent monitoring of the brooder is the key to success. Of course, if you have a mother hen who is raising your new chicks, you don't have to worry about any of this. When it comes to raising baby chickens, a mother hen is a lot smarter than you. Top of page

Housing
Housing for chickens can be extremely simple. If you already have an existing shed or outbuilding, it can probably be modified to serve quite nicely. The fundamental requirements are that the birds be protected from the wind or heavy drafts; and that they be completely dry. Chickens have a strong instinct to roost; so will be more content if furnished with some structure on which to roost. It is important not to overcrowd your birds. Allow a minimum of three square feet per bird, up to an ideal five square feet or more. Of course, if the flock has constant access to the outside, they will do fine with less space in their "sleeping quarters" inside. If you plan to build a new structure in which to house your birds, I strongly recommend that you keep an earth floor in the building, and cover it with a thick layer of high-carbon litter such as oak leaves, wood shavings, etc. (I do not think straw is a good litter material over earth floor, as it can support the growth of molds which can be a respiratory problem for the birds.) The constant scratching of the chickens incorporates the droppings into the litter, preventing the typical "caking" of manure which results in foul odors, flies, and possible buildup of pathogens. The constant mixing of the manure with the high-carbon litter results in a decomposition process similar to that in a compost pile. The billions of microorganisms driving this decomposition actually produce Vitamins K and B12, various natural antibiotics, and other immune-enhancing substances which the chickens ingest while scratching for and eating tiny critters in the litter. A study in the Ohio state university system in the 1920's demonstrated that chickens could obtain 100% of their protein from a mature 12-inch litter. You can periodically (say once a year) remove the litter and use it as compost without further processing.

If you have to use an existing building with a wood floor, that's okay. Here, too, you should lay down a thick layer of dry, high-carbon litter. (In this case, where the litter remains dry, a straw litter is okay.) Your poultry house will be far more pleasant for you and more healthful for the chickens. When you remove a mix of litter and manure from a structure with a wooden floor, you should compost it before adding it to the garden. Whenever you notice a strong odor of ammonia, especially upon opening the poultry house in the morning, it is time either to clean out the litter, or add another layer of high-carbon material. Joel Salatin has observed that, if allowed five square feet per bird, the chickens will continually turn in all manure laid down. At four square feet, there will be some "capping" of manure (accumulation of an impervious layer the birds cannot incorporate), especially under the roosts. At three square feet, there can be capping over all or most of the litter. If you find that the manure is building up in this way, simply use a spading fork to turn over the capped areas in clumps. The chickens will then be able to break up the clumps and work them into the litter. Whatever shelter you give your birds should protect them from wind and sharp drafts; but at the same time should allow for adequate ventilation. I installed solid outer doors and inner frame doors with wire mesh. This configuration allows me to open up the house completely to air flow, while still keeping the birds confined and protected when desired. Also, the birds are able to sun themselves in the direct sunlight coming through the mesh doors and windows at various times during the day. Please note that, if their shelter is tight and dry, chickens are very cold hardy. It is not necessary to provide artificial heat; and it could be detrimental to do so. [Occasionally singlecomb cocks will get some frostbite on combs or wattles. If this becomes a serious problem, you could keep breeds with rose or pea combs instead.] You will of course design your housing with predator protection (especially at night) in mind. But don't anticipate threats like dogs, raccoons, and foxes only - a least weasel can get through any opening large enough for a rat! (I once lost 19 young chickens to a least weasel!) And speaking of rats: Remember that they can be a serious threat to chicks. Half-inch hardware cloth is a great thing! Top of page

Feeding
Commercial poultry feed contains products from rendering plants, reprocessed deep-frying oil, feather meal, and other low quality ingredients which can be quite stale by the time it is fed. For these reasons I prefer to grind my own feed every few days, using certified organic ingredients I buy from Countryside Natural Products near Staunton. Making your own feed may not be a realistic option for you. Countryside also offers premixed versions of the feeds I make, in 50-lb. bags. Fortunately, they are now delivering once a month into the Northern Virginia area. Call them at 888-699-7088 for more information about products and deliveries, or visit Countryside Natural Products.

However, if local commercial feed is the only realistic alternative for you, by all means use it. If your birds have access to pasture, your eggs and dressed poultry will still be superior to any you can buy. If you do use commercial feeds, keep a couple of precautions in mind. Chickens are appropriately fed different mixes at different stages of growth, varying especially with regard to proportions of protein and of minerals, particularly calcium. It is important to feed your birds appropriate to their stage of growth. However, you should strictly avoid feeding chicks a chick formula containing antibiotics. Feeding such medications as a steady part of the diet is completely unnecessary in a small batch of chicks not stressed by crowding such as yours; and excessive use of antibiotics in our food supply has serious long-term implications for both animal and human health. If you cannot get an antibiotic-free starter mix (such as Countryside's), I suggest starting your chicks on the next stage formula ("grower mix" or "pullet developer") instead, perhaps supplementing with a little fish meal to boost the protein. When using commercial feeds, you can also add a little kelp (dried seaweed) meal, an excellent natural all-round mineral supplement. Whatever you feed, always make sure your birds have daily access to some green forage. When they are confined to the winter housing, you can dig dandelion and yellow dock up by the roots and throw them to the flock - the tops stay green much longer than other forage plants, and they are very palatable and highly nutritious to poultry. If you have a greenhouse, set aside a little space for greens (assorted grains, mustards, kale, rape, and other cold-hardy greens are good candidates) for the birds. Or sprout some of those same seeds and expose them to sunlight long enough for them to green up, then toss them to the flock. Remember, you don't need to feed a lot of green forage - even small amounts are highly beneficial. You should also feed the flock grit (small bits of stone and gravel, which they need for grinding their feed in the gizzard) and, in the case of layers, crushed oyster shell as a calcium supplement. These amendments are not so important for birds on pasture, since they are able to pick up what they need on their own. I usually offer them anyway, since it is easy to do so and they are cheap; but they should always be provided (free-choice) to birds confined to the winter housing. Grit and shell are available at any farm co-op or feed supply. Top of page

Watering
Chickens must have fresh water available at all times. Waterers come in a number of designs. Choose a type which minimizes the surface area exposed, so the water will remain as clean and litter-free as possible. Placing it above floor level on a stand will also help minimize contamination with litter. Guard against wet spots under or around the waterer. (Pathogens are more likely to grow in wet than in dry litter.) If wet spots do develop, use a spading fork to scatter the wet material so it can dry as the chickens work it into the rest of the litter. I recommend some form of automated watering, which saves a significant amount of time and effort even in a small flock. There are various designs of vacuum-flow and float-activated waterers. The most sanitary of all watering systems is the nipple waterer. Of course, watering becomes a greater challenge during freezing winter weather. If electricity is available in the poultry house, there are various heating devices that can be used. Carrying the waterer into the basement at night is also an option.

Eggs
Be sure to provide sufficient nest boxes (maybe one for each seven to nine hens or so) positioned above floor level; keep them lined with plenty of clean straw; and collect eggs frequently. All these measures help keep the eggs clean and unbroken, and reduce the likelihood of egg eating, a bad habit which - once established - is difficult to break. I prefer not to wash eggs if they come perfectly clean from the nest. (They actually keep better if not washed.) If they have even the slightest trace of litter or - yes, occasionally poop, I wash them with a half and half solution of water and vinegar, which dissolves the smear and has a sanitizing effect. Fresh eggs do not need to be refrigerated if eaten within a few days. Just set them out of direct sunlight where it is not too warm. (Remember, in nature the mother bird doesn't refrigerate her eggs. They remain perfectly viable for up to two weeks as she day by day assembles her clutch before starting incubation.)

2. Management
Pasturing the Flock
Nothing you can do for your flock will be better for their health and well-being than giving them access to pasture! Chickens allowed to roam freely on pasture enjoy the benefits of direct sunlight, exercise, and natural forage; and are more contented and free from stress. Please note that term "pasture." We are not talking here about the conventional static "chicken run," which is denuded of every blade of grass early on and then looks like the surface of the moon dotted with chicken poops! Such an area permits the birds no access to green forage and wild seeds, and virtually none to insects. The soil becomes overloadedvirtually poisoned with the excess nutrients of the manure; and any pathogens present tend to remain and build up in the soil. On pasture, however, the flock eats plenty of grasses, clovers, and weeds potent sources of enzymes, also of vitamins, minerals, and even proteinsas well as worms and insects. (This additional animal part of their diet is especially beneficial in the production of eggs rich in Omega-3's.) The manure is widely dispersed over the pasture sod and is "digested" by the microorganisms of the soil, boosting the fertility and lushness of the pasture. It is important to rotate the flock over the available pasture, in order to avoid the problems referred to above. A good rule of thumb is to move the flock each week. However, you have a good deal of leeway here, depending especially on stocking density (number of birds per unit of ground) and the season (how rapidly the green cover is growing and regenerating). Having stated the abovethe conventional wisdom on rotationI must add that last year I started thinking about my old grandmother and how she just let her chickens free-roam entirely. I don't feel that is a valid option here. However, in order to get closer to that more natural model, last year I experimented with making a single enclosure for the birds, as large as I could possibly make it; and kept them all in that one space. The pasture was not degraded as a result. However, last year's growing season was an unusually wet one, so the pasture sod had more moisture to support re-growth than it normally would have. Thus "the jury is still out" on whether such a model will be successful in a drier summer. Also, when confining the entire flock in a single foraging space, keeping the stocking density low becomes more important than ever.

The best tool for managing the flock on pasture is electronet fencing. Electronet is easy to set up and to move. It can be energized with either an AC plug-in charger (likely to maintain a "hotter" spark) or a solar powered model, which includes a battery backup. The electric net fence both keeps the flock confined and protects them from predators. (Keep in mind that your worst potential predator could be your neighbor's dog!) It must be maintained free of weed growth or anything else over the bottom wire that would short it out. If you keep a good hot spark in the fence, however, it will stop anything on the ground with a nervous system. Note that with electric fencing your flock is still vulnerable to attacks from aerial predators. I have not found attacks by raptorial birds to be a serious problem in most years, although I did lose a number of growing birds to a young Cooper's hawk last fall. If you have repeat attacks from a problem raptor, it would be a good idea to get in touch with local falconers or conservation groups who are licensed to live-trap these hunting birds. My preferred source for electric net fencing and supplies is Premier Sheep Supplies of Washington, Iowa [(800) 282-6631 or (319) 653-7622]. This is a small company all of whom actually use the products they sell. They offer only items which have worked well for them; personalized, efficient, and friendly service; and expert advice on problems and applications. Note a couple of limitations when using electronet: Very young birds can get through the mesh without a shock, leaving them vulnerable outside the fence. The solution is either to keep the young ones elsewhere until they are larger, or simply to take your chances. The latter has usually been my choice, and I don't know that it has cost me any losses. Young waterfowl can occasionally get fatally entangled in the fenceI've had a few losses that way. Finally, a chicken can obviously fly over the 42-inch net. Once they are trained to it, however (i.e., get zapped a couple of times), they almost never do. When I release new birds to the pasture, or birds that have been confined to winter housing, I usually clip wings to "ground them" until they are trained to the fence. [Note that wings are clipped on one side onlyit is the imbalance between the two sides that discourages flyingand that, if properly done, the clip is not visible when the wing is folded and the bird doesn't look mangled. Note also that guineas are much better fliers than chickens; and I usually do a much more drastic clip in order to "ground" them.] Unless a fenced pasture area is "anchored" on the poultry house, you will need to provide a mobile pasture shelter of some sort where the flock can find shade (essential on hot summer days) or protection from rain and wind, and where they can sleep at night. If the pastured flock includes layers, the shelter should be equipped with nest boxes. I find float-operated waterers on long supply hoses especially useful for flocks on pasture. Please note that in winter there is little or no growth of the pasture cover. Hence you will degrade the sod very quickly if you allow the flock a lot of access to the pasture at that time. In winter, I occasionally release the birds to the pasture for a couple of hours late in the day. The birds enjoy and benefit from these outings. However, it is necessary to limit them pretty strictly, and to monitor the condition of the sod closely. Top of page

Putting the Flock to Work

There are a number of ways you can utilize chickens to help with various homestead projects. For example, normally you want to move the flock frequently enough to avoid damage to the pasture sod. However, you might choose to "park" the flock on a given plot long enough to completely destroy an existing pasture sod. When the birds have removed the previous cover, you can re-seed the area to a new pasture mix, sow a cover crop, or work up the soil into new garden beds. The chickens can also be used to "till in" a cover crop or heavy weed growth in garden beds. If you run the flock in the orchard in the early spring and late fall, they will help significantly with insect control. (I have noticed a major difference in insect damage in orchard fruit since beginning this practice. It is a real thrill, I assure you, to watch guineas jump up and take coddling moths right out of the air!) Finally, chickens are great shredders and tillers of organic additions to the soil. Often, instead of assembling and repeatedly turning a compost pile, I simply dump the materials I would have used in the compost heap into an area where I have a flock "parked" for awhile. Their tireless scratching shreds the material and incorporates it into the soil. The manure worked in with this material boosts the biological activity in the top few inches of soil, resulting in faster, more efficient breakdown of the material and an increase in soil tilth and fertility. Because of their constant scratching, chickens cannot be used for insect control while actually growing the crop. However, you can run chickens on a garden area before planting to depress population levels of crop competitors such as slugs; or after cropping in order to catch problem insects which overwinter in the soil as they are going to ground. Please note that guineas scratch very little. I have used them quite successfully (confining them to the winter squash plot with electronet fencing) to achieve 100% control of squash bug! If you do plant an area worked by chickens, allow a period of at least 60 days before harvesting crops in close contact with the soil such as radishes or lettuce. There should be no problem with trellised crops, or tall crops such as corn.

Health Issues
A standard book on chickens will usually have an introduction to diseases and other health problems. Truly, prevention, not cure, is the key when it comes to the health of your flock. If you follow the recommendations above, you will rarely have a problem with the health of your birds. Occasionally, of course, you may encounter a sick chicken or even an inexplicable spontaneous death. Frankly, my own experience is that once a chicken is noticeably ill, it is unlikely to recover. If you want to try to save it, by all means isolate it from the rest of the flock in case the condition is contagious. I usually simply cull a bird that has definitely become ill. (The natural condition of chickens is active, vigorous, bright-eyed, and with a full crop. If you find a bird who is excessively listless, dull-eyed, and with an empty crop when there is feed around, you have a sick bird.) I do not ever eat a bird that seems ill. There are two health conditions worth particular attention: Check your birds for external parasites (lice and mites) occasionally. Pick up a bird at random and check the skin at the base of the feathers around the vent. If you see little crawly things of any sort, they are either lice or mites. Sometimes a bird with a severe infestation will seem rather dull or listless and will pick at her plumage a great deal. If the birds have a place they can scratch out a dusting place, they will usually take care of the problem themselves-the dust which they instinctively fluff up under their feathers coats the lice or mites and smothers them. (Insects breathe through their skin.) If they seem not to have sufficient dusting

opportunities, you can provide them a dusting box. I put a mix of peat moss and wood ash (sifted through inch hardware cloth) into the box and add diatomaceous earth and maybe a little rotenone powder. If these measures are not sufficient, it may be necessary occasionally to dust the birds by hand, using the d.e. and maybe a little of the rotenone powder. (Always use a dust mask when dusting by hand! It is also a good idea to wear such a mask for any extended periods of work in the poultry house. I use the Respro Sportsta Mask a great deal when doing any sort of dusty work around the homestead. One source is Allergy Control Products 800-422-3878.) If you have a situation where a cock is mounting an individual hen excessively (for example, in a breeding pen where there is only a single hen, or two or threeor simply when the cock has picked that hen as a "favorite") the sharp spurs of the cock can tear the skin of the hen's sides. In the worst cases a gaping hole can be opened into the body cavity itself. This is a very serious condition and can lead to the death of the hen. Such a hen must be immediately isolated, and some healing salve applied to the wound. If you catch the problem early on, she is very likely to recover. At the same time, you need to trim the spurs on the cock to prevent a repeat of the injury. Actually, I now routinely trim cocks with sharp spurs, especially if they will be working in the breeding pens. Use a pruning shears to cut off the spur about halfway to the end, not too close to the shank. There will be bleeding, and you can use a styptic if you like. I usually don't; the bleeding is not serious if you don't cut close to the shank.

3. Miscellaneous Questions and Observations

Nomenclature
An immature female chicken is a pullet; an immature male, a cockerel. A mature female is a hen; a mature male, a cock.

At what age will pullets start to lay?

Onset of lay can vary by breed. However, you can expect "your basic barnyard breed" to start laying at about 22 weeks or so.

Is it necessary to keep a cock with a flock of hens?

No, it is not. Even without a cock, a group of hens will establish their hierarchical social order; and they will lay just as well without the cock's "encouragement" (though of course the eggs will not be fertile). So if you think the crowing of a cock on your place might cause problems with neighbors, you could keep a flock of hens only. However, I recommend including the cock in the flock if possible. He completes the social structure in a way that seems natural and balanced; and we enjoy watching him preening and strutting and taking care of his ladies.

How well do chickens lay in the winter?

All chickens reduce egg production greatly in winter, some breeds more than others. They molt during this period (that is, replace all their feathers); so are putting most of their resources into production of feathers (which are almost pure protein) rather than eggs.

Because production is also keyed to day length, some folks put lights on the birds in winter (to make the total exposure to light fourteen hours a day) to stimulate greater production. I have never adopted this practice myself. I figure the demands of the molt are an excellent reason for the hens to reduce production; and that it would be ungenerous to push them to lay more eggs.

Are fertilized eggs more nutritious?

I have read arguments on both sides of this issue, and don't know that there is a definitive answer. Certainly the major influences on nutritional values of eggs are diet and overall health. If you feel it is better for you to manage your flock without a cock, you need not be concerned about a possibly real but minuscule difference in nutritional value in the eggs.

Are brown eggs more nutritious than white?

No, the tint of the egg shell is determined by the genetics of the various breeds and has no relation to nutritional values of the contents. Probably the myth of "brown versus white" emerged because the breeds exploited by the commercial egg industry lay white shelled eggs; while brown eggs are more likely to be from smaller, better-nurtured farm flocks and thus to be superior in quality.

Is a natural egg more nutritious than a "factory" egg?

Most definitely! Anyone who has compared the two will attest to the marked difference in flavor, viscosity of whites, color of yolks, and cooking properties. If these characteristics are indicators of nutritional qualityas I believe in a natural, unprocessed food they arethen the more natural egg your hens produce will be superior in nutrition as well as culinary pleasure to any egg you can buy. Indeed, there is serious question in my mind whether we should consider the factory egg and the natural egg to be the same food at all. For example, I think that the much-debated question, "Is eating eggs good for you?" is totally meaningless until we clarify whether we are talking about a natural or a factory egg, and the differences between them. For example: Egg yolks are rich in Omega-3 and Omega-6 fatty acids; and how well our bodies utilize these fatty acids depends to a large extent on the ratio between the two. The fatty acid profiles in a natural egg and a factory egg are completely different; and thus their metabolism by the body is different as well. Consider this: Why is an egg one of the most nutrient-dense of all foods? It is not because the hen feels an obligation to nourish you. It is because the conversion of the egg's contents into a living baby chicken in twenty-one days requires a powerhouse of nutrients! And a supermarket egg, even if fertilized, would not support the growth of an embryo and hatch out a chickthe required nutrients to do so are simply not there. Top of page

Will my own home-dressed chicken be better than supermarket chicken?

Again, most definitely, yes! A more natural chicken-raised with better feed and with greens and insects as a part of the diet; not stressed by intense confinement in unsanitary conditions

nor pushed with growth stimulants and antibioticswill be vastly superior in flavor, texture, and nutrition than the supermarket equivalent. Consider also this: The typical market broiler is raised with fifty-five thousand other birds in a space which allows only half a square foot per bird. Chickens have a strong instinct for social order, and will naturally fashion a flock hierarchy if permitted to. In the chaos of highconfinement housing, however, they are unable to do so. I think it is not at all a stretch to say that -- even aside from the filth, dust, noise, and other environmental stressespsychically, a commercial broiler lives every day of its life in chicken hell. And I hope I will not be accused of waxing "mystical" here if I offer my firm belief that, when we eat that bird, we are quite literally eating that anguish. Finally, there is the question of sanitation. Perhaps you have never yourself slaughtered a chicken. You will find it easy to imagine, however, that even the rankest amateur when eviscerating a bird by hand will exercise great care to avoid tearing open the gastrointestinal tract. We know what is on the inside of those entrails, and we are very certain we don't want it spilled onto meat we intend to eat! In commercial plants that may slaughter 25 million or more birds a week, the whole process is of course highly automated. After the carcass is slit open, a loop of stainless steel wire is robotically inserted into the cavity. It encircles the entrails and is withdrawn, pulling them out. Anyone who has done the process by hand will understand intuitively what happens next: The tract is torn open and spills its contents into the body cavity. The carcass then goes into a chill tank, where the spilled intestine contents accumulate into a fecal sludge a couple inches deep. Not to worry, however: The carcasses then soak in up to fourteen different chlorine baths to sanitize them. Then they are shrinkwrapped and offered pristine and pretty in the supermarket refrigerator case. Bon apetit!

But isn't killing your own chickens just awful?

The concern expressed here tends to go in one of two directions:

How can you bear to eat an animal you've known personally?

To which the logical answer seems to be: "How can you bear to eat one you haven't?!" Seriously, the moral questions raised by killing a beautiful animal in order to consume its flesh for food are profound ones; and I hope you will never be able to take them lightly. In the context of actually nurturing a flock, however, the question is not an abstract or theoretical onenor one that focuses solely (morbidly?) on the killing of the bird. The relationship with the flock involves a giving, a nurturinga support of the other's well-beingon both sides. In many of our meals, we have the experience of knowing the particular individual that graces our table. Our reaction is not one of horror or guilt, but of profound gratitude and respect.

Isn't cleaning a chicken just too gross?

Reactions to the mechanics of killing and eviscerating a birdthe physical contact with blood and entrailsare highly personal; and I will not assume that you could ever overcome them if you are troubled by them. Often, however, such feelings are rooted in a sense of helpless uncertainty about how to pull the whole thing off; dread of causing the bird unnecessary suffering; or fear of making an awful mess of the process. It can help tremendously to seek out a more experienced person who is willing to walk you through the process the first time or two.

Once you actually try your hand at butchering fowl, however, you will find it rather simple. You will need a large pot for scalding (the key to a good pluck is a good scald), a comfortable workspace with running water, a sharp knife (a good poultry shears is a nice bonus), and a bucket for feathers and entrails. The whole process can easily be done by hand for small numbers of fowl. Thermostatically controlled scalders and mechanical pluckers are available, but their high cost would likely be justified only if you are processing a lot of birds. (See the article "Homestead Poultry Butchering" for a detailed description of the process.) Top of page

Culling the flock

Even if you never get into selectively breeding your own stock, you will do well to cull the flock periodically. If you start a group of straight-run chicks, you will end up with far more males than you are likely to want to keep. Also, as hens age they lay fewer and fewer eggs. Thus most people choose periodically to "cull" the excess males and older females as they continually renew the flock. Be aware that older birds call for different culinary uses. They have a lot of flavor, but are tough and stringy. Long, slow, moist cooking (such as in braises and stews) is called for. An even better use for an old bird is to make it into the best, most nutritious broth you ever tasted! Check the recipe for "Ellen's Fabulous Chicken Broth" to find out how she makes her superior stock. And be sure to include the feet in the stock pot! I usually keep the heads as well, but you must at a minimum clean and keep the feet. The additional collagen they contribute to the broth is extremely beneficial to the digestive tract and to overall health.

How can you cause a hen to go broody?

The natural instinct to assemble a clutch of eggs, hatch them out, and nurture the chicks has been selected against in most modern poultry breeding, with considerable success. (If you make "going broody" a capital offense, it doesn't take long for the hens to get the message!) Thus broodiness is a rarity among modern breeds. Some breedse.g., Buff Orpingtons, Cochinsare considered more likely to express the trait than others. Even with these breeds, however, broodiness is very much "hit-or-miss" with regard to individual hens. A better strategy if you want to have a couple of reliable working mothers in your flock is to locate hens of some of the historic breeds among whom broodiness is the norm rather than the exceptione.g., Old English and Madagascar Games, Cubalayas, Shamos, and Malays. Dorkings would also be a good breed to try, though they might not express the trait at anywhere close to 100%. I now have an established sub-flock of reliable broody hens who hatch out all my new stock. The core of the broody group are half a dozen Old English Game hens, supplemented by hens of other breeds who volunteered to do this worka Dorking, a Partridge Chantecler, a Russian Orlof, even (surprisingly, since they are Mediterranean class) a Blue Andalusian and a Silver Campine. (See "Working with Broody Hens: Let Mama Do It" for an extended discussion of using hens to hatch and nurture new stock.

Soil fertility: Too much of a good thing?

When the flock is rotated frequently over the available pasture, the dispersed droppings have a positive effect on soil fertility. However, if they remain on one plot for long periods of time or even if you make heavy applications of poultry-litter-based compost to the garden year after yearthe soil can eventually accumulate levels of phosphorus that are not beneficial to plants. If poultry manure is a significant part of your fertility program, do not apply any other source of supplemental phosphorus; and have your soil tested periodically to monitor phosphate levels. Also, be wary of over-fertilization in the orchard. Fruit trees do not require high levels of nitrogen; and excessive application of nitrogen in the form of poultry droppings can stimulate lush, too-rapid growth which makes the trees more subject to winter damage and to fire blight (especially pears and apples). Limit the flock's "bug patrol" duties in the orchard to brief periods in spring and fall when insects that overwinter in the soil are emerging or going to ground.

Conclusion
I hope that nothing I have said makes you think that keeping poultry need be at all complicated or a lot of trouble. If you do "make the leap" and start a small flock, you will find that daily chores quickly become a routine requiring just minutes a day. The whole family especially if you have young children will find the flock fascinating, beautiful, and inspirational (even more so if you allow a mother hen to raise a clutch of chicks).

Poultry Husbandry in a Changed Energy Future

This article was published in the Dec 2007/January 2008 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine. Please note that, at the time I wrote this piece, the price of gasoline had topped $4 a gallon. At the moment, prices have dropped to a third of that. Far too many of our fellow citizens take that drop as a signal to return to our profligate energy habits. I hope the visitor to this site is not so nave. Whether brought on by energy shortages and high prices, the mortgage market collapse, or failure of sectors of our complex industrial food systemwe are entering a time of greater economic constriction for almost all citizens. We are well advised to give serious thought to the issue of food security. Maybe a backyard flock is part of your food future. ~Harvey, December 27, 2008

Table of Contents for This Page

Peak Oil Comes Home to Roost Breed Selection Hatching New Stock with Natural Mothers Seasonality

Protecting the Flock Poultry and Soil Fertility Feeding Recruiting the Services of the Flock The Bigger Picture

Peak Oil Comes Home to Roost

Have you filled your tank at the gas pump lately? Is the fact that gasoline prices have doubled in just a few years simply a momentary irritation? Or is filling the tank an occasion for sober reflection on the future? Pumping that gas should remind us just how much energy we use to fuel a high-octane global economy, and how much that economy is dependent at every point on cheap, abundant, readily available hydrocarbon fuels. Nowhere is this dependence more obvious than in the systems we use to grow, process, and distribute our food. And while the rapid increase in fuel prices has complex economic and geopolitical causes, it is a symptom first and foremost of a simple fact of geology: Extractable fossil fuel deposits are limited. Their extraction to fuel an economy on steroids is a one-time event in human history. Globally, we are at, or very near, the point at which we are withdrawing the maximum amount of oil and natural gas that will ever be extracted; and supplies of these resourceshowever considerable at that momentwill inexorably decline from that point. (And this in an era of rapidly increasing demand from major new players in the global economy like China and India.) If you key peak oil into an online search engine, you may find yourself catapulted into some pretty scary scenarios that could play out as petroleum suppliesthe very lifeblood of the economystart to shrink. But it is not my intention to sketch doom-and-gloom scenarios. I will focus instead on outcomes we can expect simply as a result of rising fuel and energy costs. If cheap and abundant fuels have led to centralized, mechanized agriculturedependent on fertilizers from natural gas and pesticides from petroleumand the transportation of food (and feeds for our livestock) great distances, will expensive energy and scarce fuels dictate a reversal of these historic trends? What will be the implications for poultry husbandry on the homestead? How might we change our approach to caring for our home flocks in a changed energy future? Top of page

Breed Selection
Any readers who have raised Cornish Cross as a fast-growing meat bird know how quickly they can reach freezer-filling size. But they also know how dependent Cornish Cross are on purchased inputs, sometimes from far away. They require large quantities of high-protein growing mashes, since they are not skilled at foraging their food on their own. Because their immune systems are weak, it is typical to start them on feeds medicated with antibiotics through the brooder phase (or, indeed, their whole lives, in industrial broiler operations). Finally, such birds are more suited to intensive, confined production modelsrequiring a greater investment in housing or other shelter, even at the homestead level.

More traditional breeds have much more robust immune systems than a modern hybrid like the Cornish Cross, and are more likely to thrive in the absence of expensive medicated feeds. They have more instinct to seek out beneficial foods on their own. And they do better out in the open, foraging and enjoying the benefits of sunshine and exercise, than in closely confined conditions. Historically, breeds were bred for local conditions and needs, and to serve specific functions on the homestead. I expect that in the future more flock owners will choose breeds on the basis of appropriate fit to their particular conditions and goals. For example, those with harsh winters might do well to choose a breed such as the Chantecler, developed in Canada, because its minimalist comb and wattles are almost immune to frostbite. Without expensive supplemental heat in their winter housing, the larger combs and wattles of a Mediterranean class breed like Leghorns are more apt to freeze, increasing stress on the birds. Some owners might want a flock made up of both historic breeds (like Old English Game, Asil, and Dorking), who retain the broody instinct, and non-setting Mediterranean types (such as Hamburg, Minorca, Leghorn) to keep up egg production through the breeding season. We might also choose some breeds known to be good winter layers (such as Wyandotte, Sussex, Plymouth Rock, Rhode Island and New Hampshire Reds) to offset the scarce winter production of the older historic breeds. Whatever specific breeds we choose, we should try to get stock from breeders who emphasize homestead production traits, not the finer points of color or pattern typical of breeding for show. Top of page

Hatching New Stock with Natural Mothers

There are many who expect that in our changed energy future, the grid is likely to be less reliable. If we cannot count on having uninterrupted access to electricity for the weeks needed to operate an articifial incubator, or to raise hatchlings in an artificial brooder until feathered, I expect we will gain a new appreciation of the hen who remembers the rituals of incubation and chick nurtureas opposed to those more modern hens who have been strongly encouraged through selective breeding to forget this essential lore. Most of the historic breeds like the Old English Game and Asil retain the broody instinct as the norm, not the exception. It is good to remember as well an observation by Charles Darwin in one of his works: When two decidedly non-broody breeds were crossed, many of the resulting daughter hens expressed the broody trait. It is comforting to think that, should we suddenly conclude that we need hens with the instinct to mother after all, that deep chicken wisdom might re-emerge with a single roll of the genetic dice. Top of page

Seasonality
In an era of increased costs for the energy required to process our food (as in freezing or canning), we will likely adopt a more seasonal approach to food production. Think again of the idea of filling the freezer with big batches of Cornish Cross broilers for the freezer. A less energy-intensive alternative is to cull birds successively throughout the year, as needed (both with reference to our own needs for the table, and to the needs of the flock itself as it progresses through the four seasons). In the summer, we can enjoy young, tender chicken for

grilled, saut\{e}ed, or baked dishes by culling this seasons hatch of cockerels. Fall is a time for braised dishes such as coq au vin, using the older cockerels, and pullets not kept for egg production, as we reduce flock size for the winter. Winter itself reveals deficiencies in rate of lay, suggesting that Henrietta might serve better in the stewpot, where long, slow cooking emphasizes the rich flavor of an old bird and produces a matchless broth. Indeed, it is entirely possible to eat chicken frequently throughout the year, enjoying culinary adventures unavailable to those dependent on supermarket chicken, and never once package a bird for freezing. Top of page

Protecting the Flock

Regular readers of Backyard Poultry know that I like electric net fencing as the ideal management tool for protecting my flocks from any predator on the ground, while allowing them free range on pasture within the limits I impose. In an age of rising costs for all energyand resource-intensive manufactured products (and remember that the plastic, a major component of electronet, is a product of petroleum), Im afraid that electronet will be more expensive and less readily available. Homesteaders such as myself who came to rely on electronet may have to experiment with other solutions. Many flock owners find they do not have serious predation problems if they practice day rangingthat is, allow the birds to range freely during the day, and confine them inside protective shelter at night. Such a practice can be effective against most natural predators, who are more often nocturnal. The major predation threat during the day is the neighbors dogs (or even our own). I would expect, however, thatin a time when food production is centering more on the backyard than in the pastcommunal attitudes toward dogs running at large and threatening livestock will approach zero tolerance. But dogs themselves might be an important solution to the problems of predation. I hear from more and more keepers of poultry, some of whom produce for a market, that guardian dogs work very well to protect poultry, as well as other forms of livestock such as sheep. I have even heard of folks using donkeys and llamas to protect their livestock, even from formidable predators like coyote. One thing is for sure: In a time of need, human ingenuity tends to discover novel solutions pretty quickly. A final thought about protection from predators: In previous era, people established living fences to confine and protect livestock. In the case of pleaching, suitable trees were planted in a line, then woven into a dense hedge by tying branches together in crossing positions. In the species preferred for pleachingsuch as linden, hornbeam, and hawthorn the points where the branches cross abrade and actually grow together, in a sort of natural graft. Another approach is to plant suitable trees or shrubs tightly spaced and prune them hard, to shape a stout, impenetrable hedge. If the plants in the hedge have thorns (hawthorn, Osage orange, Rugosa rose), so much the better. Though such a hedge can pose a barrier even to cats and other climbing predators, it will also serve double duty as a windbreak, and provide food and habitat for insects and birds. Some species might also provide fodder for livestock, or vitamin-rich foods for our own needs (hawthorn, Rugosa rose). Top of page

Poultry and Soil Fertility

In an era in which we will no longer assume that fertilizers in a bag, made from natural gas, are the obvious choice for nurturing our garden, we will have a new appreciation of the contribution livestock manures can make to our soil fertility program. Poultry in the henhouse should be kept on deep litter (preferably over an earth floor), whichonce it is finely broken down and agedcan be used directly in the garden like finished compost. When our birds are allowed to range over pasture sod, they boost its fertility. I remember well the first time I saw proof of this phenomenon: I was raising 50 young broilers in a Joel Salatin style floorless pen, which I moved by its own length once a day. After a week of such moves, we got a good soaking rain. Two days later, we could see the difference between the pasture that had been under the pen, and that which had notthe swath of lush, vibrant green could have been laid out with a ruler. Top of page

Feeding
It has been estimated that the average bite of food on the American plate has been moved 1500 miles from field to fork. Livestock feeds are perhaps not moved such distances, but typically they do come from widely dispersed sources, in some cases quite distant from the point of final use. As fuel for such extravagant transport of materials becomes more scarce, it will be essential to find sources of feedstocks more locally. Most local of all, of course, are those feeds we are able to supply on the homestead itself. If there are farmers in your neighborhood willing to grow for your feed needs, encourage them to do so. Perhaps you can form a buying group with other flock owners in your area, guaranteeing the grower an assured market close to home, and perhaps sharing in the required transportation, distribution, and storage. As for what we can provide on the homestead, I remember that my grandmother gave her flock almost no purchased feedsjust a couple of handfuls of scratch grains each day to keep them fixed on the coop as homeand they virtually fed themselves, free-ranging over her small farm. That memory convinces me that, if we choose the sturdier, more self-reliant breeds, and can give them the space to forage their own foods, poultry keeping can become a low-input enterprise indeed. Even on a small space, there is much we can grow to supplement our birds diets. Cover crops like cowpeas and buckwheat can be grown to benefit our soil. Once they have ripened their seeds, we can turn in the chickens to self-harvest them, saving the additional labor of harvesting, threshing, and storage. Jerusalem artichoke plantings have been used as thickets in which chickens graze, feasting on the abundant earthworms in the sheltered soil, as well as the lower leaves of the plants. (At the end of the season, the high-energy Jerusalem artichoke tubers can be dug as feed for pigs or people.) Flowering species that we plant for beauty, and as habitat and food for insects and wild birds (and possibly supplemental foods for ourselves) such as amaranth, sunflowers, and sorghumcan also provide additional foods for our flocks. Some garden crops such as pumpkins and mangels (fodder beets) provide fresh feeds that store naturally through the winter. Fertility patchesplants such as comfrey, grown to contribute to soil fertilitycan be sources of poultry feed as well, either cut and fed fresh,

dried as a sort of hayor the flock can simply be turned into the patch itself for some gorging for a limited time. Unless the birds are confined to the patch for a long time, comfrey will re-grow even if eaten down to the crowns. Mulberries provide shade and dropped fruit. Poultry also benefit from the shade of chestnut trees, and can help keep them free from chestnut weevil. Most homesteads in this country are blessed with wild plants highly palatable to poultry such as chickweed, which we can gather and feed. Some cold hardy plants like dandelion and yellow dock survive deep into winters chill, providing palatable, vitamin-rich green feed until the ground freezes. Of course, free ranging poultry will eat a lot of nutrient-dense insects on their own. If you get swarmed with an insect like Japanese beetles, though, try hand gathering them (in the cool of the morning or evening, into a bucket with a gallon of water in the bottom) and instigating a feeding frenzy in the flock. If you set up the bins for a large enough vermicomposting operation (composting with earthworms), you will reap not only enhanced fertility for the garden (earthworm castings), but will be able to take harvests of worms to feed the flock. In the winter, you can ensure continued access to live animal foods (slugs, earthworms, grubs) by releasing the flock onto a yard which is heavily enough mulched to keep the ground from freezing. Homesteaders who milk cows or goats will find that excess milk, skimmed milk, and buttermilk make high-quality feed for the flock in any amounts. Top of page

Recruiting the Services of the Flock

Most keepers of poultry adopt other strategies as well for becoming more food self-sufficient on the homestead. Fortunately, there are many ways that our flocks can assist with other food production projects, decreasing our dependence on purchased inputs. All too often, for example, we simply assume that the solution to problems of insect predation in our crops is the purchase of something stinky in a bottle. But poultry can once again (as they did in our grandparents day, before the era of Monsanto and Cargill) help establish insect balance in the garden and orchard. They can also be used to sanitize the pre-season garden of slugs and snails. Tillage is another garden project for which gardeners too often assume the solution is an expensive outside purchasea power tiller. I expect in our changed energy future the home garden tiller will be a less common option, both because of the embodied energy inherent in its energy-intensive manufacture, and its ongoing requirement of fossil fuels to operate. How fortunate that we can engage the natural behaviors of our chickens (how they love to scratch, non-stop, all day) to accomplish tillage chores on the homestead (tilling in cover crops, or areas heavily grown up in weeds). I have even used them to till in tough, established pasture sod over compacted soil, the first step in developing new garden ground. Just fence the birds onto the plot to be tilled, and set them to their work. Indeed, the results for the soil are

actually superior to that of the power tiller: The chickens do not break down soil structure or invert its natural layers, and they supercharge the top few inches with fertility via their dispersed droppings, a bonus not provided by the tiller. Remember the usefulness of domestic avian species other than chickens in the creation of a more self-sufficient homestead. Heritage breed turkeys are able to feed themselves almost entirely if given enough biologically diverse ground on which to forage. Pigeons can be raised in pigeon lofts, but released to fly freely and self-feed. All forms of domestic fowl, especially geese, can help with orchard sanitation by cleaning up dropped fruit. Guineas control squash bug in my winter squash plota pair of guineas will keep an acre entirely free of ticks if allowed to rangeand it is a thrill to see a guinea take a coddling moth right out of the air. Geese have long been used as weeders, and ducks for slug control, in compatible crops. Finally, put the waterfowl to work like I domowing the lawn and turning what would otherwise be a dead-end (and energy-intensive) chore for me into elegant winter meals and valuable cooking fats. Top of page

The Bigger Picture

Given the dependence of the economy, national and global, on lavish use of fossil fuels, a decline in their availability will certainly bring on profound adjustments, some of them sudden and wrenching. Yes, thats a scary thought. But you know what is said about the silver lining in every cloud, the opportunity at the heart of every crisis. The coming changes in energy use could also usher in a more nurturing, ecologically sound agriculture, and a renewal of community and vitality in the wasteland that some of our rural areas have become. They will bring as well a new appreciation of the backyard flock as essential to the home economy. We flock owners who have learned to manage our flocks in more integrated, selfsustaining ways will enjoy their many benefits with a minimum of purchased inputs. Equally important will be the opportunity to be of service to the majority of our neighbors, who will need help re-learning this priceless lore.

The Homestead Flock: Pets or Partners?

This article was published in the December 2008/January 2009 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine. It was posted to the site December 28, 2008.

Table of Contents for This Page

Pet Chickens? Culling the Flock The Nature of Domestication The Moral Issue Partners in the Homestead Economy

Pet Chickens?
I once gave seven four-week-old chicks to a family with several children. When I next saw the father, he told me the chicks had become a major focus for his children, who pampered them, gave them imaginative names, and wrote stories about their escapades. And when one of the chicks died, they organized an elaborate funeral, complete with candles, songs, and recitations. I love that story. We modern humans have become increasingly lonely, increasingly isolated from the natural world in the tight cocoon of a man-made environment. Those children found a powerful antidote to that alienation, a reconnection with the living world, through a close and intimate relationship with another species. By taking responsibility for their care, they began to learn about the essential interconnectedness of their ecological surroundings, and by extension, that they have a responsibility to it as well.

Cuckoo Marans Trio But lets reflect a little on the nature of that relationship. For the children, the relationship was essentially with cherished pets. For many of the adult keepers of poultryand perhaps a

substantial proportion of the readers of Backyard Poultrythat remains the nature of the relationship. While I have knownand respectmany keepers of pet chickens, I hope that we can all find our way to a broader, more useful relationship with our flocks. In the attempt to become more food independent in our back yards, poultry have far more to offer as partners than as pets. In my experience, folks who relate to their birds essentially as pets tend to have small flocks (in which each bird is known as a unique individual, often named), and tend not to do any of their own breeding of stock. Their perspective on the nature of the enterprise differs from my more utilitarian one in three ways: dealing with illness, culling for the table, and using the flocks services for benefits beyond the production of eggs. Top of page

Culling the Flock

I am always troubled by the requests I get from local acquaintances and visitors to my website to diagnose illness among their birds and suggest a remedy. I know they dont want to hear might even be shocked to hearthat I routinely cull a bird in my flock who is ill. (The difference is partly one of scale, Im sure: Its not surprising there should be more interest in treating an ill bird in a smaller flock, in which the loss of a single individual is a relatively greater loss than in a larger flock.) In my own flock, if a bird is injured, I isolate and care for it individually as long as it takes the recuperative powers of fowl following injury are remarkable. But when a bird exhibits symptoms of disease, I am more likely to do two things: Cull the affected bird immediately, and review my environmental factors and management practices. Am I overlooking something that is undermining the birds natural good health? If I am doing all I can to make sure the flock has the conditions to thrive, a bird who fails to do so is not a case for heroic interventions to rescue it, but of demonstrated genetic weakness. Why should future members of the flock be saddled with such genetics? As an acquaintance of mine says, The best medicine kit is the hatchet. This sounds cruel, but one could argue that a concern for the future well-being of the flock as an ongoing entity is just as compassionate as a tender-hearted determination to save a sick individual.

Thank you! Perhaps no issue is more likely to divide the owners of pet fowl from the poultry husbandman than the question of slaughtering birds for the table. I have known a number of owners of small flocks who keep their hens long past their productive period, delighting in their contented presence about the homestead until they die of old age, indifferent to the scant

return on investment of money and effort. Often they are puzzled or even offended by my acceptance of culling the flock for food as an inherent part of the process. Perhaps some reflections on the history and nature of domestication itself can help clarify the issues. Top of page

The Nature of Domestication

Naragansett Male Turkey Probably most of us assume that domestication began when humans way back when adopted young animals from the wild; concluded there were obvious benefits (meat, milk, hides, feathers, etc.) from animals they didnt have to hunt; and began caging or fencing them and thus increasing their value as a resource. Such a scenario fits comfortably with our habitual human hubrisan assumption that of course we would have initiated the process and been in control of it from the beginning. A fascinating book by Stephen Budiansky, based on recent advances in scientific thinking about the origins of domestication, gives another point of view, arguing that domestication was an evolutionary process not initiated by humans or, at first, much under their control. It is titled The Covenant of the Wild: Why Animals Chose Domestication. The title implies the books thesis: that domestication was a co-evolutionary event, a compact with humans into which certain animal species entered for compelling reasons of their own. Simplifying Budianskys argument greatly here: When Homo sapiens started practicing agriculture, certain opportunist species moved into the new ecological nichescultivated grain and other crops. The more aggressive individuals among them would have been killed outright by the humans, introducing an unplanned selection toward more docile animals willing to accept the benefits of living in close association with people. Among these were the obvious benefits of enhanced and easier access to food, and protection by the humans from their natural predators. But remember that the urge to reproduce is equally as powerful as the urge for nourishment and escape from predation. In their bargain with humans, domesticated species achieved spectacular reproductive success, far beyond that of their wild cousins. Gradually humans concluded that fencing or caging the opportunists in was more efficient than fencing them out of crop areas. The obvious next step would have been the control of matingsbased on the common sense observation that superior individuals produce superior offspringand the rapid development of domesticated species as we know them was underway.

Waterfowl Eating Comfrey We do not know in detail about the domestication of fowl species. It is easy to imagine, however, that their wild ancestors were drawn to agricultural settlements to make the same sorts of bargains as other domesticated species: easier access to food, protection from predators, and reproductive success far beyond that of their wild relativesgrouse, quail, mallards, Graylag geese, etc. Top of page

The Moral Issue

Slaughtering birds we have taken a personal obligation to nurture is often debated as a moral issue. Certainly any individual is free to purchase her birds from a hatchery, care for them throughout a good life that ends in natural death from old age, and never slaughter a bird in her care. Thats fine as a personal preference, of course, but it does not change the moral equations involved. Participation in domestication necessarily involves us in the slaughter of animals. Maintenance of excess males not needed for breeding (fowl, like other domesticated speciesand humansreproduce roughly half-and-half male and female), and of old females no longer in productionsimply is not sustainable as an economic enterprise (in the broadest sense of managing resource use). Because we cannot expect or imagine that those breeding our stock will not cull their flocks as an essential part of the enterprise, we are in a moral sense entirely complicit in the deaths of those animals. Such is the essential dynamic of domestication.

New Beginnings All of which seems a bit gloomy. We bring a redeeming brightness to this bargain weve made with our feathered friends by fulfilling our (moral) obligation to give them the best care, the most natural and contented life, that is in our power to provide. Recognizing our relationship to our flocks as an alliance for mutual benefit introduces a respect and gratitude that goes far beyond simple joy in them as cherished pets. We become partners in a mutually supportive task of maximizing the homestead as a resourcein which we are as dependent on the flocks good work as they are on our care. Top of page

Partners in the Homestead Economy

If you have kept your flock basically as pets, I invite you to broaden the scope of your relationship with them. There is nothing to be lost, and much to be gained. Though my goals for my flock are utilitarian, that doesnt mean I cannot know all the joysthe sheer funof keeping them as well. We get enormous pleasure from watching the antics of our birds as they forage and get excited and squabble. Our fascination with mother hens caring for their chicks is endless. And when we encounter one of our birds again at the table, we feel a sense of profound respect and gratitudeof personal indebtednessthat those eating mass-produced foods from supermarket or fast-food joint are not privileged to know. As I write, the world has collectively held its breath, staggered by the speed with which our national and now global economy has entered profound crisis, and deeply uneasy about the prospects for the future. Whatever ups and downs have intervened by the time you read these words, most analyses I read predict that it will be years before we return to normal. Indeed, most expect an entirely new and different normal to emerge. My own gut feeling is that the new norm will mean a change from the era of easy prosperity most of us grew up assuming almost as a natural right, into a time of greater economic constriction. I expect we will see a greatly accelerated movement toward home production for our needs, as opposed to consumption of goods and services generated by a centralized mass market.

Grazing Waterfowl Against this unsettling background, we might well have a new appreciation of the home flock as partners in an effort toward a more productive backyardtoward greater food selfsufficiency. Their contribution of eggs to our tables is of course something poultry owners have always valued. But those who have been reluctant to slaughter their cherished birds for the table may re-think this potential gift as they plan for a more productive flock at the heart of the homestead enterprise. Our grandmothers knew how wholesome and health-giving is good broth, which can become a foundation of our families health. (See Chicken Broth: A Way of Life, by Ellen Ussery, Feb/Mar 2008 issue.) And dont forget the value of the nutritious, high-quality cooking fats to be rendered from our chickens, geese, and ducks. Many of us may even come to value the feathers of our slaughtered fowl, especially the waterfowl, for home-made alternatives to purchased quilts and winter clothing.

Muscovies

But the flock has so many other contributions to make as we try to ramp up home production. Fowl able to forage convert resourcesinsects, earthworms, green plants, wild seedswe cannot directly utilize for food ourselves. Geese are primarily grazers, and can utilize pasture or even our lawnsas effectively as ruminants. Dont forget Muscovies as wellmore efficient grazers than domesticated ducks descended from the wild mallard. Waterfowl and chickens can clean up dropped fruit in the orchard, helping to break disease cycles. Turkeys are great gleaners of free feed resources such as acorns and beech nuts, and dropped fruit such as mulberries and persimmons. The flocks droppings help fertilize the pasture or orchard over which they range; or, if captured in a deep litter, convert to quality compost to boost the gardens fertility.

Sharp-Eyed Guinea Why is it that our great-grandparents managed to produce an abundance of garden vegetables and orchard fruits without the weapons of Monsanto and other pesticide makers for a toxic war on insects? A good deal of the answer has to do with their busy, free-ranging chickens and other fowl, who helped control crop-damaging insects. With planning and care, guineas can even be used right in parts of the garden itself for control of really tough insect competitors like squash bugs. A time of greater economic constriction may mean that a power tiller is not within the budget of many families. Isnt it wonderful that by confining chickens where we need them and allowing them to do what they love most to doscratching, all day, non-stopthese hardworking partners can take over the chore instead? In all these and other ways, the home poultry flock can help diversify and balance the homestead ecology, making it more of a closed circle, and bringing greater food security in this time of rapid and unpredictable economic changes.

Moral Puzzles in the Backyard

The following article was first published in the February/March 2010 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine. With thanks to my chicken buddy Mike Focazio, who served as philosophical collaborator for the following meditation.

Table of Contents for This Page

Lets Go to the Video Rabbit and Wolf

Shades of Gray o Cockfighting o Stunning knives o Caponizing o Debeaking o The learning curve Back to the Grinder Changing the Chick Order Expanding Ripples Sidebar: Animal Welfare Institute and Animal Welfare Approved

Lets Go to the Video

Recently an animal advocacy group, Mercy for Animals, circulated on the Net a video made secretly by one of its members at a Hy-Line hatcherythe worlds largest for layer chicks for industrial egg production. Since every male chick hatched in this facility is by definition surplus, and since the number of males generated is so enormous (150,000 per day), dealing with the male chicks is a serious management challenge. The solution shown in the Hy-Line video: dumping the sexed male chicks off the end of a high-speed conveyor belt, into an auger grinder (of the sort used to grind sausage), where the chicks are ground alive. (The video is available at many online sites including Mercy for Animals and Huffington Post.) Watching the video of chicks being ground alive is appalling. Like most of my readers, I expect, I find the practice a deeply repugnant breaching of the covenant between Homo sapiens and the fellow creatures in our care. Doubtless my indignation triggers endorphins in my brain, and I ride an emotional high on the crest of my moral outrage. I congratulate myself, smug in the knowledge that management of my own homestead flock is free of such horrors. But then I remember what somebody once said: Be careful, friend, not to get obsessed with the speck of sawdust in your brothers eyewhen you have a two-by-four in your own. That startling image reminds me that the most useful reflections on moral issues arise when I focus not on the shocking outrages perpetrated by them, but the implications of my own practices when considered more broadly, perhaps even how they are complicit in the outrages I so righteously deplore. Thus watching the video, however numbing initially, grew into a meditation on moral issues we encounter as we manage our feathered partners in our own back yards.

Rabbit and Wolf

Probably most readers of an article on moral issues inherent in poultry husbandry would think Im going to talk about slaughtering for the table, so, okay, lets start with that. I doubt any of us would argue that it is immoral for the wolf to hunt and eat the rabbit. Vegetarian alternatives are not an option for the wolfthe race between the two is as much a matter of life and death for the wolf as for the rabbit. This is not the place to engage my vegan friends in a debate about fundamental dietary questions. But, based on a great deal of study about diet and health, I believe unequivocally that animal proteins, and especially high quality fats (and the fat-soluble vitamins they either

contain or enhance), are essential for optimal human health. In that sense the necessity to kill and eat is as imperative for me as for the wolf. I do not cede the moral high ground to any assertion that I am cruelly and unnecessarily causing suffering to living beings, when doing so is necessary to sustain my own life. It is unfortunate that my vegan friends focus so exclusively (and morbidly? ) on the death of the animals in my care. For me, the life those animals live is the crux of the moral issue. Thus I do not shoe-horn my laying hens eight per cage the size of a pet crate, stacked by thousands in multiple tiers; nor do I raise my broilers from hatch to slaughter shoulder to shoulder with tens of thousands of their fellows, never seeing the direct light of the sun, nor eating a grasshopper or fresh blade of grass. And yes, these are moral issues for me. Slitting the throat of a bird selected for the table is a life necessity for me, but I do so within the context of partnership, gratitude, and respectas profound, meaningful, and essential as my relationship with the microbes that create soil fertility in my garden, the bees that pollinate my crops, the decomposer organisms that keep my world clean and sweet, rather than a wasteland of putrid corpses. As long as my partnership with my birds is one of mutual support for a life of contentment and natural fulfilment, their nourishment of me is in balance with my nourishment of them. Top of page

Shades of Gray
It is not my intention to preach to anybody. I will caution, though, that we should be careful of a tendency to see all moral questions as black or white, absolute right or absolute wrong. Most moral reflections only get really interesting (and useful) when we wander through shades of gray. There are many such areas the flockster might reflect on, with each free to come to a conclusion equally deeply felt and compassionately committed, even if it differs from my own. Here are a few that come to mind:

Cockfighting
I have seen cocks in my own flock fight to the death, and cannot imagine taking pleasure in such mayhem as a sport. But before getting too judgmental of those who breed for the fighting pit, I remind myself that there may be few who are doing more to preserve deep genetics in Gallus gallus domesticus than those old cockersnot Tyson and Perdue and Hy-Line with their cookie-cutter birds bred for production in the industrial model to the exclusion of all other traits; not those among the competitive show crowd who emphasize fine points of comb and carriage and feather, but not the sturdy robustness that is the genetic birthright of Gallus; and not me, and most homestead flocksters, who shun the hard work of serious breed improvement.

Stunning knives
I visited a farm that is approved for humane certification, where I was assured in no uncertain terms that use of an electric stunning knife is essential if you are to kill a chicken in a humane (moral) manner. Setting aside the fact that there is disagreement on whether a bird feels pain after (or while) being stunned with electric shock, I am myself stunned by this extraordinary implication: My grandmothers method of killing a chicken (popping off its head) was

inherently inhumane, whereas I may now, in contrast, kill my birds morally using a miracle of modern technology. If, that is, I can pony up the $2150 or so to buy an electric stunning system (only $1200 or so used). Most readers of this magazine have small flocks, and many will not have to cull more than half a dozen old hens or excess males per year. Shall we conclude they are moral fiends because they dont shell out the bucks for such moral purity? Frankly, I wonder if the appeal of the stunning knife is the illusion that we are neutralizing the birds suffering (when as a matter of fact we know no such thing with certainty), to escape confronting head-on what we are doing: killing a beautiful animal for food. No technological trick is going to relieve us of the anguish of that tragic dilemma.

Caponizing
Surgically castrating cockerels (for grow-out as larger, plumper roasting fowl) is unquestionably stressful on them, and for that reason is strictly prohibited by the Animal Welfare Institutes humane standards. But which is the better choice for the excess male who is to be culledbeing slaughtered at an early age, or enduring the temporary stress of caponization for the sake of getting to live a nice life for a much longer time? (One of my capons lived a full year and a half before gracing the dinner table.) Has anybody asked the bird?

Debeaking
The Animal Welfare Approved standard is unambiguous on the subject: Debeaking (chopping off half the upper beak in order to prevent cannibalism and feather picking) is never permitted in any poultry operation considered humane. I have corresponded with a few producers for local markets who keep debeaked layer flocks, either because that is the only option from their source of supply, or for management reasons of their own. Since I am not meeting the same bottom line they are, I will not presume to judge their decisions. It does seem to me, however, that debeaking is an admission upfront that the birds in our care are going to be under a high level of stress, with the implied claim that the alteration is necessary to prevent their injuring each other despite that stress. But isnt our duty to give our birds as stress-free a life as we can? In all my years of poultry husbandry, all episodes of stress sufficient to cause the birds to start pecking each other viciously have been subject to amelioration through management changes on my part. I see no need for beak-clipping in the well cared for backyard flock.

The learning curve

We all make mistakes, and sometimes our birds pay the price. Early in the management of my flock on pasture, I failed to anticipate the necessity for shade. In an unseasonal temperature spike, the poor stressed birds began pecking a couple of flock members apart, alive. We all lose birds to predators from time to time. Such calamities are not moral failings. Should we fail to make preventive changes following such crises, however, then we do indeed come up short in the moral equation between us and our birds. Top of page

Back to the Grinder

Maybe that warm-up gets us ready to consider at greater depth the question of chick-grinding. Please do watch the video. There were elements that caught my attention at least as much as seeing living animals treated like so much compactible garbage. Note the complexity and especially the speed of this highly mechanized system. The obvious context is the typical modern factory, caught in the iron jaws of an economy that demands big profits from razorthin margins. In that context, I cannot think of any alternative, more humane way of killing those chicks that would fit the demands of the production environment. Whizzing the hapless cockerel chicks into a meat grinder is unquestionably the most rational solution in the context and I have no doubt that, if I were Hy-Lines CEO, I would make exactly the same decision. So were back to context as a key component of moral dilemmas. It seems to me thatin an increasingly complex, centralized, anonymous food production systemwe are more and more forced into choices we find morally repugnant, but which are in fact the only rational solutions in their contexts. How else would a supposedly sane society pollute its groundwaters with feedlot runoff to the level that its own government issues stern warnings to mothers against giving the familys tapwater to their babies? Or create dead zones in the sea the size of New Jersey? Every one of such horrors of modern life were created one rational, economically necessary decision at a time. Did hatcheries in our great-grandparents time grind live chicks as a routine part of their operations? They did not. Hatcheries were smaller, more distributed, more human scale. Vastly more families kept backyard flocks as a part of the domestic economy, and cockerel specials were welcome money-savers for producing dressed poultry for the table. Could it be that finding our way back to more local production of poultry stock, and greater participation of the average citizen in the backyard production of meat and eggs, are not only greenie, feel-good ways of being more environmentally responsible, but have a deep moral thrust as well? For my own part, Im back to thinking about the sawdust speck and the two-by-four. I am not implicated in what I see as a moral outrage when Hy-Line grinds 150,000 live chicks per day both because I dont order layer chicks from them, and because I do not eat supermarket eggs, ever. But I do order some of my replacement stock from elsewhere; and I now know as well that the big hatcheries who supply us backyarders with our chicks also routinely kill excess cockerel chicks, a reality few of us can feel comfortable with. For example, one of the regional hatcheries in a state near me, for whom Ive always had great respect, reported that they simply dump the excess male chicks into a barrel and leave them to suffocate. Doubtless they are as appalled to be doing so as we are to learn of the practice, but the math is relentless: If we flocksters, for our own convenience, write enough pullets-only orders, there is no way the hatcheries can sell all the resulting excess males as cockerel specials to bargain-hunters large numbers of the excess males must be killed out of hand as a matter of routine, to serve our convenience. I interviewed the owners of two of the biggest hatcheries in the country. I found that they actually have a commitment to doing as much as they can to treat the chicks theyve helped bring into the world with care and respect, and to minimize euthanizing chicks. They pass on surplus chicks as cockerel specials, as box warmers added free to orders to help keep

body warmth up during transit through the mails, to feed stores who feature free chick day as a way of promoting feed sales, and to zoos and other feeders of snakes and raptorial birds. Both agreed that they would love to sell straight-run orders only, but dont feel they can refuse to fill sexed orders and remain competitive. Inevitably, therefore, their hatcheries routinely end up with cockerel chicks that must be killed. One owner refused to specify how her hatchery euthanizes such chicks (other than according to applicable law), but the other said their method is controlled atmosphere killing, using carbon dioxide. A major reason for that choice is that purchasers of these chicks (which are frozen in large quantities for feeding to captive raptors) require this method in order to retain edibility of the chick carcasses for their birds. Top of page

Changing the Chick Order

Recognizing that my pullet-only orders lead to euthnaizing excess cockerel chicks at hatcheries, I plan to order straight-run exclusively in the future. That is an option available to other backyard flocksters as well. Indeed, I have just completed an order for new layer stock next spring from Glenn Drownss Sand Hill Preservation Center. Glenn never kills excess chicks. The key to avoiding that necessity is shipping straight run orders only, no exceptions. The choice Ive made may not be a viable option for many small producers of eggs for local markets, already operating on a razors edge financially, since a straight run order doubles the chick cost of each layer pullet that remains after the males are culled at butchering age. However, in a recent discussion of this issue on the listserve for American Pastured Poultry Producers Association, two small producers said they plan to start ordering straight run for replacement layer stock, and find good uses for the surplus cockerels as culls. One made the observation that, while an egg breed cockerel wont make a carcass acceptable in his broiler market, he plans to turn the cull cockerels into chicken pot pies for sale in his farmers market. What an interesting idea: A change in strategy for reasons of virtue turns out to make good economic sense as well (since a producer typically makes more profit adding value than selling basic-ingredient products).

Expanding Ripples
This meditation has not been about expanding anyones load of guilt, but about expanding our vision, about seeing our practices with our backyard flocks in the larger picture. The image of the pebble in the pool comes to mind: When the pebble splashes into the pool, the ripples expand outward, all the way to the edge. A butterfly flutters its wings in China, and a thunderstorm kicks up in Kansas. We order our twenty-five sexed pullet chicks, and a harried hatchery worker tosses twenty-five cockerel chicks into a barrel to die. Antidotes to deeply entrenched problems are not easy to put in place. But we start with a willingness to see our own part in the larger picture. And, I believe, to return to smaller, more distributed, more human scale agricultural enterprises. It may be that some will find my rippling pool metaphor oppressiveseen from a broad enough perspective, we can never get it right. I choose to see the expanding ripples instead as

an ever-renewed invitation to learn, to meet new challenges, to help define new pathways for healing and sustainability. A lifetime should suffice. Top of page

Animal Welfare Institute and Animal Welfare Approved

Animal Welfare Approved (AWA) is a program of the Animal Welfare Institute (AWI) that certifies humane treatment of farm animals on participating farms. Clearly they put their money where their mouth is, having given $15,000 in grants for incubators, in order to encourage more local production of chick stock. In the coming five to six years, they plan further grants to increase significantly the number of regional hatcheries to serve local stock needs. Both these measures will reduce the shipment of live chicks, which is highly stressful on them in the best of circumstances. Animal Welfare Institute, unlike extremist animal-rights groups, does not oppose the raising and slaughter of domestic animals as food. However, it advocates for humane treatment of all animals, both those in our care and wild species; and has worked for the adoption of the majority of federal laws to protect animalsthe Animal Welfare Act, the Endangered Species Act, the Marine Mammal Protection Act, and the Humane Slaughter Act. While I dont agree with AWI/AWA on every point, the Standards they propose for husbandry of all common livestock species (including chickens, ducks, geese, and turkeys) could serve as compendiums of humane practices for the backyard flockster as well as for commercial producers. For example, they favor a return to traditional dual-purpose breeds. While that is an idea not likely to fly in the current climate of hyper-specialization, in smaller, more distributed, naturally based paradigms, all dual-purpose chicks hatched would be equally valued: females for future egg production, males as meat birds.

Feeding the Homestead Flock

*Table of Contents for Feeding Section is at bottom of this page.*
My advice on feeding the homestead flock can be boiled down to: Take the feeding of your flock into your own hands. Don't be buffaloed by the experts and their feeding solutions based on highly flawed paradigms. Try to feed your birds the way a chicken on her own in the wild would feed herself. The key to homesteading success is imitation of natural systems. That should be the key when we think about feeding as well. You can provide more of your flock's feeds out of home resources, at any scale. If you experiment with home feeds, please share your ideas in The Home Feeding Project.

Table of Contents for Feeding Section

Feeding the Homestead Flock: It Ain't Rocket Science! Making Your Own Poultry Feeds

Feeding the Flock from the Homestead's Own Resources Alternatives to Soy Sprouting to Enhance Poultry Feeds Current Feeding Practice The Challenge of High Feed Costs Raising Earthworms to Feed the Flock Protein from Thin Air: Breeding fly maggots for poultry feed Cultivating Soldier Grubs to Feed the Flock

Feeding the Homestead Flock: It Aint Rocket Science!

I wrote this piece as a rebuttal to a couple of articles that appeared in the first issue of Backyard Poultry. It was published in the second (April/May) issue, 2006. Specialized training or a computer program are required to confidently formulate a poultry ration. (A. Lee Cartwright, Assoc Prof, Texas A & M University, Feb-Mar issue of Backyard Poultry)

Assumptions
The above statement by Professor Cartwright was made in an article entitled Nutrition and Feeding of Show Poultry. However, a careful reading reveals almost nothing specific about feeding show birds per sethe article is rather the standard poultry specialist advice on feeding poultry in general. Its implicit point of viewcharacteristic of agricultural colleges and extension service agents for several generations nowis based on two unspoken assumptions: First, that the home flock is a miniaturized analog of commercial operations. The work of ag colleges such as Texas A & M is bent toward the support of the poultry industry, and simply assumes its models of confinement and mass-produced feeds. When they turn their attention to the home flock, they apparently have not a clue that other, more natural paradigms are possible. Second, as in the quotation above, proper formulation of feeds is an extremely exacting science that must be carried out with laboratory precisionthe balancing of vitamins, mineral cations, and the major nutrients protein, fat, and carbohydrate must be fine-tuned to the last degree, otherwise growth and health of the birds are compromised. Thus the formulation of feeds is rocket science, best left to the lab-coated experts, since we befuddled homesteaders are certain to get the ratios and balances wrong, and our birds will suffer for it. If we start with this point of view, then of course we are best advised to Feed only recommended, good quality, all-in-one manufactured feeds. (Fred D. Thornberry, also of Texas A&M, The Small Laying Flock, Feb-Mar issue. Emphasis added.) Further, we are likely to take on faith (as Prof. Thornberry obviously does) that the feeds on offer in the market are good quality; and that as Prof. Cartwright assures us they are fresh, so long as we do not permit them to become stale or rancid, for example through exposure to heat. The counter to such claims and assumptions from the poultry intelligentsia is a study of the actual ingredients and processing of industrial, mass-produced feeds. They are anything but fresh. The naturally stable nutrients in a whole seed such as wheat, corn, or bean begin to

oxydizego stale or rancidas soon as the seed coat is crushed. That is why I make my feeds in small batches (only enough for two to four days)commercial feeds bought at the local co-op may have been milled months previously. But the story is worse than that, since so many of the base ingredients do not even start as whole grains or beans at all. At the beginning of feed formulation, they are already quite stale (oxydized) byproducts of the production of other commoditiesthe milling of grains for refined flour, feather meal from huge broiler processing plants, soybean meal from the extraction of oil, etc.which have been extensively (and intensively) processed with heat, drying, and high pressure (to say nothing of possible industrial residues, such as hexane in the soybean meal, a chemical solvent used in the extraction of the oil). Especially troubling are the fats used in feeds. Fats are indeed an essential major nutrient, but Prof. Cartwright apparently assumes that all fats are equal. The truth is that much of the fat in feeds is likely to be the vegetable oils from fast-food fryers. Such fats are in the industrial recycle bin precisely because they have reached the point of rancidity, and the further processing of feed makes them more so. If there is anything nutritionists agree on, it is that consuming rancid fats is bad news. Prof. Cartwright warns against giving our birds any feed supplemental to the magic formula in the feed bag: If you have a good ration that fulfils all of the dietary needs of broiler and roaster chickens or turkeys, do not alter it. Specifically, he warns against giving fresh foods, e.g. Adding green chops, lettuce or other low nutrient ingredients to the diet. If providing a little green chop for the birds creates imbalance, how much worse to put the flock out on pasture, where they can eat grasses and clovers (more low nutrient ingredients) and earthworms and insects (certain to change the ratios of proteins and fats in that perfect balanced feed we should be offering them)!

How would the natural chicken feed herself?

But suppose we start not with laboratory analyses or large-scale feeding studies of confined flocks, but with the assumption that any agricultural enterprise should imitate natural systems. Then our first question is: If left to its own devices in a free-ranging situation, how will a chicken feed itself? Will it seek out feather meal, oil extraction residues, byproducts of flour milling? No, it will eat green growing plants, wild seeds, and animal foods such as earthworms and insects. In other words, it will eat live foodsexclusively. Whatever the touted virtues of mass-produced, ultra-processed feeds, they are anything but alive. Please understand that this is not a diatribe against Prof. Cartwright, nor an attempt to impugn his good intentions. Indeed, I agree with his fundamental observation, A balanced approach to nutrition is the key to optimum growth. I just start with a different assumption: The more our chickens eat like a completely free-ranging chicken would eat, the more naturally balanced its diet will be. I also agree that feeding our poultry must not be haphazard. Certainly we must learn all we can about the fundamentals of nutrition. Prof. Cartwrights advice, for example, that young growing birds must not be fed a commercial layer feed is extremely importanttheir developing reproductive systems can be seriously compromised by the extra minerals in the layer ration. He warns us against succumbing to the mindset, If a little is good, a lot is even better. A good example is selenium, one of those essential nutrients which in excess concentrations is toxic. If crab meal is a component of feed, we must restrict it to no more than 2-1/2% of the total mix, because of its high selenium content. Oats and barley are excellent whole grains to feed in moderation, but feeding in excess of 20% of feed total (alone

or in combination) will cause poor digestion and runny droppings. Whole flax seed is a valuable addition in small amounts (I limit to no more than 4%)but when Omega 3 became a buzzword, some folks started feeding as much as 15% and throwing their birds fatty acid profiles all out of whack. I imagine Prof. Cartwright would object: Hey, boy, we have science on our sidewe have studies A, B, and C which prove x, y, and z! My intention here is to urge the homesteader not to be intimidated by this claim of the experts to being scientific. You are the expert when it comes to the health and well-being of your flock! My advice to you is: Learn all you can about the basics of nutrition; be willing to experiment; and observe the results. Then, if necessary, adjust. I gave runny droppings as an example. Learn what the poop from a healthy bird with an efficient digestive system looks like. If you make a change and start getting a lot of smeary, off-color, smelly poopsback off and try again!

Scientific?
As for scientificwe homesteaders can be as scientific about our feeding as anyone. Isnt the heart of the scientific method the observation of actual results in the real world? I have indeed fed my flock precisely as Prof. Cartwright adviseswith the best the local co-op had to offerfor more than a decade. And for as long now, I have pastured them and fed them feeds I make myself from primary ingredients. My assumption, however, is that the feeds I make are of only secondary importance. Far more important than any sought-for balance in the formulation itself is maximizing their access to live foods. I do this primarily by putting the birds on pasture during the green season. I am also experimenting with ways production of fly maggots as a potent source of protein in the summer, and of earthworms as supplemental feed in the winterto increase the amount of live animal foods they eat. In the years I have taken the feeding of my flock into my own hands, flock health has improved; I frequently get 100% hatches from the eggs I set; and mortality in the brooder phase is lower. Results like that are scientific enough for me. I also imagine Professors Cartwright and Thornberry pointing out that, after all, the feeding programs they outline get resultsimpressive weight gain in broilers, lots of eggs from layers. Yes, and it is possible with similar industrial methods to market a strawberry that is intensely red, plump, and hugeand has no discernible flavor. Every reader of these pages is acquainted first hand with the insipidity of supermarket chicken, the paleness, lack of viscosity, and tastelessness of supermarket eggs. You can achieve the same results with your own flock, confining them and feeding industrialized feeds. Those in a position to know tell me all the time that my eggs and poultry are the best theyve eaten in their lives. Please remember that ag-college studies on poultry nutrition have been done on flocks raised in the commercial paradigmalmost no studies have been done on a feeding program for birds on pasture. Until such studies are done, we should be skeptical of the astounding claim that a dry, dusty meal in a bag is a more perfect food for a chicken than an earthworm.

Making Your Own Poultry Feeds: Part One

This article appeared in the August/September, 2006 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine. Check out BYP and consider subscribingit's a great resource.

Table of Contents
Part 1Part 2Part 3 In future issues, I would like to see some space dedicated to feeding poultry without using commercial feeds, that include the various mixtures and proportions that people use. I read often that people do it, but no one seems to be willing to share their formulas. Even in your April/May issue, you have an article called, Feeding the Homestead Flock: It aint Rocket Science!, that furthers the view that we need not depend on manufactured feed, but it doesnt give us guidelines for developing our own feedexcept to experiment and observe. I would love to get away from manufactured feedI grind my own flour to make my own bread, I roll my own oats, I never buy processed foods for our consumptionfeeding my chickens manufactured feed goes against everything I believe in, but neither am I going to experiment with my birds. Guidelines to follow from someone who has been successful would certainly be a great help. ~Nan in Wisconsin (in a letter to the editor of Backyard Poultry)

On experimentation
I find it odd that Nan in Wisconsin is so willing to experiment with her own diet, but is unwilling to do so with that of her chickens. Against the assurances of most of the expert opinion in our country that our national diet of processed convenience foods is the safest, most nutritious, and wholesome in the world, she has learned to distrust that advice enough to go to the considerable trouble of grinding her own flour, making her own bread, and avoiding industrial foods. There is no more worthy experiment she could be doing, in my opinion, to further her health and that of her family. I wonder why she is reluctant to take the same approach with the feeding of her flock. If Nan is appealing for a source of expert opinion from homesteaders making their own feeds, I must bow out. I have been making all my own feeds going on ten years, with results more than satisfactory to me, but cannot pretend to be an expert in the field of poultry nutrition, and indeed consider every one of my formulations a snapshot of a moving target that is, an ongoing experiment. As a matter of fact, I have to interrupt my writing shortly to run out and make a 100-lb batch of feed, and Ive been thinking, maybe with a dry summer coming on, I should change the ratio of. . . The truth is, if you are feeding commercial feeds, you are taking part in the most radical feeding experiment of all, one designed to answer the question: Just how unnatural a feed can we get away with?

Reflections on my grandmothers flock

The most revolutionary change in my own perspective on feeding my flocks came when I started thinking about my old grandmothers management of her flock of chickens. Contrary to all advice from the ag college crowd, the lab-coated poultry nutritionists, and all other recognized experts in the field, she simply threw a little scratch grains to her birds once a day (more to keep them fixated on the coop as the place to return home than for nutrition, I suspect)and allowed them to free-range over a 100-acre farm. This apparently haphazard approach allowed the chickens to mostly feed themselvesthe way Chicken would have fed

herself before Homo sapiens and Gallus gallus first cosied up to each other, striving for a more perfect union. So what were Grannys chickens eating? Green plants We do not think of chickens as grazers, but actually, if they have access to them, a significant portion of their diet will be grasses, clovers, and broadleaved weeds. Seeds Wild seeds of all sorts. Animal foods Earthworms, insects, slugs, etc. And what are the defining characteristics of these self-gathered feeds? They are alive. And they are raw. In other words, they are the polar opposite of the scientifically formulated feeds the experts tell us we should be feeding our birdsmade from excessively heat-treated ingredients, some of which are already stale (rancid) at the time of processing, to say nothing of when they are sold, perhaps months later, to the hapless homesteader. While my grandmothers chickens didnt produce as many eggs as a modern egg-factory hen, the eggs had viscous whites and deep yellow-orange yolks that would stand up and salute. While her birds were not ready for slaughter after a 44-day grow-out, her chicken n dumplings was not to be believed. Her birds maintained the best of health without benefit of a daily dollop of antibiotics. And they reproduced their kind easily and naturally.

The modern homesteaders dilemma

Do I feed my flocks the way my grandmother fed hers? I do not. I homestead two-and-a-half acres, with close neighbors all around. Letting my flocks totally free-range the way hers did is not an option for me. So I try to get as close as I can to the feeding paradigm in Grannys flock. That is, as much as possible I try to make sure that most of what my birds eat is alive, and that it is raw. I pasture the birds the entire green season, using electronet fencing. I constantly seek ways to give my birds more feeds produced here on the homestead, both to achieve more feed independence, and to afford them an ever-greater proportion of live foods in their diets. For more on these efforts, see Feeding the Flock from the Homestead's Own Resources. In this article, I will present my approach to making prepared feeds designed to substitute for the conventional feeds of commerce. Note that my prepared feeds are based primarily on whole seeds, untreated in any way. Hence they are indeed alive. (As someone whimsically observed: A seed is a tiny plant, in a box, with its lunch.) Any one of my feed grains can be planted to grow into vigorous plants indeed, when I need a cover crop, I most often draw the desired seeds from the feed bin and sow. Also note that I make feed in small batches. As soon as the seed coat is crushed, oxidation of enzymes, fat-soluble vitamins, and other perishable nutrients begins. I therefore grind in small batchestypically only a few days worth of feed at a time.

Feeding the Flock from the Homestead's Own Resources: Part One

This article was published in the October/November, 2006 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine. Check out BYP and consider subscribingit's a great resource.

Table of Contents
Part OnePart TwoPart Three If you have read Making Your Own Poultry Feeds, a discussion of making my own feed mixes to replace commercial feeds for my flocks, you will remember my two criteria for superior poultry food: that it be live and raw . For the following discussion, lets add a third: and produced from the homesteads own resources. There are several reasons we might produce more of our birds food ourselves, from saving money to the simple desire to be more independent (and dependence on purchased feed ingredients is a serious dependency indeed). Some of us suspect that the era of easy prosperity we grew up assuming almost as a natural right may soon come to an end. One way to prepare for a time of economic constriciton, a time when the way we now do agriculture in this

country will no longer be a possibility, is to learn to raise poultry with less dependence on purchased inputs. For me, however, producing more of my birds feeds is foremost a quest for higher quality foods, an attempt to get closer to the way the completely natural chicken would feed herself.

Pasturing the flock

The best first step we can take toward utilizing the homesteads own resources for flock nutrition is pasturing the flock. Whether free-ranging entirely, or confined where we want them with electric net fencing, birds on pasture have constant access to foods the natural chicken would choose for herself: living green forages, wild weed seeds, and live animal foods such as worms and insects. Dont assume that you have to have the perfect sward of mixed pasture grasses and clovers. Those plants make wonderful forage for the flock, but some broadleaf weeds are also quite nutritious. For example, I recently noticed how thoroughly my geese had harvested the chicory on my pasture, an excellent forage plant I had not sowed or cultivated in any way.

Sprouting
Im going to include sprouting in this discussion even if the grains and legumes we sprout are purchased, since sprouting is a kind of value added feeding we can achieve by our own efforts. Sprouting grains boosts the protein, vitamin, and enzyme content (while decreasing carbohydrate). On balance it enhances the starting ingredients and boosts more thorough utilization of everything we are feeding. There are several possible approaches to sprouting. I experimented with sprouting in trays, and allowing the sprouts to green up by exposure to sunlight. (I have also seen pictures of a setup used by dairy farmers in earlier times, a rack holding numerous trays of greening sprouts which were fed to the cows when the sprouts reached 2-3 inches high.) I found working with trays too time consuming, so devised a bucket system instead. I cannot produce green sprouts in the buckets, but that is not a problem for me, since I have other sources of green forages. If you do not, you might experiment with sprouting to the green stage in trays. That method should work even in cold winters if the trays are brought inside at night.

Green forages
We do not think of chickens as grazers, but they actually make good use of fresh green forages as a small but important part of their total intake. In my winter greenhouse, I grow grain grasses (wheat, barley, oats, rye) and mixed crucifers (turnips, mustards, rape, etc. ) as cut-and-come-again greens for the birds. If you do not have a greenhouse, you can still grow these cold-hardy species deep into the chill season. Indeed, cover crops planted to protect and build garden soil over the winter can do double duty as a source of cut greens for the birds. A couple of excellent green feeds for the flock are dandelion and yellow dock (Rumex crispus). Though much maligned as weeds, both are palatable and highly nutritious to poultry, and they stay green deeper into the frost season than any other wild forages in my area. As long as I can get a spading fork into the ground, I dig these plants by the roots and throw them to the flock by the bucketful. The birds eat the tops down to the roots, then (in the case of dandelion, though not yellow dock) eat part of the root as well, after which the roots

generally get buried in the deep litter by the scratching of the chickens. There the roots put out new growth (like Belgian endive, forced in a cellar)when the chickens turn them up again, they have second helpings.

Geese and Ducks Eating Comfrey Two extremely useful plants I recommend to all homesteaders are comfrey and stinging nettle . In addition to myriad food (for both humans and plants), medicinal, and soil-building uses, both plants are excellent feed for poultry. Comfrey is amazingly productive, especially if fertilized heavily (and it will take any form of fertility you throw at it, including raw chicken manure). Protein content is high (higher than alfalfa, and can if well grown be as high as soybean, dry weight basis). I cut and feed as needed, more at times in the season when the pasture is less generous. Chickens eat comfrey well. Geese love it. I am in the process of greatly expanding my comfrey plantings. (It is an extraordinarily easy plant to propagate.) The next big wave of propagation will feature planting comfrey patches out on the pasture, where the birds will graze the comfrey themselves. I plan to keep the plantings tight, dense, and relatively small. They are incredibly tough plants, but if they seem to be suffering from over-grazing by the birds, I can protect the patches with temporary fencing. Both comfrey and stinging nettle can be dried and fed as hay. My experiments with both have been challenging thus farthey are much more fragile than a grass hay. My next attempts with both will feature thorough drying, then stuffing into large burlap bags, in which the shattering into leaf meal will not be a problem. I will experiment with feeding straight, and with adding to ground feeds. It should be added that in recent years there has been some scare talk from official quarters about pyrrolizidine alkoloids found in comfrey. The alkoloids are indeed present, and are indeed toxic to the liver in massive, pure doses. However, my conclusion from research I have done is that there is no toxicity problem, acute or chronic, associated with consumption of whole comfrey, by either humans or livestock. (See Comfrey Report , by Lawrence D. Hills.) Whenever I slaughter fowl, I practice a form of divination I call reading the livers. As long as the livers of birds who have been eating comfrey remain healthy and free of abcesses, I will have no concerns about feeding comfrey

Feeding the Flock from the Homestead's Own Resources: Part Two

Table of Contents
Part OnePart TwoPart Three

Grain substitutes
Of course, the homesteader can grow corn and conventional small grains as well as anybody. Growing and storing them on a small scale can be labor-intensive, however. A labor-saving strategy with the small grains is to grow to maturity, then turn the flock in to self-harvest the seed heads.

Sunflower, Amaranth and Sorghum I grow amaranth and sunflowers, both for their beauty and for their support of beneficial insects, and continue to experiment with using the seed heads as poultry feed. The challenge with the sunflowers, I find, is catching them at the point at which the seeds have ripened, but before wild birds have stripped the heads. Heads can be cut and tied together in bunches, then hung from rafters under shelter for use in the winter. The same can be done with amaranth, an extremely nutritious (and high-protein) seed that was an important food source for the Aztecs. The seeds are extremely tiny, and its been hard to determine how well the birds utilize them when I just cut the heads and throw them to the flock. I plan experiments with threshing and feeding them straight to get a measure of how much the birds like them. I also plan to soak whole heads, sprout the seeds, then throw the whole sprouting head to the birds. It may be they will eat the sprouts better (more visible) than the tiny black seeds. For the first time, I am experimenting with growing sorghum. I grow this extremely tall plant as additional pollen source for beneficials, and to screen other crops needing shade, but I plan to harvest the seed heads, tie in bunches, and experiment with feeding (whole heads) in the winter.

Buckwheat

Cowpeas

Double duty cover crops

I use buckwheat and cowpeas as cover crops that are easy to start in the summer when many of the cool weather covers will not establish. Buckwheat is the instant cover cropfrom seed to flower in as little as thirty days. Cowpeas are legumes, and set atmospheric nitrogen in the soil in forms plants can use. If you can leave these crops long enough to mature their seeds, they do double duty as cover crop and feed for the birds. Indeed, its possible to net the area with electronet, and allow the flock to self-harvest the seeds while tilling in the cover crop. Thats a homestead version of multi-tasking.

Carbohydrate sources
Potatoes and sweet pototoes can be tremendously productive crops. In times of war, when people in England and other European countries had to grow more of their own feeds, potatoes have satisfactorily replaced grain feeds, in whole or in part. When I harvest these crops, I save for the flock the smallest tubers and those badly damaged by the spading fork. In an economic crisis, potatoes would be one of the first alternatives to grain I would turn to. Ducks will make good use of potatoes, as well as chickens. (It is generally recommended that potatoes be lightly cooked before feeding to the flock.) Pumpkins are usually easier to grow than other members of the cucurbit tribe. If you have the space for the big, sprawling vines, you can grow and easily store large numbers of pumpkins. To feed, just bust em open and let the flock have at them. The seeds are a good source of protein.

Mangels Growing

Mangel Mangels or fodder beets are also easy to grow, producing roots up to ten pounds or even more which store well. (I store them in a clamp, a simple 24-inch hole in the ground protected by a sheet of plastic and a couple bales of straw.) I feed one at a time, raw. In the winter house, the entertainment value is probably as high as the feed valuethe chickens really get into pecking away at them. When one has been consumed, I throw in another. Another tremendously productive carbohydrate source is Jerusalem artichoke. This is a crop to be careful with, as it can easily get out of hand, and be difficult to eradicate. I recently read of a Vermont farmer who lets his large layer flock forage in big plantings of Jerusalem artichokes. The birds eat some of the foliage, and feed on the enhanced earthworm populations at the base of the plants. There was no mention of digging the tubers to feed the flock. However, Jersulam artichoke tubers are good food for humans, and I expect they would be a good carbohydrate source for poultry as well. I plan experiments with feeding them, raw and cooked, when they are ready to harvest this fall.

Feeding the Flock from the Homesteads Own Resources: Part Three
Table of Contents
Part OnePart TwoPart Three

Mulberry

Tree Crops
We have had a big mulberry tree in the orchard for years, and the chickens have always loved the abundant dropped fruit. I have just planted two additional mulberry trees out on the pasture. The trees will provide shade for the flock, as well as large amounts of dropped fruits. (In earlier times, it was common for farmers to fatten both pigs and fowl from the windfall crops of mulberries.) I have ordered three chestnut tree seedlings, which I will also be planting out on the pasture. Again, the trees will shade the birds, who should help control the chestnut weevil, both in the emergent phase in the spring, and when going to ground in the winter. (Multi-tasking again.) Any year that brings good crops should provide far more chestnuts than we can eat. I plan to crack the hulls of the surplus in my feed grinder, then feed the nutritious chestnuts to the birds.

Kaki Persimmons Persimmons also make excellent feed for chickensand for turkeys. At the moment I have three Asian persimmons (Diospyros kaki), and am not inclined to share their succulent fruit with the flocks. However, wild persimmons (D. virginiana) grow prolifically in my area, and I may encourage their growth in our bit of woods, and make the dropped fruit available to the chickens using electronet fencing. Many homesteaders know that in earlier times pigs were routinely fattened on crops of acorns wherever there were oak trees. J. Russell Smith points out in his classic Tree Crops that acorns can be used as feed for chickens and turkeys as well. He quotes a report from England during World War II of acorns being used to replace up to half of the feed ration for chickens. There are a number of large white oaks on our property. I plan to experiment with acorns as feed for the flocks this fall, crushing the acorns in my feed grinder just enough for the birds to pick out the contents. Of course, any nuts are highly nutritious and can be used as food for fowl, to the extent they are not desired as human food. I am planting a number of grafted cultivars of nuts for our own use. However, there are several wild hickories and black walnuts on our property. I pick out a few nut meats for us, but the kernels are small and time-consuming to pick. I have found it easy, however, to gather them, place on a rock, smash with a hammer, and let the birds have at them. And dont forget the orchard as a source of food for the birds. Getting rid of dropped fruits is an essential part of orchard sanitation. Either pick them up and throw them to the flock, or simply give the birds access to the orchard and let them do clean-up. I couldnt believe the amount of dropped and cull apples the geese polished off last year.

Harvesting Worms

Feeding Worms

Alternative sources of protein

There are several sources of proteins and fats which many homesteaders can develop for their birds. Earthworms top the list as a dual-purpose way to convert wastes such as manures to both feed and fertility. I experimented with a 3 x 4 ft worm bin for several years, then last fall installed 160 sq ft of worm bins in my greenhouse (a total of almost 300 sq ft when there are no chickens in residence in two pens in one end of the greenhouse). For both feed and bedding for the worms, I use horse manure from a neighbor who breeds and boards horses. I am still working to get my populations up to optimum levels, but my intention is to perfect the operation to the point I can make regular harvests of worms to feed the flock. A huge bonus, of course, is the use of the castings as a major part of our garden fertility program. I recently researched use of the Black Soldier Fly (Hermetica illucens42 percent protein, 35 percent fat), which has been successfully used in manure management systems. The larvae of the flies feed on manure, reducing the residue to high quality compost, and are harvested for feeding to chickens and pigs. I decided not to pursue use of BSF myself. However, I have noticed BSF larvae in my earthworm bins, so expect they will be an added bonus when I harvest worms for feeding. Suppose you had the chance to harvest a source of feed for your flock that is up to 50 percent protein, 20 percent fat, absolutely freeright out of thin air? How could you pass that up? I was inspired to experiment with fly maggots for poultry feed by a recipe on the Journey to Forever site, based on kichen rejectscooking water, scraps, soured milk, etc. The batches did indeed generate maggots, but were not productive enough for my needs. Then I noticed references elsewhere on the Journey to Forever site to the practice in Europe in earlier times of fattening poultry with maggots grown on fish heads and chunks of scrap meat. Instantly I thought of my buddy Sam, and the carcasses generated by his nuisance trapping service, and a new source of free protein on our homestead was born. (See Protein from Thin Air: Breeding fly maggots for poultry feed for more on my system.) If you are in an area of the country blessed with an abundance of Japanese beetles, you can collect them for poultry feed. I no longer use the beetle traps with sex lures, since my friend Mike, who studies water pollution, observed that the pheremones used in the lures are possible sources of hormone pollution in the environment. I do accept trapped beetles by the gallon from a neighbor. I also collect by hand. The secret is to collect early morning or early evening, when it is cooler and the beetles are less likely to fly. I put a gallon or so of water in the bottom of a bucket, hold the bucket under a cluster of beetles on vine or branch, and shake. Once the beetles get wet, they do not fly. When I throw them to the flock, the chickens gobble them up before they have a chance to get back on the wing. Ducks also gorge on Japanese beetles, looking like animated vacuum cleaners as they siphon them up. If you keep a goat or cow, any surplus whole or skimmed milk can be used as excellent feed for poultry in almost any amounts. If you culture the milk first (a kefir or mjlk culture is ideal, since you do not need to heat the milk, as you would making yogurt), it should be even better for the birds, boosting the micro-flora in the gut. Most people with a laying flock at some time have either an excess of eggs, or have eggs that are cracked or just too gross (chicken-with-diarrhea syndrome) to use. Such eggs can be fed

to the flock for a protein boost. I hard-boil the eggs, then crush coarsely by hand as I throw them to the birds. Even when I do not have excess eggs to feed routinely to the flock, I set some aside for just-hatched chicks to give them a good start. Feeding a little egg is especially beneficial for hatchlings that have come through the mail, always a stressful experience.

Mulched Winter Yard Last winter I did a successful experiment in live-food winter feeding which I plan to repeat. I dont allow the winter flock out much onto the pasture, since they would quickly degrade the dormant sod. However, I kept a couple dozen chickens in one end of the greenhouse, and released them every day onto a heavily mulched area I was developing into garden. The mulch, six to eight inches deep, kept the ground from freezing, resulting in active populations of animal lifeearthworms, slugs, etc.in addition to germinating seeds in the mulch hay to which the chickens had access right through the winter. The above ideas do not exhaust the possibilities we will discover if we learn to look at our homestead the way our chickens doas an expanding, constantly renewed smorgasbord, a gift we receive simply by cooperating with what Nature is so eager to do in this little bit of Eden.

Alternatives to Soy
Written in March, 2005
More and more people are becoming uneasy about the heavy use of soy in our food supply. (If interested in exploring this subject, see Soy Alert! to get you started.) Many question the use of soybeans and soy byproducts even in animal feeds. Certainly this concern is justified with reference to feeding ruminantssoy feeds have serious deleterious effects in the rumen, for examplethough I am less certain about problems of feeding soy to avian species. Nevertheless, many small producers are getting inquiries from their customers about getting soy-free eggs and dressed poultry. How can producers meet the demands of such a market? The question is a tough one. At one time, of course, farmers grew a variety of feed legumes. But the cultivation of soybeans in present American agriculture has become so widespread that it has replaced virtually all previous alternatives. As of a year or so ago, I have used no soybean at all in my feeds, since Ive been able to get Austrian or winter peas instead (Pisum arvense, a feed pea relative of Pisum sativum, the common garden pea). However, it is my understanding that the supply of Austrian peas is very tight and that it is not easy to find a source. Producers should seek out local farmers willing to grow them, or other feed legumes. If small producers of broilers or eggs for market band together, they can present to a farmer a significant guaranteed market for such a crop.

There may be opportunities to expand such arrangements into local production of other feed crops as well, superior in quality to the run-of-the-mill alternatives, perhaps organically certified and non-genetically-engineered. Two more points about use of soy should be stressed: Do not ever feed raw soybeans to any sort of livestock! Raw soybeans contain growth inhibitors which can seriously compromise normal growth, among other problems. Roasting or otherwise heat-treating the beans will largely (though some would argue, not entirely) neutralize the growth-inhibiting compounds. Soybean meal, a common ingredient in commercial feeds, is sometimes available at ones local feed supply. Be aware that such meal is almost certain to be a byproduct of the extraction of soybean oil. If the oil was extracted using high-pressure expeller presses, it is more acceptable as a feed. More commonly, however, the oil has been extracted using hexane as a solvent; and the resulting meal is likely contaminated with residues of hexane. Unless you know the meal offered was expeller pressed rather than solvent extracted, soybean meal is best avoided. Top of page Jeff Mattocks, a livestock nutritionist who works with Fertrell Company, recently responded to a question about formulating non-soy feeds. I pass on his three suggestions, together with his caveat both with regard to the recipes and to ease of finding the necessary ingredients. Here are a few that I have formulated for others who have requested NO Soy rations for chickens. I do not stand behind the quality of these rations. They merely fill in the squares required to raise broilers. NO guarantees as to how well your chickens grow and live. If you thought getting Roasted Soybeans was difficult wait till you try and fill this list.Good Luck, Jeff

Broiler Starter Grower: 19.4% Protein Ingredient Corn Winter Peas Crab Meal Sunflower Meal Wheat Vegetable Oil Poultry NB Calcium Amount 500 525 150 400 280 75 60 10

Total: 2000 lbs

Broiler Starter Grower: 19.8% Protein: Ingredient Corn Winter Peas Sunflower Meal Wheat Crab Meal Fish Meal Vegetable Oil Poultry NB Calcium Amount 600 500 350 250 100 75 50 60 15 Total: 2000 lbs

Broiler Starter Grower: 19.7% Protein: Ingredient Corn Winter Peas Sunflower Meal Wheat Vegetable Oil Poultry NB Calcium Amount 515 600 500 250 50 60 25 Total: 2000 lbs

Note: Poultry NB is Fertrells Poultry Nutri-Balancer, a mineral/vitamin supplement, now available in a certied-organic formulation. I have never myself used sunflower meal and know nothing about its quality as a feed ingredient. I have never used vegetable oil as a feed ingredientthe whole seeds and grains I feed provide sufficient fat in my feeding program.

Sprouting to Enhance Poultry Feeds

Bucket Sprouting System In the winter, when the flock does not have access to pasture, I sprout the entire small grain portion of my feed mixand sometimes the peas as well. (See Making Your Own Poultry Feeds: Part 3 for sample mixes I have used.) When I feed both sprouted peas and sprouted grains, the chickens go for the grains by preference every time. When I return later in the day, however, they have usually cleaned up all the sprouted peas as well. There is no reason I shouldnt also sprout the whole corn, but doing so would leave little in the dry mix other than extremely fine ingredientsflax seed, kelp meal, dried yeast, etc. Chickens resist eating feed of mostly small particle size. Since I do not require a green sprout, my system is based not on sprouting trays but on six 5gallon food grade plastic buckets. Two buckets are soak buckets (if I am sprouting peas as well as grains)four are drain/sprout buckets. The latter I drill with dozens of small holes, in the bottoms and half-way up the sides. The size of the holes is important: They must permit the flushing through of dusty debris, but not get blocked by a grain of wheat or oats. Here is the schedule I follow when sprouting both peas and grains, assuming I desire a 5-day sprout: Day 1 In one of the soak buckets, I soak all the whole wheat, oats, and barley called for in the mix I am currently using. (I would certainly use other whole grains if available.) Since it is usually winter, I set the bucket in my basement to prevent freezing. Day 2 I pour the small grains into one of the drain/sprout buckets and rinse well, allowing thorough drainage through the holes in the bucket before returning to the basement. I set another batch of small grains to soak in the soak bucket. In a second soak bucket, I soak the amount of whole peas called for in the mix. Day 3 I again pour the soaked small grains into a drain/sprout bucket. I pour yesterdays soaked peas into the grains from Day 1. Both drain buckets get thoroughly rinsed before returning to the basement. I start new (separate) batches of grains and peas soaking. Day 4 Repeat, this time putting the soaked peas into the bucket containing grains started Day 2. Day 5 Again, repeat. Note that at this point I have contents in four drain/sprout buckets.

Day6 The most advanced bucket of sprouts is now ready to feed. Note that the grains are five-day sprouts (including the first day in the soak bucket), and that the peas are fourday sprouts. (The peas sprout at a faster rate than the grains, so I enter them at a later point in the rotation.) I take that bucket out to the poultry house and scatter the sprouted seeds onto the deep litter. If it is a day when the birds can be out on the pasture, I scatter some outside as well. Now I put yesterdays soaked grain into the bucket Ive just emptied, and the cycle rolls on. Note that every day, every bucket gets a thorough rinseotherwise, the sprouting grains get funky. Sometimes I prefer to sprout the grains only, in which case I eliminate one of the soak buckets (and grind the peas instead, adding them to the dry part of the mix). Also, I might reduce the number of drain/sprout buckets, or increase, depending on how developed a sprout I want, and the point in the season. (In the winter, the sprouting process slows down, even in my basement which is warmed by waste heat from the furnace, thus I might add one drain bucket for an additional dayto the system.) The above is doubtless confusing when read off the page. If you play around with coffee cups representing the buckets as you follow along, however, you will understand how the system works.

Current Feeding Practice

I hope that information offered on this site is useful for flock owners wanting to take feeding their birds more into their own hands. Please remember, though, that feeding the flock is a moving target for me. It has continued to evolve, and is now somewhat different from what has been described in some of the material earlier in the site. I guess it would be a good idea to update this page each time there's a significant change in my practice. I'll try. Note that information presented on this page assumes a basic knowledge of feeding principles and strategies presented on the other feeding pages. ~January 2007

Turning off the grinder

As of about a month now, I have not been grinding feeds in the way described in Making Your Own Poultry Feeds. Despite using a dust mask when grinding, I was having some reactions to the dust. I'm always talking about feeding chickens naturallywell, the natural chicken eats whole seeds exclusively. There are someamong them my long-time poultry guru Joel Salatinwho argue that it costs the chicken energy to grind large seeds like corn, and that you thus pay a price in output (meat or eggs) if you feed them whole seeds rather than making part of that energy expenditure for them by grinding. Maybe, but I'm generally more concerned about other issues than squeezing out that last ounce of production from my birds. Since poultry are certainly equipped (crop for pre-processing, gizzard for grinding) to handle whole seeds, I turned off the grinder to see what would happen. I'm taking the same basic feedstocks (at present corn, wheat, peas, oats, barley, and flax seed), in the same proportions as in my previous ground feeds, mixing them thoroughly, then

throwing them to the birds like a conventional scratch feed. Since, unlike in previous winters, I now have the birds outside full-time (more about that below), I scatter the feed grains outside. Thus I am less likely to encourage rodent populations inside the poultry house. I mix up anywhere from 25 to 100 pounds of the whole-seed feed at a time. But the amount per batch is really no longer relevant, since I am no longer crushing the seed coats by grinding. All the birdsa pair of adult African geese, a trio of adult Buff ducks, some growing young guineas and Silver Spangled Hamburgs, and the usual mixed tribe of Marans, Old English Games, and Boxwood Broodiesseem to be doing just fine with the new regimen.

Dropping the supplements

I am not presently doing any supplementation at all. Don't know what I'll do with the remaining bag of Fertrell NutriBalancer, or the bag of fish meal, but I'm not offering them to the birds in any form. I do plan to bang together some hoppers (woodenthe metal hoppers I have would be no good for this) to offer salt and kelp meal free choice. Again, there doesn't seem to be a pressing need for even this level of supplementation, given the increased access to real food. (More below) Top of page

Maximizing access to natural foods

Earthworms
The major investment of time, funds, and effort on the re-do of the greenhouse, Fall of 2005, is now paying off: The earthworm populations in the 160 sq ft of worm bins down the middle of the greenhouse are finally adequate both to convert pickup loads of pony poop from my neighbor Joan's horse operation, and to harvest worms in quantity to feed the chooks. Whenever I get to itevery couple of days or soI scoop out one or two 5-gallon buckets of finished worm bedding with worms, and simply dump onto the deep litter in the poultry house. The chooks pick out the worms and work the castings into the litter (which should be prime, come spring). If I seem lackadaisical about how often I offer the worms, I'm not too concerned, given the increased access to superior foods. (Below)

Mangels
I dug a clamp to store the season harvest of mangels (fodder beets). They're keeping perfectly. I pull out one or two from time to time and throw them to the flock, for a boost in fresh food, and carbohydrates.

The winter feeding project

Okay, this is below, time for me to tell you about a change in winter feeding strategies I'm really excited about. As you know, I pasture the birds fulltime during the green season. But in the past I've kept the flock largely confined to the poultry house over winter, in order to prevent excessive wear of the dormant pasture sod. Last year I put a flock of a couple dozen

chickens in the far end of the greenhouse, releasing them onto a yardone of two garden spacessurrounded by electronet and heavily mulched with spoiled hay. The thick cover kept the ground from freezing, thus kept alive a reservoir of earthworms and slugs at soil surface which the chooks could get at. Now I hear some of you objecting: Hay?! You crazy, boy?that stuff is loaded with seeds! Ah, yes, isnt it just! And when late winter/early spring came in, they all started sprouting. The chooks were delighted. The end of the winter featured large quantities of extremely finely shredded mulch for use in the garden, mellow soil still loose and workable after being protected from winter's extremes, few remaining weed seedsand no slugs. This year I'm building on that experience. I separated the flock into two groups: between two and three dozen chickens in the poultry house, and the rest of the flock in the greenhouse (the five waterfowl, eight young guineas, and 43 chickens). This year, the house group is not confined to the chicken housethey are released to a heavily mulched yard as described above, confined and protected by electronet. This area is not garden space. It is a pasture area that got overly worn last fall, so I decided to let the birds work a heavy mulch on it over winter. In the spring, I will sow a mixed pasture cover in that spacepasture grasses, clovers, alfalfa, crucifers and keep the birds off it until it establishes. In late summer through fall, I planted cover cropsmostly grain grasses and peas in both garden areas, which I netted with a long, wandering perimeter of electronet. Then in early December, I put the greenhouse flock into the greenhouse pens, releasing them fulltime into the two garden areas. The one closest to the greenhouse is now clear of green, and I'm ready to roll out another several round bales of mulch hay in that area. There is still plenty of green growth in the farther garden, so I'll let the flock work that. Whether that area will get an application of hay will depend on how long it takes the birds to take off the green cover. So that's how I'm providing maximum access to live foodsplenty of weed seeds, earthworms, slugs for the flocks over winter. Everybody seems happy, doing what they love to do best. And when I stroke a bird or two as I shut up at night, I feel full crops.

Miscellaneous
Incidentally, I'm not sprouting at present. I should be, I guess, but I've been incredibly busy, and the birds have so much access to fresh foods outsideit hasn't seemed to matter that the feed grains I'm giving them are not sprouted. I wrote in Feeding the Flock from the Homestead's Own Resources that I planned to make hay from comfrey and stinging nettle. Well, I did so, right at the end of the season. I cured it out of the sun (up in the loft, on the racks where I cure my alliums), and got some very pretty green hay from both. However, I haven't yet begun experimenting with feeding it. More about that when I do.

The Challenge of High Feed Costs

Composter Chickens (Photo courtesy of Vermont Compost Company) The following article was published in the August/September 2008 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine. It was posted to the site November 21, 2008. (Note: When I posted it to the site, gasoline prices had come down a lot. I expect that change to be only temporary, however; and thus my basic points about energy, agriculture, and food costs should continue to be valid.)

Table of Contents
A Paradigm Shift BiodiversityHomegrown Sticker shock has become a part of life, whether were filling the gas tank or tiptoing fearfully among the supermarket shelves. Dont think your backyard flock is immune from the threats of rapidly rising priceshave you looked at your feed invoices lately? I have made my own feeds for years, but am seeing stunning cost increases as well. In the past year alone, the price I pay for whole shell corn has risen 20 percent; for feed peas, 39 percent ; and for whole oats, 63 percent. The price I pay for feed wheat jumped 40 percent in eight months, then ceased being available through my supplier at any price until the next harvest. Fortunately I was able to substitute triticaleat a price 26 percent above the highest I ever

paid for the more desirable wheat. Feeding the amounts I have been feeding is simply not sustainable. Those who depend on prepared feeds have seen the same shocking increases. Julia Cronin, who produces broilers and eggs for local markets in southwestern Connecticutt, reports a oneyear rise in the cost of layer feed of 38 percent. I havent seen any persuasive argument that feed prices will continue going anywhere but up. Our backyard flocks are not isolated from momentous changes in the larger economy. Global grain reserves are at a historic low. The misguided decision to subsidize the production of ethanol from corn has led to market competition between eaters (and feeders of poultry) and drivers of SUVs. Gasoline prices have quadrupled since 1999, with enormous implications for how we practice agriculture, and process and distribute our food. Perhaps its time to take a new look at our backyard flocksat how we feed and manage them, and what we expect from them.

A Paradigm Shift
It is not the purpose of this article to offer silver-bullet solutions to increasing feed costs, but to suggest that a whole paradigm shift in the way we think about feeding is in order. We have become so inured to the thought that chicken feed is something we buy, it is difficult to imagine raising our chickens largely, or even completely, without purchased feeds. Karl Hammer of Vermont Compost Company (located in Montpelier, the state capitol) has made just such a paradigm shift, and his experience is instructive. As part of his composting operation, Karl raises 1200 layersproduction far beyond that of most readers of this magazine. If you think his feed bills are astronomical indeed, youre wrong. Karl doesnt feed his layers any grain or purchased feed. Whatsoever. Top of page Vermont Compost Company makes high-grade finished composts for farmers, landscapers, and gardeners. A major component for making their composts is food wastes from restaurants, schools, and other institutions that serve a lot of food. It is actually cheaper for these institutions to pay VCC a fee to take their food residuals, in lieu of having them hauled to the landfill. At the composting site, the food wastes are mixed with cow manure from a local dairy, and hay (by preference a late-cut hay containing plenty of grass and weed seeds), and made up into huge windrows. The laying flock is entirely free range, but where they most want to range is: on those mountains of compost. They of course eat some of the food residuals directly, but of more importance is the live, nutrient-dense foods available as the compost heaps become more biologically activeearthworms, pill bugs, crickets, slugs, etc. As in any compost heap, of course, the microbes driving their decomposition produce Vitamin B12, and other vitamins and immune-enhancing substances, which the chickens ingest along with the other goodies. In the process of gleaning all this free food, the busy chickens help turn and aerate the heaps, speeding decomposition. They also charge them with their droppings, rich in nutrients that assist the breakdown process. In other words, the chickens are an integral part of the work of this composting business, increasing its productivity. This work alone would justify their inclusion in the operation, but of course they also produce an abundance of eggs, which VCC sells via a co-op, a couple of school systems, farmers

markets, and a couple of CSAs (Community Supported Agriculturesubscription produce marketing ventures). When I talked to Karl Hammer recently, he told me that he raises about 600 chicks as replacement stock each year, largely using the same feeding resource base. Indeed, in some years he has raised the young birds from day one with no purchased feeds. At present, he is feeding the young ones some purchased grains (oats, cracked corn, and scratch grain mix) for logistical reasons: 250 pounds over the course of several monthsof which some still remained when I spoke with him. He likes to include adult hens with the little ones in their separate housing (a greenhouse), over a deep litter of food residuals and late-cut hay, and later on the composting heaps. They act as mentors who teach the little ones how to scratch and find the good stuff. Ive described VCCs approach to feeding not primarily to encourage you to seek out similar food residuals as a feeding resource. Im most interested in VCCs operation as an example of the kind of paradigm shift we need to be open to if we are to hold the line on feed costs. Lets consider some of the implications of VCCs approach for our own backyard flocks. Top of page

The Question of Productivity

I recently queried several online discussion groups as to what members were doing to deal with rising feed costs. In the American Pastured Poultry Producers Association group, Robert Plamondona major voice in the pastured poultry movement and someone for whom I have great respectrecommended increasing yield by adopting the more productive modern hybrids: You can easily get twice as many eggs from a modern hybrid [like Red Sex-Links] than a standard breed, allowing you to cut your flock and feed bill in half. But most of the super-productive hybrids are more productive only in the context of high input of purchased feeds. As the costs of those feeds continue to spiral, it will matter more whether a hen has the capability and inclination to get out and hustle a good deal of her own feed. Take as an extreme example the Old English Gamea breed with a thousand-year history as a treasured utilitarian fowl. OEGs are small, and shy on egg productionhopelessly unproductive by contemporary standards. But if given enough biologically diverse ground on which to forage, they can virtually feed themselves. Which is to say, at some point on the curve of rising costs, as purchased feeds become unaffordable or unavailable, the OEG is more productive in the changed circumstances. I think that one effect of rising costs will be a new appreciation of the sturdier, more self-reliant traditional breeds. Not only are such breeds likely to do a better job of foraging some of their own food, but they thrive on an overall lower level of protein (both in the growth and the laying phases), usually the most expensive ingredient in purchased feeds. I was interested to note that the breeds Vermont Compost uses as work chickens are not Red Sex-Links or Superlayer Whites, but Australorps, Buff Orpingtons, Wyandottes, Rhode Island Redstraditional farm breeds that were valued for their ability to hustle their own living on the farm, rather than hanging around the feeder waiting for handouts. Which is to say, when measured against purchased inputs and their role in a total production enterprise, they are more productive than high-input super-layers.

Note as well that many of the older breeds are dual purpose (used for both meat and eggs), and may offer feed savings unavailable as long as we are feeding separate specialist layers and meat hybrids.

Raising Earthworms to Feed the Flock

Note that I have decided to duplicate the article in the Composting section, The Boxwood Vermicomposting System, so that it appears here as well, offering the option of cultivating earthworms as high-protein feed for poultry. The original article, published in the April/May 2008 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine, was titled Poultry Feed from Worm Bins. Regular visitors to this site know I am always looking for integrated patterns in which one element in the homestead, food-self-sufficiency enterprise supports and enables another; in

which problems transform into benefits; and in which the homesteader finds unexpected synergiesthat is, biological efficiencies that surpass in sophistication and beauty the crude efficiencies of machine and chemical agriculture. There is no better example of integrating efficiencies than the vermicomposting bin. Using earthworms as our allies, we can practice responsible management of manures (from either our own livestock or that of neighbors), turning what is otherwise repellent and a potential vector for disease or parasites into black gold for garden fertility applications. But we can pluck one more benefit from this magic trick: We can harvest worms from a vermicomposting bin as nutrient-dense feed of the highest quality for our flocks. Let me tell you about the vermicomposting operation Ive put into place, and how I harvest worms for poultry feed.

Vermicomposting in the Greenhouse

Wormbins in Greenhouse There are many options for setting up an effective vermicomposting operation. However, worm bins in exposed spaces are apt to stay close enough to freezing in colder climates that the worms activities slow down to a minimum in winter. On the other hand, bins in enclosed, heated spaces (such as the basement) are apt to be too limited in size. The great beauty of setting up the operation in a greenhouseassuming you dig the bins into the earth for maximum protection from temperature extremes (summer or winter)is that there is never a dormant period in the composting cycle. However hot or cold the ambient temperatures, the worms in their earth-protected bins continue to feed and reproduce. In the Fall of 2005, I replaced the rotting foundation boards of my 20x48-ft greenhouse with 4-inch concrete block. I had been practicing vermicomposting in a 3x4-ft trainer wheels bin for about four years, and saw the greenhouse renovation as the ideal opportunity to step up to more serious work with worms. We dug out a space for vermi-bins, 16 inches deep, 4 feet wide, and 40 feet long, right down the center of the greenhouse. Since I needed that central access anyway, I didnt lose much growing space to the new bins. (Do note the dimensions if thinking about a similar project: Thats a lot of dirt! Plan ahead for creative uses of all that fill elsewhere on your landscape. And plan on a lot of good wholesome exercise, digging and hauling.)

Bin Construction We lined that space with 4-inch hollow concrete block, two courses deep. Every 8 ft of the 40-ft length, we placed a cross-wall of block. The result was a series of five 4x8-ft bins, 16 inches deep. We made lids for the bins from -inch plywood on 2x4 framing. The lids are heavy-duty enough for the heaviest loads, and have been a great place to lay out work projects requiring a flat surface. However, a single 4x8-ft lid (i.e., one made from a single sheet of plywood) with such hefty framing would be too heavy to move conveniently. Therefore we made each lid a more manageable 4x4 (one sheet of plywood cut in half). The result was two lids over each 4x8 bin, creating for management purposes two 4x4 sections per bin, but with no partition between them. Remember that conceptit is the key to some of the management practices weve come up with.

Bin Lid Note that there is no floor in the bin other than the packed Virginia clay with which we are blessed. This is not a problem, given the species of composting worm we work with (about more of which below), and the fact that our clay soil drains well despite its compaction. Note also that our block-walled bins inside the greenhouse have had no incursions of worm-loving moles (which are sometimes a problem for worm bins outside). Top of page

Feed/Bedding
In some discussions of vermicomposting you will see a distinction between bedding and feed for the worms. In my bins there is no such distinction: With one exception (see below), I fill them with pony poop exclusivelypure horse manure from a neighbor who breeds and boards horses. Note that qualifier pure: If the manure is mixed with hay, straw, or pine shavings, it will heat up, just as in a compost heapa disaster for the worms. Pure manure will not heat up, or only slightly so. It is an excellent medium for the worms. They live in this medium (using it as bedding) while converting it (using it as feed) into castings. Manure of ruminantssheep, goats, llamasall make excellent worm feed. Cow manure should work fine as well, though its higher water content might require some changes in management. I know of one huge and quite successful vermicomposting operation in North Carolina (home of a lot of high-confinement pig operations) based on pig manure. Rabbit manure has also been used for worms, sometimes with the bins directly beneath the rabbit hutches ready to take incoming.

It is not impossible to use poultry manure to feed worms, but it is quite potenthigh in nitrogen, and likely to heat up and generate ammonia. One could make periodic applications that are very thin, or could pre-process poultry manure in a compost heap until it is past the heating phase. Since such procedures make the operation more labor intensive, I stick with manures that are easier to use, reserving poultry manure for other fertility-recapture strategies. Note that other materials can be used for worm bedding and/or feed: shredded newspaper or cardboard, weeds or crop residues from the garden, kitchen scraps and vegetable trimmings, etc. I maintain one bin in which all contents are of plant origin exclusively. The worms process this material as well, but take much longer to do so. (A technical note: The worms themselves do not actually eat the feeds we offer them. Rather, a whole host of bacterial species eat the organic feeds in the bins, and the worms feed on the bacteria.)

Worm Species to Use in the Bins

Eisenia foetida If youve ever dug into the center of an aged heap of manure, you saw red wrigglers or manure worms at work. It is this type of wormnot the soil burrowing night crawler earthworm types you find when digging a garden bed, or in a bait shopthat is used in the rich, dense feeding medium typical of the vermicomposting bins. (Eisenia foetida is the species normally used.) This type of earthworm will not burrow down into the compacted soil under the bin, nor will it crawl out the top of the bin. Conditions in either direction are not as compatible, as inviting, as the rich feeding medium we establish in the bin.

Setting Up the Bins

The Cycle Begins For me, the vermicomposting process starts with hauling in pickup loads of horse manure from my neighbors place, and loading all five bins. (Theres plenty available in the state legislature as well, but thats a longer haul for me.) I adjust the moisture content if necessary, using a wand on a garden hose, aiming for a medium that is neither uncomfortably dry for an animal whose entire body is covered with a wet skin; nor sopping wet, a condition that would drown the worms. Before watering, I check the deeper levels of the bin, not just the surface.

Over-watering at the surface can cause a hidden accumulation of excess water deeper down, especially if drainage from the bin is poor. After waiting a couple of days to ensure there will be no significant heating, I inoculate the bin with worms. You can easily find them for purchase online. They are expensive, but you only have to buy them onceafter that, they will be fruitful and multiply, and you should then have enough for all future needs. Alternatively, you could visit the aforementioned aged manure heap and dig out a seeding of manure worms for your bins. In either case, it will take some time before your bins are fully populated. Be patient. If you check from time to time, you will find more and more red wrigglersand their small round yellowish egg capsules as wellsigns that indeed they are achieving their and your mutual objective. I seeded my five 4x8 bins (a huge amount of material) with worms from my small trainer wheels bin, and it was about a year before I could start harvesting earthworms as surplus. Top of page

Managing the Bins

At the beginning, the horse manure is in the form of the horse apples or horse muffins so familiar to anyone attending a Fourth of July parade. At the end of processing, the horse manure has been converted entirely to worm manure, or castingsa fine-grained, moist, black residue that is one of the best of all natural fertilizers (not only for its mineral components, but because it carries a huge load of beneficial microbes added in the gut of the earthworm). Unfortunately, a bin that has gone to pure castings has no living wormsno animal can live in its own wastes (as we humans are finding to our dismay). Thus the trick is to find a way to furnish an ever-renewed source of food for the worms, while separating them from the castings. There are numerous techniques that have been used for doing so, some of them quite tedious and labor-intensive. I dont do tedious and laborintensive, so will tell you the alternative which works well for my needs.

Consolidating the Bedding First of all, as the worms work the manure, they reduce its volume. At some point it is possible to shovel all the bedding from one half of the bin on top of the material in the other halfand still have it fit under the bin lid.

Ready for New Bedding Remember how I said that having two lids allows us to manage a single 4x8 bin in effect as two 4x4 sections (but with no barrier between them)? Now we begin to see what an advantage that is: We fill the emptied half with fresh pony poop. Note that at this point it no longer matters if we have some initial heating in the new materialthe worms are safe in the older, established material, and can simply wait out the heating cycle before starting to sip at the edges of the new bedding. As they exhaust the old material, they migrate into the fresh material, leaving behind pure castings for our use, but maintaining a thriving population in the fresh half. We have now established a sort of seesaw for managing a perpetually renewing vermicomposting cycle. Aint natural systems beautiful!

Harvesting for Feeding

Halfway There is a final refinement to the cycling of manure used in this system, however, and that is the point of this article: We can harvest the worms to feed chickens (and ducks, guineas, turkeysall domestic fowl except the vegetarian geese, who are appalled). To do so, we intervene in the cycle at what I call the halfway point. Remember the beginning of the cycle (discrete, clumpy horse apples) and its ending (even textured, fine-grained castings). Midway along the spectrum is the halfway point: The worms have pulled apart the manure clumps into an even mass with plenty of fiber still in evidence. That is, the material has been broken down, and infused with castings, sufficiently to use as a potent fertilizer, but still contains plenty of worms and worm eggs. At this point, we can intervene with shovel and bucketscoop up the fibrous bedding and feed it to the flock.

Feeding Earthworms In the winter, I release my birds onto the heavily-mulched winter feeding yard described elsewhere in this site. Since the mulch is over one of my gardens, I simply dump the bin material with its load of worms onto the mulch (a different spot each day, in order eventually to benefit the entire area). The chickens scratch the processed manure into the mulch while dining on the worms.

Feeding on Litter Another option in the winter is to dump the bin contents onto the deep litter in my greenhouse poultry pens or in the main poultry house. Again, the birds incorporate it into the deep litter. Periodically, I remove the litternow something like a mix between a finished compost and a mulchand lay it down in a heavy layer in my fertility patches of comfrey or stinging nettle, both capable of utilizing all the fertility I can throw at them. Later in the gardening season, I could use it instead to mulch heavy feeders like corn or winter squash. In the summer, the halfway bedding can feed chickens on the pasture. Sometimes I reserve the worms harvested from the worm bins to help meet the higher protein needs of the growing birds, using a shelter set up as a sort of creep feeder to serve the young birds while excluding the adults. Of course, I will keep the shelter moving over the pasture in order to even out the fertility application of the worm bedding.

Litter in Kill Mulch

Creep Feeder Shelter I have a couple of times seen caveats that worms raised in animal manures can pose a threat of disease if fed to chickens. I have been unable to find any substantive discussion of this

subject. For this reasonand because I know of so many real-world applications in which chickens have been successfully fed or released onto manure-fed earthwormsI am not deterred by theoretical possibilities. Vermicomposting is proving to be a source of high quality feed for my flock, and I wont be concerned about potential problems until and if they manifest.

Protein from Thin Air:

Breeding Fly Maggots for Poultry Feed
A Crucially Important Advisory to the Reader
Please be advised that, despite what is said below about the chances for disease with this system, and despite the fact that I have used it successfully for years, I have recently indeed had problemsincluding deaths of several chickensthat probably resulted from limberneckthat is, botulism poisoning. On one occasion, I cycled through the maggot buckets offal from chickens (from a buddy who came over to share my equipment) that had not been properly starvedtheir crops were filled with feed, which may have soured and supported the growth of Clostridium botulinum (the microbe that produces botulinum toxin). In another, I put a couple of groundhogs into the buckets that had been sitting around perhaps too longmaybe the C. botulinum had had longer to get a start, than it would have if I were using fresher carcasses. In any case, I have a duty to warn the reader about these problems I have had, and advise that I'm more cautious about use of this method of generating free protein than when I wrote this article. I have not given up on the maggot bucketsI may well experiment further to determine how to reap the benefits of the system, without creating a danger to my flockbut for the moment I have suspended use of the maggot buckets. Fresh carcasses that come my way I am feeding to the layer flock directly, not as maggot-generating substrate. My past experience indicates that the chickens resist eating a carcass encased in fur. However, if I open it up a bit with a hatchet, they utilize the muscle tissue and internal organs quite efficiently. If there is an inherent problem with the maggot buckets, it has much to do with the anaerobic nature of the feeding mediumanaerobic conditions are more conducive to pathogens (including C. botulinum) than aerobic ones. That's why I am excited about use of Black Soldier Fly larvae for responsibly recycling various organic residues, recapturing their residual nutrient content for soil fertility applications, and even (as with blowfly maggots) generating high quality live animal feed for the flock (42% protein, 35% fat on a dry-weight basis). I am now experimenting with a BioPod for working with this species. The feeding activity of BSF larvae is a much more aerobic process, with a greatly reduced chance there could ever be a disease complication. My next article in Backyard Poultry Magazine will be an introduction to Black Soldier Fly; and eventually I will post more information on the site. In the meantime, please check Black Soldier Fly Blog and The BioPod for more information. Stay tuned! ~Harvey, August 1, 2009

This article was published as a sidebar to Feeding the Flock from the Homestead's Own Resources in the Oct/Nov 2006 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine. Using food grade 5 and 7 gallon buckets, I drilled numerous 3/8-inch holes in the bottoms, sides, and screw-on lids. (Holes of this size allow flies to enter, but prevent pecking by the chickens.) My buddy Sam keeps me supplied with 30-35 lb beaver carcasses. These I seal inside the buckets. After just a few hours, flies have blown the carcasses with eggs, which within a day hatch into a mass of greedily feeding larvae, or maggots.

Suspend the Buckets Please note that for this system to work, it is essential that the buckets be suspended, either by hanging (from a tree or a rafter of a shelter) or by placing on a wire platform. When the larva has grown enough to pupate, it has the instinct to leave the feeding medium and burrow into the groundit will not pupate in the feeding medium. By suspending the buckets, I ensure that larvae migrating out of the carrion will free-fall, attracting the attention of the ever-alert chickens, who instantly snap them up. I have found the beaver carcasses from my friend to be tremendously productive. He also passes on the occasional raccoon, and I have even cycled the odd roadkill through my buckets, as well as a groundhog who sadly did not understand the intensity of my feelings about my sweet potato planting. When I slaughter poultry for the table, I now run the offal through the buckets as wella more efficient, and productive, way of disposing of them than burying or composting. I even put in any domestic birds that died by accident, though of course do not use carcasses of birds who may have died of disease.

Divide the Carcass No doubt the reader has anticipated potential problems with the use of carrion to breed maggots, so lets consider them: Odor The first beaver Sam gave me I simply stuffed, whole, into my largest bucket. The bucket produced an abundance of maggots but, not surprisingly, smelled pretty ripe

during the last few days of processing. I now have five working buckets, so I chop each beaver carcass into five pieces. I line the bottoms of the buckets with litter from the poultry house (mostly oak leaves), lay in the beaver chunks, then pad with more leaves around and on top, and screw on the lids. (The loose leaves do not impede access to the carrion by the flies.) With this adjustment, I find that the processing time the time from carrion addition until the maggots have reduced it to hair and bones is greatly accelerated, and there is very little smell. Indeed, I catch a whiff only when I am working in the immediate vicinity of the buckets. (Suburban flock owners, however, would do well to seek free protein elsewhere.) Curiosity seekers The buckets would certainly draw dogs, foxes, raccoons, and other curiosity seekers if allowed access to them. Therefore this system is useful only where access can be denied. I use electric net fencing, and never have problems with raids on the buckets. Placing the buckets inside permanent predator fencing would work as well. Only once have I had a visit from buzzards, drawn to that first heavily scented bucket. They hung around most of a day, clearly intoxicated by the heady aroma, but frustrated they could not get at its source. They finally gave up and lumbered into flight, never to return. I think the lack of repeat visits has much to do with the greatly reduced odor in the buckets these days. Breeding flies Many people have objected to my system because it amounts to a deliberate breeding of flies. Let me emphasize that I am breeding fly maggots, not flies, and actually my methods should decrease the ambient fly population. Imagine there are 100 female flies in the vicinity, and I manage to convince 20 of them that my carrion buckets are the best place imaginable to lay their eggs. They do so (rather than laying them elsewhere). But not a single fly larva gets to pupate and hatchmy sharp-eyed chickens see to that. Ive just reduced the local fly hatch by 20 percent. Disease Naturally my reader, however dedicated to the ideal of self-sufficiency, will worry about the potential for generating disease out of carrion worked by maggots. I am duty bound to pass on industrial-strength warnings Ive received to that effect: There is a condition the old-timers called limberneck, which turns out to be paralysis caused by botulin poisoning. My friends who warned me about limberneck insisted that it could be caused by maggots ingested by chickens from any source. However, in all the links they sent, the references actually described the condition associated only with spilled feed which had become wet, had soured and begun working with maggots, and then been consumed by the birds. Sounds to me as if the botulism bacterium was growing in the soured feed mash, not in the maggots. In any case, I have always avoided using a grain mash as a maggot breeding substrate. However, I fed carrionbred fly larvae the entire fly season last year, and this season I have honestly lost track of the number of beaver carcasses Ive put through my bucketsand I have not had a hint of a disease problem. Neither has my longtime mentor Joel Salatin, who follows beef cattle on his pastures with a big flock of laying hens, who scratch apart the cowpies for the maggots growing in them. Based on such solid experience, I conclude that the homestead flock owner need not fear disease if he chooses to tap into this rich source of free protein.

Cultivating Soldier Grubs to Feed the Flock

Photo courtesy of blacksoldierflyblog.com This article was originally published in the Oct/Nov 2009 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine. Note that I have duplicated this article in the Grow It!: Composting section under the original title, Black Soldier Fly, White Magic. I include it here to suggest that cultivating soldier grubs offers the homestead or farm flockster a superior live poultry feed one of the best examples of waste to resource. Photos copyright Bonnie Long, 2009, except as noted.

Table of Contents for This Page

Trash to Treasure Meet the Genie: Hermetia illucens An Alliance with the Soldier Parameters for Black Soldier Composting o Range o Bin o Feeds o Drainage o The crawl-off o Productivity o Flexibility o Clean-out o Winter Partners in Vermicomposting The Big Picture For More Information on the Black Soldier

Trash to Treasure
I have always been fascinated by the transformation of something yucky into something prized. When my father brought home a bushel basket of manure from my grandmothers chicken coop in the trunk of our car, and worked it into our garden beds, I was filled with wonder: That stuff they warn us barefoot boys not to step in, its going to make our vegetables grow? Wow! When I started growing gardens of my own, I had many reasons to avoid fertility in a bag, but first and foremost I shunned chemical fertilizers because they would deny me a role in compostingthe miracle of turning manures and rotting vegetation into harvests. And Ive been a sucker for the idea that I could make an alliance with another animal species to work this magic myself: I was enough of a kid to jump enthusiastically into composting with worms, turning pony poop into fertilizer and chicken feed; and enough of a madman to turn carrion from a friends beaver trapping service into live protein for the flock. [Do note that Ive had some second thoughts on the latter idea. See the important advisory at that link.] Now Im excited about yet another species that magically transforms wastes into resources. Let me introduce you. Top of page

Meet the Genie: Hermetia illucens

Most of us are annoyed and repelled by flies. House flies buzz into the house and onto our food, possibly carrying disease-causing microbes. Horse flies bite. Blow flies lay their eggs in carrion, and the larvae rid the world of dead carcassesan essential ecological service for which we are grateful, even if we are repelled by the process as just too gross!

Adult Soldier Fly But none of us within its range are either annoyed or repelled by the Black Soldier Fly, Hermetia illucensindeed, it is unlikely most of us have ever even noticed this innocuous flying insect. Why would we? They look nothing like the flies we find annoying. They do not buzz us or come inside the house. They do not bite. A resting adult looks like a slender black wasp (but without the sting)quite pretty, actually. The life cycle of the Black Soldier could be a textbook example of the most common insect life cycle: egg, larva, pupa, adult. Like countless other essential decomposers, the work of Hermetia illucens in the world is the conversion of organic debris into residues that feed the soil food web, and into new individuals who carry that work into the future. More poetically, decomposers turn death back into life. In the case of the Black Soldier, the cycle starts with eggs laid by the female near a

concentrated deposit of moist, nutrient-dense organic refuse such as succulent vegetable matter and manures. The eggs incubate for four days to three weeks, then hatch into larvae, legless and wingless grubs that are all throughput: busily feeding mouth on one end, extraction of all nutrients usable for vigorous growth in the digestive system, and ejection of undigestible feed components out the other end. The grubs molt their skins, to allow for their rapid growth, in five successive phases called instars. Under ideal conditions, the larvae mature in 10 days. Their tissues are now developed enough, and they have stored energy reserves enough, to support the next phase: the miracle of metamorphosis, the transformation into a completely different insect form. Pupation does not take place within the feeding medium, however. When they are ready, the prepupal grubs have the instinct to leave it and find a place to burrow into the earth and initiate metamorphosis. After ten days or so, they emerge as winged adults. As is the case with many species of butterfly, the adult phase is exclusively sexual: The winged phase is solely about mating, and, for the female, finding the best possible place to lay her eggs. They do not feed at all in this phase, which lasts only five to eight days. Death quickly ensues for both male and female adults, once fertile eggs have been laid to start the cycle anew. Top of page

An Alliance with the Soldier

Useful ideas emerge from alert observation. In the case of the Black Soldier life cycle, we should note particularly: They are specialists in a critically important rolethe breakdown of organic debris that would otherwise choke the ecology. Their high level of feeding activity and rapid growth in the larval stage imply the concentration of considerable nutrients. Since the adults do not feedindeed, they do not even have functioning mouth partsthey do not bite, nor do they come buzzing around us or our houses, looking for something to eat. Of special interest is their habit of crawling out of the feeding medium when it is time to pupate. These facets of the life cycle hint at an opportunity to make an alliance with Hermetia illucens to: responsibly manage organic residues such as spoiled or unused food, manures, culled fruits and vegetables, etc.; and to reclaim the residual energy in such materials as additions to soil fertility, or even high quality feed (the mature grubs themselves) which we can offer to livestock species such as chickens, pigs, or farmed fish. By channeling the crawl-off of the grubs, we can even cause them to self-harvest into a collection bucket! And because the vigorous activity of the larvae keeps the feeding medium constantly aerated (most pathogenic microbes prefer anaerobic conditions), and because the adults do not feed at all, this species is not a vector for diseases. Happily, soldier grubs tend to inhibit development of larvae of all other fly specieshouse flies, fruit flies, blow fliesso cultivating the Black Soldier can actually reduce populations of flies with a higher nuisance profile. Much creative work has in fact been done toward making exactly such an alliance. Dr. Paul Olivier has designed systems for grub composting in Vietnam and other developing countries, to reduce the load of food wastes on streets and in landfills, while providing needed employment. Academic researchers such as Sophie St-Hilaire and Craig Sheppard have

experimented with soldier grubs to manage fish offal, and manures in commercial poultry and swine houses; and to yield high-protein feed supplements for various livestock species, including commercially raised carnivorous fish. Dr. Olivier and his son Robert have founded a company (ESR International, LLC) which sells the well designed BioPod, a molded highdensity plastic bin similar in some ways to, but more efficient than, home scale worms eat my garbage vermicomposting units. Top of page

Parameters for Black Soldier Composting

The BioPod I am working a soldier grub colony in a BioPod, and in a future article will detail its management; as well as explore some ideas for more low-tech, less expensive, do-it-yourself projects for soldier grub composting. My goal is to replace 25 percent of purchased feed I offer my chickens with nutrient-dense soldier grubs (42 percent protein, 35 percent fat, dry weight). For now, these are some of the parameters that govern the design and management of a successful operation.

Range
If you live in climate zones 7 through 10, there is almost certainly a native Black Soldier population ready to work for you. (Im in Zone 6b, and I found soldier grubs in my vermicomposting bins for years before I started cultivating them.) All you have to do to start a working colony is to set up feeds and protected conditions that fit their life cycle; and the gravid females (mated, ready to lay eggs) will come. Soldiers can survive considerably farther north than Zone 7. If there is no wild population, you can purchase starter grubs through the mail. How easy it will be to keep a local population going will depend on just how far north of their natural range you live.

BioPod Interior

Bin
Bin design is quite flexible---the essentials are that the bin: protect the colony from predation and rain; give ready access to gravid females; ensure compatible living conditions; and provide for crawl-off of the mature grubs. The unit should be set up in the shade: The high metabolic level of the grubs generates a good deal of heatadditional heat supplied by direct sunlight could be disastrous for the colony. Otherwise, placement of the bin depends on your own convenience. It does not have to be stuck off in the back forty: Aerobic (oxygen-rich) conditions in a well managed colony prevent unpleasant odors. Top of page

Feeds
Most efficient conversion to biomass occurs in typical food wastes. But if yours is a frugal household such as ours, there is no edible food wasted, other than castoffs like coffee grounds (which grubs love), tea leaves, peelings, and trimmings. (It might be possible in a larger project to receive food scraps from institutions like schools or restaurants.) In the absence of such food residuals, any mix of succulent vegetable and fruit matter works well, such as over-mature and cull fruits and vegetables (the lurking Monster Zuchinni perhaps). Since grubs love the big outer wrapper leaves of cabbage (and still-succulent spent broccoli plants), I plan to grow more rape (a close relative of kale, thus of cabbage)which I grow as a cover crop anywayto harvest as feed. Im experimenting with comfrey as wellits succulent large leaves are packed with protein and minerals. Perhaps next year Ill plant more of the big pumpkins and Hubbard squashes for feeding grubs. Manures can make good feed. Low-fiber pig and chicken manures are bestthere may be no better way to deal with these manures than using energy-hungry grubs. The larvae will work horse, rabbit, and ruminant manures, but the higher fiber content of these manures reduces feeding efficiency (since the larvae cannot digest the cellulosic residues of plant stems). Of course, if the manure available to you for processing is a high-fiber type (horse manure in my case), you could simply increase bin capacity to meet your production goals, and plan on cleaning out the bin a little more frequently. Meat and fish scraps, and dairy produts, can be fed to active colonies, but in limited amounts the grubs will not thrive with too much high-protein feed. Such foods should not exceed 5 percent of total feed offered. Do not use as feed materials that are dry, fibrous, high-cellulose, toughsuch as weeds, grass, leaves, stalks, paper, cardboard. Top of page

Drainage
Look again at the list of appropriate feeds. Note that all have high moisture content; and that grubs do not thrive in anaerobic conditions. Conclusion: Efficient drainage out of the bin is essential, and will likely be your major management challenge. If conditions in the colony do become too wet, either cease feeding for awhile or add a moisture-absorbing material such as

shredded office paper (not newspaper), coir (the granular residue of coconut husk fiber extraction), and the like. Note that the effluent from the bin can be used exactly like a manure tea. Some sources advise against using it on garden crops, just to play it safe, but you can use it to encourage cover crops and other non-food plants.

Mature Grubs

The crawl-off
An essential feature of any bin design is provision of some sort of ramp the mature grubs can use to exit the feeding medium. If the incline is no greater than 45 degrees, they will have no problem wriggling up the ramp, which might end in some sort of gutter to direct their further migration. The grubs have no hesitation crawling off the end of the gutter and launching themselves into space, assuming theyre going to land on earth, where they can burrow and pupate. Uh-oh!wily you have placed the spout over a collection bucket. Next morning you only have to pick up the bucket and go feed the chickens. (They love soldier grubs.) Do remember, though, to scatter a few grubs where they can burrow, pupate, and emerge as adults ready to carry on the cycle. Top of page

Their Favorite Meal

Productivity
A colony of soldier grubs is like a chicken flock: A well managed colony is a lot more productive than a wild onethat is the essence of the almost symbiotic relationship between Homo sapiens and another species which we call domestication. What levels of production might we expect? That depends on many factorsbin design, feeds offered, ambient temperatures, management experience and skills (the your mileage may vary factor). But the equation, at whatever level of production, is all positive: If we offer the

grubs 100 pounds of food wastes, for example, they will reduce it to 5 pounds of residue usable as a superior soil amendment; in the process generating 10 and possibly up to 20 pounds of live grubs that can be fed to livestock; in addition to liquid effluent (how much depends on the moisture content of the feeding materials) which can be used to feed crops. Hey, wait a minutewhat happened to the wastes? There is absolutely no waste remaining after this conversionit has all been transformed into valuable resource.

Protein Boost In the future, widespread farm-scale conversion by soldier grubs of organic residues like manures could reduce dependence on purchased feeds for poultry, pigs, and fish. Or the grubs could be dried and sold for addition to livestock feedsas a replacement for the thousands of tons of ocean fish harvested annually for fish meal (at todays prices, approaching $1,000 per ton and rising). Top of page

Flexibility
This species is enormously adaptive in response to changing environmental conditions. If food supply runs out, the grubs go dormant until more food is available. During winter, they delay maturation for several months before resuming development. This adaptability gives the operator great flexibility in managing the colony.

Clean-out
Because of the enormous reduction in volume of the feedstocks offered to the colony, cleaning out the substratethe undigestible residue at the bottom of the binneed not be frequent. This residue makes a great soil amendment. Or it can be added to vermicomposting bins for even better natural fertilizer production. (See below.)

Winter
Because of the heat generated by their high metabolic rate, it is possible to keep a colony active through the winter. However, over-wintering a soldier colony depends on too many factors to consider here. I will return to this topic in a following article. Top of page

Partners in Vermicomposting
Those who compost with worms for managing organic wastes may enjoy expanding their repertoire to include a soldier grub colony. There are important differences between the two:

Redworms live and feed in a large, undifferentiated feeding mass; grubs should be fed only what they will consume in a day. The population in a worm bin is self-sustaining; whereas a soldier grub colony requires renewal from an ambient wild populationotherwise, there will be no egg-laying females to ensure a new supply of grubs in the bin. In some ways, soldier grubs are superior to redworms for composting: They are more active, yielding greater production of live biomass; and grubs so conveniently self-harvest into our collection buckets. However, we neednt choose between the two on the basis of which is betteractually, the two species make wonderful partners. Grubs digest fresh putrescent matter in a hurry (worms wait until bacteria are consuming them, then feed on the bacteria); while redworms convert the cellulosic residues grubs are unable to digest. Studies in Asia demonstrate that redworms grow three to four times faster on the residues from soldier grubs, than on food wastes. Top of page

The Big Picture

To paraphrase Wendell Berry, our modern habit is to take a beautiful natural solutionthe recycling by decomposer organisms of residual energy in wastes into food for other members of the ecology, including those in the soil food weband neatly divide it into several hideous problems. Nature does not know the meaning of the term wastewe have created waste, the loss of reclaimable energies in organic residues, as a new phenomenon inherent in the human economy. The refuse in landfills consists of up to 12 percent uneaten or unused food, whose breakdown there not only squanders its resource potential, but generates methane, an even more potent climate-altering gas than carbon dioxide. Manures from livestock operations are seldom fully utilized for soil improvement, and run off to natural water systems, where they function more as toxin than fertilizer. It is easy to despair of making an individual difference where some of our Big Problems are concerned. But with regard to the organic residues from our tables, gardens and orchards, and backyard livestock operations, we canwith forethought and dedication, and in ways that are funhelp end the inexcusable and unsustainable sluicing of un-reclaimed resources down a black hole from which they do not return. Hermetia illucens is ready to help. Top of page

For More Information on the Black Soldier

Jerry aka GW, who has been cultivating soldier grubs to feed pond fish for several years, maintains the informative blacksoldierflyblog.com. GW also serves as a distributor of the well designed BioPod (see next item), which I am currently using to house my grub colony. Quoting GW: If you like gardening, traditional composting, or vermiculture, then youre a likely candidate for black soldier fly culturing. Likewise, if you watch nature and science shows you will probably find BSF as fascinating as I do. theBioPod.com is the website for ESR International, LLC, the company that designed and sells the BioPod for soldier grub composting. Lots of useful information about

managing a working colony, and about many other bioconversion/waste management issues. (BioPodis a trademark of ESR International, LLC.) ESR International, LLC, sponsors an online discussion forum for enthusiasts working with this fascinating species. Introduction to bioconversion of putrescent wastes, including evolution of the major BioPod designs to date. A useful one-page summary of facts about Hermetia illucens and what it has to offer. An interesting article by Paul Olivier,Utilizing Lower Life Forms for the Bioconversion of Putrescent Waste (and how this could dramatically reduce carbon emissions) (pdf format).

Housing the Flock

*Table of Contents for Housing Section is at bottom of this page.*
For those who havent read it, I duplicate below the section on housing in Poultry 101: Starting a Small Flock of Chickens. See also the article on deep litter, perhaps the most important housing issue, and on a feeding strategy designed to minimize rogue rodents in the poultry house. ~February 2007 I will share pictures and design details of our two poultry houses as soon as I can get to it. Housing for chickens can be extremely simple. If you already have an existing shed or outbuilding, it can probably be modified to serve quite nicely. The fundamental requirements are that the birds be protected from the wind or heavy drafts; and that they be completely dry. Chickens have a strong instinct to roost; so will be more content if furnished with some structure on which to roost. It is important not to overcrowd your birds. Allow a minimum of three square feet per bird, up to an ideal five square feet or more. Of course, if the flock has constant access to the outside, they will do fine with less space in their "sleeping quarters" inside. Whatever shelter you give your birds should protect them from wind and sharp drafts; but at the same time should allow for adequate ventilation. I installed solid outer doors and inner frame doors with wire mesh. This configuration allows me to open up the house completely to air flow, while still keeping the birds confined and protected when desired. Also, the birds are able to sun themselves in the direct sunlight coming through the mesh doors and windows at various times during the day. Please note that, if their shelter is tight and dry, chickens are very cold hardy. It is not necessary to provide artificial heat; and it could be detrimental to do so. [Occasionally singlecomb cocks will get some frostbite on combs or wattles. If this becomes a serious problem, you could keep breeds with rose or pea combs instead.] You will of course design your housing with predator protection (especially at night) in mind. But dont anticipate threats like dogs, raccoons, and foxes onlya least weasel can get through any opening large enough for a rat! (I once lost 19 young chickens to a least weasel.) And speaking of rats: Remember that they can be a serious threat to chicks. Half-inch hardware cloth is a great thing.

Table of Contents for Housing Section

When Life Gives You Lemons. . . Making a Dustbox for the Poultry House Discouraging the Rodents Chickens in the Winter Greenhouse

When Life Gives You Lemons. . . (Part One)

I wrote this article for the December 06/January 07 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine, a great resource for the homestead flock owner.

Table of Contents
Part OnePart TwoPart Three If you are around any livestock operation, regardless of species, and you smell manure you are smelling mismanagement. ~Joel Salatin Theres an old saying: When life gives you lemonsmake lemonade. Certainly one of the most sour lemons we get when we raise poultry is dealing with the poops. The manure from our birds is foul-smelling, repellent, and a potential vector for disease among our birds, and perhaps for ourselves as well. Cleaning out the chicken house is not a pleasant chore, especially if the droppings have caked into a hardened layer that resists hoe or shovel. Flies come to the accumulating manure in droves, and may even breed in it. And many are the poultry enthusiasts who have faced the wrath of mother or spouse, entering the house after having stepped in something. A bowlful of pretty sour lemons indeed. Is there any way we can make lemonade? Fortunately there are two. First, to the greatest extent possible, we should keep our flocks on pasture. Poops laid down over a growing pasture sod in good condition are digested by the sod in a way that is more healthful and pleasant for both the birds and for us, while fertilizing and boosting the teeming life in the top few inches of the soila win-win situation for everybody. To the extent the birds must be confined to a houseperhaps just at night, perhaps almost all the time over the winteris there a way we can turn the lemons of manure management into lemonade? The recipe is: deep organic litter over an earth floor.

A Slow Burn Compost Heap

If you are planning a new building to house your flock, I strongly recommend leaving an earth floor in it. Soil under the litter is a source of inoculation of the litter by billions of microbes. Also, the slight wicking of moisture from an earth floor into the litter boosts healthy growth of microbial populations.

Like most living things, the microbes at work in the litter require oxygen to thrive. Isnt it fortunate, then, that chickens love nothing so much as scratching. Their non-stop turning of the litter not only disperses their droppings and mixes them in, but aerates the litter as well, boosting more active microbial life. The busy microbes feed on the droppings and the litter itself, decomposing them into their basic elementsin accordance with that great principle of Nature, that every creatures waste is a priceless resource for some other creature. What they create in effect is a slow burn compost heap. The decomposition is not as intense as in a compost heap, but the same processes are at work. Like a compost heap, a mature deep litter is very much alive.

Boosting Flock Health

Read that last sentence again. It is good to remember that we are working with a living system here. And, like any living creatures, the microbes produce metabolites (byproducts of their life processes) in the natural course of making a living. Fortunately for our chickens, these metabolites include Vitamins B12 and K, as well as natural antibiotics and immune-enhancing substances, which the chickens ingest along with whatever it is they find so interesting in the litter. Just as in a compost pile, a mature litter becomes populated with countless other critters you and I would not likely even see, but which the chickens do see, and eatan additional source of protein. Indeed, studies done in the 1940s indicated flocks on a 12-inch litter could meet all their protein needs from what they found in the litter. I cant prove that from my own experience, but certainly my chickens find plenty in a mature litter to get excited about. (Source for this reference is Joel Salatins Pastured Poultry Profit$. I have not been able to find the original source.)

What About Chicks?

Ive already referred to the potential for improvement of flock health using deep litter. But should we allow just-hatched chicks access to a litter containing significant amounts of droppings from mature birds? Arent we universally advised to practice the strictest sanitation when brooding chicks, to put down a sterile litter when placing them into the brooder, and to completely change out the old litter between batches? I expect baby chickens are like young children: The more we try to ensure they will have absolutely no exposure to germs, the more fragile their immune systems become, and the more subject they are to infection when exposed to a pathogen penetrating the bubble weve tried to put around them. Normal exposure to pathogens universally ambient in the environment, on the other hand, challenges their immune systems, stimulating them to become more robust. I raise chicks with their mothers, mixed in with the main flock, all the timewhether on the deep litter inside, or on the pasture outsideand find that the chicks are hardy and vigorous, and that mortality rates are extremely low. (See Brooding Chicks on Deep Litter for a description of brooding chicks artificially on deep litter.)

When Life Gives You Lemons. . . (Part Two)

Table of Contents
Part OnePart TwoPart Three

Deep-litter materials
It is good to remember the analogy between deep litter and a compost heap when choosing litter materials. In the compost heap, carbon and nitrogen sources must be in balance. (A ratio of 30:1 is recommended when the pile is assembled). If there is too much carbon, the heap remains coldthat is, the microbes have insufficient energy from nitrogen sources to thrive. If there is too much nitrogen in the mix, however, the microbes cannot utilize it fast enough, and much of it converts to ammonia (a volatile gas of nitrogen and hydrogen) which is lost to the atmosphere rather than being converted to more stable forms usable by plants. The major difference in the initial composition of litter is that the proportion of carbon in relation to nitrogen should be much, much higherindeed, the higher the better. Poultry (especially chicken) manure is a potent source of nitrogen, so we must ensure that the initial mix has enough carbon to absorb a great deal of nitrogen (poops) before the ratio gets low enough to start spontaneous generation of ammonia. As in the compost heap, ammonia production signals a decomposition process out of balance. When choosing organic materials for the litter, physical as well as chemical (percent carbon) properties must be considered. Materials that will fluff up easily by chickens scratching are preferable to those that mat down and resist aeration. We should use what is easily and cheaply available to us. Almost any non-toxic, high-carbon organic material is suitable. I have a neighbor who prefers to rake up and dispose of the abundant harvest of leaves from the many oaks on her placeshes even willing to haul and dump them at my place, so that is my preferred material for litter. It may be that litter materials available to you are byproducts of crops grown in quantity in your arearice or buckwheat or peanut hulls, for example, or chopped corn cobs. Wood shavings make excellent litter, so long as they are cheap enough and we avoid black walnut and aromatic woods such as cedar. Wood chips are good (and often free for the taking from tree and brush clearing companies), so long as they are well agedthey should not be used green. An excellent example of successful use of wood chips is Joel Salatins raken (ra-bbit and chic-ken) house: Cages for the breeding rabbits are suspended over a 12-inch litter of coarse chips. The chickens work the urine and droppings of the rabbits, as well as their own, into the litter. With such a deep, high-carbon litter, Joel only has to clean out once a year. As for sawdust, it too must not be used fresh, though well-aged sawdust is a possibility. I have used sawdust from time to time in the past, though it is not my preferred material. It tends to pack down and resist aeration more than coarser materials. If mixed with looser materials, however, it will remain better dispersed and aerated in the litter, and will contribute abundant carbon. (The C:N ratio is as high as 500:1.) I prefer to avoid straw, which in the slightly moist conditions of litter over earth can support the growth of Aspergillus molds, the spores of which are not good for either birds or us to breathe. Ive received reports from a number of poultry keepers, however, who use straw over earth with no problems. I do use straw in a wood-floor building I use for my breeders during

the breeding season. In this case, the litter remains dry, and does not support the growth of molds. Please note that certain organic materials do not make effective litter, usually because the nitrogen content is too high to effectively balance the manure being laid down. Examples are hay and the plant residues from threshing soybeans.

Litter management
The great thing about deep litter is that the chickens do most of the work of manure management. However, a few management practices are required of us as well. A litter outgassing ammonia is essentially poisoning the air our flock is breathing. Breathing ammonia damages the sensitive mucous membranes of the lungs, and leads to vitamin imbalances in the system and toxic reactions in the liver. Thus that first whiff of ammonia must not be ignoredit is our signal either to clean out the litter, or to add more high-carbon materials. If you are not building your chicken shed from scratch but using an existing building with a wood or concrete floor, thats okay. A deep, loose, organic litter is still the best manure management choiceit will still absorb all the poops the chickens incorporate into the litter. In this case, however, you dont get as much composting effect because the litter is so much drier, and microbial populations not as diverse and active. You may find that you get that whiff of ammonia sooner than in an earth-floor litter, and have to clean out or add more carbonaceous material a bit more frequently. Also, since the litter has not had as thorough a decomposition, such a dry litter should be processed in a compost heap before use, to avoid burning crops with forms of nitrogen they cannot use. When cleaning out the litter, it might be a good idea to leave a bit in place, in order to introduce active microbe populations into the fresh litter material. (Such inoculation is probably less needed in the case of an earth floor, which serves as a reservoir of microbes.) Be generous with the amount of space you allow your birds. Joel Salatin observesand my own experience bears this outthat five square feet per mature chicken is ideal. At this stocking density, all manure laid down will be incorporated by the chickens themselves. At four square feet, there will be some capping (build-up of a solid layer impervious to the flocks scratching), usually under the roosts. At three square feet (still two or more times the space alloted in commercial operations), there may be capping over most of the litter surface. You should break up capping as soon as it occurs, using a spading fork. Once you have broken capped material into chunks and turned them over, the chickens can scratch them apart. The litter should never be wet. Wet litter is anaerobic (lacking oxygen), a condition conducive to certain pathogens, in contrast to decompositional microbes, who thrive with abundant oxygen. Should wet spots developfor example, around the waterersagain use your spading fork to disperse the soaked material out over the rest of the litter, where the scratching of the birds will dry and aerate it. (Dont be concerned about a little water, however. I often swish out the rims of waterers onto the litter in order to rinse. The resulting increase in moisture, if not excessive, actually benefits the microbial processes in the litter.)

Waterfowl are a special case. Since they do not scratch, they lay down an accumulating layer of quite wet droppings. Either bring the spading fork into play again (only this time doing all the work of turning and dispersing yourself), ormy usual choicesimply allow the chickens and waterfowl to share the same space, and the chickens will provide the service of turning in the waterfowls droppings. In the best of circumstances, waterfowl are pretty sloppy with their water. The best choice is to water them outside the poultry house. Since they are quite cold hardy, you can do this even in winter. If you have to water them inside the winter house, prevent soaked litter with the sort of catch basin described and illustrated in The Homestead Waterfowl Flock.

When Life Gives You Lemons. . . (Part Three)

Table of Contents
Part OnePart TwoPart Three

Deep Litter Benefits

To summarize the many benefits of managing the housed flock on deep litter: More healthful Manure does not accumulate as a reservoir of excess pathogens. When processed by our microbe friends in the litter, the droppings actually become a substrate for health rather than a vector for disease. Labor saving Deep litter is incredibly labor saving: The chickens do most of the work, both of dispersing their own droppings and of managing the process of their proper decomposition. We may clean out the litter only once or at most twice a year, and (assuming were using an earth floor) we avoid the additional labor of composting, since the litter is already a finished compost. Temperature moderation Since, just as in a compost heap, decomposition of organic materials generates heat, a deep litter moderates the bitter temperatures in the winter housing. More pleasant The poultry house is a much more pleasant environment for us and, I have no doubt, for our birds. Less stress The birds when confined do not become stressed by boredom. They remain continually engaged in interesting natural behaviorsscratching the litter, taking dust baths in the driest areas, etc.

Caveats
There are almost no disadvantages to using deep litter, and they are easily resolved. Here are a few precautions: Exoparasites In the wettest season we ever had here, more ground moisture wicked into the litter than usual. The litter was not wet, but it was not dry enough for decent dust-bathing.

For the only time in the history of our flock, we had a serious outbreak of exoparasites (lice or mites). The solution was simple: I provided a dustbox for effective dustbathing at any time, whatever the moisture content of the litter, and have had no further problems with lice or mites. (See Making a Dustbox for the Poultry House.) Eye infections That same unusually wet season was also the occasion for a number of serious eye infections. It may be that molds or pathogens encouraged by the additional moisture helped cause the outbreakin any case, Ive never had a recurrence of the problem in more normal seasons. On those rare occasions when excessive groundwater gets the litter too moist, addition of spaghnum peat moss or some other powder-dry litter material should help reduce the moisture. Keets and poults I had dreadful luck trying to start guinea keets and turkey poults that same year. These hatchlings are much harder than chicks to start, in my experience. It may be they were more sensitive than chicks to possible higher levels of molds in the litter. In any case, it may be better to start these two species on completely fresh litter. Digging predators Despite its advantages, an earth floor potentially exposes the flock to digging predators a wood or concrete floor would exclude. It is therefore crucial to put into place a barrier below foundation level. I used 24-inch metal roof flashing (half-inch hardware cloth would work as well), nailed to the sill plates under my siding boards, dug in to a depth of 18 inches around the entire perimeter. Thats a lot of digging (my aching back!), but it saves a lot of digging (by unwelcome intruders). Fertility: Too much of a good thing? If you use poultry litter as a major component of your fertility program in the garden, do not use any other source of phosphorus. Excessive use of litter over many seasons can lead to unhealthy levels of soil phosphates.

The Sniff Test

I know Im on the right track with manure management when a new visitor tours the poultry house. If she has ever been in a chicken house before, at some point she invariably stops talking, looks around, twitching her nose, and asks with a puzzled look, Why doesnt it stink in here? I encourage you to switch to deep litter as the more wholesome, labor saving approach to manure management. Once your litter has begun to mellowto break down wellbend down and scoop up a handful. Sniff. The smell will not be even remotely like raw manure more like good topsoil, or compost, or forest leaf mold. A fine batch of lemonade, indeed!

A Dustbox for the Chicken House

This pictorial of the dustbox construction project appeared as a sidebar to my article on deep litter in the December 2006/January 2007 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine.

(A) Begin Chickens can take care of the problem of external parasites for themselves, so long as they have good conditions for dust bathing. Since weather conditions sometimes interfere with dust bathing, I provide a dustbox as an always-available alternative.

(B) Ripping: 1 As with any homestead project, the scrap material we have on hand usually determines the exact design. If what you have dictates a different design for a dustbox, go for it. I would just advise, on the basis of having tried several different designs, that you not make it too small (20x20 inches at a minimum), nor too shallow. If the box is too shallow, the chickens kick out a lot of the dust as they bathe, requiring more frequent filling with dusting materials. I now make dustboxes 16 inches deep, and add a lip around the top edges to help keep the flying dust inside the box.

(C) Ripping: 2 If starting from scratch, you can make two fine dustboxes 24 inches on a side from a single sheet of plywood. For this project, I chose to use 5/8-inch CDX, since I could not find a thinner plywood that was 5-ply, and I preferred to save time and effort by edge-nailing. If 5/8inch plywood seems like overkill to you, go with whatever thickness you are confident you can edge-nail securely (or install nailing cleats to use quite thin plywood).

(D) Ripping: 3 Please note that in the instructions I am not allowing for the saw kerf. If you want to be really exacting, you should do so. However, I want to keep the instructions simple. (And ignoring the kerf would be no great problemwere not working on a kitchen cabinet here.) Note also that I used a table saw (except for the initial cut), but you could certainly use a hand-held power saw for the entire project.

(E) Nail on Bottom 1: Cut sheet of plywood across the 48-inch dimension into four equal pieces (each 24x48 inches).

(F) Nail on Sides 2: Cut one of the 24x48-inch pieces in half, to yield 24x24-inch pieces for the two bottoms.

(G) Assembled Box 3: Cut the remaing three 24x48-inch pieces 16 inches wide, across the 24-inch dimension, to yield nine pieces each 16x24 inches. (Eight of these pieces will be sides for the two dustboxes, while the last one will be cut into lip strips for the top edges.)

(H) Adding "Lips" 4: Edge-nail one of the bottom (24x24) pieces onto two of the side (16x24) pieces, aligning them as in the picture. I used 4d 1-3/8 inch coated sinkers.

(I) Alignment 5: Nail the other two side pieces to box in the open ends created by the above step. That is, these side pieces cover the edges of both bottom and first two sides. (See picture. The offset of the top edges is intentional.)

(J) Sifting 6: Assemble the other dustbox as above. 7: Cut the remaining 16x24-inch piece into eight 2-inch strips along the 24-inch dimension. Leave four of the resulting strips at 2x24 inches. Cut the remaining four strips to a length of 24 inches minus twice the thickness of your plywood. I used 5/8-inch plywood, so I cut mine to 22- inches. 8: Nail the 2-inch strips to make a lip around the insides of the top edges, aligning as in the pictures. Sift preferred dust materials into the dustbox (being sure to wear an effective dust mask!) and place in the poultry house or elsewhere out of the weather, where the birds have constant access to it. (Sifting is not absolutely necessary, and you may choose to omit it, depending on the nature of your materials.)

(K) Ready Spaghnum peat moss is an excellent base for the dust box contents, though it does have to be purchased, and is a non-renewable resource. Free, more sustainable ingredients are wood ashes and fine clay soil (dried and sifted), or even drier portions of the deep litter, finely sifted. I wouldnt use wood ash at more than maybe two parts out of six or seven. You can also add small amounts of diatomaceous earth or elemental sulfur (pure sulfur as a fine yellow powder). You only need the mix to be a few inches deep, and should add more material from time to time as needed. The ideal mix is loose, fine, and easily fluffed by the birds up under their feathers.

Bath Time!

Discouraging the Rodents

Written in March, 2005
All keepers of poultry at some time have to deal with infestations of rogue rodents in the poultry house. All seek the better mousetrap. In my experience, the best possible way to deal with rodent problems is: Stop feeding them! I used to feed my flock free-choice. At the same time, the fight with the mice became trench warfare of the most desperate sort. Going into the henhouse after dark, I would see mice boiling over the partition wire, nest boxes, etc. A couple of winters ago, I became so incensed that I bought two dozen of those wooden traps with a bait pedal and a spring-wound wire bar that snaps the mouse when it takes the bait. Well, folks, I lost count of the number of times I caught two mice in one trapbut twice I actually caught three mice at once. Thats your basic industrial strength rodent rodeo! But I was enabling that colossal infestation by feeding free choice, saying in effect to the mice, Come to the feast! Or in other words, Be fruitful and multiply. This winter I became much more exacting in how I feed, and have not seen any mice in the hens quarters after dark. The two most significant changes: I started sprouting all the small grains and peas in the mix. In the winter house, I simply toss the sprouted seeds out over the deep litter. Since the sprouts are larger, more discrete pieces than a ground feed, the chooks end up eating every last grain. Also, I weigh out the amount of ground, dry feed I put in the feeders. I calibrate the amount precisely to what they seem to need: I feed enough to ensure that their nutritional needs are met, but that they are always eager enough for food to clean their plates, taking up every speck of feed by the end of the day, leaving nothing for the opportunistic rodents.

By the way, my problems have only been with mice. If you become plagued with a serious infestation of rats, you really have problems! Not only can rats eat a lot more of your expensive feed, they are a serious threat to baby chicks, even those with a mother hen. Rats will kill and drag them away, and can decimate a clutch of chicks in short order. A final note about rodents in your environment: Rodents can carry a serious pathogen called hanta virus, more common in some sections of the country than others. The main vector for the virus is dried rodent urine. If you are cleaning out any dusty environment that is home to rodents, use an effective dust mask. People (including an acquaintance of mine) have died from hanta virus after breathing such dusts while sweeping out warehouses, abandoned houses, etc.

Chooks in the Winter Greenhouse

This article was published in the April/May 2007 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine. It was added to the site December 15, 2008.

My Greenhouse Renovation
In the late summer and early fall of 2005, I had to replace the rotting foundation boards around the perimeter of my 20x48-ft greenhouse. Since I planned to replace them with concrete blocks, I decided to take the opportunity to make two other changes in the greenhouse as well: to put in place a serious vermicomposting operationand to install two 8x8-ft pens for housing chickens in the winter greenhouse. I had been vermicomposting for several years in a 3x4-ft worms eat my garbage style worm bin in the greenhouse. But I wanted to scale up, to process organic wastes by the pickup load using worms, obtaining in the process an abundance of earthworm castings (excreta) as a major component of our garden fertility program; but also a regular harvest of worms to feed the birds. The greenhouse renovation presented the opportunity to scale up indeed: I installed five 4x8-ft worm bins down the center of the greenhouse, with heavy lids (-inch plywood on 2x4 framing) over which I routinely push a fully-loaded wheelbarrow. Bins are made of two courses of 4-inch hollow concrete block, thus are 16 inches deep. Thats a lot of

vermicomposting volume. Since I need a center aisle in the greenhouse anyway, I didnt lose any significant amount of growing space to the worm bins.

The North End

Comforts of Home Similarly, I used two courses of 4-inch block as the perimeter for two 8x8-ft chicken pens in the north end of the greenhouse. (Greenhouses typically are oriented east-west. That was not possible in my situation; but the north-south alignment actually works to advantage in this case: The framing for the chicken pens does not block light into the interior during the winter growing period.) The two pens are on opposite sides of the end worm bin, each with its own door. It is possible to keep two greenhouse flocks, separated from each other, if I wish, releasing them to the outside on alternate days. Or I can open both doors and allow use of the two pens as one space, releasing all the birds to the outside. In either case, however, either pen door serves double duty: When the pen is open, its door latches into position to block access into the interior of the greenhouse, where the winter vegetable crops are growing. Top of page

The New Greenhouse in Practice

I had long considered moving chickens into the greenhouse for the winter, assuming the added body heat would help moderate the frigid overnight temperatures. I have no way to measure the degree to which it has done so, but I currently have 43 chickens, 3 Buff Ducks, and 2 African Geese ensconced there, and have to believe thats a fair amount of warmth inside the greenhouse that otherwise would not be present.

Winter Paradise

Another contribution I assumed the flock would make is the increased carbon dioxide exhaled by the birds, which is taken up by the plants as an essential step in their metabolism (conversion of sunlight to food energy). Ive read that in Holland, some growers buy bottled CO2 to pump into their greenhouses. I figured I could get the same effect with chicken breath. Again, I have no way to measure enhanced plant growth, if any. Since the openings to the pens are exactly four feet wide, either pen door can be latched into position between the two pens, blocking access into the rest of the greenhouse interior. Initially I had a few rogue fliers go over the door, and wreck havoc among the lettuces and chicories. A session of wing-clipping put a stop to that impudence.

Green Forage Crops But that is not to say they didnt enjoy the bounty of the winter greenhouse as much as we did. A 20x40-ft growing space is more than Ellen and I need to keep us in winter salads and cooking greens, so I always grow cut-and-come-again green forage for the flock as well mixed grain grasses (rye, oats, wheat, barley), crucifers (rape, mustard, turnip), and peas. Even small amounts of these greens provide a significant boost in vitamins and enzymes. As for the worm bins, I filled them with pony poop hauled in by the pickup load from a neighbor who breeds and boards horses. Though it took longer than I expected for the population levels to build to their current levels, the worms are now processing the manure rapidly, and I am harvesting worms regularly to feed to the flock. I simply dig out one or two five-gallon buckets of the bedding itself, after it is well broken down by the worms, but before conversion to pure castings (at which point it would no longer contain any worms). I simply dump that bedding out, either onto the deep litter in the chicken pens, or onto the thick mulch over the winter yard outside (more of that below). The chickens snap up the worms, in the process scratching the mix of bedding and castings into the litter or mulch, which keeps it from drying out. Thus I assume the teeming populations of microbes in the worm castings remain alive, ready to boost the soil food web when the litter is used in the garden come spring. Note that, in the protection of a bin dug 16 inches into the earth, inside a greenhouse, feeding activity by the worms, as well as reproduction, continue despite the chill outside. (Note also that in the summer, when no chickens are in residence in the greenhouse, their two pens provide an additional 128 sq ft of worm bins for processing more pony poop.) Top of page

Fall Cover Crops

Cover Crops Removed

Roll Off

Roll Out

Access to a Winter Yard

A major reason for introducing the chickens to the greenhouse was to resolve a dilemma that has always dogged my winter management strategy: I dont like confining my birds, I want to give them maximum access to the exercise, fresh air, and sunshine available outsidenot keep them cooped up inside the winter house, however much space I allow per bird; and despite the fact that the deep organic litter there provides the best possible solution to several winter care needs. But on the other hand, I cannot release the birds onto a dormant pasture sod, which they would quickly strip. I dont have to picture for you the nightmare that would follow: an accumulating coating of droppings over a plot of frozen dirt, eager to run for the nearest stream, lake, or estuary with the first rain.

The north door of the greenhouse opens onto a garden area. That is to say, an area not in pasture sod, an area that could benefit from the winter management strategies I have put in place for two winters now. I started in the late summer and early fall: As soon as I took the last harvest off any garden bed, I planted a cover crop appropriate to that point in the season small grains, peas, mixed crucifers. By the time I moved the mixed winter flock into the greenhouse pens, every garden bed was lush with thick green cover. I enclosed the greenhouse garden area in an electronet perimeter. When I released the greenhouse flock onto that Eden, they ate as well as they had at any point in the season, gorging not only on the fresh green forage, but on live animal foods there as wellearthworms, slugs, and insects. The disappearance of the last of the green signaled the next stage in the strategy: I mulched those garden areas heavily with round bales of spoiled hay. I bought the hay as a purchased input, but only because a dry summer prevented my getting a fall cutting of grass off the pasture for mulching. In a more generous season, I would not have needed the outside input. Still, the mulch hay was cheap: $10 per 800-lb bale, loaded on my pickup. With round bales, it was easy (and fun!) simply to kick them off the pickup and roll them out.

Hay Seeds Now, I can hear many of my more savvy readers protesting: Hay? Are you nuts?! Youre bringing in a huge load of seeds. Oh my yes, am I not indeed. And those seeds are available to my birds, who spend all their waking time going after them. As late winter edges into early spring, they begin to sprout, becoming an even more valuable food source. Last spring, I did not have a significant weed problem as a result of the hay mulch.

Mulched Yard I dont know how deep an organic mulch you would need in your area to keep the ground from freezing, but in mine (Zone 6b), I find that a six- to eight-inch mulch is deep enough. Keeping the ground from freezing is another part of my strategy: As a result, earthworms, slugs, and other soil-line critters remain available to the tirelessly-scratching chickens. More free, high quality food on their table. I urge you to experiment with a heavily mulched winter yard such as I describe. For me, this year, spoiled hay was the ideal mulch. In another year I might use cuttings from the pasture, or leaves from a neighbors dozen big white oaks. In your area, you might find agricultural

refuse at low cost, or free for the hauling. Corn stover or soybean vines from threshing operations; crushed corn cobs from milling; peanut or buckwheat hullstake advantage of local possibilities. Top of page

Earthworm Harvest

Feeding Earthworms

Multi-Tasking
The key to homesteading success is finding creative ways to make one project serve multiple functions. Note how my chooks in the greenhouse strategy neatly answers many needs: It provides winter housing for the flock. Body heat and exhaled CO2 benefit the plants growing in the greenhouse. The green forage crops and worm bins inside the greenhouse provide live, natural food for the birds. The mulched yard outside provides additional access to selfharvested, high quality foods. The thick organic duff the birds are working absorbs the poops laid down, preventing their runoff into water systems, where they can be deadly, and recaptures their fertility for use on the homesteads gardens, orchard, and pasture. At the end of the winter, large quantities of mulch remain for use in the garden; but so finely shredded it is ideal even for small-seeded, closely planted crops like carrots. And remember that the winter yard itself is a garden: Protected by the heavy mulch cover, the soil remains in beautiful condition, ready to plant without tillage, its microbial populations at full stride because of the protection from winters extremes, as well as the boost from the worm castings and the flocks droppings. With regard to the aforesaid droppings: It is recommended that you allow 60 days from the time raw poultry manure was laid down on the site before harvesting crops close to the ground like radishes or lettuce. Frankly, I doubt that manure from a well-managed homestead flock poses much of a hazard. (Joel Salatin sent samples of his dressed poultry and his poultrys manure off to the same lab for testing, and both samples were reported as pathogenfree.) Last year I simply planted the spring garden in that space and harvested when the crops were ready. Still, I must give you the official point of view on the matter.

Ain't it Nice!

Pasturing the Flock

*Table of Contents for Pasturing the Flock Section is at bottom of this page.*
The best thing we can do for our poulry flocks is: Put them on pasture! Wild relatives of our domesticated fowl roam freely in the outdoors, enjoying freedom of movement, sunshine, and opportunity to forage natural foods. They are not tightly confined to a crowded, artificial environment, dependent exclusively on artificial foods from our hands. Even if you don't have pasture to offer your birds, you may well be able to rotate them over your lawns. They will be grateful, and will do much better than if confined to a static, denuded chicken run accumulating an ever-greater load of poultry droppings. Not everyone who pastures his birds uses electronet, but for me, it is an essential management tool. If you do pasture your birds in electroneted pasture areas, you will need pasture shelters. There is lots of information on both subjects in this section.

Table of Contents for Pasturing the Flock Section

Managing Poultry on Pasture with Electronet Designing a Pasture Shelter Building a Pasture Shelter Going Mobile at the Small End of the Scale Mobile Shelter: The Classic Polyface Model Chicken Tractor: A Tribute to Andy Lee Pasture Shelters for Market Layer Flocks A Drown-Proof Waterer

Managing Poultry on Pasture with Electronet: Part One

I wrote this article for the April/May issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine. Check out BYP and consider subscribingits a great resource.

Table of Contents
Part OnePart TwoPart ThreePart Four

We keepers of the home flock are often advised not to keep our birds all cooped up: Get em out into the fresh air and sunshine! But we know the local tribe of predators like our poultry as much as we do, so we take care to install a good stout fence around our chicken run to keep out the bad guys. Now its safe to let the flock out into their little corner of the great outdoors. But wait! Within a week every last blade of grass is gone from the runit looks like the surface of the moon dotted with chicken poops! Droppings are accumulating, flies are having a field day, pathogens are a potential hazard, and the run is a source of run-off pollution with every heavy rain. A static chicken run is not such a good idea! Much better to release those birds, let em free-range like nature intended! Now theyre healthier and more content; and the live foods they foragegreen growing plants, wild seeds, earthworms, slugs, and insectsare of a quality we cannot hope to match with anything from a bag. The living pasture sod digests the poops laid downvastly healthier for the flock than the static run (and a boost in fertility for the pasture). This is the life for the natural chicken! Oh but wait, theyre in the garden! And Mr. Pumphreys rose bed! And worst of all, Brer Fox and Mr. Raccoon are having a field day (to say nothing of the neighbors dogs)! Free-ranging the flock is a terrible idea! Is there any way to manage the homestead flock that both gives them access to the many benefits of free-ranging on good pasture, confines them where we want them, and protects them from the bad guys? Fortunately there is: electric net fencing, or electronet.

Net Design
I have only used one design of electric netthe poultry net I buy from Premier Fencing Supplyso I will describe that option. The fence is made by welding together the black plastic string verticals with the white (or yellow) plastic horizontals. Note that the verticals are for support onlythey are not electrified. The twisted plastic strands of the horizontals are intertwined with six almost hair-fine stainless steel wires, which carry the charge. (The very bottom horizontal is black plastic with no wiresobviously it would make no sense to charge a line in contact with the ground.) At both ends of the net, all the charged wires are twisted together so they share a common chargethus a break in any given horizontal does not leave that strand dead, and the entire net remains charged. (Note that nets come with a kit to repair breaks in the lines.) Interwoven with the fences mesh are plastic support posts tipped with metal spikes. One pushes the spikes into the soil to stand the fence in place. Nets are supplied 164 ft long. Thus a single net will enclose a square about 40 ft on a side, or more than 1600 sq ft. Half nets 82 ft long are also available. I have never enclosed a flock in a half neta 20-ft square is a pretty small plot of groundbut it is convenient when laying out an enclosure to have the option of adding a half net to complete the fence (rather than trying to double up a longer net). Over the many years Ive been using electronet, there have been several changes to the basic designall of them for the better. The stays or verticals are now closer together (3 inches), as are the lower horizontals (2 inches apart at chicken or predator level), and the interwoven posts (7- ft.for a tighter, sag-free fence).

At least with the net fencing I get from Premier, one has the option of either 42 or 47 inches high. I have always used the 42-inch. Obviously chickens can fly over a fence that high, but they usually dont after getting zapped by it a time or two. If I do have a rogue flyer, I simply clip a wing to encourage her to stay where shes put. (The guineas are the only fowl who need radical treatment to prevent flying. For a persistent flyer, I shear off all flight feathers on both wingscertain to keep them grounded inside the fence.) In some situations the additional 5 inches of height could be a benefit, but remember that the gathered bundle of netting will be heavier and longer as a resultmeaning handling will be more difficult.

Energizers
One has many options for energizing the fence. Energizers are available in many sizes and voltages for different fencing needs. Some are powered by batteriesfrom size D to 9 volt to 12 volt. Some are solar powered. Some plug into household current. I use both the latter two options. For free-standing use in a site too remote to serve conveniently from household current, the solar powered energizer is hard to beat. The units controller pulses energy from the solar panel through the fence, while trickle-charging a backup battery. At night, or on heavily clouded days, the controller pulls from the battery to charge the fence. Grounding for the unit can be as simple as a metal stake driven into the soil which also serves as a bracket to hold the charger; though Ive always preferred a heavier ground rod driven a little deeper into the soil. A good solar charger with a 12-volt battery can energize several rolls of netting. I have two solar units which I use to charge my more remote nets. If possible to pull power from household current, however, there are advantages in doing so. An AC energizer provides a hotter spark in the system, can power more rolls of netting, and can take more weed load without weakening in deterrent effect. I use an AC charger located in the poultry house, which is wired for electricity, to carry power to a number of pasture nets. Unless nets are anchored on the poultry house, I use insulated cable to carry the charge, and manual field switches to kill the charge in order to enter a net. Note that in a system of separate nets served from the same charger, you can wire the manual field switches parallel (nets farther down the line remain charged when the switch is open) or in series (nets down the line also lose power when the switch is open). Equally important as the energizer is the quality of electrical ground in the system. The better the ground, the hotter the spark in adverse conditionse.g., dry soil. For my AC unit, I grounded with three 8-foot steel rods, driven into the soil along the foundation of the poultry house (which stays moist longer than any other location because of run-off from the roof) and wired together with heavy gauge wire. I do not ever have to worry about good ground in that system, however dry the soil becomes in summer.

Managing Poultry on Pasture with Electronet: Part Two

Table of Contents
Part OnePart TwoPart ThreePart Four

Setting Up the Net

The first step installing the net is to lay it out flat along the perimeter of the area to be netted. Start with one of the end posts (the ones with the twisted ends of the horizontal wires attached) and, holding the other posts in a bundle in one hand, play out the netting along the perimeter one panel of mesh at a time. Then start at one end again and stand the post up, push the spike its full length into the soil, go on to the next post, and repeat. (In moist soil, it is easy to push in the spike. In dry, tight, or gravel soil, I use a 12-inch piece of re-bar and a small sledge hammer to make a hole for the spike.) Once I have the fence standing in place, I use my small power mower with bagger (set to one of the lowest settings for the blade) to mow all around the perimeter. I then lay the fence down flat againon the inside of the perimeter and out of the way of the mowerand make an additional couple of passes with the bagging mower. The result is a mowed swath defining the perimeter of the netted area. I re-erect the fence along the center of that swath, then tie off all corners to additional free-standing power posts to secure a tighter, upright fence. Note that you can use more than one roll of netting to enclose a fenced area. The twistedtogether horizontals on both ends of a roll of net end in a special clip that attaches to the companion clip on the next net. The end posts are also equipped with cords for tying them together, leaving no loose gap in the fence. I like a nice tight fenceto ensure better contact with a potential predatorso I take any sag out of my fence by adding a 7/16-inch coated fibreglass rod in the center of each panel; and using a screw-on fence insulator to lift up on the top string, creating additional tension on the fence. You can set up the fence to conform to the perimeter of any area you need to net. One configuration to avoid, however, is a part of the enclosure that is too narrow. I once set up a fence that was anchored on the poultry house, but led via a narrow corridor to a wider pasture area. Not a good idea! A couple of smart dogs (having apparently gotten wise to the fence) learned to rush some geese in the corridor, causing them to panic into flight. With one dog feinting at the fence, and the other on the opposite side, ready to receive, the attack cost me one young goose before I figured out the problem and re-configured the fence (that is, with a bigger interior space into which the geese could retreat). Note that I never set up any sort of gate in my nets. For the 42-inch net, it is easy to swing a leg over the net to straddle it, then follow with the other leg. (Watch that trailing heel. Thats the one that catches the top of the net, after youve moved your attention on to the next thing.) If Im carrying something like a five gallon waterer, I set it down by the net, straddle, then practice proper knees-bent lifting to transfer it to the other side of the net, set it down, then swing the other leg over. Of course, we want to be certain weve killed the power before straddling that fenceespecially us guys.

Moving the Net

The great advantage of putting ones birds on pasture rather than in a static chicken run is that they are always on fresh growing grasses, clovers, and weeds. But the longer the flock remains on a given piece of ground, the closer it approaches that surface of the moon dotted with chicken poops. To maintain the advantages of pasturing the flock, it is necessary to

rotate the flock to new ground before the plot theyre on begins to wear from the activity of the birds. (Frequency of rotation depends chiefly on stocking density and the point in the growing seasone.g., lush spring or dry summer.) It is easy to move electronet and set it up on the next plot in the rotationunless it gets tangled! A seriously tangled net will make you weep with frustration. Begin by pulling up the support posts and laying the net out flat. Then, starting at one end, pick up the end post and move it in a folding motion to the next post over, pick up that post, fold over to the next post, and so on to the end. Let me emphasize that the panels of mesh between posts must be folded neatly, and that they must remain flat. Do not try to roll the net, and do not continue folding if the mesh becomes kinked or off-center in any way. Imagine the net, gathered up for moving, as a book: The flatly folded panels of mesh are the pages, and the bundle of posts now all in one handis the spine. Now you can carry the net (holding the bundle of posts above your head so the trailing mesh doesnt catch on anythingnetting loves to catch on things) to the new location, where you lay it out around the perimeter of the new area and proceed as above (Setting Up the Net). Moving the birds to the new netted area can be a challenge, and how you do so will depend on the specific situation. If I am moving the flock to a new plot not adjacent to the old one, I have learned that chickens dont herd very well to the new enclosure. (Ducks and geese, on the other hand, are usually easy to herd.) I work early in the morning, feeding the birds inside their pasture shelter and then shutting its door. Next I pop on the wheels for which all my pasture shelters are designed. Now I can roll the shelter into the new enclosurecarefully, watching that birds dont get caught under the back rail of the frameand release the birds. If the new plot is adjacent to the old, I set up the new net(s), using one side of the previous enclosure as a side in the new enclosure. I then open a gap in the fence and tempt the birds into the new enclosure with their morning feeding. Note that you can always shut the flock up in the pasture shelter while you set the net(s) of the existing fence around the new plot. However, I have found it a good investment to have extra rolls of netting available. Thus I can set up the new enclosure, while allowing the birds to continue foraging in the old one until Im ready to move them. With this option, if the birds resist moving, I can pull in the old fence, confining the flock into an increasingly small space, until they are forced to enter the new enclosure.

Managing Poultry on Pasture with Electronet: Part Three

Table of Contents
Part OnePart TwoPart ThreePart Four

Maintaining the Charge in the Net

If you maintain a good hot spark in the net, it will stop anything on the ground with a nervous system. A friend has seen it turn back a bear on two separate occasions. On my own place, I have seen it stop a large dog powerful enough to break a corner post into three pieces,

after it got tangled in the stinging net. Theoretically, digging animals, or ones large enough to jump it, could bypass either over or under the net, and animals with thick fur are insulated against the fences charge. In practice, however, almost all curiosity seekers lead with the nose, and once that sensitive probe hits the fence, its nothing but Adios! (In an electronet system, the flock is still at risk from aerial predators. With one exception, my own losses from the air have been at most an acceptable two or three per season. Your mileage may vary.) As the grass and weeds grow over the bottom charged horizontal in the net, its charge begins to ground out, until there is not enough spark in the system to stop a predator. Unless it is time to rotate the net to new ground anyway, it is easy to move the posts so the fence is standingand confining the birdsbut inside the existing perimeter. Now I can mow the perimeter line with the bagging mower, then again set up a tight fence over closely mowed sod. Its a good idea to walk the perimeter every day or so to make sure nothing has fallen on ita green branch, for exampleor accumulated on it to short out the system. I once had a flock enclosed on a piece of ground to be converted to blueberry bed. Because of a slight slope to the ground, the birds kept scratching uprooted grass, dirt, and other debris over the bottom of the net. I saw what was happening, and each day reminded myself, Hey, boy, better get that stuff pulled off the net. And then one morning went out to service that flock, only to be confronted with several splashes of feathers outside the net. I grabbed the top of the netnot a whisper of charge. Mr. Raccoon had dined well off my procrastination. Since that time, Ive always been careful to keep my fence lines clean, and keep em hot. How hot? Get yourself a good fence tester, and use it often. I always test every roll of net in the system following a new installation, and routinely monitor every couple of days thereafter, always remembering that the fence is only as effective as the spark in it. Its a good idea to spend the extra bucks for a good tester. My first tester had a series of five tiny lights, some or all of which would light, depending on the amount of charge in the fence. But it was almost impossible to see which lights came on in strong daylight. The tester I use now has a console with a clearly visible digital readout of voltage in the fence. The highest voltage I ever read in one of my nets (a single roll, freshly mowed, on the AC charger) was 9700 volts. Yes, reader, that was nine thousand seven hundred! Thats enough voltage to wake you up, even wearing boots with rubber soles. And if you hit the fence with a knee on the ground, it will rattle your teeth. Negative stimulus defined. But even though the voltage is high (with a whiplash of a sting), the amperage is very low, so the potential for actual injury is correspondingly low.

Hazards of the Net

The current in any electric fence is not without its hazards, and it is essential to be constantly on guard against them. Warning signs on your fence are a good idea, and in some areas are required by law. Despite what I said above about the low danger of a jolt, it is believed that a shock from the fence to head or spinal cord has greater potential for injury. It is therefore especially important to avoid contact with the fence when working close to the ground next to it. And please remember, it is extremely important to make sure infants are not permitted to crawl into any electric fence. There is one case on record of a baby who did indeed get tangled in a fence. While a single jolt would not have been injurious, repeated pulses of current to the trapped child resulted in its death.

I have occasionally had fatalities, wild and domestic, on electric fencing. I once had a low single-strand electric wire at the bottom of a goat fence. A dip in the ground allowed first a possum, then later a box turtle, to get under the strand without contact. When the animal climbed up the slope of the dip, it became jammed between earth and wire, unable to retreat from the repeated pulses of current. Both animals died as a result. Now I try to avoid dips, or hold the bottom (uncharged) string close to the ground in a dip using a screw-on plastic insulator set low on a fibreglass rod. I no longer have such fatalities. Once or twice black snakes have tried crawling through the fenceonce they settled the body over the bottom charged wire, they received repeated shocks and died as well. I do not know a solution to this problem, but as said, it has only occurred once or twice. Finally, there can be problems specific to young birds. If inside older nets, young chicks will sometimes scoot right through the netting without getting a shock, leaving them vulnerable on the outside of the fence. I dont know that I ever had any losses as a result, but thats certainly a possibility. Once they manage to get zapped by the fence, they no longer scoot through it. I have had a few losses of young waterfowlducklings and goslingswhose body conformation is more front-loaded in a way that makes it difficult to reverse and get out of a net, once theyve pushed head and breast into the mesh trying to get through. Once tangled in the net, they are almost certain to die from the shocks unless I happen to come along pretty soon and release them. I noticed last year that I had none of the latter two problemsescapes of young chicks, entanglements of young waterfowlafter I took care to use the newer nets exclusively (with the lower horizontals set much closer together than in the older versions) for the young fowl. I think that having the young birds with mother hens also helps with these problemsthey tend to stay with Mama, rather than wander off through the net.

Managing Poultry on Pasture with Electronet: Part Four

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Part OnePart TwoPart ThreePart Four

Storing the Net

With proper storage in the off season, electronet will last a long time. Ive read that the expected service life for a roll of netting is seven years, but the first nets I boughtmore than ten years agoare still in service at my place. Long life for the net depends on removing it from the field promptly when no longer in use (to minimize breakdown by UV radiation in sunlight). The wires that carry the charge are stainless steel, and Ive never had them rust, but obviously they must not be left lying out on the ground. To prepare a net for storage, fold it up as in the section Moving the Net, and lay out your book with the posts all in a tight bundle, with the net folded neatly in pages to one side. Now, tie a lead line around the middle of the bundle of posts, and pull it out so that it extends farther than the folded netting. Now roll up the net into a bundle, starting with the tied posts as the bundles core. Note how the tail of the lead line projects out of the bundle. If

you pull on that tail, the bundle will roll out in a way that allows you to find an end post to start with as you lay out the fence. Its difficult to describe the problem that the lead line prevents, and most likely youre going to ignore my advice until the first time you encounter it. Again using the analogy of a book, we can start either with the first page or the last page (the end post at either end of the net) when laying out the net. If we open into the middle of the book, however, it is extremely difficult to find our way out to the first or last page (one of the end posts). It can be a quarter hour of frustration before you get the net opened out properly. After that, you understand the need for the lead line. Once you have the net rolled (and note that this is the only time you ever roll the net), tie the bundle twice, one tie near each end. Now it is ready to store. But do not store on a floor, a shelf, or anywhere else mice can get to. It is imperative that you hang the rolled nets somewhere inaccessible to rodents. I hang mine from the roof rafters of an equipment shed. If you forget this essential point, you will make the mice happy (with the great place youve provided to chew nests in), but you will be very unhappy indeed.

The Investment
Good electric net fencing is not cheap, but I wouldnt cut corners on quality. If you buy the best equipment from a reliable company such as Premier, the initial investment in a roll or two of netting plus a decent energizer will set you back several hundred bucks. However, that investment buys you a fundamental tool for managing the homestead flock that with good care will last for many years. It buys you the ideal compromise between maximum health and well-being for your pastured flock, and maximum protection from the heavy hitters in the neighborhood. Ive consistently said good things about Premier Fencing Supply in this article. Friends whose opinion I respect also recommend Kencove Fence Supplies.

Designing a Pasture Shelter

Photo by Deborah Moore The following is the main portion of an article of the same title that I wrote for the August/September 2007 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine, a great resource for the homestead flock owner.

The pastured flock Easy mobility Weight Wind Whether to install a floor Avoiding injuries In the garden Doors Nests All-season? Predation issues Watering issues Roosts

Materials

The pastured flock

I have numerous times in these pages encouraged readers to keep their flocks on pasture if at all possible. There is no place a chicken (or duck or goose) is happier and healthier than foraging over good pasture, socializing and engaging in interesting natural behaviors, finding best-quality foods on her own, and enjoying the benefits of sunshine, fresh air, and exercise. Unless your pastured flock is anchored on the main poultry house, you will need a pasture shelter to provide protection from rain and from predators, a place where they feel secure to roost at night, and (in the case of layers) nests for laying eggs. (You really dont want to go hunting down eggs laid by laissez-faire hens.) Remember too the need for shade from the sun on the hottest days, assuming there is no tree cover in or on the edge of the pasture area. Waterfowl usually show no interest in a shelter, even when it rains, but they badly need shade when it is hot. Design of appropriate shelters is determined by many thingsscale of operation, your skills set, materials already on hand, overall management choices, etc. Following are some design elements one might take into account while thinking through a pasture shelter construction project. Top of page

Easy mobility
To avoid damage to pasture sod, it is necessary to move the shelter frequently, perhaps even daily. (How often depends mostly on stocking density, the point in the growing season, and whether the birds are confined to the shelter or are able to range.) Thus ease of moving the unit is a key design goal. The larger shelters appropriate to small farms producing for markets are often moved by tractor or pickup. For most homesteaders, however, I would recommend avoiding moving with any sort of powered vehicle. Stay up close and personal with the move, to avoid injury to young or hapless birds that get in the way. Attached wheels are not the only option for moving the shelterrollers and sledge-type runners are possible as well. Joel Salatin, innovator of the now-classic Polyface 10x12-ft mobile broiler pens, uses a two-wheeled dolly which he places under the trailing end of the shelter, then pulls from the other end. However, most homesteaders choose some sort of wheel, either permanent or temporary, for putting their shelters in motion.

Sabot

Affixing Sabot The size of the wheel is an important consideration. The smaller the wheel, the lower the trailing bottom rail, and the more likely it will catch on bumps or tussocks of grass on the pasture; or that a bird will get caught between ground and moving rail, and be injured. A larger wheel gives better clearance over uneven ground, and less chance of injuries to young or stupid birds, but is harder to take off and put on as a temporary wheel. Larger wheels (such as bicycle wheels) are more often used where they are permanently installed on the unit. My own choice is to use an 8-inch wheel, the sort used on lawnmowers, widely available at garden centers or the local co-op. The hubs of the ones I use take a -inch axle, so I permanently install -inch bolts through the bottom rail on each side, front and rear. It is easy then to lift up each corner of the shelter in turn, popping the wheel on the bolt, then locking it in place temporarily with wing nuts. After the move, it is easy to back the wing nuts off and remove the wheels for use on other shelters.

Bolt

Wheel With the smaller wheel I use, I do indeed find that the rear rail catches on bumps and tussocks, though such obstructions are usually no more than a brief annoyance. For a pull, I use wire cable passed through a short length of old garden hose and twisted into a closed loop at each end. I hook the loops onto open hooks screwed into the lower rails of the

unit, fore and aft. Since the hooks are open, I can use the one wire pull for moving all my shelters. Top of page

Weight
If you get even a quite heavy shelter up onto mans oldest tool, the wheel, it will roll like a Cadillac. However, there comes a point where the weight of the unit makes it balky and even dangerous to work with, especially on uneven or sloped ground. Therefore, when thinking through your choice of materials or construction details, look for ways to shed weight to the extent possible, while retaining the strength your shelter will need to withstand rough use.

Diagonal Bracing Perhaps the most important way to reduce weight while keeping and even increasing structural strength is the use of diagonal bracing. My first shelter designs featured all 2x4 construction with all right angles between the structural membersproducing a frame that was unnecessarily heavy and clumsy to move, and not nearly as strong. Now, when constructing the bottom frame for the shelter, I typically rip 2x4s at 2- inches and use those pieces for the bottom rails, and use the remaining 1--inch thick pieces for diagonal bracing. The result is a tremendous gain in structural rigidity, with no increase in frame weight for the diagonal bracing. Top of page

Wind
A constant dilemma in shelter design: It is essential for mobility to make the shelter as lightweight as possible; and at the same time it is essential to add some sort of cover on at least part of the structure to cast shade and provide shelter against rain. In doing so, youve put up a sail with very little to anchor it down. How do you prevent your easily moved shelter from moving all too easily into the next county with the first bare-knuckle wind? There is an inherent trade-off between reducing weight while retaining structural integrity, and at the same time dealing with wind load. If you are an engineer, you can probably factor in aerodynamics as wellsome shapes catch the wind more than others. Im not an engineer, but it is obvious from designs Ive used that the higher the profile, the more problem there will be with wind. (The classic Polyface broiler pen is 10x12 feet, but only 24 inches high.) Therefore I opt for squat and ugly rather than high and elegant. Also, I have found hoop type structures and A-frames more wind-stable than rectangular, boxy profiles. And finally, the more cover attached to the shelter, the more it will act as a sail. Using poultry wire to replace the solid cover to the extent possible reduces wind resistance.

Anchoring Shelter Whatever the profile and weight, however, any shelter that includes a solid cover and can be moved by hand will be blown away if the wind gets strong enough. Again we face a trade-off: The more we anchor the structure, the more hassle each move becomes (and the more tempted we become not to move the shelter as often as we should). I usually keep an eye to the weather reports, and anchor the shelters only when strong winds are predicted. I use earth anchors, stout steel rods with an abbreviated auger on one end and a closed eye on the other. It is easy to screw the auger end into the earth, anchoring the rod, then fasten the shelter to the anchor, using wire or cable around a bottom rail and through the closed eye hook. Sometimes I use weights (such as buckets suspended from the shelter frame) to anchor the shelter against the wind. Rectangular shelters often feature a hinged lid on top for access to the interior. A lid should be fitted with a stout, positive-lock latch. The country version: putting a both-hands rock on top of the lid after closing it. Top of page

Whether to install a floor

A major question in the design of the shelter is whether to install a floor. The classic Polyface broiler pen is floorlessthe whole point is to give birds confined to a pen constant access to pasture. In management strategies in which the birds are not confined to the shelter (as when the flock roosts in the shelter at night but ranges inside an electric net during the day), the addition of a floor to the shelter might make sense. (More below.) If you do add a floor, however, I strongly recommend either wire or plastic mesh. A plywood or other solid floor quickly accumulates a layer of caked droppings that is unpleasant, unsanitary, and especially hard to clean in the cramped quarters of a shelter. Top of page

Avoiding injuries
All birds are young to begin, while some adults seem just plain stupid. Both classes will sometimes get a leg caught under the trailing rail of a shelter being moved, and be squashed between the rail and the ground. Great care should be used, therefore, not to move the unit too fast, and to be constantly vigilant to the birds inside the shelter. Any hint of distress calls for an immediate halt. It is best to enclose the end you pull from with poultry wire (rather than solid cover), so the back rail is visible as you pull. A helpful strategy is to move the shelter

when you feed: Place the feeders outside the shelter and get everybody crowded eagerly around them, then shut the door to the shelter and roll away. Another strategy for avoiding moving injuries is the addition of a floor. The shelter can be moved early in the morning, while the birds are still shut inside, and released to the outside only after the move is complete. Top of page

In the Garden

In the garden
A pasture shelter of the right dimensions is a great adjunct to gardening. My garden beds are 42 inches wide, so I made one of my shelters 4x10 ft. I can park the shelter on a bed and allow the birds to work a 10-ft patch at a time, while keeping the other beds off limits. Great way to till in heavy weeds or cover crop, and make way for planting. Top of page

Doors
I use one small A-frame completely open at each end, but for most shelters I like to have a door. Even if I dont close it routinely, I want the option of closing the birds in (to get ready for a move from one netted area into another, to do a census or selection, or in preparation for slaughter). Top of page

Nests
If the shelter is serving layers, it should have nestssimply mounted on the framing is best which should be accessible from the outside. Id be embarassed for you to know how many years I clambered inside my large A-frame to collect eggs before that Duh! moment. It was easy enough to hinge a scrap of plywood for an access door and protection from weather, but it would have been easier to make this provision from the first. Top of page

Winter Shelter

All-season?
An important design question is whether the shelter will serve the flock in summer only, or whether it will give climate-adequate protection in the winter. To maintain the shelters weight at the mobile end of the spectrum and still provide a sufficient bulwark against winters extremes can be challenging. Top of page

Predation issues
A shelter on its own is subject to digging attack if floorless. Dogs and fox are diggers, as are other predators. In a free-standing shelter, a 2x4 mesh welded wire floor is the minimum required to defeat diggers. (Such a floor also has the virtue of letting birds graze through it during the day.) I keep all my shelters inside electronet, so use nothing but floorless shelters. And I dont shut up at nightthe sleeping birds are safe enough behind an electric perimeter. If you are neighbors to owls, it would be advisable to shut the shelter doors at night. Be aware that poultry netting may not be impervious to unexpectedly powerful (and determined) predators such as dog or raccoon. Ive had both rip through poultry netting with tooth or paw. (Bet you cant do that). If you are exposed to predators this potent, you might use -inch hardware cloth, well secured, in lieu of ordinary poultry wire.

Wired for Defense Another option is to wire for defense. After the attacks (in a Salatin-style 10x12 broiler pen) referred to above, I ran a couple of passes of single-strand electric wire around the shelter, standing it off from the structure with plastic or porcelain insulators. With completely satisfactory results. Top of page

Watering issues
In the case of shelters that confine their birds, most folks prefer a hanging waterer that can be filled from outside, as opposed to lifting heavy waterers in and out. My birds are not so confined, so I run supply hoseswhich Y-off as neededfrom household pressure out to automated (float-operated) waterers on the pasture. If you have the misfortune to be raising a crop of Cornish Cross, Id advise placing a waterer inside the shelter, whether its door is open or not. I once lost 22 Cornish Cross just at the age of slaughter: An out-of-season May heat wave hit, and the poor dorks sat in the shelters shade on their butts and died rather than walking 10 feet for a drink of water. Top of page

Roosts
Chickens do not absolutely have to have roosts. However, they have a strong instinct to roost, and will be more content if enabled to do so. (And remember that little feral wildcard: If denied the opportunity to roost, chickens may go roost in the trees. Just imagine where that might lead.) In a pasture shelter, have all brace framing possible do double duty as roosts. For instance, if you are constructing a fair sized A-frame, you will certainly want to add collar ties. Space them low enough under the peak to accomodate several sleeping birds. Top of page

Materials
Pasture shelters have been based on every material other than titaniumyou will doubtless make yours from a material you are comfortable working with. For me, that material has always been wood. (The one exception was a 10x10 hoop shelter based on -inch solid fiberglass rods.) It is heavier than some alternatives (which up to a point can be an advantage), but joins easily and takes screws and staples for putting on cover, wire, or hinges. I strongly recommend screws for securing woodunlike nails, they will not work loose in a structure that will be yanked and wrenched a good deal. However, I do not use ordinary wood screws (requiring drilling of pilot holes)a self-drilling screw such as a deck screw or the like (if galvanized against the weather) holds well and is easy to set without drilling pilot holes. If in prolonged contact with the ground, wood will rot if not sealed regularly, and placed up on blocks over the winter. You may even want to set each corner on a small block each time you park the shelter. Since the bottom rails are more subject to rotting out than any other part of the frame, you might do well to design a frame in which the rails are independent of the rest of the frame and covering, and thus more easily replaced separately.

Hoop Shelter A popular option is the hoop shelter made from heavy gauge welded wire livestock panels, bent from one edge of a frame and secured to the other in a semi-cylinder. Doors and wire netting can be added to the ends using light wood framing. Countless designs have been based on PVC pipe. I dont work with PVC much, so Ive never used it. Ive seen pictures and descriptions of use of PVC in cases where results were satisfactory. All of them, however, were based on heavy-duty PVC, something like Schedule 40. All the PVC structures I ever saw put together from lighter PVCone-inch pipe and the liketurned out to be disasters: not only blown away but irretrievably wrecked in the first nononsense wind.

Wrecked PVC Shelter If light PVC is a bad choice, 1-inch PVC pipe frames covered by plastic tarps are the absolute worst. They weigh nothing and are flimsyhello wind! But actually, its a mistake to use plastic tarps in any pasture shelter: They shred all too quickly from ultraviolet exposure, wind, and flying claws landing on them.

All-Wood Shelter So what is the covering of choice as a rain and sun barrier? Ive seen shelters sided and roofed in plywood. Unless quite small, such shelters are incredibly heavy, the kind of thing you move only once or twice a year, when you have friends around and some beer to share. However, such shelters are more likely to be winter-proof than most other designs. Sheet metal roofing is a good choice. Galvanized or baked-on-paint steel roofing is cheaper, and heavier. Aluminum roofing is lighter, but more expensive. Either will last a long time.

An alternative is 12-mil or 24-mil woven poly fabric. This is a greenhouse plastic available from any greenhouse supply, but usually in 100 foot rolls. I know of only one source for these fabrics custom-cut to your order: Greenhouse Sales in Neche, North Dakota. (204-327-5540) (Northern Greenhouse Sales) They sell a 12-mil woven poly, black on one side and silver on the other (giving the option of installing for solar gain or reflection). More durable will be the 24-mil. There is no silver/black version, but there is white/silver or white/white. Either white or silver reflects solar heat away from the structure (the white is likely to be a little more effective than the silver at keeping the interior cooler), while the white on the inside makes for more interior light. These tough woven fabrics last longer than any other version of plastic I know of. The 24-mil cover on my big A-frame survived a tumble through 30 feet of underbrush under the lash of the windwithout a tear. As Andy Lee, author of Chicken Tractor, characterized it to me, its bulletproof.

Woven Poly A-frame

Building a Pasture Shelter

This pictorial presentation of my latest pasture shelter construction project appeared in the October/November 2007 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine, a great resource for the homestead flock owner.

Thinking Through the Design Materials Notes on Materials Cutting Framing Roofing Wheels

Thinking Through the Design

In Designing a Pasture Shelter and other articles in the Pasturing the Flock section, I discuss the principles to consider when designing a pasture shelter for poultry; and share photographs representing the many approaches poultry people have made to this project. This article describes step-by-step construction of a serviceable shelter that should be adequate for most backyard flocks. It includes a nest box and plenty of roosts, so would work well with adult laying flocks. However, it could also be used to raise young birds on pasture. This particular model is floorless, but a floor of wire or plastic mesh could easily be added if desired.

Old A-frame I like the A-frame structure for a shelter, which provides more structural integrity for less weight, and is more stable in the wind, than more boxy designs. When planning my new shelter, therefore, I decided in many ways to duplicate my most successful design from the past, with a few modifications learned through experience. The biggest change from my previous design is the choice of metal roofing to cover it, in lieu of woven poly fabric. Since reading the article Polymers Are Forever&rdquo (Orion magazine, May/June 2007), I have tried to cut out use of plastics wherever I can. It is disturbing to realize that that plastic which we use with such convenience today will most likely still be somewhere on the planet in the time of our great-great-great-grandchildren. Still, the woven poly fabrics may be the best choice for some. As said in Designing a Pasture Shelter , it is much lighter than metal roofing. (The metal roofing on my new A-frame added about 80 pounds to the shelter. A piece of 24-mil woven poly, custom cut to cover this same shelter, would weigh about 10 pounds.) Of course, up to a point the added weight can be an advantage: There is no doubt that my new, heavier shelter is more stable in the wind. Cost might also be a factor when deciding between these two coverings: I spent $112 for the metal roofing for my new shelter (including a piece of ridge vent to cap it)a piece of 24-mil white/silver woven poly sized to fit this structure would have cost $78. A final consideration is durability: My previous A-frame with a 24-mil woven poly cover is still going strong.

Based on current degree of degrading from weathering, I would estimate a total service life of twelve to fifteen years. The galvanized steel roofing with baked-on enamal paint which I used (Fabrals Grandrib 3) comes with a 25-year warranty, so I expect total service life to be considerably more than that. (One could of course choose plain galvanized roofing, but the savings realized would not cover the cost of painting it more than a couple of times.) Another change I was glad to make: In the past, I have used 8-inch wheels on my pasture shelters, with the -inch bolts that serve as the wheels axles set in the exact center of the bottom rails. This configuration results in a very narrow gap between the ground and the rear rail, which as a result tends to catch on every bump or tussock when I move the shelter. For the new shelter, I bought a set of 10-inch wheels. Instead of drilling through the center of the rail for the axle bolt, I offset the hole toward the bottom of the rail by an inch. The combination of the greater wheel radius and the lower axle hole gives me an additional two inches of clearance when moving the shelter. Based on your own particular needs, you may prefer a smaller clearance (to prevent escape of birds from inside while moving, for example), but I love the way my new Chicken Ferrari rolls across the pasture. The following report is intended to give you, the reader and pastured poultry keeper, a solid introduction to the construction of a proven shelter design. There are endless modifications you could make to better serve your own needs and circumstances. Top of page

Materials

6 - 6-ft sheets of Fabrals Grandrib 3 painted steel roofing 1 - 10-ft 6-in Fabrals ridge vent Fabrals painted screws with neoprene washers (optional) or a box of neoprene washers 4 - 12-ft construction grade 2x4s 6 - 10-ft 2x4s 4 - 8-ft 2x4s Assorted deck screws (See note.) 4 to 8 metal corner braces (See note.) 4 - -in carriage bolts, 5 inches long 4 each flat washers, lock washers, and hexagonal nuts for the carriage bolts 4 wing nuts for the carriage bolts 4 wheels with -inch axle bores 1 10-ft roll 1-inch mesh poultry wire, 48 inches wide Small fence staples (for poultry wire) 2 pairs 1--inch utility hinges 1 - 1--inch barrel bolt 4 - 4--inch open screw hooks (ceiling hooks) 1 sheet -inch CDX plywood (optional) Small roll of -inch hardware cloth (optional) 1 quart or so wood sealer A short length of twisted wire cable and a scrap of old garden hose

Top of page

Notes on Materials
(1) I ordered the metal roofing through my local farm co-op, custom cut to my order. There are other options for metal roofing than Fabrals Grandrib 3, of course. Check out the possibilities with your local farm supply. The width of coverage of the Grandrib 3 is 36 inches, so the choice of three pieces per side dictated a total length for the shelter of nine feet. As for the length of the roofing pieces: I used the Pythagorean theorem to calculate the 6-ft length, based on a bottom rail of 8 ft 3 in, and on a preference for cutting angles on the ends of the rafters at 45 degrees. If you are making a smaller or larger shelter, or prefer a different profile with reference to its height, use the good old Pythagorean theorem to recalculate the length of your rafters (the hypotenuse of a right triangle) and the angles at which to cut the ends of your rafters. (2) For fastening Grandrib 3 onto roof framing, Fabral offers a hex-head painted screw complete with neoprene washer. Since I had some left over from a larger roofing project, that is what I used. They are quite expensive, howeverup to 16 cents per screw. You could use decking screws for this part of the job as well, adding small neoprene washers to seal the screw holes from the rain. (3) For the framing, I bought all 2x4s and ripped them down as needed. You could of course buy lumber already cut to your needed dimensions (2x2, 1x2, etc.) if you prefer. (4) Do not use nails for a pasture shelterthey will work loose as the shelter is jerked about in moving. A coarse-thread deck screw, galvanized or coated against weather, will provide much more durable framing joints, and will not require the drilling of pilot holes (except at the ends of pieces to be joined). I keep a supply of a wide variety of lengths and shank sizes on hand at all times. For this project, I used, as appropriate to the join being made, all of the following: #7, 1 and 1-5/8 inches;#8, 1-, 2, 2-, and 3 inches; #10, 3- inches. (5) I had a number of 3-x-inch steel corner braces (corner irons) on hand, so I used two on each corner. If you can get larger corner braces, you should need only one per corner. (6) If you have some scrap wood on hand, use it to assemble a nest box. If you do not, you might find it easiest to make one from plywood. If you buy a sheet of plywood, you should have at least half the sheet left over after making your nest box. (7) I always use -inch hardware cloth (welded wire mesh) for nest bottoms that are more self-cleaning than solid bottoms, so I had on hand the small piece required to floor the nest box in this shelter. If you cant find a source that will custom cut to your length, you will probably have to buy a 10-ft roll and keep the remainder on hand for other projects. (8) The size wheel you want to use on your shelter is up to you. For most pasture shelters, you want a solid (non-pneumatic) wheel, available from a garden or tractor supply. See discussion of wheel size above. (9) The sealer I used was Cabot Waterproofing, a clear silicone sealer for wood. I didnt coat the interior parts of the frame that will be completely sheltered from blowing rain. I applied several liberal applications, however, to the bottom rails and end framing, and the end grain of stringers and rafters. I used about two quarts of sealer.

Top of page

Cutting

Ripping (1) Set rip fence of table saw or hand-held power saw to 1- inches, and rip all four of the 12ft 2x4s in half. Cut each of the resulting pieces in half cross-wisethat is, into 6-ft lengths. Reserve 14 of these pieces for the rafters of the shelter, and set aside the other two for other uses. (2) Cut 12 inches off four of the 10-ft 2x4s, to yield four 9-ft 2x4s. Set aside two of these 2x4s to use for the side rails. With rip fence still set at 1- inches, rip the other two 9-ft 2x4s in half. Set aside the resulting four 9-ft pieces, for use as stringers. (3) With the rip fence still set to 1-, rip one more 10-ft 2x4 in half and set aside for use as collar ties and end framing. (4) Re-set the rip fence to 2- inches and rip the last 10-ft 2x4. Set aside the 1--in thick piece for later use. Cut the 2--in piece to 9 ft, for use as the ridge pole. Top of page

Framing

Corner Alignment (5) Assemble the bottom rails. [Please note that in Designing a Pasture Shelter, I said that it is possible to cut down on weight by ripping the bottom rails at 2- inches, which normally is plenty heavy for a shelter with adequate cross bracing. In the present case, however, I was adding a lot of weight because of the choice of the metal roofing as cover. Therefore, I used full 2x4s for the bottom rails.] Lay out the bottom frame, with the two 9-ft 2x4s previously cut (Step 2) to the outside, and two of the 8-ft 2x4s to the inside. Study the photo of this step carefully and make sure that the 9-ft rails set the length of the bottom frame at exactly 9 feet; while the 8-ft 2x4s, set on the inside of the outer rails, make for a width that is 8 ft, 3 inches (8 ft plus the thickness of one nominal 2x4 times two). We doubled up on our smaller corner

braces, and used #10x3--inch screws for drilling into end grain, and #7x1-5/8 screws when screwing into cross grain. (#8x1-5/8 would have been even better.) Note that as we begin assembling the frame, we want to be as square as we possibly can. If you have a large enough completely flat surface (such as a garage floor) to work on, that is the best choice. That was not an option for us, so I simply used the most level section of lawn I have (well, the most level that remained in the shade most of the time). For squaring up the corners, I laid each of the corners in turn on a sheet of plywood when joining them with the corner braces. Square your corners as well as you can (measure on the diagonal from opposite cornersthe two measurements should be the same if the frame is square) before the next steps, which will be locking in the structure. (6) Cut 45-degree angles on both ends of the 14 rafters. Be careful with this step: You want to end with rafters that still measure a full 6 ft on the top edge, with the angles coming in from the ends. Be sure youre clear on this point by studying the photos of the attachment of rafters to ridge pole and bottom rails. When driving screws into the ends of the rafters (or near the ends of other pieces elsewhere in the construction), I first drill a pilot hole to prevent splitting the end. (When driving deck screws into the middle of the work piece, no pilot hole is necessary.)

Begin Rafters

Rafters Complete (7) I hope you have a buddy willing to help set the first two pairs of raftersdoing that single-handedly would be more challenging than juggling five balls while walking a tightrope. Screw the ends of all the rafter pieces solidly onto the ridge pole and the side rails, setting the rafters at 18 inches on center. [Note: Be aware that some roofing materials might require a different spacing of the rafters.]

First Stringers (8) Attach two of the 9-ft stringers cut in Step 2 to connect the rear and the front rails. I came in 32 inches from the right and left ends of the front and rear rails to set the stringers. You could vary that distance, depending on the size door (and access to the nest box in the rear) you prefer.

Diagonal Braces (9) Re-set rip fence to -inch. Rip the two remaining 8-ft 2x4s to give eight pieces x1- inches. (No, theyre not all precisely inch thick, but we dont want to go crazy figuring the kerf here.) Set aside four of these pieces for later use. Check a final time that the bottom frame is square. Trim the remaining four pieces to make diagonal cross braces, from each lower corner up to the top in the middle of the structure, attaching to the undersides of the rafters wherever they cross. Though fairly lightweight, these cross braces add tremendously to structural rigidity.

End Framing (10) Using the 1-x1--inch stock cut in Steps 1 and 3, cut pieces to frame for a door and access to the nest box on the ends. (Study the photos for the general layout. Youll have to do a bit of trial-and-error to establish the correct angles.)

Collar Ties (11) Using the same 1-x1--inch stock, cut five additonal pieces to use as collar ties, which join opposite pairs of rafters. The collar ties add to structural integrity, but they can serve double duty as roosts for your birds. Exactly where you set them is up to you: The lower you set them, the longer they are and the more useful as roosts; the higher, the easier it is to get

around inside the structure when you need to do so. A good compromise for us (based also on best use of the pre-cut stock used in this step) was to make the collar ties 29 inches long (measured across the bottom side), which set the top 13- inches from the ridge pole.

Additional Stringers (12) To complete the framing, we installed an additional two stringers (16 inches up from the first pair) connecting the uprights in the framing at the two ends (using the remaining two 9-ft pieces cut in Step 2). These two stringers are not essential structurally, but we wanted them to provide a comfortable amount of roosting space for the birds. Remember the 1-x1- stock cut in Step 4? We cut pieces from that to make two center supports for the pairs of stringers on each side. (See photo.)

Completed Frame (13) At this point we have a frame that is rock solid. Im going to leave it to you to design your own nest box and end door if you want them. (I rarely use a door, since I use electronet to protect the flock, but always want the option of shutting in the birdsfor a census or selection or whatever.) For these two projects I used the 3/-4 inch stock generated in Step 9 and the remaining 1--inch stock from Step 4, plus (for the nest and its hinged access door) some scrap -inch CDX plywood. I used some -inch hardware cloth on hand for the bottom of the nest box. I used more scrap plywood to give additional protection to the ends of the nest box from blowing rain. (See photo.)

Nestbox Floor

Nestbox Access (14) While all parts of the frame are still accessible, coat all surfaces that could possibly be reached by blowing rain with a good wood sealer. Dont forget the bottoms of structural pieceswith a structure this rigid, there is no problem flipping it on its side to get to any surface needing application. (15) Cut the 1-inch mesh poultry wire for the (mostly triangular) spaces to be sealed off in the front and rear. Staple into place. Staple some over the door frame as well. (Youll see in the photo that I used a convenient piece of -inch hardware cloth instead.) Top of page

Roofing

Roofing

Nestbox Door (16) We attached the metal roofing, using four screws per rafter. The Grandrib 3 we were using is designed to be laid down over horizontal roof purlins, but the addition of purlins is not needed in this simple structure. Therefore, we simply attached the screws into the rafters themselves, occasionally doing so through a ridge in the Grandrib 3 (not recommended when installing on a house roof, for example), but mostly through a flat section of the profile as recommended. We then attached a ridge vent over the top to protect the interior from rain. If you are using the 24-mil woven poly to cover your shelter, you can order a plastic lath called cinchstrap for nailing down the poly. Top of page

Wheels

Axle Bolt

Wheel (17) Drill -inch holes into the side rails, front and rear. I drilled mine with the center ten inches in from the end, and one inch up from the bottom. Insert the -inch carriage bolts through the holes, from the inside of the rails. Place a flat washer, then a lock washer, then a hexagonal nut on the bolt, and tighten until the square shoulders of the carriage bolts are firmly engaged in the wood. Now simply pop the wheels on the bolts and lock them down with wing nuts. (If installing permanently, use more hexagonal nuts. The wingnuts make it convenient to put the wheels on and off with ease.) (18) Drill pilot holes and then screw in the four open hooks into the front and back rails. Make a pull using a length of wire cable, twisted into a strong loop at each end, and a scrap of old garden hose as padding for your hand. Loop the ends into the hooks and pull to move the shelter. Now youre rolling!

Taking the new Chicken Ferrari for a spin

Going Mobile at the Smaller End of the Scale

The following appeared as a sidebar to my article Designing a Pasture Shelter, in the August/September 2007 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine.

Broody Shelter

L'Artiste Even flocksters with only a very few hens are going mobile with their birds along with the bigger players in the pastured poultry movement. Such flock owners find that even extremely small pasture shelters are adequate to their needs, that they are easiest of all to move, and that, if well designed, they resist predation.

Minimalist Shelter

Tina
Tina Essert of Corapeake, North Carolina (tinaessert.blogspot.com) fashioned a tiny shelter which is adequate for two or three full-sized hens. In the ever-present trade-off between mobility and stability in the wind, Tina has adopted a minimalist design with little cover to shade the interior from sun and rain (though as a result it offers little sail to catch the wind). She has deployed three such units. Tina prefers multiple units that are easy to move, to a larger, less mobile unit that would house the number of hens needed to supply her family. Tina reports: We made a box with 2x3s, covered them with chicken wire, put a platform in the back about 2 feet wide and put a Rubbermaid box screwed onto the platform for a nest box. Generally, our chickens roost on the roof of the nest box and we havent provided roosts for them. The wire provides enough airflow and the frame enough weight to anchor them weve never had one budge in the wind. Tinas hens shelter under a small hinged plywood access lid if the weather is unusually hot or rainy, even taking shelter in the nest box if the weather is severe. However, they seem to have no problem getting a bit wet, so long is the weather is warm. She believes her simple design would be ideal for suburban homeowners who want to keep just enough hens to ensure a small supply of eggs for the family. She has never had a loss to predation from her chicken tractors, but speculates that she would add a 2x4 welded wire floor if neededto protect from digging predators while still allowing the birds access to the grass. She would use -inch hardware cloth (welded wire mesh) in lieu of poultry wire to block the paws of raccoons if they were a problem in her area.

Deborah and John

Whimsy

The Payoff Materials on hand and a bit of whimsy may be all that are needed for a shelter that houses the flock and serves as a conversation piece in the neighborhood. Jon Kinnard made a delightful mobile home for the flock of half a dozen Cuckoo Marans that supply him and Deborah Moore (and some of their Hume, Virginia neighbors) with matchless pastured eggs. The project used scrap plywood; wheels, pneumatic tires, and axle from a defunct tractor; and scrap window sash and metal roofing. The shelter is entirely self-contained, including storage space for feed, grit, and equipment.

Cody

Cody's Mobile Pen and Shelter

Pen Wheel Cody Leeser of Orlean, Virginia designed an ingenious pasture shelter which docks with a portable pasture pen. Each is moved independently, but they fit together to exclude predators.

Docking Port

Docking to the Pen Most of the materials for the project were available scrap or found objects. For example, the 2- x 3- shelter rides atop a landscapers wagon which had been on Codys place since she moved in. The metal roofing was rescued from the county dump.

Daytime Ramp

Securing the Ramp The pasture pen itself is 8x8 ft, and 4 ft high, wood framing with poultry wire (including over the top). The frame includes both a door for a person, and a narrow opening to which the shelter itself docks when moved into place. The pen has two small wheels permanently mounted on the rear of the bottom frameto move it (which she does daily), Cody simply lifts the frame from the other end and pushes. She makes the move in the morning, when her four laying hens are still shut up in the shelter. After moving the pen, she moves the shelter easy to pull or push on its wagon chassisdocks it with a narrow opening in the pens

framing, and lowers a plank drawbridge type ramp. Its that ramp which is the key to defeating predatorswhen closed up at night, the shelter is impervious to attack.

Nestbox

A Mobile Pasture Shelter: The Classic Polyface Model

The following appeared as a sidebar to my article Designing a Pasture Shelter, in the August/September 2007 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine.

Polyface Broiler Pen

Moving the Polyface Pen In our grandparents time, of course, ranging poultry on pasture was the norm, not the exception. It is only in the CAFO Age (confined animal feeding operation) that chickens have been confined by the tens of thousands in a single enclosed spaceand giving them abundant access to grassy pastures has come to seem a radical idea. More than any other person, Joel Salatin of Polyface Farm in the Shenandoah Valley of central Virginia has inspired the recent revival of pastured poultry. I am proud to hail him as a personal friend and mentor of more than twenty years.

Barreda Broiler Pen

Barreda Pen Another View Polyface has raised pastured broilers for many years for local restaurants, a loyal drive-to-thefarm customer base, and a number of distribution points in Virginia and the District of Columbia. This year they will raise more than 12,000 broilers, using about fifty 10x12-ft movable, floorless pasture pens. The growing birds benefit from the lush pasture, and the manure they lay down is a key part of the Polyface soil fertility program.

Barreda Pen: Predator Proof Beyond their provision of food of integrity to countless customers over the years, I salute the Salatins for their inspiration of widespread adaptation of their model by homesteaders and small producers everywhere.

The Chicken Tractor: A Tribute to Andy Lee

The following appeared as a sidebar to my article Designing a Pasture Shelter, in the August/September 2007 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine.

Chicken Tractor on Garden Bed

Hinged Lids It was Andy Lees book Chicken Tractor which more than any other source introduced the idea of keeping micro-flocks in small, mobile pens to provide a more wholesome, more contented life for the birds, and of putting them to work. Many such shelters are sized specifically to fit the owners garden bed width. Small flocks in chicken tractors (or as I like to call them, chicken cruisers) can till up new ground for garden, till in cover crops or heavy weed growth, and help with control of slugs and snails. In the process, they forage nutrientdense foods such as earthworms, grubs, and slugsa big gain in dietary quality.

Halfway Shelter

2Boypower Shelter

Creep Feeder

Pasture Shelters for Market Layer Flocks

The following appeared as a sidebar to my article Designing a Pasture Shelter, in the August/September 2007 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine.

Ault Chicken Hilton

Another Ault Mobile Layer Shelter If you have a hankering to produce for an expanding pastured egg market, you may find the pasture shelters of small farmers of interest. Steve and Chris Ault of Pamplin City, Virginia produce more than 100 dozen eggs per week for sale in one farmers market, two natural food stores, plus a few on-farm sales. Steve says his favorite layer shelter is an old recreational trailer, which he bought for $200, gutted, and outfitted with roosts and nest boxes. It houses about 200 layers, who shelter in it at night and range inside electric net fencing during the day. Steves flocks suffered heavy predation before he started restricting foraging to the electronetted areas. However, he hopes to return to complete free-ranging soon, having recruited two guardian dogs (Great Pyrenees) to safeguard the flocks. Steve built another layer shelter using an old hay wagon as the base. It too houses about 200 layers, but is light enough to pull with his lawn tractor. He reports that both the above units are heavy enough to remain stable in wind gusts up to 60 mph.

Barreda Layer Shelter

Another View Michael Barreda of Upperville, Virginia sells eggs from his pastured layer flock through the local IGA, a small independent grocer. Those in the know share the secret: Be sure to get there on Thursdaythats the day Michael brings in his eggs. He houses his mixed layer flock (Australorps and Australorp-Welsummer-Langshan crosses) in a shelter large enough for 80-100 hens. Like Steve, he built his layer house on an old hay wagon chassis, which he moves with his pickup. The shelter is heavy enough to be stable in strong winds. Over the winter, or if expecting unusually heavy wind, Michael parks the layer house in a spot sheltered from the wind. Ranging inside electronet during the day, Michaels flock has had no significant predator problems.

Barreda Layer Shelter: Interior

A Drown-Proof Waterer
This idea for a waterer that both serves the needs of waterfowl and protects young chickens from drowning appeared as a sidebar in my article The Homestead Waterfowl Flock in the June/July 2006 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine, a great resource for the homestead flock owner.

Components

Setup Waterfowl must have water deep enough to submerge their heads, in order to rinse eyes and nostrils. If waterfowl are kept on the same pasture with growing chickens, however, the chicks can fall into any sort of open waterer and drown. Here is a solution I came up with to drown-proof a waterer deep enough for ducks and geese to submerge their heads. I cut off the bottom one-third or so of a 5-gallon food grade plastic bucket. (I drilled holes in the bottom so it wouldnt float when placed in the tub.) I set it in a 6-gallon rubber watering tub, to which I attached a float valve on a supply hose. Watering is automated; the waterfowl are able to dunk their heads; and chicks who fall in are able to scramble up onto the rim or the upturned bucket bottom, rather than floundering around helplessly in an open waterer.

Waterfowl
When mention is made of waterfowl we are likely to think ducks and geese. Actually, the common domestic waterfowl include four different species. Domestic goose breeds descend from two separate wild ancestors. Embdens, Pilgrims, Romans, Toulouse, Pomeranians, and other common breeds descended from the European Graylag (Anser anser); while Chinese and African geese descended from the Asian Swan Goose (A. cygnoides). An identifying characteristic of the latter is a large, forward-inclining knob that develops where the upper bill meets the skull. (Two feral speciesthe Canada and the Egyptianhave also been domesticated and are kept by some hobbyists.) All true ducks share the same ancestorthe wild mallard (Anas platyrhynchos). Though referred to as ducks, Muscovies have an entirely different wild ancestor, Cairina moschata considered by some more closely related to geese than to true ducks. (They can mate with true ducks, though the offspring are likely to be sterile, like mules. In southwest France, Muscovies and Pekin ducks are crossed to produce prized Moulard ducks.) I have raised all four of these species and recommend them if you are looking for fowl that are easy to raise, take advantage of foraging opportunities, and have lots of personality. Some

flocksters such as Carol Deppe (in The Resilient Gardener) prefer ducks to chickens as working homestead partners.

Table of Contents for Waterfowl Section

The Homestead Waterfowl Flock The Silver Appleyard: A Great All-Round Duck

The Homestead Waterfowl Flock Part One

I wrote this article for the June/July 2006 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine, a great resource for the homestead flock owner.

Table of Contents
Part One Part TwoPart Three

A Multi-Purpose Flock
A small waterfowl flock is a great addition to the homestead. You may prefer either ducks or geese to start, but I like keeping both: Their needs and care are similar enough that it is easy to run them together in the same flock. When I refer to the homestead waterfowl flock, I have in mind utilizing them not only as a part of the household economy, but incorporating their natural behaviors to assist with the work of the homestead. The waterfowl recommend themselves as homestead poultry especially because they are healthy and vigorousalmost entirely disease freeare easy to raise, and can forage a lot of their own food after the brooder phase.

Breeds (and Species)

Before you decide on your choice of breeds, there are some facts about these species you should know.

Muscovies Although all domestic ducks except Muscovies are descended from the wild mallard (Anas platyrhynchos), they have been bred for greater size and weight, and hence have largely lost the ability to fly. A low fenceonly a couple of feet or sois sufficient to contain them. Muscovies have an entirely different wild ancestor (Cairina moschata), considered by some more closely related to geese than to mallard type domestic ducks. Though comfortable in water for brief periods, their plumage is less water-repellant than that of mallard type ducks, hence their needs for shelter in extreme weather are greater. Unlike mallard types, Muscovies retain the ability to fly, and I have sometimes found it necessary to clip wings in order to keep them grounded where I want them. Absent such restraint, they may prefer to roost in trees at night. You may prefer to raise ducks primarily for eggs. You may be surprised to learn that the more productive laying ducksespecially Campbells and Runnerslay more eggs than many breeds of chickens, from 250 to 325 eggs per year. Duck eggs are especially prized for baking. Heavier breeds lay many fewer eggs and are raised primarily for meatAylesbury, Muscovy, Pekin (the fastest growing of all duck breeds), and Rouen. Just as with chickens, there are also dual purpose breeds that do fairly well as both layer and meat birdsSaxony, Swedish, Orpington, Magpie, etc.

Two Goose Species Most domestic geese also derive from two separate ancestors. Embdens, Pilgrims, Romans, Toulouse, Pomeranians, and other common breeds descend from the European Graylag (Anser anser); while Chinese and African geese descend from the Asian Swan Goose (Anser cygnoides). An identifying characteristic of the latter two breeds is the large, forward inclining knob that develops where the upper bill meets the skull. (Two feral speciesthe Canada and the Egyptianhave also been domesticated and are kept by some fanciers.)

Geese are not kept for egg production. Their eggs are perfectly edible (and they make a large omelet), but their laying season is restricted to the spring, and they produce relatively few eggs. Keeping of domestic waterfowl has been declining for decades. You can help to preserve these valuable birds by adding a small flock to the homestead. See the American Livestock Breeds Conservancys website for a list of the different breeds and their preservation status.

Getting Started
Like chicks, just-hatched ducklings and goslings that have not been fed or watered can be sent through the mail, so you can order them from numerous hatcheries around the country. The artificial brooding of these hatchlings is similar to that for chicksreview Gail Damerows excellent introduction to brooding chicks (Chick SuccessStart Those Birds Right!) in the April/May issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine. You will find the brooding of waterfowl hatchlings at least as easy as that for chicks. There are, however, two key points to keep in mind: While it is typical for commercial chick feeds to be medicated (contain antibiotics), it is imperative that medicated feed not be fed to waterfowl hatchlingsit can kill them.

Brooder Waterer Second, waterfowl hatchlings are incredibly sloppy with their water. Be sure to use a waterer that doesnt allow them to get into itif their down gets soaked, it loses all insulating value, the hatchlings become chilled, and they can die. Even with the best designed waterer, however, the playful hatchlings will splash a good deal of water out over their litter, creating unhealthy conditions in the brooder. Take up this wet litter regularly and replace it with fresh dry litter. It can also help to set their waterer on a platform over a catch basin. I have seen advice from some quarters that you brood ducklings and goslings separately. I always brood them together (they arrive in the same shipment), and have never had a problem. (Indeed, I have even brooded chicks, ducklings, and goslings in one brooder.) The key is to make sure there is plenty of space in the brooder so the hatchlings are not stressed by crowding; and that they are allowed the opportunity to self-regulate their need for warmth that is, there are cooler areas in the brooder they can circulate in, or spend more time underneath the heat source. Frequent monitoring of the brooder is the key to success.

Feeding
Dave Holderreads The Book of Geese and Raising the Home Duck Flock have excellent chapters on feeding waterfowl at all ages, including sample formulations for homesteaders wishing to make their own feeds. He recommends a 20-22 percent crude protein feed up to 3

weeks; 16-18 percent protein from 4 to 12 weeks; and 16 percent protein from 13 to 26 weeks. The earlier the birds get onto high quality pasture, the sooner they can forage a good deal of their nutrition on their own. Since I like to keep things simple, I make a compromise feed for both my chicken and waterfowl flocks. Note that the major difference in their nutritional requirements is that waterfowl need more B vitamins, particularly niacin, so I add cultured dried yeast to the mix to boost B vitamin content. Currently I am feeding my adult birds a mix that per hundredweight contains: 12 lbs of a pre-mix made of Fertrells Poultry Nutri-Balancer, kelp meal, salt, cultured yeast, fish and crab meals, and whole flax seed; 6 lbs alfalfa meal; 30 lbs whole corn; 22 lbs whole peas; 20 lbs wheat; and 10 lbs mixed oats and barley. I grind the corn and peas coarsely and combine with the pre-mix. The small grains I sprout and feed separately. (The birds go for the sprouts by preference every time.) This formulation is about 16 percent protein. When I receive my ducklings and goslings later in the spring, I will boost the protein content with more fish meal, and with earthworms harvested from a large vermicomposting project.

The Silver Appleyard: A Great All-Round Duck

Photo by Bonnie Long This article was first published in the August/September 2010 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine.

Table of Contents for This Page

A Profusion of Ducks Two Contenders for Top Duck Breeding My Appleyards

Ive tried a number of duck breeds over the years, always looking for my true love duck, sometimes keeping several breeds in a given season. But Im trying to simplify my three-ringcircus of a poultry flock, inspired in no small part by the superior wisdom of the Lady of the Manor; so a couple of years ago decided to settle on my ideal breed and raise only the one, rather than constantly playing the field.

A Profusion of Ducks
Ive always found waterfowl in general great fun to raise, so sheer enjoyment was my first criterion. One of the most fun breeds Ive encountered are Runner ducks. For a couple of years, my poultry buddy Mike next door had a flock of seven, and I loved to go over and watch their antics. They were the clowns of the barnyard, with their hyperactivity and their odd vertical stancea busy troop of animated bowling pins, or caricatures of soldiers moving ramrod-straight with military precision. Like some flocks of wild birds, they all moved together, veering in one direction or another in absolute lockstep. As Mike put it, They move like theyre one tissue. Did I call them clowns? Ill never forget the evening I first saw them stop their constant scooting about, and arch their necks gracefully to feed and drink. The transition from clown to ballerina was instantaneous, unexpected, magical. I was charmed. But sentiment rarely leads the way in my flock, and I continued to enjoy Mikes flock of Runners vicariously. They are simply too small-bodied to fit the ideal breed I sought. For those looking for a duck that excels at egg production, however, Runners may be the perfect combination of fun and productivitythey lay up to 300 eggs a year. (Other light-bodied egg specialist breeds include the Campbell, now most readily available in its Khaki color up to 340 eggs per yearand the rarer Harlequin, Magpie, and crested Bali.) We slaughter a good number of ducks each fall, not only for their sumptuous meat but for their superior cooking fat; so my ideal breed had to be a good meat duck. One of the best of all meat ducks is the Muscovyfast-growing to an impressive twelve pounds (for drakes seven pounds for ducks), with superb flavor. Muscovies actually have a different wild ancestor from other domestic ducks, who are all descended from the wild mallard. They are much more capable on the wing than the true ducks, and may prefer roosting in trees, or flying over the fence, presenting more of a challenge to the flockster. I prefer ducks who are easier to keep where I want them, inside one of my electric net fences. And I must say that one of my ideal-duck criteria is beauty, and Muscovies have a face only a mother could love, with their large face patches of rough, bare red skin (caruncles). Hmmm, now that I think about it, though, Muscovies are like guineas: The first impression is ug-ly!and then they grow on you. Still, you wouldnt call them a beautiful duck, and beauty as said is a further criterion for my ideal duck. Ive raised Pekins and Rouens, and found they performed well as meat ducks. But Ive never cared for all-white birds such as the Pekin; and I lost interest in the dark, subdued garb of the Rouen after a visit to Eliot Colemans farm in Maine a number of years ago. Eliot had some Swedish Blue ducks on slug patrol around his garden; and after seeing them, I knew I wanted a duck with brighter colors than the Rouen. Top of page

Two Contenders for Top Duck

The Swedish Blue itself is medium size (drakes eight pounds, ducks seven), so I kept looking for a beautiful, colorful duck in the heavier class. A couple of years ago I decided to try Saxony and Silver Appleyard ducks, both from Holderread Waterfowl Farm. Both are fun, easy going, and easy to manage. As my regular readers know, I gravitate toward fowl willing to hustle a good deal of their own grub; so a big plus was that these two breeds are among the most active foragers of the heavy breeds of mallard type ducks. They are also far and away the best layers in this class, making them top choices as the most general purpose domestic duck. Both are beautiful ducks, fine ornaments to the homestead; and grow fast to an adult size (drakes nine pounds, ducks eight) that puts them not quite at the top of the heavyweight class (Aylesbury, Muscovy, Pekin, Rouen), but certainly among the best of the table ducks.

Two Appleyard Drakes and One Duck

Two Month Old Appleyard Ducklings To my eye, the Appleyard is the more colorful and beautiful of the two breeds. And their egg production (200-270 eggs per year) gives them a bit of an edge over the Saxony (190-240). Last spring, therefore, I bought another batch of Dave Holderreads ducklings, but just Silver Appleyards this time. The Silver Appleyard was bred in the 1930s by Reginald Appleyard, a well-known poultry writer and breeder in England at that time. Appleyards notions of the ideal duck were pretty much the same as mine: He desired to develop a breed with a combination of beauty, size, lots of big white eggs, and deep, long, wide breast. I have been unable to find any information about the breeds Appleyard used to develop his new breed. Appleyards were brought to the United States in the late 1960s, though they did not see wide availability until the 1980s. They were accepted into the American Poultry Associations Standard of Perfection in 2000. Top of page

Breeding My Appleyards
My Appleyards performed beautifully last year; and in the fall, when I would normally slaughter the seasons entire crop of ducks, I reserved a drake and two ducks for breeding this year. Which brings me to the final criterion for my ideal duck: I want a duck who remembers how to reproduce her own kind. Like many modern breeds of chickens, many recent duck breeds have been selected to forget the lore of incubating a clutch of eggs and nurturing a family of ducklings. My research indicated that broodiness is a trait that Reginald Appleyard managed to retain in this breed. They are not at the top of the class of broody ducksthat honor goes to the Muscovy (and the bantam ducks who, like bantam hens, tend to excel as mothers)but reports I read indicated they should give good service as mothers. As insurance, while waiting for my ducks to go broody, I placed Appleyard eggs under chicken hens as they went broody, with good hatches that gave me a head start on the season. I gave the ducks, Aster and Yarrow, their own section of my main poultry house, inaccessible to the various chicken flocks; furnished with a simple duplex nest in plywood (each side eighteen inches wide, sixteen deep, and twenty high), lined with burlap sacking over the earth floor and topped off with clean straw. (Planning ahead in this way is necessary when breeding ducks: Unlike most chicken broodies, broody ducks cannot be moved after they settle without breaking them up.) The ducks had free access to the outdoors, with plenty of grass and alfalfa to forage, and a fifty-gallon sheep waterer in which to bathe. But they continued to lay in the nests inside. I removed the eggs from the nests as they were laid, leaving plastic eggs in their place. I stored the eggs at cool room temperature on their sides, and gave them half a turn each day.

Broody Appleyard Ducks on Nests In early May, both ducks went broody simultaneously. Onset of broodiness was signaled first by a lining of breast feathers in the nest, then by their remaining on the nests full time, with the exception of several nest breaks each day. When the ducks were well settled into this routine, I replaced the plastic eggs during one of the nest breaks with my reserved hatching eggs. I didnt have the best of luck with my broody Appleyards. Aster lost focus about a week before the end of the incubation period (26 to 29 days for mallard type ducks, a week longer for Muscovies). While she continued to set the nest, she did so erratically, and the embryos failed to complete development. Yarrow remained faithful to her work, however, and at the end of the first week of June brought four ducklings off the nest (out of nine eggs set). Sadly, two ducklings had been smothered while hatching (first-time mothers sometimes remain too heavy on the struggling hatchlings), and three eggs had failed to develop properly.

Appleyard Ducklings Hatching Though she had had her problems with her first clutch, Yarrow more than redeemed herself when she adopted a clutch of seven ducklings, more than a week older than her own. The mother of that clutch was a hen who got confused about her duties (she settled onto a roost at night, leaving her babies distressed and forlorn at ground level), and I hoped that a duck would after all be the best mother for them. Yarrow was suspicious of the intruders at first, but I monitored closely to make sure she did them no harm; and by next morning they were all one happy family. As for Aster, the duck who failed to incubate her clutch: There are stern rules at Harvs Hatchery for broodies who ask to be mothers, then fail to carry through. (Im thinking curry.) I will replace her with two ducks from this years hatch, for a total next spring of three breeding ducks. I will also add a second breeding drake. Wish me luck as I continue working with my Appleyards to make them my ideal breed of duck.

New Family on Pasture

Breeding the Homestead Poultry Flock

This page was updated July 21, 2011.

*Table of Contents for Breeding Section is at bottom of this page.*

For too long, the site has lacked a page on starting chicks in an artificial brooder. I have now added Brooding Chicks: Two Options, which contains a good overview of that project. (I'm not the person to advise you about hatching eggs with an incubator, since Ive never used one.) I strongly encourage making deep litter over an earth floor the key to wholesome manure management in the poultry house. In a guest article, Jean Nick of American Pastured Poultry Producers Association describes her use of a deep litter system when raising chicks in an artificial brooder. The second half of the new article Brooding Chicks: Two Options deals with using natural mothers instead, though there is a more detailed treatment of that topic on the siteWorking

with Broody Hens: Let Mama Do It. If you've been buying your poultry stock as day-old hatchlings shipped through the mail, why dont you try your hand at hatching your own, with help from the true expert? Its great fun, and will be especially rewarding if you have children with whom you can share the miracle of life. Since I'm so committed to hatching with natural mothers, I've begun a breeding experiment to enhance brooding skills in hens of good sizemy Boxwood Broody cross. Of course, you'll never hatch an egg if you don't have a cock in the flock to ensure that its fertile. Working with the Cock(s) in the Flock is a discussion of the special challenges of working with the boys.. Breeding Your Backyard Flock discusses general principles of utilitarian homestead breeding. Of course, breeding our own isnt just about breeding chickens. Read about My Long Goose Breeding Sagafinally successful! This section ends with a pictorial of the design, construction, and use of my trap nests. Note that I have moved the article on the Cornish Cross to the Small Markets section. Those interested in breeding a better bird for pastured broiler models can check it out there.

Table of Contents for Breeding Section

Brooding Chicks: Two Options Brooding Chicks on Deep Litter Working with Broody Hens: Let Mama Do It Selecting for the Broody Trait: The Boxwood Broody Working with the Cock(s) in the Flock Breeding Your Backyard Flock My Long Goose Breeding Saga Making and Using Trap Nests

Brooding Chicks: Two Options

Whether you want to start a new flock of chickens, or need replacement stock, you wont always have the opportunity to bring in adult birds. Most flocksters at some point need to raise chicks from scratch. How do we go about that? This page is currently the only one on the site describing use of an artificial brooder to start purchased day-old chicks. It also contains a description of brooding chicks using mother hens, though a more detailed treatment of that topic is on the site. The following is the original version of an article published under the title Anyone Can Raise Chickens in the Dec 08/Jan 09 issue of Mother Earth News. This page was added to the site February 28, 2009. ~Harvey

Table of Contents for This Page

Starting Chicks in a Brooder o Chicks in the mail o Setting up the brooder o Arrival of the chicks o Feeding o Brooder management Using Natural Mothers o The broody hen o Isolating the hen o Setting the eggs o Managing the setting hen o Candling the eggs o Hatch day! o The new family Help Finding Best Breeds

Starting Chicks in a Brooder

Chicks in the mail
It surprises many would-be keepers of poultry that just-hatched chicks can be sent through the mail. But an interesting fact of chick embryology is that, just before a hatching chick breaks out of its shell, it absorbs and stores the last of the yolk. It now has water and food reserves that support it while it waitsfor two or even three days if necessaryfor its slower siblings to hatch. This provision by nature to sustain the new hatchling while waiting for its first drink or first meal is the key to shipping day-old chicks from a hatchery far away to your front door. There are many hatcheries to order from, from massive operations like Murray McMurray; to small regional, family-owned hatcheries; to individual breeders you can get in touch with by joining preservation organizations like Society for the Preservation of Poultry Antiquities and American Livestock Breeds Conservancy. (See insert, Help Finding Best Breeds, at the bottom of this page.) Success with purchased chicks is relatively easy, so long as you remember that they rely on you to fulfill their every need. Dont forget for a minute: You are Mama! Top of page

Setting up the brooder

Commercial Brooder

Simple Brooder Be sure to have your brooder set up and ready before the chicks arrive. You can of course buy a commercial brooder, complete with heat lamps, feeder trays, and waterers. It is cheap and easy, however, to assemble the brooder using whatever materials are at hand. For a small group of chicks, you might even use a large cardboard box, maybe the carton an appliance was shipped in. I make an ersatz brooder with four large pieces of scrap plywood, assembled in a box shape with four screws when needed, and hung flat on a wall when not.

Brooder Setup

Beth Spaugh's Brooder

Horse Stall Brooder

Brooder Hover

Some folks prefer a brooder without corners (where chicks might in some conditions pile up and suffocate). In lieu of a cardboard box, they cut a long strip of cardboard maybe two feet wide, and set it in place as a circular enclosure. Another option is a hover: A box-like structure of metal or plywood, containing the heat lamps or other heat source, is suspended a few inches over the brooder floor, allowing the chicks to retreat under the hover to warm up, or to range in the cooler areas outside the hover. If the feed and water are placed outside the perimeter, such an arrangement speeds feathering and hardening off of the young birds. Conditions in the brooder can be judged by the Goldilocks principle: They should be just right, avoiding the extremes of too cold or too warm, too drafty or too stuffy. The bottom of the brooder should be covered with a loose, absorbent material such as straw, wood shavings (kiln-dried, not green), or shredded cardboard or paper. Do not use a slick surface such as newspaper or sheets of cardboard, which can cause leg development problems, especially in waterfowl hatchlings (ducklings and goslings). Do not use open waterers in the brooder. Even if the chicks do not drown in them (a distinct possibility if deep enough), they can splash in them, become soaked, then chill and die. Use a waterer with a restricted lip the chicks can drink from, but cannot wade in.

Waterer for Waterfowl Hatchlings Ducklings and goslings are exuberantly messy with their water, splashing it over the litter until it is soaked. When I have young waterfowl in the brooder, I set the waterer on a wire frame over a catch basin. Wet litter encourages growth of anaerobic bacteria, some of which are pathogenic, so it should be replaced, or scattered in a thin layer over the rest of the litter to dry. The brooder must be furnished with a heat source. For the small homestead brooder, heat lamps (150 or 250 watt) or small electric heating elements are probably best. (For temperature control, lamps can be raised or lowered. The electric heaters usually have an adjustable thermostat.) Be sure to secure the lamp or heater the recommended distance from combustible surfaces (litter, cardboard or plywood sides, etc.)usually 18 inches or so, as recommended by the manufacturer. Be sure the area in which you set up the brooderbasement, garage, barn or other outbuilding is secure against pets, other livestock, rodents, snakes, and wild predators, any of which could devastate your helpless brood. Top of page

Arrival of the chicks

Plan ahead for the delivery of your chicks. Make sure you will be at home on the expected arrival date (usually one or two days after they ship from the hatchery). Advise your postmaster or letter carrier you are expecting a shipment of live chicks. You may even prefer that they call you so you can pick the chicks up rather than waiting for delivery. Open the box in the presence of the postal clerk or carrier to check on the condition of the chicks, and note whether any have died or become ill en route. Shipments from any reputable hatchery are insured, and the hatchery will likely replace losses if there is a large number of fatalities. That sounds scary, but Ive rarely had serious problems in dozens of shipments over the years. It is not unusual, however, to have a couple of losses, either in transit or within the first day or two, of weaker chicks that just didnt make a good start. Remember that, even in the best of circumstances, transit through the postal system is stressful for the day-old chicks. Turn on the heat source in the brooder a few hours before their anticipated arrival, so you can provide them with warmth, water, and feed immediately. It is often recommended to give an electrolyte solution (available from many hatcheries and poultry supply houses) to help invigorate the chicks after the rigors of their trip. My country boy version: several tablespoons of honey in a gallon of warm water, a couple tablespoons of unpasteurized apple cider vinegar, and a large clove or two of raw garlic, squeezed through a garlic press. I keep this solution in the waterer for the first day, then switch to plain water.

First Drink Remember, youre Mama: The first thing to teach your babies is how to drink. As you take each chick out of the box, dip its beak into the water for a few seconds, until it is swallowing vigorously. Then release it onto the floor of the brooder. Top of page

Feeding
I prefer kiln-dried pine shavings as floor litter for the brooder. It is usually recommended to cover the shavings the first couple of days, sincewithout a mother hen to teach themthe chicks havent learned to discriminate about what to eat, and might eat the shavings. Since as said I want to avoid a slick surface like newspaper or cardboard, I get empty burlap coffee bean sacks from a coffee roaster/distributor near me, and lay them down as a floor cover the first couple of days. (After taking them out, I use them for mulching.) By that time the babies have learned whats good to eat, and do not eat the litter. Use a special chick feeder designed to minimize spillage of feed. Again, the chicks may need some help figuring out what is food. Since their way of exploring their new world is to peck at everything, it can help to simply scatter some feed over the litter cover. Once theyve learned to peck up the feed they find there, you can start offering feed in the feeder only. Note that a

hanging feeder can be used after the chicks have learned to eatit can be raised to keep the feeding level at about shoulder height of the rapidly growing chicks. In addition to feed, you must offer your brood free-choice grit, small bits of rock they ingest to grind their feed in their gizzards (in lieu of chewing their food like us humans). You can buy commercial granite grit (which comes in sizes appropriate to different ages and species of fowl), or you may find a source of clean, chick size grit (say, the size of radish seeds) on your place. It is worth remembering that modern superhybridsmeat hybrids ready to slaughter at seven or eight weeks, or layers who begin laying at 16 or 17 weekshave higher protein requirements than the more traditional farm breeds. (More on feeds below.) Top of page

Brooder management
You will often see a standard list of Thou shalts and Thou shalt nots regarding brooder management. The key to success is not rigid adherence to a checklist, however, but frequent monitoring of the brooder. And common sense. Be especially wary of advice based on the implicit assumption that your flock is an analog in miniature of giant industrial flocks. Strive to make it anything but. Remember that the greatest obstacle to success is stress on the chicks, and avoid sources of stress such as overcrowding, temperature extremes, or running out of feed or water. Keep your nose tuned for the slightest hint of ammonia coming out of the litter (as it starts to decompose in the presence of the droppings), and add fresh litter material as needed.

Brooder temperature

A Bit Chilly The usual recommendation is that brooder temperature be maintained at 95 Fahrenheit for the first week, and reduced by 5 each week. My advice? Dont waste your money on a thermometer. Just observe the behavior of the chicks. If they huddle up under the lamp or heating element, the brooder is too chilly. If they retreat to the perimeters of the brooder, the heat source is too intense. If they are scooting about the brooder like little water bugs, the temperature is just right. (Of course, like all babies, they need to sleep a lot, so do not be perturbed when you see individuals immobile on the litter.)

Mixing ages and species

Most sources advise not to mix hatchlings of different species, nor of different ages. In a small brooding project with a keeper who is monitoring frequently, however, this is a rule that is easily bent. The last brood I did, for example, featured 100 individuals in two batches, one week apart in age, each batch consisting of chicks, ducklings, and goslings. Apart from a bit of bossiness from the goslings toward the end of the brooder period, there were no problems whatever.

Cleanliness, or sterility?
Good sanitation in the brooder is essential to prevent disease and distress. But it is a mistake to assume that absolute sterility is either possible or desirable. Like any living thing, the chicks immune response needs to be triggered by some challenges from the environment, while not being overwhelmed as it grows into its task. In practice, this means that you should prevent the caking of manure in the brooder, caused by overcrowding or inappropriate litter materials (any materials that are not absorbent and do not fluff up easily). If you are doing successive batches of chicks in the brooder, I favor topping off the old litter with fresh material between broods (in lieu of removing it entirely and sterilizing the brooder, as usually recommended). There is evidence, both scientific and anecdotal, that the litter becomes biologically active as the high-carbon litter and the droppings decompose (as in a working compost heap), yielding micbrobial metabolites that actually strengthen the immune systems of the growing chicks.

Cannibalism
It is possible that chicks in the brooder start pecking at each others feathers and toes. Once raw wounds develop, everybody starts zeroing in on themthings get really ugly, fast. It is often recommended to use an infrared lamp to prevent the resulting cannibalism. The most extreme prevention is debeaking, which means exactly what the name implies: chopping off half of the upper beak of the just-hatched chicks. Debeaking is standard practice in massive industrial brooder operations, where the chicks are under such enormous stress it is not surprising they exhibit behavior which is biologically insane. Most hatcheries offer debeaking as an option, but in your home flock the procedure is completely unnecessary, especially for birds who will be pastured and will need that beautiful curved beak to effectively forage grasses and other natural foods. Recognize debeaking for what it ismutilationand register an emphatic No to the option. Assuming that the chicks basic needs are metproper temperature and ventilation, easy access to the waterers and feeders, and sufficient protein in their feedthe only inducement to cannibalism would be overcrowding or boredom. Give them plenty of room to run around in, and a litter that they can scratch and have fun in, and you are unlikely ever to have a problem with cannibalism.

Pasting up or pasty butt

Green Forage Chicks droppings sometimes get sticky, and cling to the feathers around the vent. As they dry, they can even occlude the opening of the vent. In extreme cases the chick can die, simply because it cannot poop. Monitor your chicks for such pasting up, especially in the first couple of weeks. To treat, hold the chick in one hand and gently pull off the caked feces. It will probably be necessary to pull out some of the down along with them, in order to clear the vent. Feeding a little fine oatmeal or cornmeal can help clear up the condition. Being chronically too chilled can bring on pasty butt, so make sure the brooder is warm enough. But I believe the condition is most often related to the mediocre quality of many commercial poultry feeds. If purchased feeds are your only option, introduce small quantities of natural feeds from day one: fresh grass clippings, fresh lettuce from the garden, etc. (Remove any that are not eaten within a few hours, so they do not mold.)

Vaccination and medications

Chicks raised under industrial conditions would not survive without intervention with vaccinations, antibiotics, coccidiostats, etc. Though many sources will advise you to choose vaccination for your chicks as well (frequently offered by hatcheries), or to use medicated feeds during the critical early weeks, in several decades of experience I have strictly avoided both, and have not had a single case of Mercks disease, losses to coccidiosis, etc. Be aware that commercial chicken feeds are usually sold in three formulations: a high-protein, medicated chick starter; a medium protein grower ration or pullet developer; and a lower protein, higher mineral layer mash. I am strongly opposed to the routine feeding of any medications, antibiotics, growth stimulants, or hormones to any sort of livestock. In a well managed home flock such additions to the diet are completely superfluous; and I believe may leave residues from these additives in the eventual eggs and dressed poultry, despite standard assurances to the contrary. So, even before I started making my own feeds, I never fed medicated chick starter, and recommend that you avoid it as well. I started the chicks on the level two feedthe grower ration or equivalentand boosted the protein with fish meal, hardboiled eggs, farm milk, raw beef liver, earthworms, Japanese beetles, etc. (Note that you must never feed commercial layer mash to growing chicksthe extra mineral content can hinder proper development of the reproductive systems.)

Leaving the brooder

As the chicks grow, they may become too crowded. Plan ahead, and increase brooder space as the chicks become not only larger but more active.

How long to keep the chicks in the brooder depends on many factors, but most importantly the point in the season. In early spring, when nights are still cold, keep the chicks longer in the cozy warmth of the brooder. If you can give the additional management time, on balmy days you can put the chicks out in a little enclosure on the pasture, returning them to the brooder at night. You will learn by working with successive broods when the chicks are ready to be outside the brooder full time. Certainly they must be completely past the down stagethat is, fully feathered. Three or four weeks is typical for the brooder phase. My practice is to move the chicks directly to pasture from the brooder, usually with the main flock. The adults will boss them a bit to put them in their place in the flock hierarchy, but vicious harassment is rare. The chicks will tend to hang together as a subflock, and will certainly bed down together in a corner at night, to share warmth and camaraderie. Be especially careful that the growing chicks do not go running around in the dew-wet grass early in the morning. Until their body mass is greater and their feathers denser, they are subject to lethal chilling if they get wet. Aside from the above considerations for chicks without a mother, manage the young ones as for The new family (below). Top of page

Using Natural Mothers

There is a lot of good advice above about starting your new flock from day-old chicks in a brooder. But now Im going to give you the best advice of all: Forget all that! Be smart: Let a good mother hen do the job for you.

The broody hen

It seems strange in the extreme that we consider the ideal hen one who has forgotten how to reproduce her own kind, but indeed, the broody instinctthe inclination and skills to assemble and hatch a clutch of eggs, and to nurture and protect chickshas been almost universally bred out of modern breeds. Among such breeds, the occasional hen will go broody, but most will not. And, if a hen has forgotten the mothering rituals, there is no way you can nudge her into these behaviors. Some traditional dual-purpose farm breeds, such as Cochins, Buff Orpingtons, and Wyandottes, are known for broody tendencies, though you cannot be sure any given group will produce hens inclined to be mothers. If you want to work with natural mothers, therefore, you need to get a few hens of the historic breeds (Old English Games are excellentalso other gamey breeds like Kraienkoppes, Malays, Shamos, Asils, Madagascar Gamesas well as Silkies and some strains of Dorking), among whom the broody instinct is the norm, not the exception. Another interesting possibility is to get some hens who are crosses between distinct breeds. (Charles Darwin noted experiments in which the hybrid daughter offspring of non-broody breeds expressed broody behavior.) Bantam hens generally are known to make good mothers, though many contemporary breeders seem determined to exterminate the broody trait in bantam breeds as well.

Spotting Broodiness Broodiness in a hen is hard to describe, but easy to spot if you pay close attention to your hens normal behaviors, especially where nesting is concerned. Typically, the hen will decide she wants to brood in the same nest box she has been using to lay her eggs. She will look deeply settled, somewhat flattened-out in the nest, with a characteristic Zen-like intensity. If you reach in a hand, she will put up her hackle feathers with a fierce glare and an indignant Sqwarrrk! (to drive the predator away from the nestthats you). Most importantly, she will remain on the nest at night, when her sisters have gone to the roosts. Such a hen should be isolated. Top of page

Isolating the hen

Broody Box

Broody Box Unit

Broody Box Above Breeder Pen

Re-read that last sentence. Dont even think about letting the hen incubate in the egg nest. She may leave the nest to feed or relieve herself, then return to a different nest box to (in her mind) resume incubation of her eggs. Or the other hens will come and go, eventually breaking an egg and coating the clutch with suffocating goo. Trust me on this one: Ive been there. It doesnt work. Dont do it. Move the broody hen at night only, when shes in the trance-like state that is chicken sleep, to a corner where she will have quiet and privacy, with some sort of physical barrier excluding the other hens. Keep feed and water available to her in this space, and make sure it is large enough for her to leave the nest to stretch and relieve herself. (A good broody has the instinct not to poop the nest if she has sufficient space elsewhere.) If you work with more than one or two broodies a season, consider installing permanent broody boxes to isolate your mamas. Make them at least 24 by 30 inches, and 16 inches high, and mount them on a wall of the coop, so you dont lose any floor space for the other hens. A wire floor in the box (say half-inch hardware cloth) is far preferable to a solid one not only does it provide better ventilation, but is much easier to clean. (Just scrap droppings through the wire.) A couple of caveats about moving a broody hen: Chicken broodies usually tolerate a move that is done with care, as described above. If a hen refuses to settle in her broody box (more typical with a first-timer who hasnt yet gotten the knack), you might return her to the main flock and try her again the next time she goes broody. Since I have a lot of broodies in my working mother sub-flock, and since a broody hen ceases laying eggs, I usually cull an uncooperative broody to the stewpot. Be aware, though, that females of other domestic fowlducks, geese, guineas, turkeys cannot be disturbed after onset of broodiness without breaking them up, that is, disrupting the broody mindset. Plan ahead for such hatches, and let the broody female continue with her work where she has chosen to set, simply adding some sort of partition to ensure she is not disturbed by her sisters. Top of page

Setting the eggs

It is better initially to set the hen on plastic or wooden eggsfolks have even used golf balls or smooth stones, anything suggestive of eggs. A good broody will typically settle immediately on the fake eggs. Sometimes, however, a hen will resist being moved from the nest shes settled on as the perfect place to brood a clutch of chicks, and will be restless and agitated the first day. Give her time to get over it and settle on the fake eggs, usually by the end of the first day. Then (again working only at night), remove the fake eggs and substitute the fresh, high quality, fertile eggs you have collected from your breeders, or purchased from a breeder with superior stock, etc. How many eggs should you set? That most depends, obviously, on the size of the hen: 9 or 10 for a petite Old English Game, up to 15 for a matronly Wyandotte. The hen should completely cover the clutch, since it is her body warmth that enables incubation of the developing embryos. The number of eggs to set is also dependent on the point in the seasonthat is, on the average ambient temperature: The hens body can keep more eggs at incubation

temperature as the warmer weeks come on, as opposed to the deeper chill of the early spring nights. There are some common misunderstandings about managing hatching eggs: The eggs you are going to set do not have to be collected all on the same day. You can include in one clutch eggs gathered over many days (up to a limit of about 10 days or so), since the fertilized germ cells remain dormant until the eggs are warmed to a constant incubation temperature by the setting hen, when all the embryos start to growand hatch outon the same schedule. By the same token, however, you must not make additions to the clutch (or allow other hens to do so) after embryo development has begun, since the eggs would then not be on the same schedule for hatch. Finally, do not give in to the temptation to add more eggs to the clutch than is appropriate for the hens size, thinking that its okay to lose any excess ones if you can thus maximize the number who do hatch out. The hen moves the eggs about in the nest each day, ensuring even incubation. Eggs on the perimeter not adequately covered by the hen can chill, killing the embryos. When the hen moves those eggs into the center of the nest, other developing eggs can be exposed on the perimeter and lose their embryos. As in other endeavors, getting greedy can bring its own punishment.

Managing the setting hen

As for feed, its probably best to use a leaner feed like a scratch-grain mix, in lieu of the regular layer mash. Do not be concerned if a hen eats virtually nothing while incubating: Some hens fast almost completely during this period, while some are little piggies at the feed bowl. (In any case, it is not unusual for the hen to lose up to one third of her body weight during the ascetic rigors of incubation.) Daily management of the setting hen consists of unobtrusive monitoring only, making sure she has feed and water. Some hens like to leave the nest for a brief outing, others will not do so even if given the opportunity. If you do permit a broody break, be sure to do so only when you are in the area, and ensure that the hen gets back to nest duty (with assistance from you if necessary) before you leave. Top of page

Candling the eggs

It is a good idea to candle the eggs at about day ten. Work at night, in full darkness, beside the broodys nest. Remove the eggs from the nest, and, working quickly, shine a strong light through the egg. (You can buy candling lights, though I just use a strong flashlight.) A growing embryo will show as a small pulsing mass at the center of a spider-web of red supply veins. Keep examining eggs until you are sure you recognize a living embryo with its support system. Then it will be obvious when you find a non-living eggone with only a yolk showing, or a dark mass. Such eggs should be discarded immediately. A non-viable egg is a rotten egg; and the putrefaction in that egg generates gases which can sometimes cause it to explode. Not only is the resultant smell not to be believed, the remaining eggs get covered with a thick coating of goo. Egg shells actually permit essential gas exchange, and the coating in effect smothers the embryo by blocking oxygen from entering. Also, the exploded contents of the bad egg carry a heavy load of nasty bacteria which can penetrate the pores of the shells. You should candle instead.

Top of page

Hatch day!

Hatch Day How long does incubation take? The literature will tell you 21 days for chicken eggs (longer, up to 36 days, for other domestic avian species). But mark on your calendar a be ready date of 20 days out: I have found that, under natural mothers, eggs are as likely to hatch in 20 days as in 21. Hatch day is especially exciting if you have children with whom you can share the miracle of new life. Again, unobtrusive monitoring is the key. Most chicken hens will permit a gentle exploration of the eggs under them, perhaps with a token peck at your hand. If a hen is upset by the attempt, or makes a particularly sharp-beaked defense, simply back off and await events. (Hens of other fowl species are more likely to be badly disturbed by such examinations. Leave them in peacemore than likely, the new mother knows just what is needed.) Hatch begins with pipping, the initial cracking of the shell by the determined chick inside. (Even before that first crack, you may hear the chick peeping if you hold the egg up to an ear. Kids love this!) Breaking out of the shell is a heroic effort, and the wet, bedraggled, justhatched chick will lie exhausted for awhile, recovering its strength. Soon, however, it is dry and fluffy, and surprisingly active. If the nest has sides that would prevent the chick from climbing back in should it fall out, be sure to add some straw or other material to make a ramp of sorts back into the nest. If unable to climb back in with mama, the chick could quickly chill and die. Inevitably, you will have a chick that is weak, and unable to break out of the shell on its own. Many sources will tell you how to gently remove bits of shell to assist the struggling chick; but I consider such apparent kindness ill advised. The difficult task of breaking free of the shell is natures first challenge for the new life, and it should pass that test or fail, on its own. If too weak to manage on its own, your assistance may help it start a compromised life, in which it continues to struggle to catch up, then succumbs to the first major stress that comes along. Certainly you would not want to pass on its genes to future members of the flock. Like a mother hen, who will leave a too-weak chick behind, you should concentrate your efforts on the strong, vigorous members of the clutch. In my experience, hatch-out of the entire clutch takes place over the course of a daysay, maybe sixteen hours (though I once had a clutch of ducklings that took a full two days). In practice this usually means that you can leave unhatched eggs under the hen overnight for a final chance to hatch. Beyond that point, it is unlikely they will do so. I usually do a quick

postmortem on such eggs to try and figure out what went wrong, then turn my attention to the new family. Top of page

The new family

Cuckoo Marans Broody

Direct to Pasture The specifics of your own management situation will dictate what you do with the new family. Whatever you do, this is the point at which you realize what a smart move youve made, giving over the task of starting new chicks to the real expert, a mama chicken. My preference is simply to move the hen with her clutch directly to the pasture. (You do pasture your flock, I hope?) The earliest I ever did so was the last week of March (Zone 6b), when water froze in the waterers overnight, daytime temperatures were 40-45, and winds were 2025 miles an hour. (95 the first week? No drafts?) The chicks were happily foraging from day one, with mama providing a cuddling session to warm everybody up when needed. She didnt lose a one. The hard-working hen finds the best possible natural foods for her babiesweed seeds, green forage, live animal foods like worms, slugs, and insectsensuring vigor and health, and saving you feed dollars. And do note: I have never once had a case of pasting up in a chick on pasture with a mother hen.

Creep Feeder Shelter I am often asked whether it is okay to return the mother hen and her brood to the main flock. A precaution: As noted above, growing chicks should never eat commercial layer mash. If you do have the chicks feeding in the same area as the adult layers, feed a compromise feed that everybody can safely eat. (You can supplement the hens extra mineral needs with crushed oyster shell, which the little ones will ignore for now.) A tip: To provide for the higher protein needs of the chicks, feed protein-dense feeds inside a small creep feeder shelterthat is, one set up to allow entrance of the growing chicks, while excluding the larger adults. An assurance: You dont need to worry about the safety of the vulnerable chicks with the older, sometimes contentious adult members of the flockthey all know that mama will properly kick butt for anyone foolish enough to mess with her babies. Top of page

Help Finding Best Breeds

I recommend that you not add the latest superhybrids to your backyard flock simply because that is what is available at the local farm cooperative. Choose among the fascinating older breeds, many of whom will exhibit greater immunity to disease and foraging skills. You can help as well with the task of preservation of traditional and historic breeds, some of whom are in danger of being lost forever. You can learn more about traditional and rare poultry breeds, and get in touch with preservation breeders, at:

Society for the Preservation of Poultry Antiquities

SPPA does not have a website, but Barry Koffler hosts several SPPA pages on his excellent feathersite.com. Check it out at SPPA or write to: Charles Everett, SPPA Secretary-Treasurer, 1057 Nick Watts Rd, Lugoff SC 29078 or email crheverett@bellsouth.net.

American Livestock Breeds Conservancy

ALBC maintains a list of breeds in need of preservation, and a list of members who are breeders. Check their informative website or write: The American Livestock Breeds Conservancy, PO Box 477, Pittsboro NC 27312 or call: 919-542-5704

American Pastured Poultry Producers Association

ThoughAPPPA is an organization dedicated to small farmers producing for local markets, it offers much of relevance to the serious poultry husbandman who wants to make the flock a key part of the household economy. Members who join at the Producer Plus level have access to the APPPA discussion listthe very best listserve I participate in. Discussion is serious and to the point, and members do not waste my time with idle chit-chat.

Brooding Chicks on Deep Litter

Guest Article: The material on this page is copyright by Jean Nick, December 2006.

I found most helpful Jeans description of using a continually-maturing deep litter to start chicks in an artificial brooder; and received her permission to include it as a sidebar in my article When Life Gives You Lemons. . ., published in the Dec06/Jan07 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine. Jean broods more chicks than most of us (since she produces for a local market), and she finds that brooder chicks do very well on a deep litter which continues to build up and develop. She also confirms that a deep litter actually produces edible critters for the flocks enjoyment. Our deep litter brooder generates a suprising amount of gentle heat. The set-up is far from fancy, just a circular cardboard wall made from old corregated boxes set on a concrete garage floor bedded with commercial pine shaving bedding, over which we hang one or two 250-watt heat lamps for extra warmth. (We had a big metal electric brooder hood in it early on, but we like the heat lamps much bettereasier to monitor the chicks and very easy to adjust the heat immediately by raising and lowering.) It has had chicks or poults in it almost continuously since a week before Easter this year, and we just keep adding clean shavings as needed. Broiler chicks spend two weeks in it before moving outside. The pack is now almost a foot deep. Once the pack got perhaps 6 inches deep (quite a while back since it settles a good bit) you could feel warmth radiating up from it when you held your hand over it. And not only does the bedding pack provide heat, but it also seems to be generating food and forage training for the chicks. A month or so back we started to notice the chicks scratching more than previous batches had. We thought we must have gotten a particularly active batch (we pick up broilers from Moyers every few weeks so the chicks should be about the same), but closer examination revealed masses of wiggly brown critters anywhere the pack was a bit moist (not house fly larvae, I know what those nasties look like). No idea what they are but the babies love them. They now are actually digging down 4 or 5 inches (yes, week-old, lazy broiler chicks!) and creating great craters. And after we have moved the last two batches outside I think they do forage a wee bit more on the pasture than earlier batches did. Deep decomposing bedding is also supposed to help prevent and combat disease problems. Does it? In the months since the pack started heating up we have not seen any diarrhea or pasted butts, and have lost just one poult to a respirtory illness and one chick that failed to grow and eventually starved at about 10 days old (not sure what might have caused that, but I suspect a defect in the chick rather than diseasethe 50 other chicks in the same batch grew normally). Out of 25 poults and 250-300 broiler chicks that seems a quite respectable showing. Has the deep bedding helped? Who knows, but it certaily doesnt seem to hurt. It doesnt smell bad either, in case anyone was wondering. Just a mild earthy-chickeny smell. ~Jean Nick, Happy Farm, Kintnersville, PA

Working with Broody Hens: Let Mama Do It (Part One)

Photo by Brenda Van Ness I wrote this article for the June/July 2006 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine, a great resource for the homestead flock owner.

Table of Contents
Part One Part TwoPart ThreePart FourPart Five I hope all readers of Backyard Poultry read Gail Damerows excellent Chick SuccessStart Those Birds Right! in the April/May issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine. I have brooded dozens of clutches of chicks over the past twenty years or more using the practices Gail outlines, and can assure readers that the process is not especially mysterious or trickyyou are likely to find it relatively easy to start a clutch of chicks in a homemade brooder.

Mother Hen with Chicks However, as I read Gails article, I couldnt help but feel rather fortunate, because so many of her precautions against disaster are things I simply do not worry about. For example, she

warns that the brooder must be draft free and that it must be kept at 95F the first week. But my first chicks of the seasona week out of the shellare out on the pasture even as I write. The temperature is 45-50, and there is a 20-mile-an-hour windtoo chilly for me to be outside without being well wrapped. The chicks are scooting around like little waterbugs. (The temperature last night was 29, freezing the waterers.) Gail warns about the dangers of stress, infection, and boredom if the birds become too crowded as they growleading to infections, toe and feather picking, even cannibalism. Sounds pretty horrifyingbut my little chicks have a large plot of pasture at their disposal. They are hardly crowded, and certainly show no signs of being bored. Gail advises us about avoiding chick diseases, especially coccidiosis, including the admonition Brood your chicks away from older birdsbut I dont even think about coccidiosis, and I dont know that Ive ever had losses to disease of any sort among my chicks on pasturewho are with the adult laying flock from day one. Indeed, the loss of a chick to misadventure of any sort is a great rarity. Gail gives good advice for avoiding pasting upan outcome devoutly to be wished, as I can attest after picking sticky goo off the rear end of many a distressed chick in the past. These days? I never, ever have a case of pasting up. So what is the difference between Gails carefully-managed brooder and my easy-going attitude toward week-old chicks? I decided long ago that a mother hen is a lot smarter than me when it comes to raising chicks. Thus the smart thing for me to do is: Let mama do it! I have never used an artificial incubator, preferring to hatch new stock under broody hens though as said, I have artificially brooded many clutches of purchased chicks. For two years now, however, I have not purchased any chicks at all, and am raising all my chicks (150 last year) using broody hens exclusively, from eggs out of my own breeders.

Where Are the Broody Hens?

I meet many poultry enthusiasts who would like to use broody hens, but who are frustrated. They want to know my secret for making a hen go broodythat is, get into the mood to incubate eggs and raise chicks. The true secret, though, is that we (human keepers of poultry) have made it emphatically clear to modern hens that their mothering instincts are not welcome. That is, we have considered broodiness a big nuisance (since a hen who is brooding is not laying; and weve decided that managing broody hens is a lot of trouble), so have selected against this natural instinct in modern breeds. If we make going broody a capital offense, it doesnt take long for the hens to get the point! The result is that in most breeds developed in the past hundred and fifty years, the broody instinct is either entirely lacking, or hit-or-miss at best. Hens of some breedsCochins, Buff Orpingtonsare more likely to express the trait than most, but even in these breeds, emergence of a good working broody is more the exception than the rule.

Old English Games

So my secret for getting lots of broody hens to do my hatching? Revert to the older, historic breeds among whom broodiness is the norm rather than an oddity. Old English Games, for example, express the trait at virtually 100%, and the hens are accomplished, attentive, and fiercely protective mothers. Note that I am not recommending basing ones entire flock on a broody breed. A broody hen is indeed less productive where egg laying is concernedwhile incubating eggs and raising her chicks, she does not lay. But one can establish a sub-flock of reliable working broodies, based on historic breeds much in need of preservation, to do all ones hatching and brooding chores. (In addition to Old English Games, consider Kraienkoppes, Malays, Shamos, Asils, Madagascar Games, Silkies, and some strains of Dorking.) Once my sub-flock of working broodies is established, I permit them simply to mingle with the flock until they indicate they want to be mamas. Only at that point is it necessary to do anything special with the broody hen.

Selecting for the Broody Trait: The Boxwood Broody

This page appeared as a sidebar in my article Working with Broody Hens: Let Mama Do It for the June/July 2006 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine. Im the sort of guy who thinks the way to make progress is to take a giant step backwards: I want to strengthen, rather than weaken, the mothering instinct through selective breeding. Last year I started an experimental cross intended to do just that. Who knowsI could end by developing a new breed: the Boxwood Broody. (Boxwood is the name weve given our homestead.) I have bred Old English Games for several years, making the OEG hens the foundation of my working mother sub-flock. Not only have they been 100 percent broody for me, they are attentive and protective mothers. They are small, however, and can only cover 9 or 10 eggs per hatch. It would be nice to have larger hens with the same broody skills, but who can hatch more chicks with the same management input on my part. I have also been fortunate to have a few hens of larger breeds do mama duty for me. Last year I made the first experimental crosses using two of those hens: OEG cock onto proven Partridge Chantecler and Rose Comb Dorking broodies. I kept the best F1 cock, as well as several F1 hens, of each cross. This spring I placed the two F1 cocks and all the F1 hens together, along with the original Chantecler and Dorking, and additional larger hens who proved themselves as broodies last year: Cuckoo Marans, Welsummer, Silver Grey Dorking, and Spangled Russian Orlof. I have set about 40 eggs from these matings to produce an F2 generation. My first hatch of the season was under one of the OEG x Chantecler hens, who is doing a superb job of raising her nine F2 chicks out on the pasture. During the growing season, my primary selection criterion for both pullets and cockerels of the experimental cross is larger body size. After each breeding season, however, the primary criterion among the hens will be demonstrated mothering skills: A medium size hen with excellent broody skills will always trump a large mediocre broody.

As my breeding project goes forward, I am applying ever stricter selection criteria. Finely honed broody skills are paramount. A broody who offers to be a mother must do so early in the seasonMarch or April. She must accept the transition to the broody box and get down to business without hesitation. She must stay solidly on her eggs, and keep a clean nest. She must produce a high hatch rate, and perform as wise, caring, and protective mother after she brings her chicks off the nest. Hens who are late to go broody, who do so but are fussy about settling in the broody box, who are restless on the nest, who poop the nest, who smother chicks during hatch, or who are not closely attentive of their clutch after hatchsuch mediocre broodies are culled from the breeding program. Obviously as the selection program proceeds, I will gain more competent broodies than I need. But no highly skilled working broody will ever be culled to the stewpot. I know many people interested in working with natural mothers, and will pass on my smaller proven broodies to them. One point of concern in my breeding program is that my F1 cocks are rather feisty, reflecting the game side of their inheritance. At some point I plan to work some cocks of large, less aggressive breeds that tend to retain the broody trait (Cochin, Brahma, Buff Orpington, Marans, Chantecler, Buckeye, Java, Wyandotte) into the mix. As long as broody skills among the hens remain high, it would be nice if the boys were a bit more mellow.

Working with the Cock(s) in the Flock Part One

I wrote this article for the April/May 2006 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine, a great resource for the homestead flock owner.

Table of Contents
Part OnePart TwoPart Three It is not necessary to have a male in your flock of laying hens. If you live cheek by jowl with neighbors who might object to the crowing of a cock, you can keep a flock of much quieter hens without problems. Of course, the eggs will not be fertile absent the attentions" of the male; however, the hens will lay just as many eggs. And they will form their own hierarchical social structure without a male. If you want fertile eggs, of course, you must have a cock in the flock. In which case, what is the ratio between cocks and hens for fertility? The answers to the question range from 8-12 hens per cock, up to 25 or even more. Clearly the answer depends somewhat on how certain we need to be of 100 percent fertility in the eggs.

Old English Game Cock with Hens

Behavior
I prefer having at least one cock in the flock. I enjoy the way he completes the social pattern in the flock, and how he looks out for his ladies. The cock has the reputation of being something of a bully, based on his typically pretty crass manner with the ladies: He approaches the hen without much apparent by-your-leave and mounts her in a way that seems almost violent. We sympathize with the hen, shaking herself off as if to say, Well! Glad thats over!" But the cock is actually quite solicitous of his flock. Alert to the sky, he gives the alarm if a hawk swoops over, setting off a dash for cover. I have heard stories of cocks attacking dogs or foxes in defense of the flock. And if you want to see the true colors of the cock, throw some special tidbita cricket or grasshopper youve just caughtinto the flock, near the cock. Does he shove the hens out of his way like the bully we thought he was, and gobble this special treat for himself? Not at all! He calls the hens with a special deep-throated burble used at no other time. It is especially endearing to see him pick up the cricket and beak" it to one of his favorite hens. Clearly, he has the instinctual wisdom to know that the hen needs this nutritional boost to produce the nutrient-dense egg that will carry on their species. One behavior on the part of the cock you might look for in particular is dancing." Temple Grandin, well known for her work with domesticated animals, has remarked on this dancing" behavior: The cock performs a strutting dance for the hen, which convinces her to squat and welcome his advances. The mating is accomplished without the violence referred to above, and the hen is never injured, even when the cocks spurs are long and sharp. Grandin believes that we have not paid attention to this dancing behavior when breeding our chickens, and that

modern cocks have forgotten" how to dance, with the result that mating is carried on with more violence, and sometimes results in injury to the hen. I have begun looking for dancing on the part of the cocks in my flocks. Unfortunately, I suspect that the more cocks in the flock, the greater the tendency for a cock to make his move" in a hurry, before being challenged by another male! In the coming breeding season, when all the cocks are in separate pens with the hens Ive chosen, Ill take note of dancing behavior. I may even make dancing a factor when selecting cocks to keep for further breeding. If the cock in your flock is not a dancer, be on the lookout for spur injuries to the hen. I have occasionally seen hens whose sides were seriously injured in mating. Indeed, in extreme cases the internal organs were visible through the gaping rents in the hens side. Isolating such hens immediately is imperative. (When protected from further injury, their recuperative powers are astounding. Still, I have lost a hen or two to spur wounds, as have others of my acquaintance.) I have started routinely trimming the spurs of all my older breeding cocksthe ones with the long, sharp spursusing an ordinary pruning shears. Please note that you must not make the cut too close to the shankor the bird may bleed to death! Shear the spur off no closer than half its length. There will be bleeding, and you can use a styptic if you like, but bleeding will not be serious if the cut is properly made. I had an elderly neighbor who kept chickens for many years. Sitting by his chicken pen, he would observe the flocks behavior four or five hours at a time. I think he knew more about chicken mating behavior than any expert in any ag college in the country. So if you got two roosters," he told me, the top guy is gonna have his pick of the henshell have his own special group that are his. Hell look out for em, and hell tread em. The other rooster can tread the other hens, but the top guy will keep him away from the hens hes picked. Well sir, after about four hours therell be a change! Suddenly the top guy will be treading a different group of hens!" If my friend was accurate in his description of natural flock behavior, think of the implications: The dominant male gets his pick of the hensthat is, priority when it comes to passing on his genes. But the flock has the instinctual wisdom to know that the subordinate cock also has his role to play in ensuring genetic diversityin keeping some wild cards" in the handand affords him the opportunity as well to pass his genes on to the future flock.

Breeding Your Backyard Flock

The following article was published in the February/March 2007 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine. It was posted to the site December 16, 2008. Successful breeding starts with the recognition that diploid species, whether human or chicken, have paired homologus chromosomes in their somatic cells. Thus phenotypes expressed in the F1 generation are dependent on whether the alleles for a given trait are coded for dominance or recessivenessalthough they are often neither. Got that? Me either. Relax.

Setting your goals

Cuckoo Marans Trio If you have an interest in the intricacies of genetics, by all means learn all you can. Certainly the competitors in the large poultry shows know a great deal about the interaction of genes to give quite specific results. Their birds are works of art, sketched in DNA. You can achieve the same impressive resultsbut only with regard to traits, such as feather color and pattern, comb style, etc., which are determined by a single gene. It is important for homesteaders interested in breeding their own stock to understand, however, that not one of the utilitarian traits likely to be of most concern to them is the result of a single gene. The rate of growth or the level of egg production, for example, or the ability to produce large eggs or resist diseasethese result from interactions of many genes, and thus are not subject to selection by targeting individual genes. In some casesbroodiness is an excellent examplethe genetic basis for the trait is not even known. Clearly the trait is inheritabledegree of broodiness exhibited in various breeds differs markedlybut no one knows which specific genes are responsible for this complex behavior. The good news is that breeding for such traits comes down not to detailed knowledge of alleles, genes, autosomes, etc., but to the intuitive, common-sense wisdom that has guided livestock breeding since domestication began: You get the best results (offspring) by mating your best individuals. Its that simple. The truly liberating implication is that best is defined by your specific goals for your flock. You do not have to seek out the expert who can tell you what is best breeding practice in your breeding program, since no one else is in a position to decide what traits are worth emphasizing in your flock. Do you prefer a pullet with early onset of lay, or one who reaches table-fowl size quickly? A hen who lays more frequently, or lays a larger egg? If you make a lot of scrambled eggs, perhaps you dont care that some of your hens lay misshapen eggs, while you might be more of a stickler for good egg shape if you sell to a market, or if youre just enchanted with the simple beauty of a perfectly shaped egg (thats me). If you raise a breed known for dark shell color like the Cuckoo Marans, do you favor breeders with the chocolate shell color, even if they are not as productive? Which is more important, a hen with higher annual production, or one who keeps her rate of lay better in the slack winter period? You might notice that some of your cockerels build a large frame first, then flesh out to impressive size. Would you prefer a smaller cockerel who reaches table size sooner? No one can answer these questions for you, and no one can give you a genetic formula for achieving the goals you resolve on. Only a refinement of your ability to make appropriate selections over successive breeding seasons will achieve your goals. A lifetime should suffice. Top of page

Start with good stock

Frankenturkey A major reason to breed your own is that you may well produce better results than many of the commercial hatcheries. Huge operations featuring large breeding flocks and producing hundreds of thousands of hatchlings cannot give the same care to observing and culling for flaws that the small flock owner can. Is it any surprise we are seeing more birds with crossed beak, deformed feet, crooked keel, etc? Most hatcheries breed to the lowest common denominator of commercial flock needs, certainly not to your particular homestead goals; and they breed for volume production, not longevity. Finally and most importantly, almost all commercial breeding flocks are raised in high-confinement situations routinely utilizing antibiotics and other medications to make the model work. When you buy commercial hatchlings, every decision behind their breeding has assumed a high-confinement paradigm in which the birds are short-lived, expendable, and dependent on formulated feeds and medications. Hardly the stuff of which sturdy homestead flocks are made. It is better to start with stock bred to thrive in a homestead or small farm context. Join Society for Preservation of Poultry Antiquities and American Livestock Breeds Conservancy, and get in touch with other members willing to share sturdier stock. Then use your own circumstances of climate, access to forage, predation pressures, management style, etc.to help winnow the flock and select the breeders that best fit your goals.

Rigorous selection
When Andrew Christie was developing his strain of New Hampshire Reds, he kept his breeders in pasture shelters through his harsh New England winters. Those who rose to that challenge went on to become a robust strain of super-hardy birds that were a major contribution to American chickendom. Do not be shy about adopting a similar survival of the fittest strategyit is the key to breeding more robust flocks. For example, if a bird develops a serious eye infection, shouldnt we reject it from the breeding program in preference to one who in the same conditions avoided the infection? Or suppose one hen gets the infection but recovers without issue, while her sister is left with a blind or recurrently swelling eyewhich is the obvious candidate for filling the future gene pool? Such questions are not easy, but in the long run they are far more important to the quality of the flocks we breed than the question of where to find the latest magic-bullet medication. If the above seems heartless or uncaring, be assured that I see nothing wrong with intervening to help a bird in distress, or keeping pet chickens with obvious flaws to whom we have

become attached. Just dont allow birds with demonstrated weaknesses to serve as breeders. For example, we once had an adorable Old English Game bantam cock with deformed feet whom we named Charlie Brown. Charlie would dance for the ladies, scold misbehaving flock members, and break up fights, keeping us constantly entertained. He lived to a ripe old age before dying a natural deathbut I never used him for breeding.

Breed for preservation

A breeding program focused on our own particular goals does not imply a haphazard approach to breeding. We honor both the birds in our care and the work of generations of breeders before us by preserving the unique characteristics of our breeds. Failure to breed for preservation results ultimately in generic chickens lacking in the complex genetics from which we can draw for future needs in changing circumstances.

Making crosses

Boxwood Broody Cock This is not to say there is no place for experimental crosses in our flocks. After all, all existing breeds started as crosses, deliberate or accidental. Making crosses can be great fun, and can fit into overall homestead goals. For example, I am approaching my fourth year working with a cross I call Boxwood Broodiesa cross of Old English Game cocks onto proven broody hens of larger size, to produce a working broody subflock with the mothering skills of the OEG, but able to raise a larger number of chicks per clutch. Crosses can yield surprising results. I once crossed New Hampshire Red cocks onto White Jersey Giant hens. None of the offspring were any possible combination of red and white rather, they were all varying mixes of black and red. This was puzzling until I remembered that the White Jersey Giant actually began as a white sport of the Black Jersey Giant (more than sixty years ago). Charles Darwin referred in one of his books to a crossing of two decidedly non-broody Mediterranean-class breeds, all the daughter offspring of which expressed the broody trait. Isnt it comforting that, just below the veneer of our manipulations of domestic breeds, lie the complexities of their own deep wisdom, ready to express themselves in new and surprising ways with a single roll of the genetic dice. Top of page

Selecting for homestead traits

If we are breeding for homestead traits (as opposed to the fine points of comb and color), the following factors might guide our selections.

Health, vigor, and an ability to adjust to stress such as rapid weather changes
Positively, this means selecting those individuals who best thrive in the particular stresses and challenges of our own circumstances. Negatively, it means culling against weakness of any sort, whether demonstrated susceptiblity to disease, or structural flaws like crossed beak, crooked keel (breastbone), and deformed feet.

Foraging skills
Assuming you are able to raise your birds on pasture or free-ranging, birds who get out and rustle their own grub should be favored as breeders over those that prefer to hang around the feed trough.

Broodiness

Boxwood Broody Hen with Chicks Whether we see broodiness as blessing or bother depends on our goals. I hatch new stock under natural mothers exclusively, so I value the mothering trait. On the other hand, like anyone, I want that steady supply of incomparable eggs. My solution is to keep a subflock of working broodies (Old English Games, Dorkings, and my Boxwood Broody cross) for mothering duty. Among this group, any hen who fails to brood is culled to the stewpot. At the same time, I keep a subflock of Silver Spangled Hamburgs, typically a non-broody breed, to keep egg production up. In this group, any hen who goes broody is culled.

Behavior and temperament

Some behaviors are somewhat set in a given breed. For instance, Mediterranean breeds tend to be more excitable, more likely to get upset when we approach. Certain breeds such as the Oriental games tend to be more aggressive. Of course, almost all behaviors are greatly influenced by management practices. Within the parameters of best management for good temperament and the limitations imposed by the breeds we are working with, however, we might select breeders on the basis of behavior and temperament.

Cuckoo Marans Buddies

Old English Game Cock With regard to aggression, any cock that is aggressive toward people unprovoked is ruthlessly culled in my flock. With regard to aggression among cocks, the question gets more complicated. I find that my Cuckoo Marans cocks are generally pretty laid back, and work out dominance-submission questions easily. Old English Game cocks, not surprisingly, are a good deal more aggressive with each other; and investing more care to prevent mayhem is necessary if I want to work with this breed. Still, I usually cull a homicidal maniaca more than usually aggressive cock. (See Working with the Cock(s) in the Flock for more on managing aggression.) Selection regarding aggression in hens might be pegged more to the management situation. For example, if hens with clutches of chicks are completely free-ranging, Touch my babies and you die! is good. In a more confined situation, we may prefer Hey, Matilda, really sweet chickswhy dont yall come over and play!

Longevity
Longevity has been largely ignored in the commercial breeding of poultry, and indeed many homesteaders have unconsciously played along through a two years and out approach to their laying flocks. But we would be wise not to throw out the genetics for longevity in our birds. Not only does it require more time and resource to bring a new group of birds to maturity more frequently, but the genes for longevity are apparently the same as, or closely linked to, the genes for health and vigor. Homesteaders should make longevity a factor in selection. If Matilda and Henrietta are producing eggs at the same rate but Matilda is a year older, why cull Matilda just because she has completed her second laying season? Doesnt it make more sense to cull Henrietta, and pass on Matildas genes for longevity and maintenance of production?

Breeding systems
Whatever your specific goals, it is important to have an understanding of the various breeding systems that have been usedline breeding, clan matings, out-crossing, etc. A good overview is Traditional Breeding Programs for the Home Flock in the April/May 2006 issue of Backyard Poultry. (See Charles Everetts excellent introduction to breeding strategies, Further Breeding Options, in the February/March 2007 issue of Backyard Poultry. However, it is not available in the online version of the magazine.) I mostly use the rolling mating system, mating cocks to pullets, and cockerels to hens (but not individuals of the same generation), since I like to keep things simple and minimize record keeping. When I find good individuals outside my flock, I work them into the system to diversify the gene pool. Top of page

Selection in practice
Whatever system you use, careful selection of breeders is the key to success. Selection is a hands-on as well as a visual process. Handle the birds to determine body style or flaws such as crooked keel that are hidden under the plumage. Note especially conformation of the breast, whether narrow and pointy, or broad and plump. When I am selecting Old English Games, for example, I always favor plumper cocks with broader breasts, in preference to the lean, compact body style favored in a bird intended for the fighting pit. As always, it is much less stressful (for both the birds and for you) to handle fowl at night. Of course, visual inspection of the birds is impeded at night; so perhaps a hand selection and isolation at night can be followed by further visual inspection the next day.

Hood while Weighing A scale for weighing your birds is a good investmentits amazing how much the weight of birds that look the same size can vary. A little trick Ive learned when weighing fowl: When you lay the bird in the scoop of the scale, hood its head with your hand as closely as you can without touching it, then release the feet. The bird remains quiescent for the second it takes to get your reading. Grasp the feet again before removing the hood of your hand over the birds eyes. On the male side, selection is a matter of weight, age, body conformation, temperament, plumage, comb style, etc. You can also track comparative fertility if you want to get detailed enough in your record keeping, though a fertility problem in a well managed homestead flock is unlikely.

On the female side, nest-trapping is the key to selectionyou have to know actual performance of individual hens to make informed decisions. Without trapping, you cannot track key traits in breeder selection such as onset of lay, egg production, rate of lay in relation to body size at any given point in the hens development, egg size, longevity related to production, egg shape and color, etc. Without trapping, you will not know who is laying that wonky egg that is driving me crazy? See Making and Using Trap Nests, a pictorial of the construction and use of a trap nest design that has worked for me.

My Long Goose Breeding Saga

This article was first published in the December 2010/January 2011 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine.

Table of Contents for This Page

Pilgrims I Africans Pilgrims II Pilgrims III Sidebar: Information and Stock

I love raising geese, and recommend you give them a try if you have not. Starting a clutch of day-olds sent through the mail is as easy as starting ducklings or chicks. Geese are grazers without peer among domestic fowl, and, once past the brooder phase, will do fine on good pasture grass exclusively (though will grow faster and fatten better with some supplemental feed). A great option for stacking with other livestock species, they are especially good pasture partners with sheep. Geese grow amazingly fasta goose hatched in the spring is ready to slaughter by around Thanksgivingand not only grace the table with memorable

feasts, but yield large deposits of fat easily rendered into high quality cooking fat. Finally, geese are long-lived, chock-full of personality, and terrifically entertaining. Theres been only one little problem in my work with geese. I like to hatch my own replacement stock when possible, but have found geese more difficult to breed than any other fowl species Ive tried (chickens, ducks, and guineas). Holderread and Ashton, my major sources of information on goose husbandry (see sidebar), agree that breeding geese offers special challenges. Should you decide to try, maybe you can learn from the frustrations Ive encountered in my long and winding goose breeding saga.

Pilgrims I
I first tried breeding a pair of Pilgrim geese, from a group of fifteen goslings received through the mail. I liked Pilgrims because they are closer to what Ashton calls the Common Goose that is, the basic barnyard goose that emerged naturally on farms in Europe and America. Though only a medium size goose, it tends to be sturdier and easier to work with than some of the larger goose breeds, whose development has been driven by selection for exhibition rather than farm utility. Pilgrims may also be the most efficient foragers of all goose breeds; and the geese (females) are considered among the best as mothers among all the common goose breeds. (If you do work with a breed with poor mothering instincts, you can set your goose eggs under a broody hen, duck, Muscovy, or even turkey.) In the fall, when I slaughtered geese, I set aside a male and femaleeasy to identify, since Pilgrims are among the few goose breeds that are dimorphicthat is, among whom geese and ganders are colored differently, making gender selection easy. (See photos of Pilgrim geese below.) There are other dimorphic breedsWest of England, Shetland, Normandy, and Cotton Patchbut they are even rarer, and in most cases smaller, than the Pilgrim. My matched pair thrived through the winter. As late winter hinted of spring, the gander began mounting the goose, right on schedule. Ah, but I became more and more concerned about that mounting of the goose: The gander would climb aboard and stand on the goose as if she were a platform, gazing dreamily around the pasture. The goose was compliant enough, cooperating patiently with the ganders odd approach, but I wondered, Hmmm, does my boy Herman really understand the job here? Still, I gave him the benefit of the doubt, assuming he was a private sort of guy, and got more competent with his work when I wasnt around to see. The goose went broody after I had collected seven of her eggs, making a nest inside a hoop shelter on the pasture. Once it was clear she was thoroughly settled on the nest, I quietly set the eggs under her one night. All seemed to be going well. Then, about halfway through the incubation period (twenty-nine to thirty-one days for geese), I candled the eggs. Imagine my consternation to find there was nobody home, in any of the eggs. My first thought, of course, was of the ganders peculiar mating behavior; and I concluded the guy had failed me, and would have to pay the price. The day I slaughtered the gander, it happened that I started the days work with a mature cock and a mature drake. The first had an impressive pair of testiclessimply enormous, really, in relation to body size. The drakes testicles were, unbelievably, even larger. But when I opened up the hapless gander, I found a couple of testicles the size of peanutsconfirming him as the

reason I wasnt getting any goslings that year. (He redeemed himself somewhat as a delicious roast.) Top of page

Africans
I tried next with a pair of Africans, part of a fine mixed group of goslings, made up of all the breeds available from Holderread Waterfowl Farm. Two of the Africans grew so fast, and were so beautiful, I decided they would be good candidates for producing our annual crop of geese for the freezer. But this choice posed a challenge: Like most domestic goose breeds (but unlike the dimorphic Pilgrim), African geese and ganders are colored the same, making sexing for breeder selection more difficult. You will see folk wisdom about distinguishing goose from gander in these breeds (with reference to height and body size, voice, behavior, neck posture, and size of the knob in the case of Chinese and African); but there is no substitute for vent sexingthat is, the eversion of the cloaca to pop out the genitalia for examination. Should you try vent sexing of geese (or ducks), carefully study a good guide to the process, since it is possible to injure the bird if you dont handle it with great care. In the best case, this is a stressful procedure, so you will want to manage it with least stress. Do note that vent sexing is more likely to be accurate with young goslings, three to five weeks old, and with adults, and much less so at eight to sixteen weeks. I did vent sex my pair of Africans before selection as breeders. But there is a little gotcha to watch out for when vent sexing. If you fully evert a males penisa peculiar corkscrew shaped appendage dotted with small rubbery knobsyou have a 100 percent certain identification: Its a boy! Ah, but if you do not fully evert, the penis can lurk inside, and show externally almost exactly like the more modest genital eminence of the female. Those who are new to the game may lack sufficient skills to pull it off correctly. I followed directions as earnestly as I was ablebut it seems I was indeed too new to the game. Convinced I had a guy and a gal to do what would need to be done, I patiently waited through two full seasons. Smaller breeds, and those closer to your basic farm goose such as the Pilgrim, are likely to be sexually mature in time for the breeding season in the following spring. In the case of larger breeds, however, it is common for sexual maturation to take longer: The gander will likely be ready to breed at a year old, but the goose may not lay until two years oldand rarely, even three. So I was not concerned when my African goose produced no eggs in the first season after hatch. But when there were still no eggs the following year, I decided it was time to vent sex again. Turns out I had just put two full years into two guys who were never going to be anything more to each other than good buddies. It was too late in the season to start a new goose flock from purchased day-olds. Things were getting frustrating. Top of page

Pilgrims II
Suddenly the fact that Pilgrims are the most readily available of auto-sexing geese took on a great deal of significance to meI couldnt imagine risking more wasted time with guessing games about gender. So I ordered a clutch of fifteen Pilgrim goslings from one of the

countrys major hatcheries, buying from that source because they were so much cheaper than those from Dave Holderreads flock. (Repeat after me: You get what you pay for!) All went well until time to slaughter in the fall. I had more ganderstheyre the ones with white plumage and blue eyes, right?so I started with six of them. Imagine my shock when I opened those birds to find that three of them had miniature egg clusters, in lieu of testicles. I called the hatchery about the failure of the auto-sexing feature in my Pilgrims, and was transferred to the manager of the goose breeding division. Unbelievably, the gentleman didnt seem to have a clue why I was so upset that the Pilgrims I had bought from his hatchery couldnt be reliably sexed by color. I then corresponded with Dave Holderread, who assured me: After hatching many thousands of Pilgrims over the last 35 years, we have never produced any that were not sex-able by color. If the birds you purchased are not true autosexing, then they are not Pilgrims. Since a major motivation for choosing Pilgrims was to ensure easy color-sexing for breeders, wild-card Pilgrims were useless to meand I put all my remaining Pilgrims on the slaughter table. The take-home lesson from my sad experience should be: If you want to breed Pilgrims, be certain your source of breeding stock understands dimorphism as a defining trait of this breed, and is committed to maintaining breed purity. Crossing among goose breeds is common in commercial breeding. A Pilgrim x Embden cross would be especially likelyand especially prone to produce a lot of white, blue-eyed progeny of either sex. Make sure the source of your starter stock is neither clueless (as the hatchery manager seemed to be) nor unscrupulous, to be sure of starting your project with reliably color-sexing Pilgrims. Top of page

Pilgrims III
In the spring of 2009 I was ready to try again. (Im not especially smart, but Im stubborn.) This time I spent the extra bucks to get fifteen goslings from Holderread Waterfowl Farm. At fall slaughtering I selected one gander and two geese as breeders. Since both Holderread and Ashton emphasize the importance of access for geese to fresh green forage, I was glad as winter came on that I had sowed a large cover crop of rye beside my poultry house. Though not actively growing over the winter, it remained lush and green, and there was enough of it to provide all the forage needed by three geese. I also fed soaked wheat, recommended by Ashton as a favorite of geese, and maintained a free-choice supply of crushed oyster shell and the largest granite grit. I set up a hundred-gallon rubber watering tank for the geese to batheand matein. Pilgrim geeseand other small and medium breedscan manage to mate on the ground, though they prefer mating on water deep enough to swim in. (Some of the large breeds simply cannot mate successfully without access to water. Note as well that a broody goose with access to bathing during nest breaks will carry some water back to the nest on her feathers, helping ensure adequate incubation humidity.) Freezing was not much of a problem: The tank was black, so overnight ice melted rapidly after the sun came out.

Wouldnt you know itit was on Saint Valentines Day that we first saw Weston, the gander, mating one of the geese out on the snow. We observed mating every couple of days thereafter. About ten days later, we found the first egg on the litter in the goose corner of the poultry house. (It is the attentions of the gander that bring on the hormonal changes that induce laying in the goose.) Within a week, we started seeing two eggs on the same dayclearly Weston was mating both geese. (Geese pair-bond for life. However, the gander will mate additional geese on the sidehow many varies by breed.)

Broody Goose in Pasture Nest Unit It was three weeks later before I built a two-nest, A-frame shelter outside, in the plot of rye, which was protected from predators by an electric net fence. Since youre doubtless smarter than I am, I hope you wont wait that longset up the nests where you want your breeding geese to lay well before laying begins. I was lucky: Both geese accepted the new nests as the place to lay without demur. Do note that, once a goose goes broody, she cannot be moved without breaking her up. To make the nests, I nailed together some scrap plywood strips to make shallow open boxes 24 inches on a side, 4 inches high, screwed onto the center partition to keep them in place. Inside them, I dug out shallow depressions in the earth, lined them with burlap, then with wood chips, then topped them off with clean straw. I left the earliest eggs in the two nest boxes to encourage further laying. (The early eggs are often not fertile.) Then I began collecting eggs for hatching, storing them on their sides in a cool place in our house, and turning them once a day (180 degrees clockwise one day, 180 degrees counterclockwise the next). Once I had as many hatching eggs as I wanted to set, I rotated the older ones out as new ones came in. (We dont care for goose eggs for the table as much as chicken and duck eggs. However, they are perfectly usable, and like duck eggs are valued for baking.) In mid-April, one of the geese, Gretchen, stayed on the nest full-time. On a nest break next day, I found her nest lined with breast feathersa sure sign among waterfowl of onset of broodiness. After a couple more days to ensure she would lay no more eggs, I waited for a nest break by Gretchen, and placed nine of the reserved hatching eggs in her nest. From that point, I stayed well away from the nest, to avoid unsettling her. Gretchen remained faithful to her duties. For more than the expected thirty days. Grabbing an opportune nest break, day thirty-two, I checked the nest. I found three hatched goslings who

had been smothered because their mother remained too heavy on them during hatchnot an unusual mistake for an inexperienced mother. I checked the remaining eggs, some of which were not fertile. Again, that is not too unusual for the first breeding season for geese, when fertility is often low; but this was failure number four, and my frustration level was climbing. Lucy, the second goose, showed no inclination toward broodiness, and Gretchen was still setting, so I set nine more eggs under Gretchen. She remained on the nest for three more weeks, but then abandoned itthere are limits to patience for anybody, I suppose. Just as I reconciled myself to another attempt down the drain, Lucy went broody in the second nest box. I prayerfully set my final seven hatching eggs, all I hadand waited. On the twenty-ninth day I heard a distinct gosling squeak. Observing from a discrete distance, I could see that Lucy, unlike Gretchen, had the knack of backing off the hatching eggs a bit, to give the struggling goslings some space to break out of the egg and to breathe. And her care was paying off: There was already a fluffy yellow gosling, looking out at the world in surprise.

Success at last! I allowed Lucy to leave the nest when she was ready, followed by three perky goslings. A check of the unhatched eggs revealed that some were not fertileagain, a disappointment, but not unusual for a first-season clutch.

Pilgrim Goose Family Lucy was delighted to be back with Weston and Gretchen. I had anticipated that Weston would help as a papa (ganders help parent the goslings, and can be quite fierce in their defense); but Aunt Gretchen as well engaged fully in the nurture of the hatchlings. I am providing the same feed that I make for my chicks and ducklings; mowing the pasture to stimulate new growth that is not only more tender (tough grass can cause impaction in goslings), but higher in protein; and maintaining the electric net fence to guard against predators. Though this first hatch has been a limited success, to this proud papa it is most welcome after my long saga of frustrations.

Geese grow fast! Top of page

Breeding Geese: Sources of Information and Stock

My favorite books on raising geese are Dave Holderreads The Book of Geese (Hen House Publications, 1981) and Chris Ashtons Domestic Geese (Crowood Press, 1999). I found Ashtons book a bit more fulsome on the details of breeding geese and management of the broody goose.

Check out feathersite.coms pictures and descriptions of goose breeds.

If youre interested in breeding geese, there is good conservation work for you to do geese are among the most neglected of all domestic fowl. You can get in touch with other breeders by joining American Livestock Breeds Conservancy, which maintains lists and descriptions of livestock breeds in need of conservation, including geese.

Joining the Society for the Preservation of Poultry Antiquities (SPPA) will also put you in touch with breeders dedicated to conservation breeding of all domestic fowl.

Holderread Waterfowl Farm is widely seen as the best commercial source for waterfowl stock on this continent. Though Dave Holderread is no longer offering Pilgrims, I have been pleased with the many batches of goslings and ducklings, of many breeds, I have bought from HWF over the years. (Dave does sell Shetlands, another auto-sexing breed.)

Metzer Farms specializes in waterfowl and offers assistance with FAQs and blogging sections on their website.

Sand Hill Preservation Center is another source of goslings, from Glenn Drowns, deeply committed to poultry breed conservation. (SHPC is a source of Pilgrims.)

Making and Using Trap Nests

This pictorial of the design and construction of my trap nests appeared as a sidebar to Breeding the Homestead Flock, published in the February/March 2007 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine. It was posted to the site December 16, 2008.

Materials Construction Using Trap Nests Troubleshooting

When I first started raising chickens, I remember seeing trap nests for sale from poultry equipment suppliers. Now, I cant find them anywhere. So I made my own. Ive seen a number of designs for trap nests, including one in Rolfe Cobleighs Handy Farm Devices and How to Make Them, a useful book for the homesteader, first published in 1909. Modern homesteaders could enter trap nest into a search engine and find workable designs. But my own design emerged in one of my fathers visits, when we tackled the trap nest project. After mulling over a couple of designs I showed him, he concluded he didnt much like either, and proposed, Why dont we do it the way Grandaddy used to put together his rabbit boxes? I remembered my grandfathers rabbit traps (or rabbit gums, as the oldtimers called them), with which he caught hundreds of rabbits on his place. Despite some skepticism about turning a trap for rabbits into one for hens, I agreed to give it a try. The design has worked well for meperhaps youd like to try it as well. The following description sketches assembly of two units, each containing two separate trap nests.

Materials

One sheet of plywood, CDX Small nails for edge-nailing the plywood and nailing on strips 8 - #10 2 or 2--inch self-drilling screws 2 - 8-ft 1x4 pine boards 2 - 24x12 inch pieces of -inch mesh hardware cloth An additional few small pieces of hardware cloth, any mesh (optional) 8 - open screw hooks (about 2- inches or so)

1 - -inch dowel, 36 inches long

The above are the materials needed if starting from scratch. Buy -inch or 5/8-inch plywood, depending on which you are confident you can edge-nail effectively. However, many homesteads will have on hand enough scrap from other projects to piece together what is needed. I used some scrap -inch plywood for the sides and backs, and -inch for the tops. The door stops, front perches, and nest fronts I cut from 1-inch rough-cut poplar. All the required strips I cut from one-by scrap. Theres no problem altering the suggested dimensions to accomodate material youre working with, so long as sufficient interior space is allowed for the laying hens. The nails I used were 4d 1-3/8-inch and 6d 1-7/8-inch coated sinkers. Top of page

Construction

(A) Top and Sides (A) Start by cutting 2 - 12x24 pieces of plywood for the backs, and 6 - 12x18 pieces for the sides and middle partitions.

(B) Windows (B) I cut little windows into the sides of the nests, a step thats probably not really necessary. I cut them in the four exterior side pieces only (not in the interior partitions), making the openings about 4x9.

(C) Drill Tops (C) Cut 2 - 16-x24 pieces of plywood for the tops. Drill two 5/8-inch holes for the trigger sticks in these top pieces, 6 inches in from the sides and 6 inches in from the back. When drilling through plywood, the exit hole tends to be a bit ragged. Since you want a nice sharp edge to engage the notch in the trigger stick, be sure to start drilling into the side that will be on the inside of the nest. For good ventilation, you can add a few other 5/8-inch holes in the top as well.

(D) Nail Top (D and E) Nail the top onto the back and exterior sides, using the smaller nails (4d 1-3/8inch), aligning as in the picture. Then nail in the interior partition in the middle of the box thus formed.

(E) Partition (F) Youll want to switch to a somewhat larger nail (6d 1-7/8-inch) for some of the nailing in the next several steps. Cut one of your 1x4s in half crosswise, then rip one of the resulting 4ft pieces in half. From the ripped pieces, cut pieces that will stop the doors when they drop. Study the picture of this step carefully, because you can do it more easily than we did. We cut individual pieces that we inset into the spaces between the sides and interior partitions. Not only did that mean more cutting and fitting, but we had to toenail one of the inside ends. Youre much smarter than that, so youre going to cut a single ripped piece to 24 inches, and nail it underneath the front ends of the exterior sides and the interior partition. (When you look at the picture, imagine the two interior cross pieces replaced by a single piece, and the ends of the exterior sides and interior partition sitting on top of it.)

(F) Door Stop (G) Now nail another of the ripped pieces, cut to 24 inches, across the bottom front, aligning as in the picture. This is the perch on which the hen stands as she looks into the interiorthe perfect place to lay an egg. (I later rounded off the sharp edges with a wood rasp, and its nice to the hens feet if you do as well.)

(G) Perch (H) Cut nest-front pieces from (unripped) 1x4. The length will be 24 inches minus the thickness of your sides and interior partition, divided by 2. I was using -inch stock, so I cut mine to 10-7/8 inches. Nail these pieces in place to serve as fronts for the nests, setting them 5 inches in from the front edge. We want the nesting material to be held behind this piece, so the hen will completely enter the nest before triggering the door. (If it triggers early and whacks her behind, she will become shy of the nest.) Note that in this case there is no alternative to toe-nailing the end of one of these pieces where it butts to the interior partition. If you have cut windows in the sides, at this point you can staple hardware cloth over the windows to keep smaller hens from escaping.

(H) Retainers (I) Rip your remaining 1x4 stock into strips as needed. I used -inch and -inch strips for the door tracks and for fastening harware cloth onto the bottom of the nests, respectively. (Thus if you are using 1x4 nominal stock, you will end up with strips of actual x, and x.) You will need approximately 14 ft of inch strips, and approximately 22 ft of inch strips.

(I) Rip (J) Turn nest unit upside down. Cut -inch mesh hardware cloth to 24 inches long and wide enough (12 or 13 inches or so) to span the bottom of the nesting areas (only). Secure the hardware cloth to the underside edges of the nest areas, using small nails and -inch strips cut to needed lengths. (Note that I always use -inch hardware cloth for the bottoms of nest boxes, never solid bottoms. Finer, dustier material sifts out through the wire, I renew the nests with fresh straw from above, and the nests remain largely self-cleaning.)

(J) Bottom (K) Cut -inch strips into 16 - 16-inch pieces. Nail into place as in the picture, aligning the front strip with the front edge of the side or partition, and using a 1-inch spacer to ensure that the back strip is exactly parallel to the front strip. These pairs of vertical strips will define the track through which the door falls. (Strips need only be lightly tacked into place using the smaller nailsthey will bear no load.) Attach some sort of bumper over the door stop (so the door doesnt bang down too loudly and panic the hen). I used strips cut from an old bicycle inner tube.

(K) Tracks (L) The unit is now ready to install. If you attach a cleat to the wall (say, a scrap piece of 2x4), it will be easy to install it by yourself. Otherwise, get a buddy to assist.

(L) Cleat (M) Attachment to the wall must be rock-solid. I used four #10 - 2--inch self-drilling screws for each unit. (By self-drilling, I mean screws such as deck screws not requiring pre-drilling of pilot holes.)

(M) Mount (N) Cut doors 12 inches high from plywood or any stock that you have that is -inch thick. The width is determined by the thickness of material you have used for sides and partition, and allowing inch clearance on each side within the doors tracking slot. I cut mine to 10- inches. Drill holes in the exact center of the top of each door, and screw in a hook. Position another hook overhead, screwed into any accessible structural member of the building. The position of this hook is the most critical alignment in the whole setup: I used a plumb bob to ensure that the overhead hook was precisely perpendicular from the door hook.

(N) Hooks

(O) Trigger Stick

(P) Doors Set (O) Cut a -inch dowel into 9-inch pieces for the trigger sticks. Use a saw to cut 5/16 inch through the dowel, 3- inches from what will be the lower end. (This cut is made with a saw because the shoulder we are shaping here must be well squared, in order to engage the edge of the trigger hole without slipping.) Drill a 3/16-inch hole near the other end of the trigger stick. Using a knife, whittle a notch that starts about 1- inches toward the upper end and comes down to the inside of the shoulder of the notch. (See picture.)

(Q) Trigger Set (P) Time to put it all together. Tie a string between the hole in the top of the trigger stick and the hook in the top of the door, running it through the hook above the door. (Strong braided string that will not stretch is beste.g., mason twine.) The length of the string will depend on the position of the upper hook, of course. Hook the edge of the notch in the trigger stick into the trigger hole, and suspend the door from the upper hook, hanging within its tracking slot. Door should hang slightly above the upper edge of the top of the nest box, so the hens back will not bump it as she enters the nest, triggering premature release. Note that the weight of the door creates tension on the string, which keeps the trigger stick securely notched in the trigger hole. (Q) See picture of the lower end of the trigger stick in the set positon from the inside. As the hen begins her self-important little ballet settling into the nest, she is certain to bump against the trigger stick, knocking it loose and allowing the door to fall into blocking position. Top of page

Using Trap Nests

Nest-trapping is simple: The door falls shut when the hen enters the nest, leaving her trapped until you release her and make a note of her achievement. You dont need to nest-trap all the timethat would be far too time-consuming. Just set up a schedule for trapping and stick to it. For example, you might trap for the same three days of each week during the month when you are selecting your breeder hens. Check the nests frequently throughout the day, especially the morningsat least every hour, more frequently as you have more hens in relation to the number of trap nests. (If urgent hens lay in the litter, there go your carefully accumulated records.) Use the same nests for both trapping and regular laying (with the doors removed). The hens will get accustomed to using them, and laying cycles will not be disturbed by a change of nests. You can code each egg in pencil when you release the hen, or make a note on a sheet you keep by the nestwhatever makes record-keeping easy.

Troubleshooting
If the upper hook is not precisely positioned overhead, the door will not fall straight, and may jam in the tracking slot. If changing the position of the hook doesnt solve the problem, you can box in the sides of the tracking slot with thin strips, ensuring that the door cannot veer to one side as it falls.

Step If you find it difficult to get the trigger stick to stay locked in the trigger hole, try passing the string from the trigger stick through an additional hook overhead (before it continues on to the hook over the door). In this case, however, you do not want the overhead hook to be in line with the trigger hole. Position the second hook at enough of an angle to notch the trigger stick securely in the trigger hole. If hens fly up to the front perch, they may jostle the door, triggering premature release. A prelimanary step up to the nest will ensure a less jarring approach. Doors can be left in the closed position at night if chickens like sleeping in the nests. A lightweight slanted cover can be put into place on top of the nest unit at night to prevent the birds roosting there.

Success!

Dealing with Poultry Predators

*Table of Contents for Predators Section is at bottom of this page.*
Every keeper of poultry discovers sooner or later that there are neighbors out there who like her delicious fowl as much as she does. My own strong feeling is that our response to wild predators (and those not so wildthe local dog could be your worst predation threat) should not be to launch a war on them, but to find ways to coexist peacefully. We share the stories of our own close encounters with various predators in In the Shadow of the Hawk. To put one's own predation issues into perspective, I asked my friend Oogie McGuire to share her own challenges in the mountains of Colorado. If you have your own stories and solutions to share, please be in touch. And good luck keeping the flock intact.

Table of Contents for Predators Section

In the Shadow of the Hawk You Think You Have Predator Problems?

In the Shadow of the Hawk: Part One

I wrote this article for the October/November 2006 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine, a great resource for the homestead flock owner.

Table of Contents
Part OnePart TwoPart Three

A rude awakening
Hey, whats going on? I heard Ellen ask, followed by a snick of the latch on the door. Dont open the door! I screamed. Do not open that door! In a deranged frenzy, I continued swinging the spade at the nimble-footed creature dancing among scattered

carcasses. You @%#$& little $@#&@, you killed my little chickens! I shrieked, taking another wild swing. My daughter Heather started our first flock of chickens, more than twenty years ago. We brooded that first group of 26 New Hampshire Red chicks in an ersatz brooder in my shop, then, when fully feathered (about four weeks), put them out into an 8 x 16 ft shed that was on our place when we moved in. During the day, they happily enjoyed sunshine and bug chases out in a fenced run, but we were careful to shut them in the coop at night, to ward off raids from predators. One morning a week later, my wife Ellen opened the cooponto a scene of appalling carnage: little feathered carcasses lay everywhere, a few missing head or leg, all with bloodied necks. Numbed with horror, she shut the door again. After I got home to the sad news, I went out to clean up the massacre. I had gathered up more than a dozen stiff little casualties, sick at heart, when the cutest little head popped up from behind a board, a look of Who, me? innocence on its face. I didnt even know what this critter was, but knew it had to be the source of this horrible mayhem. Grabbing a spade and shutting the door, I began chasing the little villain around the coop, screaming and cussin. The little guy was amazingly good on his feet, but finally I landed a blow that almost cut him in half. I picked him up, feeling both astonishment that anything so small could be such a killer, and admiration for his perfectionhis needle-like teeth and silk-like pelt. Here was a creature evolved to do one thing supremely well: kill for food. I realized now that I had been naive when I set up my defenses against fox and possum and raccoon, never dreaming that I had to exclude a stealthy stranger this small from the henhouse. If I even thought of the possibility of a weasel, I assumed it was the size of a mink. Now I confronted a Least Weasel (Mustela frenata), smallest (by far) of the weasel tribe. Excluding a short tail, he was no more than six inches long, amazingly slenderanywhere a rat could get in, this guy could as well. Using the head as a template in reverse, I went around the coop, testing every opening under the eaves, beside the rafters. Wherever I could fit that head, I nailed blocks to exclude further attacks. We lost 19 out of 26 in that initiation into raising poultry near neighbors who like our chickens as much as we do. (I was amazed to find as I continued picking up the bodies that seven little chickens had actually survived, hidden well enough to escape the weasel, though for days afterwards utterly traumatized.) We have had losses to a Least Weasel only once more in the intervening years. As said in my article on electric net fencing, I have found electronet almost foolproof for protecting the flock from predators. One August, however, when the ground was extremely dry, I found a dead hen inside my electronet fence three mornings in a row. Though I ensured both fence and charger were in good working order, the kills were all inside the fence, and each hen showed the chewed neck characteristic of weasel attack. I could only assume that a Least Weasel had come in under the lowest charged wire of the net. It would have made contact with the wire, but the insulating effect of the pelt together with the dryness of the soil provided no ground for the current in the fence, and the weasel received no shock. For two weeks thereafter, I shut the chickens inside their pasture shelter at nightthat is, I put into place a physical barrier to the weasel. At the same time, I increased the robustness of the

ground in the fence system: I purchased three -inch thick, eight-foot ground rods, which I drove full length into the ground under the eaves of the poultry house and near the water hydrant, where the soil was certain to be moist any time of year, and connected all three with heavy gauge wire. With the enhanced ground in the system, Ive never had a subsequent problem with grounding (or with weasels), even in times of drought.

Your worst potential predator

Most beginning poultry enthusiasts think of foxes or raccoons when thinking of predation threats. But your most bloody-minded predator could beyour neighbors dog (or even your own). Even dogs who are the sweetest of poochies at home may transform into entirely different creatures on the roam. Especially if running with other dogs, the hunting pack mentalitywhich for millennia meant survivaltakes over, and they can become cunning and efficient killers. The first summer we abandoned the static chicken run, we had 50 Cornish Cross broilers in a Joel Salatin style 10x12 mobile pen on pasture. The birds were growing well, obviously benefiting from the pasture, and I was pleased by the new direction we were takinguntil I went out one morning to find mangled white carcasses scattered over the pasture. Two of my neighbors dogs were still on the scene, clearly pleased with their exploits. (They had both dug under the bottom rail of the pen, and torn a hole in the poultry netting itself, to get at the hapless birds inside.) When I called them, they came without hesitation, wagging their tails. I then called the animal control officer, who hauled them away to the pound. Later, at my request, their owners came over to review the remains of the attack. Fortunately, they paid what I asked for the slaughtered birds and the repair of the pen. Unfortunately, not all owners are so cooperative when solicited by flock owners being harrassed by their dogs. A buddy of mine has gotten fed up with going to owners of dogs on the loose who say, in response to his report of harrassment of his flock, Oh, really? Wow, youve really got a problem there, dont you! My buddy says that these days such owners only get one courtesy call. After that, its shoot, shovel, and shut up. My solution to the attack on my mobile pen was to wire for defense: I mounted a small battery-powered fence charger right on the pen, and ran single-strand electric wire around the pen, both at nose level near the ground and about 12 inches up, standing it off from the pen with insulators. I never again had an attack on a movable pasture pen with a functioning electric defense. I have, however, experienced two successful dog attacks on chickens inside fencing. One was from a wily old bitch and her year-old daughter (kept by a neighbor but not especially well fed, I suspectthese dogs were hunting not as fun and games, but out of hunger). Again, that pack mentality came to the fore: One dog would rush the fence, spooking the chickens inside into panic flight over the fenceright into the waiting jaws of the other dog. Another case where the animal control officer came riding to the rescue, and hauled the marauders off to jail. I once lost a young goose inside electronet to two dogs who obviously were wise to the sting in the net, but who used the same cunning to rush the geese in a narrow portion of the fence, forcing one to panic over the net and meet its doom. Since then, I avoid net fences with corridor-like portions, but configure them with plenty of interior space into which the birds

retreat when threatened from the outside from any angle. If you are installing fixed runs with conventional poultry netting, I recommend wide and roomy over long and narrow. I have heard reports of large dogs (or coyotes) jumping over electronet, which is usually 42 inches or so high. Certainly large canines can jump that high; but in my experience, they tend to lead with the nose. Once that sensitive probe gets a jolt from the fence, they do not back off and think, Hmmmm, if at first you dont succeed but rather, high-tail it into the next county. A bit of research into your local and state laws regarding livestock and unrestrained dogs could be useful, especially if you have to confront the owner of a dog that is harrassing your flock. Most areas favor the livestock owner in such cases. Laws of both my county and state, for example, require dog owners to keep their dogs under control, and even give livestock owners the right to kill dogs running at large and harrassing their animals.

You Think You Have Predator Problems?

Guest Article: The material on this page is copyright by Oogie McGuire, October 2006.
Oogie's description of the industrial-strength predation threats she deals with in the mountains of Colorado appeared as a sidebar in my article In the Shadow of the Hawk (October/November 2006 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine). It gives the rest of us new perspective on our own predator challenges. Our area has all major predators except not yet wolves. We have bear, mountain lion, bobcat, coyote, dogs, hawks, eagles, foxes, raccoons, skunks etc. Our primary fencing for the pasture is DOW [Department of Wildlife] provided game fence, 8 ft tall with 2 strands of barbed wire on top, then 2 segments of woven wire hog fence ringed together then a barb wire at ground level. Ours is old, over 25 years and is in poor shape so weve reinforced it with 16 ft welded wire panels around the entire bottom section. Internal cross fences are either electric netting from Premier or welded wire fences. Sheep and geese are the ones in the pasture. Chickens have always been totally free range and can go anywhere. That will change now based on problems we have had this year. In spite of that fencing and even though we put the poultry in the barn at night weve had losses so to back up the fencing we have guard dogs. Unfortunately we have not been able to get our guardians to also protect the poultry. They either ignore them or keep them away from the sheep. This year we lost 49 out of 100 chickens to coyotes. These have been daytime attacks and weve been unable to get back to the barn in time to kill the offenders. At the time of the most recent big attack we had one dog in with ewes and lambs and our other working dog was at the vets. The coyotes came under the game fence, over 2 hot electric nets and killed 1 adult goose, 2 half grown goslings, injured the adult male goose, attacked one adult ewe and also one lamb. The kills were devoured, the gander is recovering as are the sheep. The dog that was at the vets would have prevented that because she would have caught them digging and repelled them but its clear that even with our fences we need the assistance of dogs to keep our stock safe.

We have had bears in the driveway and between our house and sheep pens and the dogs kept them from attacking the sheep. We have also had the bobcat come right up to the sheep pen fences but never went in. In that case we did not have a dog with that group but it was a pen of about 25 adult rams with horns and I think the cat decided not to take them on. We have lost sheep to mountain lions in the past, they can jump the 8 ft fences carrying an adult ram. But that was before we had guard dogs. No attacks from cats since we got the dogs. Guard dogs take a while to train/grow up and some dont work but overall they are the best predator repellant we have.

Addendum: January 2007

[Guard dogs figured prominently in Oogie's strategies for warding off predators, so I suggested: Since you've had such good results with your guard dogs, readers will certainly benefit from knowing what breed(s) you are working with. Below is her response.] Breed is irrelevant, individual dogs are [what count]. We've had both good and bad from several breeds. Currently we have one Pyrenees and one Polish Tatra x Spanish Mastiff Cross. Both these are good working dogs. We also have one Polish Tatra x Spanish Mastiff x Pyrenean Mastiff cross puppy that is untested; and one Akbash x Pyrenees cross that isn't good. We've had a Pyrenees who was not great and an Akbash x Pyrenees cross who was excellent. About one in four guard dogs will not work in your specific situation. You can't always know what a puppy will grow up like. Best bet is a breeder willing to work with you in helping train or willing to swap out a dog if it matures into one that won't work. Most guard dogs will work somewhere. All guard dogs need to be gotten as puppies, especially if your sheep are not the standard docked tailed big white sheep as dogs will learn colors and may attack colored sheep if not raised with them.

Butchering Poultry
*Table of Contents for Butchering Poultry Section is at bottom of this page.*
I added this new section in late December, 2008, and moved into it the seven-page photoillustrated article, Homestead Poultry Butchering. January 29, 2009, I added two companion articles on the homemade Whizbang poultry plucker. The first page introduces Herrick Kimball's design, widely used by both ambitious homesteaders and small-scale producers serving local broiler markets. The second is a Guest Article by my friend Mike Rininger, who shares with us photos and the most important materials and construction details from his Whizbang project. After I published my original Whizbang article in Backyard Poultry Magazine, David Schafer wrote to BYP's editor that he markets his assembled Featherman plucker, for

considerably less than the two or three thousand dollars or more that I cited as typical prices for commercial models. I'm sorry that I failed to point readers to the Featherman at that time. I plan to add a page about it in this section in the near future. In the meantime, check David's site for more information. ~Harvey, January 29, 2009

Table of Contents for Butchering Poultry Section

Homestead Poultry Butchering The Whizbang Homemade Poultry Plucker Building the Whizbang Plucker

Homestead Poultry Butchering: Getting Ready

Grateful acknowledgment is made to my friend and chicken buddy Mike Focazio, who took the photographs for this article.
This description of home butchering is a hybrid between the article of the same title I published in Backyard Poultry Magazine, August/September 2006, and the butchering article on this website before the February 2007 update.

Table of Contents
Getting ReadyKilling the BirdThe Naked FowlEvisceration: 1Evisceration: 2Evisceration: 3Afterwards

Getting Ready

Introduction
Butchering skills are almost essential for anyone serious about keeping an ongoing homestead flock. Whether you breed your own stock or buy in day-olds straight run, you face a large surplus of males for whom there is no long-term place in the flock. Even if you keep a flock of hens only, they usually cease or greatly decline in egg production long before the end of their natural lives. Maintaining them on welfare is a fine option if you are keeping pet chickens, but hardly a practical choice for those tending their flock as part of a productive homestead. Whatever your reasons for culling the flock, you will find that the meat from your own birds is orders of magnitude superior to the remains of the sad creatures from concentration-camp industrial poultry production.

Flock keepers often try to find someone else to do their culling chores for a fee. Most people find, however, that individuals interested in providing such a service are few and far between. I expect there may be a growing number of small custom butchering services in the future even mobile processing units that arrive on site and butcher, leaving neat packages for the freezer behindbut at the moment most homesteaders are stuck with doing their own butchering. [Addendum, February 2007: I have a friend who has set up a custom butchering operation. I plan a visit to him in the Spring on a day when he is slaughtering, and will share with you what I learn, together with pictures.] It is easiest to learn butchering skills working with someone more experienced. In lieu of that better option, I hope you will find the following guide useful. Read it thoroughly, study the pictures, and dont be discouraged if there are points that do not make sense. When you have your bird on the butchering table, you will recognize key anatomical features from the pictures, and obscure points from the text will become clear. It can be helpful to work with a partner who assists with point-by-point reference to the guide, while you do the hands-on work. Good luck.

Some General Observations

Starving the birds
I strongly recommend isolating birds to be slaughtered overnight without feed. (Provide water free choice.) The brief starving of the birds clears the gastrointestinal tract, making for easier, less messy butchering.

Chill!
Be prepared to chill the carcasses as you complete them. You can ice them down in a cooler, or pop them into the refrigerator after each bird is finished, but do think of freshly dressed poultry as highly perishable. I arrange the kitchen refrigerator with space to cool my birds, loosely wrapped in plastic bags. (The wire rack shelves are preferable to the solid shelves if there is a choice.)

Butchering waterfowl
This guide focuses on butchering chickens. Processing geese and ducks is anatomically quite similar, but there are thousands more feathers in these species. You pay your dues when you dress waterfowl!

Use it all
You honor the bird who has made such a contribution to your homestead by utilizing it to the maximum extent possible, minimizing the parts you define as waste. Learn to make stock from what I call the spare parts. Learn to love liver. Top of page

Scalder and Plucker

Set-up and Equipment

The key operations are: killing the bird, scalding, plucking, and eviscerating. Set-up requires at a minimum a scalder of some sort, a work table, cutting tools, and running water. You can work indoors if you like, but I prefer to work outside, setting my work table in the sun if the day is cool, and in the shade of a big white oak if it is hot. I use a 15-gallon fiberglass scalder heated by a thermostatically controlled electric elementjust like in an electric water heater. (I encased it in 2-inch foam insulation for greater efficiency.) You can use instead a large enameled canner (as shown in the Dunking picture) on stove top or portable burner. I also use a mechanical plucker featuring a drum driven by an electric motor, into which are set many stiff rubber fingers that slap the feathers off the bird as the drum rotates. The considerable expense of a mechanical plucker would likely only be justified if you process a lot of birds, but a plucker does speed up the operation considerably.

Work Table You will be more comfortable using a table at a good working height. My father and I put mine together from scrap lumber, a double stainless steel sink donated by a friend, and a single stainless steel sink with drain board which I picked up at a junk yard for four bucks. (For use when friends join me for slaughter day, I put together insets for the sink wells to provide additional work surfaces. They are simply small synthetic cutting boards screwed onto wooden feet.) Note the supply hose hooked onto the leg of the table. The pistol-grip sprayer is just the thing for that quick splash of water whenever needed. I like to have on hand a tray (for carrying dressed carcasses into the house for chilling in the refrigerator) and a stainless steel bowl with a lid to hold the usable innards until I get them inside. And of course, the homestead revolves around 5-gallon buckets. I use them under the table to catch the rinse water (so the area doesnt become a muddy mess), and position them on either side of each work station, to catch feathers and offal.

Cutting Tools

About Cutting Tools and Knife Technique

Do yourself a favor and invest in good cutting tools. (Yes, the good ones are expensive.) One of my greatest frustrations in my butchering workshops is the wretched cutlery many students bring to the work. Knives that are badly designed, or that will not take or hold a keen edge, are clumsy and fatiguing to useand of course, a dull tool is always more dangerous than a sharp one, because of the greater force required to cut with it. You will of course discover your own preferences for cutting tools. I prefer two knives: One with a thin, flexible, 3-inch blade for more delicate cuts (e.g., around the crop); and the other with a stiff, heavier, 6-inch blade for more hefty, resistant cuts. I recommend a good pair of shears as well (for cutting off the neck). Poultry shears vary tremendously in quality, and I have broken at least half a dozen over the years. After eventually breaking the spring on the best model I ever found (the blackhandled Soft Touch shears in the picture), I lost patience and bought a Felco No. 2 pruner (red handles). Dont expect Ill ever break that one. Let me emphasize two points about knife technique, based on the most common mistakes I see beginners make. Never use the point of the knife when cutting. All the cuts you need to make are slicing cuts, some of them rather delicate (to avoid piercing the entrails), so always use the edge of the bladeand keep it sharp! You may have wondered about my preference for a stainless steel work surface, having expected a chopping-board surface designed for contact with the blade. Using my methods, the blade need never come in contact with the work surface. Either make downward cuts from above, so the carcass itself prevents contact of blade and work surface; or pull on the part to be cut, using the weight of the attached carcass to create tension, and make your cut against that tension (rather than sawing or chopping down onto the work surface, as when using a chopping board).

Killing the Bird

Table of Contents
Getting ReadyKilling the BirdThe Naked FowlEvisceration: 1Evisceration: 2Evisceration: 3Afterwards The killing of the bird is typically the most difficult part of the process, emotionally and psychologically. Naturally you will want to do the job is quickly and humanely as possible. I use three methods. (Please note that, whatever method you choose, it is essential that the bird bleed out completely. The dressed bird will not keep nearly as well, nor taste as good, if the blood remains in the muscle tissue.)

Chopping Block

The chopping block

A solid, stable round from a log makes a good chopping block. Drive a couple of large nails into the block, between which the birds head can be positioned as you pull on the feet. Under such restraint, the bird is unlikely to continue struggling. Dont be rushedpull on the feet, stretching out the neck, take a breath, and steady yourself for a decisive blow of the hatchet that takes off the birds head with one whack. Hold it away from you and near the ground, so the blood will drain without spattering.

Killing Cone

The killing cone

A killing cone made of sheet metal is a useful accessory. Hang it on the side of an outbuilding or a tree. Insert the head through the hole at the bottom of the cone, pulling it to stretch out the neck and draw the wings and legs more tightly into the confinement of the cone. Use your sharpest knife to make a quick, decisive cut just below the jaw. It is important to note that you sever the jugular vein only, not the wind pipe (resulting in less stress for the bird). Allow the bird to bleed out thoroughly, guarding against a final spasm at the end that might flip it out of the cone.

English Method

English method
You can kill the bird by what Ive seen referred to as the English method, if it is young enough for you to break the head off the neck. (I find birds at the fryer-broiler stage, and most old hens, easy to kill with this method. I cannot break the necks of mature cocks, ducks, or geese, so for those birds I use the cone or the chopping block instead.) Holding the head of the bird in the clutched fist of your strong hand, and the feet in the other, brace the bird over one thigh, and pretend you are going to pull it apart. At the right point of tension (which you can only learn by experience), give a sharp twist-snap downward-outward, and the head will separate completely from the neck. Hold the bird out away from your body until its spasms subside. You will likely find this method difficult the first time you try it, and mistakenly conclude you are not strong enough to make it work. Trust me: It is not a matter of brute strength, but of techniquethat is, proper action in the wrist. The first time the head comes offso easily, really, with a sort of liquid giving-waywill be something of a surprise. An advantage of this method is that the bird does bleed out, but the blood is retained inside the skin of the neckthus less messy. Note, however, it is essential that the head actually break away from the neck for this method to workwhen that happens, the jugular vein is severed as well, and the bird bleeds out properly. It is possible to kill the bird simply through trauma to the spinal cord, but without breaking the jugular, resulting in a dead bird that has not properly bled out. Squeeze the skin of the neck between the head and the end of the neck: If you dont feel a completely flacid, empty balloon space there at least big enough to insert three fingers, you have not properly broken off the head.

About using a mask

If you find that your sinuses are heavily congested after slaughtering, especially during the night, use a good dust mask to filter out the poultry dander kicked loose during the killing phase (and the plucking phase as well, if you are using a mechanical plucker). The one I use is the Respro Sportsta Mask, extremely effective, and comfortable enough to wear for all dusty chores on the homestead. (One source is Allergy Control Products 800-422-3878.)

The Naked Fowl

Table of Contents
Getting ReadyKilling the BirdThe Naked FowlEvisceration: 1Evisceration: 2Evisceration: 3Afterwards

Scalding

Scalding
The key to an easy pluck is a good scald. Note that scalding temperature is nowhere near the boiling point. I set my thermostatically controlled scalder to 145 degrees F, and that is a good temperature to aim for if your scalding container is over a stove top or burner. However, it is not really necessary to use a thermometer to measure the temperature. Just stick in a finger. Can you immerse the finger without getting a burn, but you cannot hold the finger in for more than a second without burning? Thats proper scalding temperature.

Testing the Scald Note that overscalding (either through too high temperature or scalding too long) starts to cook the skin, which then tears when you pluck. Underscalding, on the other hand, fails to loosen the feathers sufficiently, and they are difficult to pluck. No exact formula can be given for scald timehow long to scald depends on the age of the bird, the species, the point in the plumage cycle, probably the phase of the moon. You will learn only through experience when enough is enough in the scalder.

Dunking Add a few drops of liquid soap to the scalder (to break the surface tension of the water and increase penetration to the skin). Put the bird into the hot water and use some sort of poke to agitate the bird up and down. After a minute or two use your poke (I use an old 3-prong cultivator missing one tine) to snag a leg. Pinch-squeeze the scaly covering of the shank: When that covering easily breaks loose from the skin of the leg, remove the bird from the scald, and dunk in cold water. (The dunk stops the skin from overheating from the residual heat in the water under the feathers.) Top of page

Plucking by Hand

Using a Plucker

Plucking
If youve scalded properly, it will be easy to remove the feathers in handfuls. Its better to start with the largest feathers (wings and tail), since they are the ones that start resisting pulling out first as the follicles cool. If you process a lot of birds, a mechanical plucker like the one pictured will speed up the process. It will snatch the pajamas off your bird in half a minute flat.

Cleaning the Feet

Cleaning the feet

If you dont save the feet, dont ever tell anybody you learned butchering from me! Always save the feet. They are a valuable addition to the stockpot, yielding collagen, which is beneficial for the entire digestive tract. Remember how you used the scaly covering of the shank to test the scald? Simply continue with the same pinching-pulling action to pull the covering off leg and toes like a glove. Be sure to pinch tightly and pull the toenails as well, and the cuticles will pop off easily. The result is a pristine foot you will be proud to have in your stockpot.

Leg

This is the first point to take care to avoid sharp edges of cut bone, which could puncture the wrapping you use for freezing your bird. (If cooking it right away, of course, the point is moot, and you can cut leg or neck any way you like.) Therefore, you should not use your shears to cut through the joint at the hock (corresponding to our knee) to remove the leg.

Cutting off Leg Instead, hold the foot and pretend you are going to break the leg sideways at the hock. The resulting tension on the joint makes it easy to slice through the skin and find the cartilagepadded interstice between thigh and leg bones. Once the edge of your blade has found that space, it is easy to continue cutting through skin, connective tissue, tendonanything but boneuntil the leg is cut away.

Head (Not pictured)

Unless you chopped off the head, at this point you will need to remove it. If you used English method, cut through that empty balloon segment of neck skin with a knife. If you used a killing cone the head will still be attached, so cut it off with your shears. The head can also be reserved for the stockpot if you like. Pull off the feathers, rub the coating off the skin of comb and wattles, and pinch hard on the beakthe horny cuticle will pop off (as with the toenail cuticles earlier).

Evisceration: 1
Table of Contents
Getting ReadyKilling the BirdThe Naked FowlEvisceration: 1Evisceration: 2Evisceration: 3Afterwards

Starting Evisceration

Separating the Crop

When Crop Is Full

Clearing the Neck

Cutting away Tubes

Crop, windpipe, and esophagus

Start the evisceration at the skin where neck joins breast. Using your small knife, slice through the skin on the left side, and continue slicing through skin (only) to make a full circle around the neck. As you slice, you expose the crop, a semi-translucent membranous pouch (to the right of the birds neck) in which the bird stores its food for pre-processing, before passing it on to the gizzard. Because you wisely starved your slaughter birds overnight, the crop is empty and this step is not messy. If the crop is full, it is no great problemthe contents will

spill over the top of the carcass and the work surface, but a thorough rinse will whisk them away. Force a thumb between the neck and everything attached to itthe crop (in the process pulling it free from the top of the breast meat), the esophagus, and the windpipe. Pull all that free of the neck. Separate the neck skin from the three tube-like elements and reserve it for the stockpot as well. Then pull on the tube-y things and cut them off as close as you can to where they enter the body cavity.

Cutting off the Neck

Cutting the neck

Do not leave a stub when you cut off the neckthat would leave jagged edges of sheared bone that may poke through your wrapping later. Instead, force the blades of your shears around the neck but well up between the shoulders of the wings. After your cut, the sheared edges will be protected from the wrapping by the shoulders.

Cutting off Oil Gland

Oil Gland Removed

Removing the oil gland

If it remains on the carcass, the oil gland (which secretes oil the bird uses in preening its feathers) may affect the flavor of your cooked bird. To remove it, start slightly forward of the

little nipple of the gland and simply slice down vertically until hitting bone. Then turn the edge of the blade toward the end of the tail and make a scooping cut to slice off the nipple and the two fatty lobes of the gland beneath. [Note: If you plan not to keep the tail, but to cut it off after evisceration, you do not have to bother with the oil gland.]

Evisceration: 2
Table of Contents
Getting ReadyKilling the BirdThe Naked FowlEvisceration: 1Evisceration: 2Evisceration: 3Afterwards

Cutting into Abdomen

Insert fingers. . .

. . .and pull.

Opening the body cavity

Lay the bird on its back and make a shallow slicing cut into the abdomen, just beyond the end of the keel (breastbone). Cut through skin and fascia (the translucent membrane surrounding

the inner organs) only. Remember good knife technique: Avoid poking at the skin with the point of the knifethe birds intestines are millimeters below. Sooner or later, you will have a slip of the knife and nick the intestine, spilling some of its contents into the body cavity. Do not despaireven with such a mishap, your home butchering is vastly more sanitary than the filthy conditions under which commercial poultry is processed. After eviscerating, simply do a more thorough rinse of the interior cavity than usual. Make the cut into the abdomen just big enough to hook two fingers from either direction, and give a stout pull, tearing a larger hole in the skin and fully opening the interior cavity. Please note that the pressure exerted on the intestinal tract at this point can cause what I call a poop attack,the forcing out of some residual fecal material from the cloaca. A poop attack is likely to happen only if the bird was not properly starved in preparation for slaughter, but you can guard against it any time by hanging the vent end of the bird over a drain when you pull open the carcass. If there is an expulsion, carefully rinse it away from the vent, being careful to avoid backwash into the body cavity.

Reach in and. . .

. . .pull out the heart.

Heart
Reach as far as you can into the body cavity to find an organ that feels like a large grapethe heart. Hook two fingers around it and pull it out. Squeezing out the remaining coagulated blood, rinse it and set aside (I use the steel mixing bowl with lid which I mentioned), along with the neck and feet and other good things you will be saving. Top of page

Pull out Entrails

Cut Liver

Cut Liver (close-up)

Livers Compared

Liver
Reach again into the body cavity, fingers and hand encircling the gastrointestinal tract. The fingernails lead the way, tight to the rib cage, finding the seam between the chest wall and the ropy tubes of the tract and other organs, the large purple-red ball of the gizzard filling your grasp like a slippery apple. Grip all and pull. The tract and the organs pull free in one mass connected only at the base of the abdomenwhich you allow to hang over your drain. The liver is the large reddish organ beside the gizzard. The clear tissue connecting it to the other organs is easily torn away with the fingers to leave it attached at one point onlyto a small, dark-green sack the shape and size of a caterpillarthe bile sack. The bile it contains is essential for the birds digestion of fats, but is extremely bitter. Sacrifice a bit of the liver as you pare it away from its connection to the bile sack with your small knife. If on occasion you do have a spillage of bile, rinse with more than usual thoroughness and proceed.

Incidentally, note the picture of this cut as an example of proper knife technique: The weight of the hanging gizzard is used to put a little tension on the connection between liver and bile sack, allowing the cut to be made against that tension, rather than against the steel work surface. Of course, the blade must be sharp, to enable cutting against such a tiny bit of tension. The liver of a young, healthy bird (on the right in the comparative picture) is plump, dark red, glistening. Such a liver is extremely nutritiousrich in fat-soluble vitamins (especially A and D), antioxidants, and essential fatty acidsand most delicious if cooked quite rare. The liver of an old bird (on the left in the picture)equally healthy, equally well fedis usually pale brown, indicating longer service as the birds major metabolic filter. While I honor this liver for the good work it has done, I do not eat such livers.

Cutting Gizzard

Gizzard
The gizzard is a large, muscular organ with a tough interior pouch, filled with bits of rock. In lieu of chewing its food, the chicken processes it inside the gizzard, using the grinding stones and digestive enzymes. One tube goes in, one comes out. Cut off both, flush with the surface of the gizzard, and add to the other goodies.

Evisceration: 3
Table of Contents
Getting ReadyKilling the BirdThe Naked FowlEvisceration: 1Evisceration: 2Evisceration: 3Afterwards

Egg in Oviduct

Body Cavity Fat

Eggs and fat deposits

If the bird you are butchering is a hen, you may well find inside a number of egg yolks of various sizes, or even a fully developed egg. (The one in the picture is a finished egg ready to be laid, but is still inside the oviduct.) These unborn eggs, as Ellen calls them, are a real treat: We add the small yolks to soup or broth just before serving (so they are just warmed through), and use the completed eggs as we do any other eggs. Especially in a hen (and even more so in hens slaughtered in the fall), you will find a deposit of glistening, yellow fat at the lower end of the body cavity. This fat is easily rendered into high quality cooking fat. [Simply cut the fat into small pieces and heat in a heavy pan over low flame until the fat liquefies, strain, and store in small jars in refrigerator or freezer.]

Cut to the right of the vent...

...then to the left...

...slice beneath vent.

Cutting away the entrails

What a neat trick youve pulled off! Youve drawn away all the interior structures without spilling stuff-we-dont-want-on-our-meat, and now theyre hanging from the vent in one long, intact package. What now to complete the separation? Hang all that ropy stuff to one side of the vent, and position your blade on the other side, between the vent and the sharp point of the pubic bone. Simply slice down until the blade hits bone. Now move the ropy stuff to the side of the vent where you just made your cut, and repeat the cut on the opposite side. Pull on the entrails, and slice under the vent itself, leaving it intact along with its connection to the end of the intestinal tract (the cloaca).

Pop out Lungs

Lungs
Reach into the cavity one final time and remove the lungs. Again, lead with the fingernails as you follow the curve of the rib cage, finding the seam between rib and lung, and lift the spongy lung tissue free. This step takes some practice, and can be a bit trickyits not unusual for the lungs to shred, and resist coming free easily. Dont worryleaving a little lung tissue is no problem. I like to remove them to make a neater carcass.

Voila!

Congratulations!
Give a final rinse, inside and out, and admire the creature who has made so generous a contribution to your homestead, now ready to grace your table. Dont forget to say Thank you!

Afterwards
Table of Contents
Getting ReadyKilling the BirdThe Naked FowlEvisceration: 1Evisceration: 2Evisceration: 3Afterwards

Packaging
If promptly chilled, freshly dressed poultry can be held up to a week in the refrigerator. If you do plan to keep it that long, though, do not keep it tightly wrapped in plastic. Instead, set it on a plate and loosely cover with wax paper or freezer paper.

Freezing
I dry the carcass inside and out before freezing. To package, I have used loose plastic bags (double-bagging if the plastic is thin), freezer paper (again, double wrapping), zip-seal freezer bags, and shrink wrapping. That is the order of my preference as well (from least to most desirable). Whatever method you use, expel all the air you can. And make sure the wrapping is thick enough to prevent loss of water vapor from inside the package (through osmosis) to the drier air of the freezer. These two precautions will prevent or delay freezer burn. When using either a loose or a zip-seal freezer bag, I use a drinking straw to suck the air from inside the package, then seal tightly with twist-ties or the zip seal. If using freezer paper, I wrap as tightly as I can. The best package for long-term freezing is shrink wrapped. In the past few years, home vacuum heat sealers have become widely available where kitchen appliances are sold. They come with a range of features and prices, but need not be expensive. I have used one for several years nowthe resulting packages keep better and longer than those I produce using any other method. The greatest limit with a home vacuum sealer is size. The manufacturers seem not to have anticipated that the homesteader might want to shrink-wrap an entire goose, a roasting chicken, or a turkey. For those, use one of the other methods.

Cut or leave whole?

Our usual practice is to freeze almost all our dressed poultry whole, then cut as desired after thawing. It may be that the meat keeps better in larger pieces. What is certain is thatif you cut before freezingyou create pointed ends of sheared bone which can puncture wrapping. When freezing cut pieces with exposed points of bone, I take care to tuck the jagged points inside other cuts with a smooth exterior. It is occasionally necessary to fold a piece of freezer paper several thicknesses to pad an exposed point. A major exception to the leave-whole preference is the processing of duck carcasses. Many cooks have discovered how difficult it is to cook a whole duck satisfactorily: Either the breast overcooks while waiting for the legs and thighs to cook through; or the breast is au point,

while the legs and thighs are under-done. Our solution is to cut up the carcass, and use the parts in separate preparations. I use my thin, short blade to fillet the breast off the breast bone in two portions. I use my heavier, stiffer blade to cut off the wings, thighs, and legs. The remaining bony back is saved for the stock pot. The breast fillets are reserved for meals for the lord and lady of the manor (thats us!) and are cooked like small steaks. For us, that most often means pan-grilling hot and quick in the fat that renders from the skin as grilling begins. Duck breast is best served rare. The bits and pieces (wings, legs, and thighs) are passed on to the peasants (thats us, too!), and are usually braised, with onions and red cabbage, sometimes with apple as well. After such a meal, we sigh with satisfaction and muse, Hmmmm, wonder what the rich folks are eating tonight! Top of page

Processing The Goodies

Stock parts
Feet (you did save the feet, right?), heads, necks, and the skins from around the neck can be saved for the stock pot. Dry thoroughly and freeze in appropriate size packages. If you cut up a carcass, the bonier parts such as the back can also be reserved for the stock pot. In addition, we always freeze the bony carcasses from roasted fowl until ready to make stock.

Giblets
You dont like liver? Forget that! This is your chance to appreciate real livers, not the pale yellow-brown, tired looking livers your mother may have bought at the supermarket. Livers from your poultry are more likely to be dark red, plump, and glisteningsigns of healthy livers. Saute some onions, then saute fresh livers hot and quick in the same pan, deglazing the pan with a little wine or sherry. Do not cook beyond rare. Delicious! (Freeze extra livers in small packets for later use.) The hearts and gizzards can also be sauteed and added to soups, sauces, or stir-fries. (Or they can be added to the stock parts.) Processing the gizzard is complicated by its structure. It is a mass of lean muscle around an inner pouch with a tough lining, containing bits of stone the bird uses to grind its feed. You can cut through the muscle to reveal the outer surface of the pouch, then peel the muscle back with your fingers, leaving a butterfly-shaped cleaned gizzard. It can be tricky peeling off the muscle without splitting open the pouch. Sometimes it helps to chill the gizzards a little before peeling them. Another option is to brace the gizzard against a cutting board, and slice off bite-size pieces, keeping the blades edge away from the interior pouch and leaving it intact.

Remember Your Pets

Remember Your Pets

Actually, at our house, all the necks, hearts, and gizzards are reserved for our dog Nyssa. Before dogs started eating that dry crunchy stuff they ate raw meat, right? And bones. So we decided several years ago that Nyssa could only benefit from raw meat and bone as a substantial part of her daily diet. I cut the hearts, gizzards, and lungs, and freeze in minipackets. I also freeze the necks, wrapped individually in plastic wrap. Each day Nyssa gets one or the other, thawed to room temperature. She loves them! Yes, I know youve been cautioned never to feed chicken bones to dogs. Thats excellent advice, with reference to long bones (thigh bones, drumstick bones), cooked bones, and bones from commercial chicken generally (which are poorly mineralized, softer than homestead chicken bones, and apt to break into long dangerous splinters). Raw chunky neck bones have never been the slightest problem for Nyssa. Chewing them helps keep her teeth clean and healthy; and they are unmatched for promoting good bowel function. We used to offer our cat the same raw tidbits, but she didnt seem much interested. She was a good hunter who regularly ate her kills, so I suppose she considered our offerings a poor second best. Ive read, however, of cats who relished such raw tidbits.

Cleanup
You will end your slaughter day with a pile of wet feathers and a bucket or two of entrails. I throw the feathers onto the deep litter in the poultry house. The birds will eat some of them (feathers are almost pure protein), while the rest get buried in the litter, where they quickly break down. The entrails can be composted or buried. If you compost, take care to build a pile which heats up rapidly and does not become an attractant to dogs and other curiosity seekers. I have at times placed the entrails out in the edge of our woods, as an offering to friends Fox, Raccoon, Possumwho live in the neighborhood and who need to eat as well. It's my way of honoring our kinship, and saying Thank you that we are able to coexist peacefully while my flocks stay (mostly) intact. Another option Ive been using the past couple of years is processing the entrails in the maggot breeding buckets to generate high-protein live food for the chooks.

[Addendum September 2007: I had a few deaths of birds in my flock this season which seemed consistent with the botulism poisoning the oldtimers called limberneck, after I cycled some slaughter offal through the maggot buckets. It is possible that enough feed remained in some gizzards discarded by a friend working at the slaughter table with me to give rise to the sort of soured mash medium for botulism I referred to in the maggot breeding article. At this time I am avoiding the use of offal from the slaughter table in the breeding buckets. However, I have seen no evidence whatever that the use of beaver carcasses and other such carrion has presented the slightest disease problem for the birds when used for breeding fly larvae.]

The Whizbang
An Affordable Homemade Poultry Plucker

This article was published in the June/July 2008 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine. It was added to the site January 29, 2009. The more birds the backyard flockster slaughters in a year, the more likely he is to crave some mechanical assistance taking the raiment off the birds being processed, since hand plucking is probably the biggest drag on his time at the worktable. When he starts checking prices for purchased pluckers, however, he quickly finds himself with the familiar dilemmas: price versus convenience versus performance. Even a simple home model like the Hom-PikJr I use (not a more automated tub type plucker) is quite expensive purchased newabout $765. The cost of a good tub plucker will approach $2000.

A widely used design

The Whizbang

If our flockster is handy, therefore, he might wonder whether he can gain greater ease in processing and still beat the high cost of a mechanical pluckerby building his own. There are many plans for homemade pluckers available, especially in this age of the Netsome as simple as an attachment to an electric shop drill to which are affixed the rubber fingers used in almost any plucker design to slap the feathers off the scalded bird. But for years, one of the most widely used designs has been the Whizbang plucker, designed by Herrick Kimball of Moravia, New York. Plans and extensive instruction and advice are available in Herricks book, Anyone Can Build a Tub-Style Mechanical Chicken Plucker ($15), either via Herricks websiteor Amazon, Acres USA, Stromberg Hatchery, Murray McMurray Hatchery, and many other sources. Herricks site itself has a wealth of information on planning, building, and using his Whizbang plucker, including a helpful Frequently Asked Questions page. Herricks design has become something of a gold standard for homemade backyard pluckers. His book has sold 5000 copies to date, and working models of the Whizbang are in use in Australia, South America, England, Scotland, Israel, and elsewhere. There is a Yahoo Group (whizbangchickenpluckers), presently more than 1800 strong, that serves as the online community of Whizbang users. You could find a lot of support for a Whizbang project by joining. My friend Michael Rininger (Marshall, Virginia) recently built a Whizbang, and kindly agreed to document the project with pictures and notes. [See Building the Whizbang Plucker.] He and everyone I talked with made the same point: The Whizbang is a lot cheaper alternative to any tub-type mechanical plucker on the market. But they also emphasized that a Whizbang project is scavenger friendly: There are many opportunities to save lots more money by utilizing parts and materials you may be able to scrounge rather than buy. Of course, a few parts are not easy to find or makeexamples are the featherplate (the rotating plate in the bottom of the tub), the steel shaft (which has to be precisely engineered), and the large driven pulley (which can be hard to find). Unless you are especially skilled at precision crafting such items, these parts as well can be purchased from Herrick Kimballs website. The featherplate is a good example of a part about which youll have to decide whether you have the equipment and skill to engineer it yourself, or spend the extra bucks to buy one ready-made. Mike started out attempting to make his from -inch plywood (which would later have been clad with metal). But when someone offered him a piece of 1/8-inch sheet steel, he abandoned the plywood in favor of an option he believed would be sturdier and more precise. Such precision, however, would not be available to every garage tinkerer. Mikes perfectly round steel featherplate would not have been possible without the assistance of our mutual friend, local sculptor John McCarty, who had both the requisite skills and access to a plasma arc. Once John had shaped the disk, Mike drilled the -inch holes for the plucker fingers, using a drill press.

A trial run
This article cannot give a step-by-step of the construction projectit is too big, and there are too many alternative strategies and materials choices. It just presents the highlights of one persons approach to the project [see Building the Whizbang Plucker]; and the assessment of two seasoned old chicken-pickers of its performance.

Moment of Truth

Whizzing and Banging

Success! A couple of weeks ago, Mike brought over his Whizbang for a trial run. I found that the Whizbang lived up to its name: It took the feathers off in a whiz, but banged the birds pretty roughly inside the tub. Indeed, it broke a couple of legs of the smaller hens I was slaughtering (old Silver Spangled Hamburgs). In Herrick Kimballs FAQ, he suggests that one is likely to have less damage if one puts more birds into the pluckerat least two, even three or more. Since I was instructing a student in butchering the day of the trial run, I was running only one bird or at most two at a time. Herrick also emphasizes an ever-critical point: The key to a good pluck is a good scald. Getting the perfect scald is especially important with the Whizbangthe better the scald, the less time spinning in the tub (15 seconds, at most 20), and the less chance of damage to the skin or carcass. I talked with Herrick recently, and he said thatif he were to build his Whizbang again from the beginninghe would choose to slow down the rate of rotation of the featherplate a bit, for a somewhat gentler pluck. Someone building a Whizbang could achieve this effect in his own project by changing the size of one or both pulleysby making the drive pulley slightly smaller, or the driven pulley slightly larger. Herrick, by the way, is still using his original production model, built in 1999. He likes to loan it out as frequently as possible, in order to put it through its paces and test its limits. He says

that the only important maintenance is routine greasing of the bearings, since they are exposed to so much water on every run.

Ready for prime time

The Whizbang is a major contender as the best design for a plucker that is both affordable and capable of serious production work. Certainly it is more than adequate for home production: If the whole family shares the processing chores, at three or four birds per spin, output for the day could fill the freezer. However, I hear from several members of American Pastured Poultry Producers Association that they have been using home-built Whizbangs to pluck hundreds of birds per year, to serve small local markets. (See Stepping Up to Production for a Small Broiler Market.) Of course, those producers might well prefer a commercial model such as that used by Matt and Ruth Szechenyi, pictured in Serving a Small Broiler Market. That unit is a 35-inch Poultryman LLC, designed and sold by Eli Reiff of Mifflinburg, Pennsylvania. It will pluck 10-12 broilers at a time, very clean. However, it retails for $2995 (awfully close to three grand). A 27-inch model sells for $1895. [Addendum January 2009: See David Schafer's Featherman for a less expensive but well-made assembled plucker.] But many smaller producers cannot justify that kind of expense for the limited scale of their operations, and have turned instead to the Whizbang. Some were almost passionate about the utility of their pluckers, and their contribution to the success of their broiler operations. Tricia Park of Tully, New York, supplies her customers with 500 Cornish Cross and 40 turkeys per year, using the Whizbang her husdand Matt built four or five years ago for $600 (which included cost of four parts ordered from Herrick Kimball to save time on the project). She says emphatically that their Whizbang was the critical difference in keeping their broiler/turkey operation going: We could not have stepped up to that level of production without mechanizing plucking, but could not have afforded a commercial model, which would have required a whole years profit to pay off. Tony Barber of Peru, New York, emphasized that Herricks manual contains everything you need to know to make a Whizbang construction project a success. He built his plucker four or five years ago, keeping costs low by using locally acquired parts only, some of which he bartered for, and recycling an electric motor already on hand. He and his wife Beth Spaugh use it to pluck 600 Cornish Cross broilers per yearas well as some ducks and turkeysfor their customers. Tony, Beth, Tricia, and Matt agreed on a few points about using the Whizbang. It plucks turkeys fine (even turkeys up to 25 or 30 pounds), but they all cut the legs off turkeys before spinning, to keep the feet from entangling. The plucker is a bit rougher in its spin than a commercial model, butsince finding the precise operating temperature and time for scalding they have had no damage to the skin. Mike and I had some residual feathers on the old hens and mature cocks we were running in his Whizbangwe werent processing any Cornish Cross. The APPPA folks I interviewed assured me that Cornish Cross come out of the Whizbang very cleanat least one indisputable virtue of the bird everybody loves to hate.

The Whizbang
Materials List and Hints for Building a Plucker From Scratch

Guest Article: The material on this page, text and photos, copyright by Michael Rininger, February 2008.
This article was published in the June/July 2008 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine. It was added to the site January 29, 2009.

Note: Mike's list of materials is at the bottom of this page.

And remember that clicking on a thumbnail will call a larger image and a lot of useful additional text.

(1) Tub Cylinder

(2) Frame I came to this project knowing that I had a number of birds to process in the near future and that I didnt want to hand-pluck them. In the past I have butchered birds at Boxwood with Harvey Ussery, using his equipment, but thought it would be a good idea to have a plucker of my own so that Id be free to process birds as the need arose.

(3) Bearings

(4) Drive Shaft My research began with mechanical pluckers both used and new. I immediately found that new mechanical pluckers were well out of my price range. They work very well but I was unable to justify the cost based on the small number of birds that I process every year. I was unable to locate a used unit for sale in my area. Considering myself pretty handy, I began to investigate building a plucker from scratch. The plans I encountered on the Internet ran the gamut from little more than an electric hand drill with plucker fingers attached, to massive units that looked unmovable. I came upon the Whizbang model [see The Whizbang Homemade Poultry Plucker] through a Google search, and ordered the plan book from Amazon.com. [Also available from Whizbang Books.]

(5) Aligning Bearings and Shaft

(6) Cutting a Disk The unit looked interesting and fun-to-build, though I was a little concerned about the metal fabrication and welding skills involved. I was also concerned about being able to locate some of the components, particularly HDPE cutting board material for the feather plate and the very large pulley at the bottom of the unit. The plans suggest a method for making a laminated feather plate (the piece that actually spins around at the bottom of the tub) out of aluminum and plywood. I bought plywood for this purpose and cut it to size, but abandoned this route when a friend located a sheet of steel plate that I thought would be more suitable. Luckily a local friend with an extensive metal shop, sculptor John McCarty, volunteered to cut out the steel circle and do the required welding for me.

(7) Plate

(8) Motor and Switch Assembly of the components was pretty straightforward. The wooden frame is rough construction that shouldnt prove a challenge to those with even the most rudimentary carpentry skills. Pulling the rubber plucker fingers into the barrel and featherplate was hard work but probably could be done by anyone with a pair of pliers and a lot of patience. The plucker performed pretty well in its maiden voyage. We ran seventeen birds [nine mature cocks, six small hens, and two mature male guineas] through it, and it did a very satisfactory job of plucking them. We did encounter some broken legs that became trapped between the

wall of the tub and the feather plate, but that only happened once or twice. Overall Im pleased with how the unit performs.

(9) Plucker Fingers

(10) Pulley My recommendation to someone else considering building a Whizbang plucker would be to carefully investigate your options for getting the required welding done and to scope out costeffective suppliers of the plucker components. Having to pay a professional machine shop to do your welding/metal fabrication or having heavy parts shipped to your door via UPS will quickly drive up cost. If this project is something you think you might enjoy then by all means order the plans. If you decide to build from them youll find things explained very well, with copious suggestions by the author for making things easier or alternate ways of doing the same thing.

List of purchased materials, including source and price

Plan book: Anyone Can Build a Tub-Style Mechanical Chicken Plucker, by Herrick Kimball, Whizbang Books$15.00) Electric Motor HP Capacitor-start (Harbor Freight Tools$75.00 + shipping & handling$10) Main Driven Pulley 15.25" with 1" bore (Part #MA153, Mid-State Electric Motors, Washington, VA$68.45) Drive Pulley2.5" Outside Diameter x 5/8" bore (Tractor Supply Company$7.50) 150 Rubber Plucker Fingers (Item #C-25, Kent Company, Miami, Florida62 each x 150 + shipping & handling = $105.00) Misc. Hardware, Lag/Carriage Bolts (Home Depotapprox. $22.00) Lumber 2x4s, 2x6s (Home Depotapprox. $15.00) Drive Belt 63" 4L " (Tractor Supply Co.$12.00)

Electrical Parts including Switch, Weathertite box, Romex cable (Home Depot approx. $20.00) Two Pillow Block Bearings 1" Bore (Northern Tool Co.$16)

Total out-of-pocket costs: Approx. $365

The following items were salvaged locally or found at home

1/8" thickness sheet steel for feather plate 1" round stock pipe for shaft Misc. scrap 2x4s and 2x6s Misc. electrical wire, wire nuts, staples Plastic juice barrel for plucker tub (Supplied by Harvey Ussery) Caulk Stain (for wood frame) Misc. Screws/Hardware/Washers Two 10" diameter wheels

Steel cutting and welding services were generously donated by local metal sculptor John McCarty.

Producing Poultry and Eggs for Small Markets

*Table of Contents for Small Markets Section is at bottom of this page.*
This section is addressed to the more ambitious homesteaders who, having mastered some of the lore of bringing their flocks to abundant increase, contemplate producing eggs and dressed poultry for small local markets. The section begins with a fairly long and comprehensive overview of issues to be considered if scaling up to broiler production for the small end of the market; followed by a look at three examples of small farmers producing between a few hundreds to a few thousands of broilers per season. A major question is choice of broiler stock for your operation. The Cornish Cross has long been the standard, not only for MegaPoultry, Inc but for pastured producers as well. Two articles discuss its limitations, and alternatives available for pastured broiler models. Finally, reviving the lost art of caponizing may be the small producer's entre into a profitable niche market. At some point I expect to add an article about egg production for small local markets. ~Harvey, February 10, 2010

Table of Contents for Small Markets Section

Stepping Up to Production for a Small Broiler Market Serving a Small Broiler Market: Three Examples The Cornish Cross: What is wrong with this picture?! Alternatives to the Cornish Cross Caponizing: Reviving a Lost Art Serving a Niche Market for Started Birds Game Birds: A Niche Market Opportunity

Stepping Up to Production for a Small Broiler Market: Thinking It Through

This article was published in the Feb/March 2008 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine. It was posted to the site January 26, 2009.

Table of Contents for This Page

Making It a Business The Question of Scale Marketing Pricing Production Models Choice of Breeds Feeding

Butchering Equipment Regulationsand Regulators The Diversified Farm

Making It a Business
The best thing about this venture is that it has benefits no matter what the size of the flock. You can start so small, with such a small investment, and just see where it goes. ~ Chrystal Mehl, Amissville, Virginia I expect there are many readers of my scribblings in the Poultry section who have largely mastered the challenge of producing all their dressed poultry, year-round. I hope they feel proudeven smugknowing their families will never again be dependent on the sad remains of concentration-camp chicken in the supermarket. But perhaps some of those master flocksters now yearn to take the next stepincreasing production enough to share the best chicken on earth with relatives, neighbors, or some specialty market. Maybe they dream of making a little money with what up to now has been a hobby, perhaps to help cover a new expense like college costsor perhaps just enough to pay the costs of their flock (and thus support their habit). Perhaps they have even been seized with a sense of mission: To help reverse the decline of the diversified small farm, and to proudly offer customers dressed broilers vastly superior to those available in the supermarket. If you are thinking of producing for a small market, in what ways can you expect your operation to change as you cross that line between producing for the family and producing to sell? What are some of the keys to success? Are there hidden gotchas to watch out for? I interviewed a number of members of American Pastured Poultry Producers Association to find answers to these questions. (Please note, there is no higher recommendation I could make for the success of your venture than to join the APPPA.) Top of page

The Question of Scale

Some of the producers I interviewed have plans for expanding, others are content to remain at the lower end of the production scale. They have neither the facilities, the space, the funds, nor the inclination to produce at the level of the tens of thousands of broilers per season of a Joel Salatin, but aim to produce hundreds or at most a few thousands instead. All agree, however, that it is important to start small and work up to increased production commensurate with increased experience. There are significant new variables when you start growing to sell it would be foolish to expand too rapidly without first getting your feet wet in the changed environment. Dean Mullis of Richfield, North Carolina started 16 years ago with 75 broilers, processing them completely by hand. For the next five years, he raised 75-100 birds per year, for a few word-of-mouth customers. For the past ten years he has served a steady and repeat customer base with 400-500 broilers per year, plus 45-60 turkeys for Thanksgiving.

After a recent expansion of her equipment and facilities, Summer Steenbarger of southwest Washington finds production at 1500 broilers a year to be comfortable. She may expand to 2000 birds, but has no desire to increase production beyond that point. Beth Spaugh of Peru, New York has produced 500 broilers each of the past two years, and plans to increase production about another 100 birds next year. The year she grew 800, however, was rather stressful, and she has no intention of returning to that level. The proper scale of your enterprise depends on many things: the size of your property, available pasture (you do pasture your birds, dont you?), amount you can invest in equipment and facilities, whether you have a job away from home, your age and stamina, etc. If you have young children, your commitments to them may limit the size of your enterprise. On the other hand, if your children are old enough, what better strategy, for both you and them, than to let them be a key part of the enterprise? Summers oldest childAdyn, a boy of sixprovided the daily feeding and care of her 65 turkeys during the entire grow-out. Beths experience suggests a key to the size of your enterprise: If it stops being fun, perhaps you have become a little too ambitious in your project. Top of page

Marketing
You already know you can grow them, but can you sell them? The question of marketing is a critical one, since the one certainty is that you will not be selling in the conventional poultry market, dominated by giant, vertically integrated, million-bird operations. It is simply a fact that the big boys have the poultry market locked up, and can outcompete your home-grown birds on every front. Or can they? While supermarket chicken is cheap and convenient, American consumers have begun to doubt the assurances that their food supply is safe and reliable when E. coli contamination in a single field of spinach in California sickens people in 26 states, causing several deaths; when thousands of pets and hogs die after eating contaminated pet food from China; when hundreds of thousands of cans of meat products are recalled from supermarket shelves in a panic, following botulism contamination in a single industrial processing vat; and when two successive Consumer Reports studies have found significant levels of Salmonella and Campylobacter contamination in random samples of supermarket chicken (an astounding 83 percent in the most recent studyup from 49 percent in their 2003 survey). They have also begun to doubt the basic quality of the food on offer in the supermarket, to wonder about the relationship between our epidemic levels of obesity and heart ailments and cancerand, most disturbingly, degenerative illnesses among children once thought the exclusive real estate of the very old. More and more people are refusing to buy into the fantasy that these illnesses are simply bad luck, and have nothing to do with the nature of the food we are eating. They are hungry for alternative foods not laced with a witchs brew of antibiotic, growth hormone, and toxic chemical residues. Further, you dont have to be a vegan or extreme animal-rightist to be outraged by the deplorable conditions under which meat animals in the industrial system are raised and

slaughtered. Growing numbers of consumers are insisting that the meat on their tables be from animals that were raised in humane and healthful conditions. As Beth Spaugh has found, Customers biggest concerns are drugs in feed, humane treatment, and flavor. These growing concerns about whats for dinner are opening niche markets that anyone with a dedication to produce superior food can exploit. Take a look at your own area as a market. Are there niches to be exploited? The small producers I interviewed described a number of creative marketing solutions. Experience selling to restaurants varied. Beth Spaugh has found chefs quite cost-conscious, unwilling to pay an acceptable price for her broilers. They also insist on absolute consistency in size. However, she has found the chef at one restaurant a great liver customerhe cannot get chicken livers of that quality from any alternative source. Fred Forsburg, who raises 1700 broilers a year near Livonia, New York, sells to two high-end restaurants in Rochester whose chefs assure him, Your chicken is absolutely the best I have ever eaten! Recognizing that their success depends as much on quality ingredients as on their skills, and knowing they cannot get dressed broilers of comparable quality from any other source, they are willing to pay Fred a decent price for his birds. Freds chefs do insist on uniform size (3- pounds for one, 4 pounds for the other), but he simply sorts his broilers to the appropriate weights at processing. Be on the lookout for opportunities to piggyback on existing distribution arrangements. For example, you might find someone with a CSA (community supported agriculture) who would be willing to add in your broilers to weekly deliveries to their subscription customers. Many small producers already serve one or more farmers markets with fresh produce, honey, eggs, etc.it might be possible to add fresh or frozen broilers to the mix. Top of page Growing on a small scale, you may find you can sell most of your output in a smaller niche, rather than competing in the broader market. For example, Beth Spaugh has discovered that her best market is in a local town with a lot of city families summer homes. Many of these customers have developed a greater sophistication about food quality, and are glad to have the access to higher quality fare available near their country retreats. A particularly valuable market is that among ethnic and immigrant communities. In many cases, these folks have a greater appreciation of real food and willingness to make considerable effort to seek it outin contrast to more established citizens likely to be inured to bland supermarket imitations. Remember the power of the Internet to enable your marketing efforts. You can post notices about availability of your broilers on local co-op e-lists, local food websites, or even deploy your own website. Summer Steenbarger keeps in touch with her customers via an expanding email list, making the marketing of her next batch of broilers easy: Each week I send out a delivery email so that they will know what is on its way in our Mobile Farm Store. I put a quiz at the bottom of each email, where folks will win something at the farm. This keeps people reading my emails, and learning as they go. This has been a very successful way to keep us all in the loop with each other! Summer reports that, by the end of a given season, she has half her production for the following year already sold.

Ellen and I are local chapter leaders for the Weston A. Price Foundation (dedicated to food and health issues), and maintain a list of local small producers and the products they offer, which we distribute to consumers eager to get the best possible food for their families. Get in touch with the local chapter leaders in your areait is likely they maintain a similar list that can assist you. A major marketing issue is whether to go to the customers, or convince them to come to you. Dean Mullis offers his broilers and turkeys for pickup at the farm only, and reports that he could easily sell twice as many as he does. Yes, the small producers I interviewed had to find their particular niches in the market. But having done so, they invariably assured me the demand is there, they can sell all they are willing to grow, and hence there is obviously room for entry of other producers into the market. If you are unable to find eager buyers, it may be that youre just not looking in the right places. Top of page

Pricing
In todays market, the question of appropriate price for any food product is complicated by the fact that we Americans have become accustomed to bargain-basement food prices, with both an expectation that food be cheap, and a resistance to paying higher prices, whatever the quality. Success at selling your birds at a price that rewards you fairly thus means bucking a major trend in our culture. On the other hand, we are not talking about the production of industrial widgets by the millions, whose pricing is straightforwardbut about offering a highly specialized product from a living animal and a living farm, to a unique niche market that may not get itself served by anyone other than you. And remember what was said above about the experience of every small producer Ive talked to, that the demand for high-quality table chicken is growing fast. Realize that your customer is not the one who demands to know why he should pay $3.50 per pound for your chicken, when it is available for 79 cents a pound at the supermarket. Your customer is the one who recognizes that these two choices are not the same product at allnot in terms of flavor, nutrition, quality, or safety. Beth Spaugh said she started out selling her broilers at $2.50 per pound, and some of her more savvy customers urged her to increase her price. They had the good sense to recognize that this inexperienced grower couldnt sustain her operation if she were selling herself short, and to urge the higher (more reasonable) price to ensure their continued access to the best chicken around. Beth points out that, if you are making $1 per bird, and you increase your price per pound to average an additional $1 per bird, you can earn the same return at half the number of birds, with greatly reduced labor. As she sums up, Dont go hogwild on volume if you can do better with small volume. Naturally, you may encounter resistance to a price raise. Dean Mullis increased his price from $3.00 per pound last year to $3.50 this year. His largest customer, who had been buying 50-75 broilers a year, felt he had to drop out at that price. However, Dean had a waiting list for his birds, and made up the gap in sales without breaking stride. The point is often made that the higher prices of local and organic foods put consumers of restricted means at a disadvantage. But food that is unsafe or that does not support health is

not a bargain at any price, however restricted ones budget. Your challenge is to help your customer understand that. Challenge any comparison between your broilers price and the 79 cents per pound for supermarket chickensince the two products are in no way comparable, neither should be their prices. A better comparison is between your price and that for organically produced chicken in a top-end natural foods store. When that comparison is made, your price looks attractive indeed. However, your sense of mission may inspire you to find ways to give the less affluent customer a break on price. For instance, Summer Steenbarger reports, Some folks cannot pay as high a price, and we very much want to serve them as well, so we offer discounted prices on any imperfect birds (broken wing, etc). We want everyone to have access to good, clean, local, healthy food! Remember factors in pricing that might not at first be obvious. You can sell at a lower price if you offer your birds only for pickup at the farm, saving you the time and expense of transporting them to a market. Cutting and packaging require a lot more time and materials. You can either provide those services at a higher price, or give a price break to customers who bring their own containers, ice, and wrappers for whole broilers from a chill tank. Remember that processing a smaller bird takes as much time as a larger one. Beth Spaugh likes to market large birds, with a higher per-pound return. For those customers who prefer a smaller bird, she sets a minimum per-bird price, even if it happens to be higher than a per-pound price for the smaller broiler. Without exception, the small producers I interviewed stressed in the strongest terms the growers responsibility not to sell at too low a price. In the past, youve been something of a hobbyist grower; and you might be tempted to accept a low price for your broilers if youre not putting a lot of time into the increased production, and you are enjoying expanding your hobby a bit. Do not ever charge a hobbyist price, urge my correspondentsdoing so is a tremendous disservice to other growers in the area who are dependent on their sales for their livelihood. Once you enter the market, you become responsible for reversing the crippling expectation that food be unreasonably cheap, and the attendant deleterious effects on public health and small-farm livelihoods. Nobody wants to be a chiseler, but the renewal of local food and the viability of the diversified family farm is serious business. Play your part. Top of page

Production Models

Polyface Broiler Pen

Moving the Pen Whatever differences they had in other phases of their operations, all the small producers I interviewed agreed that they want to grow broilers on pasture. Broadly speaking, the basic choice they make is between the classic Salatin style mobile floorless pens (moved daily or even twice a day)or a free ranging model on a larger area centered on a range house, usually protected by electric net fencing. My impression is that more small producers these days are moving to the latter. However, many continue to use the self-contained mobile pens. Dave Chirico, who produces 750 broilers a year in western Pennsylvania, is happy with his results from 9x10 hoop cattle panel shelters with 50-60 birds each, moved every day. Summer Steenbarger incorporates her broiler pens with the rotation of her beef cattle on pasture, as in the classic Salatin model.

Steenbarger Mobile Pens

Brooding in Pen Julia Cronin raises 350-500 broilers a year for both restaurants and direct consumer marketing in southeastern Connecticut. In a SARE (Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education) sponsored study comparing the daily move coops and the range house systems, she found the former more labor intensive, requiring slightly more daily service time which over the course of the season made a significant difference. She also had problems of escapes from the mobile pens when moving them over uneven ground. As for the dressed broilers: I definitely noticed that the range house birds (all of them) had much better carcass qualityas measured by the number of scars, cuts, bruises, and broken wings. The short term environmental impact on the sod under the mobile pens was greater, especially in the drier parts of the season, when the accumulated manure resisted breakdown in the absence of rain. The sod eventually recovered, but Julia preferred the more even application of manure over a wider area in the day ranging model. She was also thrilled to turn the heavy poop deposits into an asset in the range houses: She parked them on fallow garden beds and added deep litter, yielding a tremendous boost in fertility for next years garden.

Dean Mullis illustrates the typical evolution: We started out with the standard 8x12 Salatin pen, switched to 8x12 pens made from hog panels, tried painted PVC pens for a year (they sucked), and switched to 8x8 hog panel pens. I got really bothered by the fact that the chickens had limited grazing area and were sleeping on a carpet of poop in the pens, and switched to a range system a few years ago where the broilers have access to a weeks worth of pasture at a time. I find the range system much more enjoyable. Of course, ones system is always evolving. Dean continues, Our current plan for 2008 is to build a mobile unit for broilers, similar to the rolling houses for our laying hens and turkeys, built on the frames of hay wagons and moved weekly. I want to be able to grow 200 chicks at a time in the same mobile unit they were brooded in.

Spaugh Dayrange Shelter

Open Top If you dont have a lot of pasture space, you may not have to compromise on the issues of green forage, access to live animal foods, and exercise in the fresh air and sunshine for your flock. Beth Spaugh started her original pastured broiler operation on a -acre house lot, rotating the birds throughout the yard. This strategem allowed successful pastured poultry production for several years, at a level of 300-400 birds a year. Pasturing your birds imposes a seasonality on broiler production that consumers may require some getting used to. I know of no small producers who switch to a confinement model and continue production after the end of the green seasontheyre not willing to lower their standards. Encourage the same appreciation of seasonal broilers as for other local foods like tomatoes and strawberries: Revel in them when theyre in season, switch to alternatives in the off season, and learn to enjoy the anticipation of the next turning of the great wheel. Micromarket broiler producers most often have a layer flock operation as well, so offering customers cull hens in the off season makes sense. Any resistance to buying old birds will likely vanish if you teach them how to make chicken broth the old fashioned way. Accepting the dictates of your climate is another aspect of seasonality. Dean Mullis says that he raises 200 broilers in the early summer and another 200 in the fallhe finds the heat and humidity of his North Carolina summers just too stressful on the fast-growing meat hybrids,

so wisely chooses not to fight the climate and forgoes production in the hotter weather. This strategy fits nicely with the need for concentrating on his market garden in the more intense part of the gardening season. Small producers typically have two or three batches of broilers growing simultaneously. The schedule can get pretty tightif the most mature group, for example, must be slaughtered to make way for the next wave in the production schedule. You will have to find the rhythm that works best for you. Top of page

Choice of Breeds
Most pastured poultry producers are still raising Cornish Cross as the foundation of their broiler operations. None are especially happy with this fast-growing hybrid bred for the poultry industrys high-confinement, high-input production modelCornish Cross are quite fragile, succumbing easily to environmental stresses, and prefer to hang around the feed trough rather than foraging more natural feeds on their own.

Freedom Rangers Some growers are turning to alternatives to the Cornish Cross. Julia Cronin, in her SARE study, also compared Cornish Cross with Freedom Rangers, a meat hybrid bred for pastured rather than confinement systems. She found that the Freedom Ranger has a slower (which is to say, more normal) growth curve. Also, The Freedom Ranger has a very different conformation from the Cornish Cross, noticeably longer body, less breast meat, and more dark meat. Fortunately, their flavor is amazing. The enhanced flavor brings good market acceptance of her Freedom Rangers, despite the fact she charges more to compensate for the longer grow-out ($4.00 per pound, as opposed to $3.50 for her Cornish Cross). Dean Mullis plans next year to raise 200 chicks at a time in the same mobile unit in which they were brooded100 Cornish Cross and 100 of the slower growing Freedom Rangers. This strategy will spread processing over four weeks, evening out the work and achieving a mix of sizes to satisfy customer demands. Few small producers are willing to revert to the traditional chicken breeds for growing dressed broilers for a market. Though almost universally recognized as having more flavor, there is often resistance to the smaller, more narrow-breasted, and more expensive (because of the longer grow-out) carcass of a traditional breed. However, Summer Steenbarger plans to experiment with half Cornish Cross and half Buff Orpington in her broiler pens next year, to test market acceptance of a smaller, more expensive, but more flavorful broiler.

If you successfully tap into an ethnic or immigrant market, you may find it dictates your choice of breed or hybrid. Some ethnic groups are convinced a black chicken is the only one worth eating, for others its a redwhile most agree that a white chicken is not worth bothering with. Dont forget other poultry types and species as an adjunct to a pastured broiler operation. Most broiler growers find it natural to add a flock of laying hens for high-demand pastured eggs. Raising more cold-hardy turkeys, ducks, and geese can extend market profits beyond the broiler season, providing centerpieces for Thanksgiving and Christmas festivities. Perhaps you can develop top-dollar markets for rarely available items like dressed guinea hen or capons. Several of those I interviewed noted how profitable raising turkeys has been for them. Indeed, Summer Steenbarger reports that the profits from 65 Thanksgiving tukeys (a first for her this year) completely paid off the debt on her new processing facility (described below). Top of page

Feeding
Will you need to change your feeding program to better meet the requirements of an expanded scale? Beth Spaugh recognizes that her level of operation is really too big to continue with bagged feed. However, its not big enough to accomodate bulk deliveries from the feed mill. And she doesnt feel the investment of time to grind her own would pay off. So for now she continues with the bagged feed. Her rule of thumb for 100 broilers is to start the first week with a 50-lb bag of feed, and increase the number of bags purchased by one bag per week, working up to feeding 8 bags (400 pounds) in the eighth week. (This is just an approximation: She does end up with a few extra bags, but these numbers help her, and her feed store, plan ahead to keep feed on hand.) Once she gets into the full seasonal cycle, growing three batches simultaneously and starting a new batch of 100 chicks every three weeks, she plans on 14 bags per week. Dean Mullis has chosen to make his own feed, gaining efficiency by using the same basic mix for several feeding needs: I am fortunate to be able to grind my own feed with a Gehl mixer/grinder that makes 2 tons of feed at a time. I buy local corn from my dad, soybean meal and oyster shells from the local feed mill, and use fish meal and Nutri-Balancer from Fertrell. My ration is 50 bushels of corn, 800 lbs of soybean meal, 120 lbs of Nutri-Balancer, 100 lbs of fish meal, and 50 lbs of oyster shells. This gets fed to the 400 broilers, the 130 laying hens (which have access to free-choice oyster shell also), turkeys, and the occasional pig. I do amend the feed with extra fish meal for young turkeys the first 8 weeks. Producers at higher levels often contract with a local mill to grind feed to their own recipe (sometimes providing the mill with less typical supplements like kelp meal or NutriBalancer), and deliver it in bulk to the farm. Top of page

Butchering
One of the most critical questions for your emerging broiler operation is how to process your birds. Some producers are able to sell their birds live for a nice profit, which is obviously the easiest solutionprocessing chickens is hard work. Some take their birds to a custom slaughter house, paying a fee for processing, and hauling the dressed carcasses away for packaging and sale. Many find, however, that it can be difficult to get a high enough price to adequately reward both themselves and the butcher. Thus most small producers roll up their sleeves and handle this task themselves. Usually, you can count on processing to take up the whole day, once you figure in setup, butchering, cleanup, and some down time after a stretch of intense effort. Give careful thought to this aspect of the enterprise. Will killing and dressing your birds be an emotional burden for you? I know more than one small producer who has no problem with evisceration, but shrinks from killing the bird. Some work with a partner, and find that it works well if the partner does the emotional heavy lifting of killing the bird. Such an arrangement could be a problem, of course, in a case where the partner is unpredictably not able to help and the schedule is pressing. Speaking of partners: Most small producers I know work with at least one other person, often more, to help with slaughtering. Not only is it true that many hands make light work, but slaughter day can become social event rather than drudgery when it is sharedas I found when helping on the disassembly line at Joel Salatins place. The whole family helped including apprentices, a brother, mother, cousins, nephews, and nieces. The young guys joshed each other with humorous insults, everybody caught up on gossip, and I picked Joels brains for take-home lessons. Before I knew it, Joel announced that wed finished the 450 broilers set aside for the day, and it was time to quit. I always tell folks considering growing for a market: You either make money or give away that bird, not at the feed trough, but at the slaughter table. Use your experience in slaughtering for your own table to gauge whether you will be efficient enough (or can become so) at processing your birds to earn a decent return on your time. A question that small producers struggle with is how fully to utilize all available parts of the dressed broiler. Most want to honor the bird by using it as fully as possible for food. On the other hand, processing some of the spare parts is time-consuming. As Beth Spaugh puts it, Another issue I struggle with relates to stewardship and sustainability. We spend as much time cleaning and packing livers, hearts, gizzards, necks, and some feet, as we spend on the birds carcass. We make much less income on that time, even though we have good demand for livers at $4/lb. From an economic standpoint, we shouldnt bother with anything but the carcass, but I hate to waste good food. Even in this challenging area, though, she is finding a niche market: There is a local Weston A. Price chapter, so they are becoming a necks and feet market [for broth making]. The fact that butchering your poultry is such hard work is an argument in favor of diversity and of not expanding the broiler operation too far. As Summer Steenbarger observes, as long as you are butchering once or twice a month, you take the work in stride and it does not become deadening drudgery. Doing it every day would take a heavy toll. Top of page

Equipment
As you expand your existing flock to serve a small local market, most accessoriespasture shelters, electric net fencing, etc.can simply be scaled up. If youre processing broilers for market, though, its probably a good idea to tool up for greater efficiencynobody gets rich plucking by hand. New processing equipment is expensive. You can save a lot of money if you can find good used equipment for sale. If you are handy, there are a number of plans available online and in books for homemade chicken pluckers. Stainless steel work tables are available from auctions and brokers of used restaurant equipment. If you make your own table, look for stainless sink units with drainboard, castoffs from someones kitchen renovationseems theres one of those in every third garage. As with any question of scale, it is wise to start small and work up. Dean Mullis started broiler production 16 years ago, initially plucking the birds by hand. The expansion of his production (from 75 broilers a season to 400-500) has gone hand in hand with stepping up to greater plucker capacity, first to a Pickwick Jr. manual picker (which requires holding the bird to rotating rubber fingers), and finally to a drum picker (simply put the scalded birds in the picker and turn it on).

Steenbarger Mobile Processing Unit Once you are comfortable with your operation and your market, you might make a serious investment in more capable and efficient equipment. Thats what Summer Steenbarger and her husband Scott did this year. We started on craigslist. We found an inexpensive mobile job shack. After putting in walls, plumbing and electricity [with much labor input from family to keep costs down], bigger pluckers and commercial fridges, we finished for about $3500. The inside of the 20x8-ft trailer is used for eviscerating and packagingSummer and Scott do all the killing, scalding, and plucking outside under a pavilion canopy. Since the trailer is mobile, there is the possibility of doing custom slaughtering or otherwise sharing this facility with other local growers. Top of page

Regulationsand Regulators
There is no area in which your home operation could change more radically than having to deal with regulationscomplex, confusing, contradictory, sometimes downright bizarre. By all means read Joel Salatins most recent book, Everything I Want To Do Is Illegalit will get your blood boiling but also provide lots of laughs (its classic Joel), and thats about the right mix to get you ready for the trials ahead.

You may imagine that all the regulations you have to comply with have to do with the safety of the food product in question (dressed broilers), but you will quickly learn they are a good deal more byzantine than that. Indeed, some of the regulations have the specific intent, as Joel points out, of leveling the playing fieldyes, thats right: between Homestead Hannah and the likes of Tyson and Perdue. As a broad generalization, most states go with the federal guidelines for poultry production for sale: The grower may process and sell from the farm up to 1000 bird units with no inspection or regulation required. (A broiler is one unit, a turkey fourany combination is allowed to bring the total to no more than 1000.) Beyond that, on dealing with regulations, the small producers Ive talked to agree:

Know the regulations

You should know the existing regulations thoroughly, inside and out. Be aware that often the regulators do not! Numerous sharp-eyed producers have saved their operations from onerous changes by pointing out to the inspector that he has in fact misinterpreted the relevant regulation. Dean Mullis reports, When we started 16 years ago, I called three seperate state agencies asking if we could process and sell our own chickens off the farm and got three different answers on why we could not. Later, I attended a workshop that featured the assistant director for NC Agricultural Inspections, who told us that we could legally and technically raise and butcher up to 1,000 poultry units without inspection.

Maintain as low a profile as possible

Dean also suggests: If you dont have to be inspected or regulated by a given agency, by all means avoid getting on their radar with inquiriesthats like poking a hornets nest with a stick to see what happens. Remember that if you choose to fudge existing regulations a bit in your favor, a first-offense action by the powers that be is rarely more than a cease-anddesist warning. And remember that the ultimate low-profile approach is to avoid the thicket of regulation entirely by seeking out those ethnic, immigrant, or other can-do customers willing to buy live and slaughter their own.

Be creative
Remember that bureaucracies develop over time a momentum of mindlessness, becoming more enslaved to detail and paper work than to common sense. This has its frustrations for sensible people, to be sure, but is a fact of life you will have to live with. Be prepared to use the myopia of bureaucracies to your own advantage. For example, a regulation may limit ones processing to ones own birds exclusivelyi.e., one may not do custom processing of birds owned by another grower. But if one buys the birds from that other grower, one can now legally process them as ones own. The change of ownership as a paper transaction satisfies the regulatory niceties (even if it has nothing whatever to do with the safety of putting the end product into ones mouth).

Focus more on the regulator than on the regulations

Most growers agree that cultivating a good working relationship with your particular inspector is more important than slavishly complying with the last letter of the regulations. Do

your best to adopt a cooperative and friendly attitude. Growers who do so often find friend rather than fiend in the official they have to work with. Indeed, Ive heard from more than one grower of helpful inspectors suggesting, Well, the regulation says x, but you know, youd be in compliance if you did y [made a painless change that shows up in the paperwork]. Summer Steenbarger was pleasantly surprised when she worked with her state department of agriculture to obtain the Temporary Slaughter Permit for her mobile processing unit. After cooperating and seeking their support at every stage of the process, she ended with a facility approved not only for broilers, but for ducks, turkeys, and rabbits as welland is a licensed commercial kitchen to boot. Who knows what value-added possibilities that could offer her farm in the future? Top of page

The Diversified Farm

None of the small producers I interviewed dreams of becoming the next Frank Perdue. Indeed, their goals, motivations, and methods are in complete contrast to those of MegaPoultry, Inc. They are dedicated not merely to making a buck, but to being of service to neighbors needing good nourishing food, to the rural ecology and economy, to the viability of the family farm. None exhibited a sense of ruthless competition; indeed, several mentioned ways in which they support and cooperate with other growers. In lieu of a complex, anonymous, inefficient regulatory system, these growers accept their customers as the ultimate inspector, inviting them to come and see and be a part of their farms because they have nothing to hide. The food they offer to put on their customers tables is exactly what they put on their ownwhat better assurance they will never take the slightest chance with its safety? All my producer correspondents who have hit their stride with their broiler operation have found it a significant profit generator. None, however, have any desire to specialize in broiler production as a sole source of farm incomeall see their poultry operation as fitting into a more integrated and diverse farm enterprise. In lieu of overextending their own production models, they encourageand even serve as mentors toaspiring new producers making a start in the expanding pastured broiler market.

Serving a Small Broiler Market: Three Examples

This article was published in the Feb/March 2008 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine. It was posted to the site January 26, 2009.

Table of Contents for This Page

Chrystal Mehl Deanna Child Matthew and Ruth Szechenyi

As said in Stepping Up to Production for a Small Broiler Market: Thinking It Through, I expect there are many visitors to this site who toy with the idea of using the experience gained producing their own familys dressed poultry to expand into serving a small local market. They have no desire to become the magnates of the pastured poultry movement, just to introduce others in their area to the best poultry in the world, diversify their farm enterprise, and earn enough money on an expanded broiler operation to make it worth their effort. This past summer and fall I followed three friends in my area who are growing for a broiler micro-market through one full production cycle. A peek at what they are doing may give readers an idea of the possibilities.

Chrystal Mehl

Chrystal Moving Shelter Chrystal Mehl and her husband Tony moved to their 13-acre farm near Amissville, Virginia two years ago. It wasnt until June of 2007 that Chrystal got her first chickens, but then she hit

the ground running, buying young pullets for a laying flock locally, and 24 Cornish Cross chicks from Welps Hatchery in Iowa. The latter constituted a trial run for broilers not only for her own table, but for sale to family and friends looking for good chicken. That first trial batch was followed by two production batches, of 30 and 50, once she felt confident in the process.

Brooder for Day-Olds

Barn Brooder Chrystal keeps the just-arrived hatchlings in a deep plastic tub nursery for three days, then moves them into a corner of a stall in her barnset up as a brooder using hay bales, a stall door with heavy gauge wire as a protective top, and a 250-watt lamp. The chicks stay in the brooder for four weeks, then go out on pasture for an additional four weeks.

Protective Fences The pasture shelter is inside poultry electronet, which is itself inside a horse pasture fenced with plastic posts and a special electric horse fencing. This level of protection has deterred all ground predators, including coyotes that are active in the area. Chrystal moves the shelter once a day. During the drier parts of summer, when the pasture sod is less actively growing, the heavy application of droppings from the growing birds can kill it, or set it back severely. When necessary, she has used a sprinkler on the vacated spot, in order to help the grass recover. If there is suffcient moisture, the grass where the shelter was parked gets a marked boost from the extra fertility. Chrystal and Tony had slaughtered the trial run of 24 birds earlier, using equipment at my place. I visited them on their first slaughter day using their own setup. Together they processd

30 birds, which dressed out mostly at around 5 pounds, though some were close to 7 pounds. They found it a long day, the most grueling part of raising broilers for sale.

Scalder

Plucker Equipment consists of a purchased 14-gal electric scalder, and a 1/6 HP table top plucker. The small plucker seemed inadequate for production at the scale they are working, and they may find themselves in the market for a larger model.

Worktable Tony built a 2x6 work table, mostly from scrap material from a building site, incorporating a stainless steel sink donated from a relative following a kitchen renovation, and another sink and a piece of composite countertop purchased from a Habitat for Humanity auction. He estimates he paid $40 or less for the purchased parts of the table. As with the earlier batch of 24, many of the dressed broilers went to friends and relatives, folks who were curious what farm chicken would be like. Chrystal reports that some who ordered from the earlier batch declined to buy again this roundthey werent convinced it was worth buying her $2.50/lb chicken when supermarket chicken is selling for 79 cents per pound. Still, simply through word-of-mouth marketing, Chrystal is finding that the increasing demand for quality food is generating more than adequate interest in her birds, and anticipates easily selling all the broilers shes willing to grow. Limits on production appear not to be potential market demand, but the limits on the time shea mother of a three-year-old girl, with a part-time job as bookkeeper in a veterinarians officewill be able to give the project; and the time that Tonya manager of construction and design for a development company will be able to contribute in his time off.

At the moment Chrystal is selling her dressed broilers for $2.50/lb, picked up at the farm out of the cooler. She plans to experiment with packaged chicken (cut and vacuum sealed for the freezer) at $3.50/lb. Chrystals plan for next year is to start a new group of 30 chicks every four weeks through the growing season, perhaps six batches or so, for a total production of 180 to 200 broilers. She will move them to pasture after four weeks in the brooder, and slaughter them at good carcass weight at eight weeks, making way for the next batch from the brooder. The most fascinating of Chrystals customers is the owner of a kennel of championship fieldtrial Labrador Retrievers. Having concluded that supermarket meats do not support the level of performance she is striving for in her dogs, she feeds them local farm meats exclusively: Beef from other small farmers, and all Chrystals birds she is willing to sell15 in Chrystals second batch, 25 in the third. (She would have preferred to buy more, had it not been for commitments Chrystal had already made to other customers). She feeds one of Chrystals birds per day to a nursing bitch. Will the reader pause to focus on this astounding fact: Here is a customer who believes that supermarket meats are not fit to feed her dogs! Can we doubt that the growing concern about food quality will lead more and more paying customers to seek out local small-producer poultry for their tables? Top of page

Deanna Child

Deanna Deanna Child and her family moved onto a 13-acre small farm near Orlean, Virginia two years ago. Deanna, long smitten with the urge to produce food not only for her family but for a small market, immediately began assembling her supporting cast: a small flock of laying hens, pigs, goats, etc. This past spring, she added Cornish Cross broilers, raising three batches of 100 each. We had a look at Deannas new 12x8 pasture shelter in the Oct/Nov, 2007 issue of Backyard Poultry. She added a plywood hover inside the shelter to serve as a brooder for 100 Cornish Cross chicks. In addition to the protection of the shelters metal rear wall and roof, the hover is insulated by reflective bubble insulation and by empty feed bags, covered with pine shavings, over the plastic mesh floor to block chill from the ground. The hover is heated with one 100-watt and one 250-watt bulb. Since the chicks can come and go from the hover, they are able to self-regulate for temperature. Deanna had excellent results, with only two losses in the brooder phase.

Pasture Shelter Brooder Once the chicks were feathered, Deanna either moved them to a different pasture shelter, or simply moved the brooder shelter to the pasture and opened it to give the growing birds access to the outside. Unfortunately, Deanna encountered problems with her last two batches in the post-brooder grow-out, resulting in serious losses20 birds from the second batch, 22 from the third. Clearly she cannot continue the project with this level of losses, and will have to make some changes in management. The biggest problem I observed in her operation was the failure to move her pasture shelter and the electronet surrounding it frequently enough. She needs better to undestand that pasturing the birds means not just access to the outside, but frequent moves to fresh grass, allowing the pasture sod to digest the heavy load of droppings laid down by rapidly growing birds, especially Cornish Cross. Without frequent moves, the droppings soon coat the pasture grass, rendering it unusable as green forage and most unsanitary for the growing broilers. My advice to Deanna was to move her flock much more frequently to fresh pasture. If that is not practical for her, it would be better to grow her broilers inside a section of her barn on deep litter, which would provide more wholesome conditions. I very much hope Deanna can resolve her management challenges and establish a thriving broiler operation, if only because she has the advantage of the most intriguing marketing arrangement I have encountered. Deanna enjoys raising her birds, but is uncertain at this point whether she wants to begin processing her own broilers. Fortunately, her friend Susannah is eager to get her birds. Susannah has a diverse small farm from which she sells beef cattle, goats, pigs, broilers, eggs, and (in summer) fresh produce. As an alternative to struggling with labyrinthine regulations for farm slaughtering, she has cultivated a market among local ethnic and immigrant communities, who often retain more exacting standards for food quality than the typical consumer inured to the insipid fare on offer in the supermarket. Crucially, they are also willing to do their own butchering. By selling live animals direct to her discriminating (and willing) customers, Susannah has short-circuited the regulatory rigmarole required for processing the animals herself.

Deanna Catching Broilers Though Susannah raises some broilers herself, she cannot meet customer demand on her own. To avoid disappointing her customersand keep them coming not only for broilers but for high-profit items like sweet corn, eggs, goats, and pigsshe is willing to take Deannas birds to help supply them, and to remit to Deanna all the receipts from the sale of the broilers currently $8 per bird.

Delivering Broilers Deanna thus simply raises her birds from brooder to butcher weight, loads them in a horse trailer, and delivers them to Susannah, who houses the birds in an outbuilding on her place for the week or two it takes to sell them off to her customers. This arrangement with her friend is an ideal way for Deanna to develop her broiler enterprise, allowing her to learn and gain experience without gearing up for processing at this time. Top of page

Matthew and Ruth Szechenyi

Szechenyi Processing House Matthew and Ruth Szechenyi have lived for ten years on Briars Farmstead, near Boyce, Virginia, a farm next door to the one on which Matthew grew up, and which has been in his family for several generations. Though Ruth retains a day job, Matthew three years ago committed full time to operating their place as a diversified small farm, offering from the beginning a diverse mix of broilers, eggs, turkeys, pork, and fingerling potatoes. In their first year they raised 400 broilers, 800 the second, and 1200 the third. Matthew anticipates keeping production at approximately the same level next year. He has the pasture capacity to increase production, which would be profitable; but is hesitant to do so until Ruth is able to commit to the farm full time, or he finds someone reliable to help with the work, especially on processing days.

Processing House Interior Matthew raises his broilers in a day ranging modellarge range areas inside electric net fencing, with hoop shelters moved with his pickup truck. He has found grazing by the birds and deposition of their droppings to be excellent for boosting the quality of his pastures.

Ruth

Matthew The Szechenyis sell most of their broilers either to customers who come to the farm, or at their county farmers market one day a week in its main season. Matthew has found restaurateurs hes approached resistant to paying an acceptable price for his broilers, but does sell from time to time to a caterer who loves his chicken and is building a reputation on its quality. An interesting marketing opportunity for the Szechenyis opened up when Forest Pritchard, who sells fresh broilers at markets in the Washington, DC metropolitan area, asked them to grow for him. This past season, Matthew raised four batches (200-250 birds each) of Cornish Cross broilers for Forest, and found the arrangement a cornerstone of the farms income for the year. When it is time to butcher, Forest brings a refrigerated truck and a crew of three. Matthew and Ruth join Forests team to slaughter and dress the birds. Though Forest would take all the broilers Matthew could supply, Matthew has concluded that within his current limits he will be able at most to grow one additional batch of 200-250 next year.

Scalding

Plucker by Eli Reiff Matthew raises Cornish Cross for Forest, whose market insists on its broader, plumper carcass. For his own customers, Matthew raises Freedom Rangers exclusively, because of their superior flavor and performance on pasture. He has no resistance from customers to his Freedom Rangers, which dress out at 3- to 4 pounds (higher for males), slaughtered at 10 weeks, selling at $4.00 per pound. Indeed, the day I visited the Szechenyis at their market stand, they sold out of broilers by mid-morning.

Plucker in Action They sold out of eggs about the same time. That happens too early every market day, so Matthew plans to add more hens to his layer flock next year. Eggs are an important point of contact with the customer, he explains. They may be leery at first about buying farm meats, but if they try our eggs, they recognize their quality and start to develop trust in our other products as well. Matthew buys his feed from a local mill, which grinds his broiler feed to his recipe in ton lots. The mill delivers the bulk feed into a gravity wagon, which Matthew uses to distribute to the pasture feeders daily. The Szechenyis completed a new processing facility on the farm this falla 12x24 hoop (a Farm Tek kit for erecting a tractor shelter) on a 12x28 concrete slab. Inside is an ensemble of stainless steel equipment, almost all of it new. The layout is based on their experience with earlier, temporary setups and, says Matthew, the fact that Im left handed. The cost of the slab, hoop, and equipment was about $10,000, which Matthew noted could have been reduced had he had time to do more of the work himself.

Ruth and Matthew do all they can to cultivate a community of repeat customers, with whom they keep in touch via postcards and emails. Person to person contact is the key to their operation, the opportunity to pass on to the customer not only a food product but a point of viewabout what constitutes food quality, about appreciating the seasonality and the breedspecific character of local foods, about the relation between the diverse small farm and the rural ecology and economy. Were not just selling a product, but enhanceing our customers relationship to her food, says Matthew. This is the ultimate retail transaction.

The Ultimate Retail Transaction

The Cornish Cross: What is wrong with this picture?!

The Cornish Cross is the most commonly used meat hybrid. Not only is it the foundation of the broiler industrymost pastured poultry producers also base their broiler operations on this generic chicken hybrid. I wrote this article years ago (January, 2001) for Grit!, the newsletter of American Pastured Poultry Producers Association. (It was recently included in APPPAS compilation Raising Poultry on Pasture: Ten Years of Success, along with a producer profile of yours truly as The Chicken Man of Hume.) Since then, I have stopped raising the Cornish Cross or fast-growing meat hybrids altogether. Our poultry for the table comes from successive culling of our flocks throughout the growing season. I have also experimented a little with caponizing as an alternative to the hybrids. But many homesteaders and would-be small producers are interested in an option for a meat chicken without the flaws of the Cornish Cross. I hope to have more information in the future. In the meantime, try online searches for Freedom Rangers, Label Rouge, and Corndel. I stopped raising Cornish Cross chickens for several years because of their many weaknesses and flaws, known only too well by anyone who has worked with them. I returned to raising barnyard chickensthe old standard dual-purpose breedsto put broilers on the table and give to family and friends. But my wife and I missed those plump roasters you can produce with the Cornish Cross but not, in my experience, with the standard breeds (without caponizing, at any rate), which are simply too tough at a dressed weight of 5 to 7 pounds. So last year, when I learned that Tim Shell was producing Cornish Cross chicks from parent stock on pasture, I decided to try again. When I called Tim, he confirmed that he and others who have been using his chicks have found them to be hardier and more robust than the everdeteriorating equivalents from the large commercial hatcheries. I ordered a batch of 60.

All was well through the brooder phasejust a single lossmost impressive in comparison with past batches of Cornish Cross. I moved them onto pasture at about four weeks, in a netted area along the lines of Andy Lees day ranging model. They showed the usual Cornish lethargy about foraging; but weight gain was as always impressive, especially in comparison with a group of standard chicks (New Hampshire Reds) hatched by natural mothers in my main flock. Then in June we had a spike of hot, humid weather. When I went out one afternoon to check on the birds, I found a number of Cornishnow right at broiler stageeither dead or seriously distressed with heat exhaustion. (I lost 22 of them over the next day or so.) Despite the fact they had been on that pasture more than two weeks, drinking from a float-operated waterer right outside their shade shelter, they sat on their butts inside the shelter and died rather than walk ten feet for a drink of water! I turned 180 degrees from the sight of scattered bodies and looked at my young standard chickensthe same age to the day in a separate netted pasture. They were bright and active, scooting about in the hot afternoon like water bugs. Whenever they felt the need for a drink, they would cross the entire area to the waterer. Turning back to the appalling sight of dead and dying birds, my shocked mind wailed: What is wrong with this picture?! We in the pastured poultry movement have turned our rhetorical guns on the Tysons and the Frank Perdues of the broiler industry. We have blasted the waste, the pollution, the lack of sustainability, the inhumanity, and the contamination of both our groundwater and our food supply that flow from a debased production system. Striving for a model which both protects natural and agricultural resources and offers our customers poultry fit to eat, we have rejected all thatall, that is, except the very heart of the industrys flawed system: the Cornish Cross chicken. The Cornish Crosss greatest virtue is also its greatest vice: its phenomenal rate of growth. That growth is constantly outstripping all its bodily systemsits internal organs and nervous system as well as its skeletal structure. The inevitable results include not only the well-known leg problems and tendency to heart failurethe digestive system clearly lags behind as well. Look at the droppings: They always contain a fair amount of undigested feedindeed, sometimes look like nothing more than a wet feed mash. Whatever the statistics about conversion of feed to flesh seem to imply, clearly there is a great deal of waste and inefficiency here. A standard chickens droppings, in contrast, are usually firm, gray or greenish with a white coating, and show no trace of undigested feed. The Cornish Crosslike the huge supermarket strawberry whose growth has been forced by over-fertilization and irrigationis lower in flavor than a bird that has had a more natural growth curve. Of course, to folks whose only experience of chicken has been the supermarket versionor worse yet, Mega McNuggetspastured poultry has been a revelation: Man, chicken was never like this! But I would be happy to put one of my barnyard chickens (slaughtered at about 12 weeks) up against any pastured Cornish broiler in the land in a taste test: They unquestionably have more flavor. And, if flavor is a measure of nutritional value as I believe in a natural, unprocessed food it isthen again we should be asking, What is wrong with this picture?

I may be accused of waxing mystical here: But I believe that when we eat another living thing, plant or animal, we are eating not only its physical nutrients but its vitality as well. We have quite rightly condemned the broiler industry for producing chickens all of whom are sick, propped up by antibiotics, growth hormones, and other industrial voodoo. And yet we continue to offer the same birdraised without those contaminants and in a far more sanitary manner, to be surebut weak and low in vitality, propped up by high management inputs. Let me emphasize as strongly as I can: These observations are not intended as a criticism of all those good folks who are working so hard to make pastured poultry a viable alternative. I know that the market has come to expect and demand that broad, plump Cornish breast. I know that the economic pressures on pastured growers are fierce; and that most feel they must have that seven or eight week grow-out in order to stay in business. However, I believe that the pastured poultry movement has matured to the point that we should be setting as a goal the production of an even better product. We should start by finding a viable alternative to the Cornish Cross. In the long run, of course, the solution is to breed a better bird. And since no corporate or governmental agency is doing any breeding research relevant to pastured poultry needs, we are going to have to do that job ourselves. We should all start learning about the genetics of breeding. Some of us can contribute by making experimental crosses of our own; or working with one of the standard breeds that were the foundation of the broiler industry before the Cornish Cross, selecting for traits that will maximize both vitality and production on pasture. Perhaps APPPA could put together a working group and/or sponsor a conference to explore options in breeding a better pastured bird. Recently I talked again with Tim Shell, who likewise is frustrated with the weaknesses of the Cornish. Excited about the prospects for line breeding, he has begun crossing cocks from one of the former broiler breeds [Delaware] onto hens of one of the Cornish Cross strains; and plans to continue crossing and selecting until he has a bird more suited to pastured production. He believes that careful selection through 10 to 14 generations will develop a genetically consistent chicken adapted to our model. [Note: In developing his Corndel cross, Tim actually found that he was able to get a stable pastured hybrid in about four years.] Such a bird would:

Have enhanced viabilitymeaning that it would be sturdier, healthier, would have more on reserve to deal with episodes of stress such as changes in weather. Exhibit much of the plumpness and broadness of breast of the Cornish Cross. Be superior in flavor and nutrition to the Cornish. Have a moderately fast growth ratebut a balanced growth in which not only muscle tissue but all systems are developing healthily and in sync. Have an efficient digestive system which converts feed to flesh with a minimum of loss and waste. Be vastly more proficient than the Cornish at rustling its own grub ranging on pasture.

Tims goal is to produce such a bird with an ideal grow-out of about nine and a half weeks. The costs of the increased turn-around would be offset by lower mortality, lower labor input, and reduced feed costs. Note that the latter two factors assume a model more along the lines of Andy Lees day-ranging model than the now-classic Polyface mobile pens,

developed before the availability of electric net fencing in this country. I agree with Andy that the future of pastured production lies more with net fencing than with the pens in any case, given the lower initial materials and equipment costs and the reduced labor. But netting is essential if we develop a less lethargic, more active bird, which will need more space to range and forage a greater percentage of its feed. The expanded foraging range may be the key factor in the sustainable production of an improved broiler. I regret that, due to the mixed nature of my own flock, I cannot give accurate feed-conversion comparisons. Years of experience has convinced me, however, that when standard chickens have a large enough pastured area in which to roamtheir perpound slaughter weight has a lower feed cost than the Cornish, even with the longer grow-out factored in. In the short term, there are a couple of things that might be useful to try. I urge producers who have been working exclusively with Cornish Cross to raise a few of the standard breeds for broilers as well. (The White and Barred Rock, Delaware, New Hampshire, Wyandottes and others, as well as crosses among them, have at various times been important in broiler production.) See if you dont agree that these birds work with you in a way which is encouraging, in contrast to the fragility of the Cornish. Put some on your own table and see if you too find the flavor superior. Provide some to your more long-term and/or discriminating customers and ask whether they prefer the flavor. Certainly there is now a large enough universe of pastured poultry palates to ensure that there are many with the discrimination to recognize poultry that is even better. For a larger fowl suitable for roasting, I would like to see poultry folks reviving the almostlost art of caponizing. Capons of some of the standard breeds could give us roasting fowls even larger than a Cornish roaster. (I have begun caponizing some of my young cockerels, and will report on my results later.) We must of course keep Andy Lees warning in mind: That the wing-walker makes sure of the new hand-hold before letting go the old! Certainly those who have worked so hard putting into place a model which works for them should not abandon any element of the system including its foundation, the Cornish Crosswithout due care, experiment, and thought. In the long run, however, we must adopt the goal of producing a better bird. Let Perdue and Tyson have the Cornish Crosswe can do much better than that!

Sunday Dinner Chicken: Alternatives to the Cornish Cross

This article was first published in the Apr/May 2009 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine. It was posted to the site February 10, 2010.

The bird everybody loves to hate

One option for putting on our tables chicken worth eating is simply to cull our flocks as needed. There are many advantages to this approach: If we are hatching our own stock or buying in straight-run chicks, such culling is something we have to do anyway. And eating current account chicken as we do successive culling throughout the flock year reduces the need for packaging (and production of plastic waste) and increasingly energy-expensive storage of dressed poultry in the freezer. Such a strategy opens up culinary experiences not available to those dependent on one-size-fits-all chicken from the supermarket. These varying taste adventures have everything to do with the age at which the culled bird is prepared for the table: really young chickens that dress out at almost the size of quail (the French call them poussin), incredibly tender and delicate in flavor; fryer/broiler size (what I call spring chicken, twelve to fourteen weeks old for traditional farm breeds) for sauteing, broiling, or grilling; birds approaching maturity, four to ten months old, for braised dishes such as coq au vin; and old stew birds for incomparable broth.

The Cornish Cross But there are many flock owners who do choose to raise freezer-filling batches of meat chickens. For too long, the bird of choice for the backyarder has been the same as for the poultry giants: the Cornish Cross, an astoundingly fast-growing hybrid that has been the foundation of the broiler industry for several decades now. These birds can reach a dressed

carcass weight of almost four pounds in as little as six weeks. But we never get something for nothing, do we? The development of the Cornish Cross has pushed muscle tissue growth to extremes, at the expense of balanced growth of all other systemsresulting in failed tendons and crippled legs, compromised immune systems, heart failure, and other problems. One would think the industry would seek a sturdier bird with a more natural growth curve, but their choice instead is to force still faster growth with antibiotics and even arsenic (thats not a misprint). Indeed, preventing catastrophic collapse of 55,000-broiler flocks in filthy, highstress conditions requires feeding antibiotics from day one to slaughter. Perhaps Id be more inclined to excuse such abuse of one of Gods noble creatures if the result were the besttasting chicken in the world; but everybody I know who compares them with more traditional chickenseven folks who raise them for a livingadmit that the Cornish Cross is flavor challenged at the very best.

A Better Example There are many backyard flockstersand small producers for broiler marketswho find they can successfully grow the Cornish Cross without growth hormones and antibiotic feeds. I did so many times myself, in the early years of my backyard flock, typically with few losses. The key to success, however, is to substitute more intensive management input for the pharmacological voodoo of the industry. I found the limits of my own willingess to coddle such a compromised bird one year when a sharp, unseasonal temperature spike resulted in the loss of twenty-two Cornish Cross broilers, right at slaughter weight, in a matter of a couple of hours before I discovered their distress. They had sat on their butts in the shade of their pasture shelter, panting desperately, and diedrather than walk six feet for a drink of water outside the shelter. I have no doubt that with more intensive management I could have ensured against future such lossesby placing the waterer inside the shelter, or sprinkling the shelters top frequently to create evaporative cooling. (Yes, some growers actually do that.) My inclination instead was to turn 180 degrees to ponder a group of young New Hampshires, the same age as the Cornish Cross to the day, scooting about the pasture like little waterbugs, crossing their entire electronetted area when they needed a drink of water. My conclusion was that the problem was not so much the broiling sun, as my choice of breeds for putting chicken on the table. Since that day, I have never raised a batch of Cornish Cross. Top of page

A Better Alternative: The Freedom Ranger Tribe

I was not much surprised last year when the publication of two articles in the Feb/Mar 2008 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine (Stepping Up to Production for a Small Broiler Market and Serving a Small Broiler Market: Three Examples) was followed by a flurry of inquiries about the Freedom Rangers I had referred to as the preferred alternative to the Cornish Cross for a number of small market producers I had interviewed. Doubtless many backyard flocksters had despaired as well of working with the bird everybody loves to hate, and were

looking for another option for filling the freezer. Both Elaine, BYPs editor, and I (via my website), referred readers to the only source of Freedom Rangers we knew: an enterprising business run by a Canadian couple with hatchery associates in the US, Barbara and Brian Aaron (B & B Agriculture).

Freedom Rangers on Pasture I was keen to try the Freedom Rangers myself. Despite the poultry cornucopia on our table listed above, Ellen and I missed the plump roasters we had produced with Cornish Cross, allowing them to grow a couple of extra weeks for even greater size. I had tried caponizing for producing roasting fowl (see below), but an easier option was unquestionably an alternative meat hybrid, if I could find one I could enjoy working with. I ordered a batch of thirty-six Freedom Ranger chicks from the Aarons (a dozen each of Bronze, Red, and Grey), which arrived pert and healthy, with no losses in transit. I passed them on to my next-door chicken buddy Mike Focazio, who cared for them in a makeshift brooder in a tool shed, without a single loss in four weeks. Then we each put eighteen of the feathered chicks out on pasture areas fenced with electric net fencing. Both Mike and I fed our birds feeds free of antibiotics and growth hormones. In my case, I fed a mix I made myself, at seventeen percent protein. Thats low by any recommended standards, but the birds grew well all the same, supplementing what I offered with live, natural foods they eagerly foraged on their own. (I did get a boost in available protein by feeding earthworms from my vermicomposting operation.) Since I raised my Freedom Rangers with the rest of my pastured flock, I cannot give feed conversion figures. Their active foraging had to have made a dollar-saving difference, however, in comparison with Cornish Cross I had raised in the past. (The Cornish Cross is known as an exceptionally lazy forager. And a stupid one as well: Mike told me he once saw one of his growing Cornish Cross broilers pick up an earthworm out of curiosityand then spit it out!) Though many producers prefer a white-feathered broiler like the Cornish Cross (since colored pinfeathers tend to mark the dressed carcass), I found that these birds plucked easily and dressed out very clean. (Reports from American Pastured Poultry Producers Association members confirm this observation.) They dressed out at four to five pounds when slaughtered at twelve weeks. Not as impressive as typical performance for Cornish Cross, but the flavor was incomparably better. (I received a report from one APPPA associate of dressed weights for these birds of seven to eight pounds for cockerels, five to six for pullets. The feeding ration was twenty percent protein, with slaughter at about twelve weeks.) Unfortunately, shortly after I raised my experimental batch of Freedom Rangers, the Aarons abruptly went out of business. Wondering if any other hatchery was continuing to offer the

Freedom Ranger, I called my friend Matthew Szechenyi (featured in Serving a Small Broiler Market: Three Examples)), who last year had switched to Freedom Rangers exclusively. Matt told me that initially he ordered chicks from an Amish farmer in Wisconsin who had been hatching for the Aaronsand who in desperation started shipping thousands of chicks to former customers of the Aarons himself, in order to avoid losing his investment in brooding facilities and breeder stock. Matt has since been getting all his chick stock from J. M. Hatchery in New Holland, Pennsylvania; and has been most pleased with both the chicks and the service he gets from JMH. When I checked the JMH site, I saw no mention of Freedom Rangers, only chicks for Colored Range broilers, whose pictures looked identical to the Bronze, Red, and Grey Freedom Rangers I enjoyed growing on my pasture last year. I recently called Joel Martin (thus J. M. Hatchery) to find out more about his Colored Range birds, and their relationship to the Freedom Ranger. As it turns outthey are one and the same. Joel explained that Freedom Ranger was simply a catchy name, a savvy marketing ploy, on the part of the Aarons. In reality, the stock they offered were a set of proprietary hybrid broilers developed by Hubbard, a French corporation that provides breeder stock for producers of broiler chicks world-wide. Though Hubbard has long offered several strains of Cornish Cross for the broiler industry, they developed a number of slower growing, colored genetic strains as well, under a variety of names: Redbro, Redpac, Color Yield, etc. Many of these hybrids were bred specifically for the rigorous production standards of the Label Rouge system in France, organized to guarantee high quality, humane husbandry and slaughter, sustainability, and environmental responsibility, all within pastured and freeranging production models. The good news for readers who have been trying to find a source of Freedom Rangers is that there are a growing number of hatcheries in this country selling broiler chicks bred to the Label Rouge model. Such broiler strains are more likely to fit into homestead production models than the unhappy Cornish Cross. (See sidebar below.) Addendum February 2010: At the time the above was written, Joel Martin was not calling his Label Rouge broiler strains Freedom Rangers, since that name had been copyrighted by the Aarons. Apparently he has since come to an arrangement about the name with themJ. M. Hatchery's colored Label Rouge chicks are now sold as Freedom Rangers. Top of page

Other Homestead Alternatives

Whatever your needs for table poultry, you are not stuck with the high-input, flavorchallenged Cornish Cross. Indeed, if you are growing only for your own table, and not constrained by the bottom line considerations of small producers for broiler markets (some of whom feel they have no choice but to grow Cornish Cross)you have all the options. If you want to make your meat bird a traditional farm breedskinny and narrow-breasted in contrast to the market standard, but tasting better than any chicken aroundyou might experiment with breeds used to grow broilers before the Cornish Cross revolution: White and Barred Rock, Delaware, New Hampshire, Wyandotte, and others. By judicious selection of breeders, you might find you can get increases in weight gain and rate of growth in less time than you thought. Don Schrider managed an American Livestock Breeds Conservancy breeding project with the endangered Buckeye. Careful breeder selection over a mere three generations achieved a reduction of grow-out to slaughter age from nineteen or twenty weeks,

down to sixteen, with an average increase of one pound live weight in the process. (And the increase in performance as a meat bird did not reduce levels of egg production in this traditional dual-purpose breed.) (Get downloads from ALBC on selective chicken breeding.) Will Morrow of Whitmore Farm in Emmitsburg, Maryland, has been trying to restore Delawares as utilitarian meat fowl, a role they served before the Cornish Cross revolution using the work of Don Schrider and ALBC as a template. Will has found as well that three years of selective breeding has resulted in significant gains in rate of growth and slaughter weight at twelve weeks (without sacrificing performance of his Delaware hens as layers). Matt John of Shady Lane Poultry Farm believes that the four traditional breeds with the most potential for selective improvement as meat birds are the true, original strains of Naked Neck, New Hampshire, Plymouth Rock (either White or Barred), and Delaware. How about breeding our own hybrid meat strains? Joel Martin was emphatic that such a breeding project is not a task for amateurs, and requires a lot of detailed knowledge of genetics and financial resources. But he was talking about the development of stock that is absolutely and reliably uniform, for commercial flocks. For backyard flocksters, a more laid back lets see what happens approach would be in order. How many hobbies are both fun and allow you to eat your results, however successful, or not? Years ago, a young farmer friend of mine, Tim Shell, developed his Corndela broiler strain with reliably consistent performance and conformation in pastured production systems starting with Delaware cocks (which I helped him locate) crossed onto hens of one of Hubbards Cornish Cross strains. (Tim subsequently moved to China with his family as missionaries. I have been unable to ascertain whether the breeders who took over his work with the Corndel are offering them commercially.) If you are inclined to experiment, that approachtraditional breed cocks crossed onto existing broiler hybridsmight be fruitful. Or you might start with the original slow-growing but stocky, broad breasted Dark Cornish, crossed with faster-growing breeds. That was, after all, the recipe for developing the Cornish Cross: Dark Cornish X White Rock. Selection for superior performance in a pastured model, not just for faster growth and meatier carcass, could yield a better meat bird that does not make the compromises in health and foraging skills seen in the Cornish Cross. Finally, for producing Sunday-dinner roasters, truly brave souls might want to start with excess cockerels of sturdier traditional breeds and caponize themthat is, surgically castrate them. Like steers (castrated bull calves), male chickens with no testosterone in the system grow larger, plumper, and fasterand remain tender and juicy even at ages of a year or more, when their intact brothers are likely to be tough as an old shoe. Top of page

A Few Sources for Alternative Broiler Chicks

It is ironic that breeders of broiler strainswho for decades have bred for fastest possible growth to the exclusion of all elseare now making a virtue of producing slower growing broiler types. Such meat birds not only taste better (a longer growth curve yields better flavor even a Cornish Cross will be tastier if slaughtered at ten or twelve weeks rather than six or

eight); but help satisfy the growing demand from more discriminating and thoughtful consumers for poultry that it is raised in humane, sustainable, and environmentally beneficial ways. When looking for alternatives to the Cornish Cross, therefore, the designation slower growing may be a clue that a given hatchery broiler chick is more suited to pastured homestead production, even if you dont recognize the specific (often quite fanciful) name it has been given. I prefer ordering chicks from smaller, family operated, regional hatcheries. If the hatcheries in your region do not have the Hubbard hybrids of the Freedom Ranger/Label Rouge type, perhaps they offer other options for meat-type chicks that forage better, and are sturdier, more fun to raise, and tastier than the unhappy Cornish Cross. The list of hatcheries below is just a small sample to illustrate the sort of regional hatcheries you might seek out, and some meatbird options you might encounter. All these hatcheries ship to backyarders, with the typical twenty-five minimum per shipment (with one exception as noted). (Thanks to members of the American Pastured Poultry Producers Association for help assembling this list.) J. M. Hatchery, New Holland, Pennsylvania The hatchery whose owner, Joel Martin, clarified issues of terminology and genetics regarding slower growing broiler hybrids; and from whom I have ordered my own Label Rouge style broiler chicks for the coming season. MT-DI Poultry Farm, Altoona, Pennsylvania George Dibert of MT-DI offers Rosambro and Red Broiler (Label Rouge type strains). A number of fellow APPPA members report that MT-DIs prices are excellent, stock quality is high, and the personalized service is outstanding. (814) 9427024 or mtdifarm@atlanticbb.net Whitmore Farm, Emmitsburg, Maryland Will Morrow has been selectively breeding Delawares to restore the utility as a meat breed which they enjoyed before Cornish Cross became almost the only game in town using models established by Don Schrider and the American Livestock Breeds Conservancy. Wills Delawares, as well as three other traditional dual-purpose breeds, are available via his website. Nolls Poultry Farm, Kleinfeltersville, Pennsylvania Henry Noll is working to make slower growing broiler strains available for use in more natural production models. Maintaining their own parent lines for making broiler crosses, Nolls offers their Kosher King (also known as Silver Cross), Red Meat Maker, and Black Broiler, primarily for ethnic markets and backyard growers not concerned about the odd colored pinfeather mark on the dressed carcass. They also offer a slower growing white broiler strain more adapted to pastured management, for those who prefer an absolutely pristine finished carcass. (717) 949-3560 S & G Poultry, Clanton, Alabama Danny Eilands breeding work is dedicated to those who find the Cornish Crosss weaknesses unacceptable, but need a better growth rate and finished carcass size than available from traditional farm breeds. He also seeks to produce broiler strains that do not require pristine, pampered environments and heavy medication, but will thrive in real world growing conditions. His broiler crosses all descend from American pedigree lines, and represent genetic development entirely separate from Label Rouge strains. S & G Poultry requires a minimum order of 80 chicks. (However, those 80 can be a mixed lot chosen among four broiler strains and one high-production layer strain, developed originally out of Buff Orpington.)

Caponizing: Reviving a Lost Art

I wrote this brief introduction to caponizing for a couple of poultry/homesteading newsletters in August, 2004, making an addendum in December, 2004. I cant believe its been that long since I did my caponizing experiment. I have not continued with the caponizing, but really want to do so. Clearly there is a lot of interest in the subject among homesteaders: This caponizing page is among those most frequently hit since the site went up three years ago, according to my site statistics analyzer. I will try valiantly to make the time to caponize another batch of cockerels next year, and will report on the results. ~September, 2007 While it is true that capons (surgically castrated male chickens) are still commercially available in specialty markets, the art of caponizing is largely lost on the homestead and small farm. I would like to take part in a revival of that lost art. Recently (late June)after years of dancing around the ideaI finally took the plunge and caponized a dozen young cockerels. Seven of them are still standing, out on our pasture, and are doing quite well. My wife and I are looking forward to having one of them in lieu of the traditional turkey this Thanksgiving. Though I do not produce commercially myself, I am not a casual backyard hobbyist: I produce all the dressed poultry we eat year-round. I turned to caponizing because I love roast chicken, but I hate working with Cornish Cross, the most widely raised fast-growing meat hybrid. I wanted a big, meaty, flavorful bird that would still be tender enough to roast. (Cornish Cross is big, meaty, and tender.) Perhaps other homesteaders will join me in reviving this almost-lost art. And perhaps those who raise poultry for sale will consider capons for targeting a niche market. Caponizing has been practiced for thousands of years, by the Romans for example, as well as the ancient Chinese. As with castration of mammals, e.g., bull calves, the removal of testosterone-producing glands yields an animal that has better weight gain, is docile, and remains tender up to the day of slaughter. Unlike with mammals, the testicles in male birds are not held externally (easily accessible), but are deep within the body cavity, tucked up next to the spine. Taking them out is major surgery, and without question a major intimidation for the beginner. Even a rank beginner such as myself, however, is able to learn the technique cold (i.e., from a book rather than an experienced practitioner) and practice it successfully. Surgical kits for doing the operation are not difficult to obtain. Capon production could be advantageous for pastured poultry farmers. Cockerels are always in plentiful supply and usually quite a bit cheaper than pullet chicks. The actual operation once one has developed the necessary skills and had sufficient practicetakes little time, and the follow-up care is routine. The grow-out is much longer than for a meat hybrid broiler, of course, so an adequate price to cover the additional feed and management input would have to be forthcoming to justify the enterprise. Aside from the surgery itself and the longer grow-out, though, there is no element in the project that would be significantly different from raising broilers. Indeed, my seven capons are simply part of my general flock. (The recommendation in the literature is that they be raised separate from other birds. When raising larger numbers than I am, that would make sense.) I will not give a detailed account here of my own experience with caponizing my birds. However, the following are a few general observations and conclusions.

Do not even think about caponizing until you have had extensive hands-on experience with slaughtering your own chickens. I cannot imagine the limited success Ive had thus far without extensive practice dressing out birds for the table (probably more than two thousand now, and counting). A good way to get some practice before prime time is to perform the procedure on dead birds. Use young cockerels youre going to cull for the table anyway. It wont matter that theyre probably quite a bit older than you would normally caponize (3-5 weeks, up to a maximum of 8 weeks)you can still gain some skill with the surgical tools, finding and properly removing the testicles, etc. Even professional caponizers (who are able to operate on one bird a minute!) will have some losses. The beginner will have considerably more. Anyone interested in developing this skill should discipline the mind to accept that probability. It would be best to set aside a decided number of birds to castrate, and then carry through whatever the problems encountered, however many the outright failures. With persistence, the skills will come. Most commercial capons are produced from Cornish Cross cockerels. As implied above, I consider Cornish Cross flavor challenged and think producers may better choose from among the basic barnyard (dual purpose) breeds. The last time I talked with Joel Salatin about the subject, he had begun raising some of those breeds for customers who were requesting a bird with more flavor than the Cornish Cross. That encourages me to think there could be a market as well for a superior roasting fowl. I was quite pleased with the Cuckoo Marans among my own capons. The Marans are vigorous, dual purpose birds of good size. A further advantage is that they are autosexing with reference to color from day one, so you could caponize as early as you liked with the assurance youd find cojones once you got the bird opened up. Capons should be ready for slaughter at 4- to 6 months of age, though they can get even older (and larger) and remain tender. Thus, starting with the spring or earlysummer crop of cockerels, one could be in a position to sell for Thanksgiving and Christmas, feasts that often call for specialty fowl.

I intend at some time to add a caponizing session to my current poultry workshop offerings. However, I cannot predict whether I will feel ready to do that by next year. I will need considerably more experience before I feel able to instruct while standing with a scalpel over the fragile inner workings of a living creature whose well-being is in my care.

Addendum, Dec 6, 2004:

I have now slaughtered three of my seven remaining capons. Unfortunately, all three turned out to be slips. A slip occurs when the removal of the testicle leaves behind a small amount of tissue, which grows. The bird may not be fertile, but he is not a full capon because there is testosterone in the system. I am not particularly discouraged by these results, since I learned a lot from them. First, I caponized cockerels that were past the ideal age for the procedurenine weeks rather than the recommended three to five. The testes in an older cockerel are larger and thus easier to locate; but they are softer and easier to tear. The testicle in a younger bird is smallera firm little kernel which, if grasped with the forceps, is certain to come out whole. Next year I plan to caponize at around four weeks.

Secondly, I learned how to spot the slips unfailingly: If there is any testosterone in the system at all, the combs and wattles will develop. Only a castrated bird with a completely hen-like head (perhaps with a comb even smaller than that on a hen of the same breed) is a full capon. (The hackle, saddle, and tail feathers may look more or less male.) Of my remaining four castrated males, one is a slip, but three (a Buff Orpington and two Silver Grey Dorkings) are clearly full capons. I plan to grow them on for awhile longer, and to report after we have tried them at the table.

Addendum, January 2007

I remember that we ate the last of the caponsthe Buff Orpingtonat a year and a half age. He was quite tasty, though not quite as tender or juicy as I expected. Still, vastly more edible as a roaster than an intact cock of the same age would have been (tough as an old boot!). I look forward to raising more capons, and experimenting with proper cooking techniques. There are various versions of caponizing kits available. The one I use is the NASCO Caponizing Kit (their Stock No. C10606N), available from many of the large poultry supply houses. I have found the surgical retractors rather difficult to use, but have no basis for comparing this kit with others that might be available. People often inquire about instructional literature on caponizing. The truth is that not much is needed. The problem is not the complexity of the procedure itself, but getting up one's nerve to try it, and then, with practice, developing the skills needed to do it quickly and competently. The NASCO kit I bought comes with instructions (actually Leaflet No. 490, U. S. Department of Agriculture), which are completely adequate, assuming one has sufficient experience slaughtering chickens. I bought Caponizing: Modern Management and Profitable Marketing, by Loyl Stromberg. Like anything by Mr. Stromberg, one of the worst written and edited things you are likely to see in print, though it has information on the history of caponizing you may find interesting. Online, there is an instructional leaflet originally produced for Sears, Roebuck & Co. in 1922.

Addendum, September 2007

The three most frequent questions I get about caponizing: How do you achieve sterility? We've all seen the tense operating room dramas where all the doctors and nurses are garbed to the eyes in sterile gowns and masks and the last caution is taken to ensure that not a single stray germ can gain access to the surgery site. How can the homestead caponizer possibly create such a clinically sterile environment? The answer is that it is really not necessary to do so. The robustness of immune response of a well managed homestead flock is astounding, and your birds' recuperative powers are enormous. Of course, you should come as close as you can to reasonably sterile conditions. I use a stainless steel surface (the one on my slaughter table, actually), well cleaned and swabbed with alcohol or peroxide. I soak the tools of my surgical kit, and generously rub my hands and fingers, in the alcohol or peroxide between operations. This level of precaution is sufficient. You are far more likely to lose a bird to stress brought on by your beginner's lack of skill, than to infection.

Do you sew up or bind the incision? No, sewing or binding the incision through which the testicles are extracted has never been a part of caponizing. The incision is made between the lowest two ribs. From the standpoint of the bird's immune response, the incision through the skin is trivial. It is the incision between the ribs and into the body cavity which presents the most critical threat of infection. Standard practice is to pull the skin over the ribs well to one side before making the incision. After plucking out the testes, release the skin you have pulled to the side, and it will return to its normal place, covering the incision site and guarding against its contamination with dirt and pathogens. Do you give the cockerel any sort of anaesthetic? Again the question arises out of our anology with operating room procedures. But remember that the anaesthetist who sedates the patient is a highly skilled technician with years of training in the use of what is actually a rather perilous procedurerendering the patient unconscious or insensate with a substance which at too high a dosage would kill him. Do you plan to duplicate that training? Where will you buy potentially lethal anaesthetics? Who can advise you how many units to apply to a chicken of seven and a half ounces? Obviously, as much as we might wince at the thought of inflicting pain on our patient, administering an anaesthetic is not an option. Actually, I'm not sure what the nature of the cockerel's experience is. He's quite upset when caught and handled, but calms down completely when put under restraint on the table. (Various ways of restraining the bird have been used.) I have been amazed when making the incision and pulling out the testicles with the forcepshe doesn't even blink. (On occasion, it is true, I have hit some sort of nerve, and the poor guy has jerked as if hit with a jolt of electricity. I think one can learn where that super-sensitive spot is, however, and avoid it.) More later!

Serving a Niche Market for Started Birds

This article was first published in the June/July 2009 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine.

Table of Contents for This Page

The Story of Brooklin Farm The Brooklin Brooder Words of Advice

We work with our backyard flocks because its fun, it helps the household budget, and it gets us in touch with the natural world. And before we know it, weve developed a level of expertise that surprises us. We start looking for new challenges. Or maybe for ways to make that growing expertise pay. If youre thinking markets, you should check out Stepping Up to Production for a Small Broiler Market. Many have found that a profitable enterprise, though that may be a more ambitious expansion than youre interested in. Maybe serving an egg market could be a little easier? (Patienceeventually I hope to offer you an article on producing eggs for market.) Heres another idea that could reward effort in an under-exploited niche: If youve become comfortable raising chicks in a brooder, why not offer small-lot started birds for sale? You already have the experience, may not need a lot of additional equipment, and could find that word-of-mouth is all the promotion you need.

The Story of Brooklin Farm

My two young friends Leila Brooks (18) and Allison Hoblin (19) started thinking about their niche market enterprise when they were working together at a local Tractor Supply. Leilas only experience with poultry was a single small flock of chickensone of my starter packages, a Cuckoo Marans broody with her ten chicks, passed on to her family in 2005. Allison had no prior experience with poultry at all. Each spring their Tractor Supply offers a limited number of day-olds, timed for the Easter market for cute, fluffy chicks. They heard time and again from customers, Why cant I get just a few? or Id love to have a few layers, but I dont want to mess with a brooder. As well, the small number of chicks the Tractor Supply offered quickly sold out, and no more were ordered, so Leila and Allison heard complaints from many disappointed customers who failed to get chicks. They sensed a large potential customer base for small-lot sales of alreadybrooded birds. Both (unusually, for young people these days) had for some time had a yearning for farming. Perhaps this was a chance to make a beginning in that direction. My friends were anything but timid: They ordered 300 chicks to start, in November, 2007. They concluded in retrospect that first order was naivethey ordered straight run stock, thinking there would be plenty of demand for roosters. On the other hand, they were willing from the beginning to butcher excess males, or any other excess birds, to sell as dressed poultry as necessary. As for breeds, again they were willing to experiment to find out what worked: They ordered a mix of Ameraucana, Rhode Island Red, Buff Orpington, Barred Rock, Silver Laced Wyandotte, and Black Sex-Links. They had no problem selling out that first broodeven the males sold well. By the end of those sales, however, it was becoming obvious that they had approached saturation in their market for cockerels; and their customers were starting to express a preference for pullets. In February of 2008, they ordered another big batch of day-olds, the same mix of breeds, but this time one-half pullets, the other half straight run. From that point, they proceeded on the basis of trial and error, and a willingness to stay loose and try anything that might work for them, to recognize and grab any opportunity for expanding the market for their started birds. Top of page For example, in May they started 50 turkey poults (25 each Bronze and Broad Breasted White). In June they started 100 ducklings (Pekin and Rouen), which they found the easiest to brood of all the fowl types theyve tried. The ducklings were a great draw at their farmers market for families with children, and drove sales of their other products such as eggs and dressed poultry. (Though the ducklings were great fun to raise, they will probably not grow more for the time beingunless they get access to a pond: Otherwise the ducklings are just too messy for their situation.) They even started one batch of 400 all-cockerels, the same sort of breed mix mentioned above, because they were cheap (30 cents apiece) and they assumed theyd be able to sell them as fresh-dressed, all-pasture-and-grain poultry. They were rightthey easily sold all they could bring to marketbut the experience was horrible, to quote Allison. Processing large batches of birds was necessary (since their market showed a marked preference for fresh rather than frozen poultry), but difficult to coordinate with their job at Tractor Supply. To supply their fresh-broiler market, they began growing small batches (25 per month) of meat-

type birds. (They were able to sell all the traditional-breed birds they brought to market as dressed broilers, but found more ready acceptance of the meat types. They have raised Cornish Cross to date, but I urged them to read Sunday-Dinner Chicken: Alternatives to the Cornish Cross and consider trying some alternative meat strains.) A major event in the expansion of their business last year was meeting the owners of Smith Family Farm, long established in local markets, with whom they have established a productive and cooperative relationship. SFF contracted with them for 300 ready-to-lay (20 weeks) Black Australorp pullets needed for their egg market. In the fall, they bought all the turkeys Leila and Allison had, since they were getting more demand than they could themselves satisfy as Thanksgiving approached. Leila and Allison now take all their slaughter birds to SFF, exchanging help processing SFFs birds for access to their excellent butchering setup and stainless steel equipment. Another major event in the life of their business is their current move to a new farm. A fact of life for Allison and Leila, as for so many young people who aspire to be farmers, is that they simply cannot afford to buy land. Fortunately, they have foundagain, as many aspiring young farmers dothat it is not unusual to find folks with land who are not farming it themselves, but are willing, even eager, to rent it out to someone likely to farm it well. Allison and Leila are looking forward to rooting an expanded operation at their new place, with more space, and especially, more access to pasture for their flocks. Top of page

The Brooklin Brooder

Here is a brief sketch of Allison and Leilas production practices and their results so far.

Stock: All Leila and Allisons purchased stock thus far has been in the form of dayolds. They have had good luck getting sound, healthy stock shipped through the Postal Service, from a hatchery theyve settled on as their preferred source. (They did have disastrous results last year with a batch of poults they felt was of poor quality, from a hatchery they now avoid.) They have not requested vaccination of hatchlings in the past, though plan to do so this year (as extra insurance they will not have disease problems, given the mix of species they routinely work with, and the frequency of outside visitors to the brooder operation). This year, they may try incubating some of their own batches of chicksor even experiment with hatching under broody hens, if any of their older hens decide they want to be mothers.

Batch size and composition: After the big batches (300 to 400 chicks each) of last year, Allison and Leila have concluded that it will fit their needs and their job schedule better to do smaller, more frequent batchessay, 200 chicks once a month. Since they have enjoyed raising turkey poults, they will fit batches of them into the schedule as well. They expect to have up to four batches of various ages in brooders at one time. They plan to stick with the mix of mostly dual purpose, traditional farm breeds described above, since that is the type bird most customers are looking for. Ameraucanas have been especially popular, because of the novelty of the pastel tinted

eggs. Rhode Island Reds are also a frequent choice, perhaps because that is a breed more people have heard of. But Leila and Allison have found that customers are pretty flexible about breed choice, and are usually happy to pick from whichever are available at the time. Starting this season, one early batch will be straight run, since they have frequent requests for a good flock rooster. Afterwards, batches will be all or mostly pullets, to serve the greater demand for started layers.

Brooding: Leila and Allison like to brood over a litter of wood shavings or pelleted horse bedding. Theyve also found especially useful the fuel used in pellet-burning stoves. (They are careful to buy pellets made from 100 percent hardwood sawdust, and avoid those containing additives.) They spread the pellets, then mist the surface just a bit. The moistening causes the surface pellets to expand into a fluffy litter. As moisture penetrates the surface, intact pellets below also fluff up, for a constant renewal of fresh litter. Usually they clean out the litter between batches, though not alwaysIt depends on how it smells and looks. (I suggested allowing the litter to become more biologically active by keeping it in place throughout the season, as described by Jean Nick in Brooding Chicks on Deep Litter.)

Equipment and structures: Brooklin Farms started bird enterprise has been do-ityourself from the beginning. Equipment is simple, an elaboration on the sorts of 250watt heat lamps, wade-proof waterers, and chick feeders well known to any flockster who has raised chicks in a home brooder. They have built three 8x16-ft brooder houses. Each can brood up to 300 chicks, with the number reduced to 100 per brooder if they need to hold the growing birds beyond six weeks. They have begun using electric net fencing from Premier Fencing Supplies to confine and protect their flocks.

Feed: Allison and Leila take advantage of their employee discount to buy their feeds from Tractor Supply. They start with a 24 percent protein chick starter, then at six weeks switch to a 20 percent grower ration. They feed free choice, which in their experience results in less stress and conflict among the chicks. Once the birds start going outside, they feed in addition cracked corn and small grains, as a scratch feed.

Getting the birds onto pasture: And with regard to outside, Allison and Leila are big believers in pasturing their flocks, and try to get the young birds out on pasture at five or six weeks, depending on the season. Early on, they keep the heat source on inside the brooder structure, so the chicks can come and go as they wish, to selfregulate temperature.

Predators and other losses: The young birds ranged freely outside the structure last year. Aside from a few episodes with hawks, their only major predator problem has been the loss of fifteen to twenty growing birds to a fox. The fact that losses were not greater in a free-range flock had much to do with the fact there were a number of dogs at their previous farm, who kept predators at bay. They will be using electronet for predator protection at their new place. They have had no disease problemsno coccidiosis or serious cases of pasting upin their brooders so far. They did have heavy losses of Black Australorp chicks in one batch, but concluded the cause was heat stress in an unseasonal temperature spike.

Top of page

Words of Advice
Ive elaborated on the broader elements of Leila and Allisons farming enterprise, which has expanded to include as well a few breeding rabbits, and they are currently bottle feeding a couple of calves. At their new place, they hope to raise some guineas (they were not allowed to raise such noisy birds at their former farm rental), and test the market for both started and dressed guineas. Theyve made a virtue of staying loose, and being willing to slaughter any excess birds, which have been easy to sell in their farmers markets. (As Leila said: Theres always something you can do with a bird.) But brooding hatchlings for the niche service they offerfurnishing no-minimum started birds the customer doesnt have to brood, with a range of breed, gender, and species choicehas consistently led the way in the evolution of their business. You might not want to be as broad-ranging in your own project. Specifically, you might prefer to avoid producing excess birds that have to be butchered, and to sell only small-lot started birds to local buyers. If you start small, you can determine the level of local demand for live started birds exclusively. If that is your preference, here are a few helpful hints you might glean from their experience.

Brooklins average customer: I asked Leila and Allison to describe what they think of as their average customer. The reply, without hesitation, was: Somebody buying for a family of four, concerned about healthier eating, and looking for a good experience for their children. Lately weve seen a lot more concern about food security because of the economic downturn. It seems that more people than ever beforepreviously content to get their food from anonymous sourcesare now thinking about ways they can put more wholesome food on their familys tables by raising poultry in their own backyard. You can serve that expanding market.

Look for partnerships: Remember Allison and Leilas successful relationship with Smith Family Farm. In the expanding better-foods market, you may find operations such as theirs who are unable to supply all their demand for eggs, broilers, or turkeys. They may be eager to buy started birds from you.

Diversity: Brooklin Farm from the beginning has avoided a rote offering of only the most common super-hybrids for their customers. Offering a mixmostly of older breeds, with more of a sense of heritagehas worked well for them.

Profits: Leila and Allison plowed most of the profits earned last year into growing their businessinvestments in the brooder sheds and equipment, electronet, etc. As the business expands this year, they should start realizing significant income from their enterprise.

Promotion: Promotion of the service they offer has not been a problem to date. They put up fliers in feed stores, post offices, pet stores, grocery storesanywhere with a bulletin board. Their work at Tractor Supply gives them direct contact with the sorts of customers eager for their service. They did a trial listing on craigslist. (We got a lot of responses, but few serious inquiries.) I have circulated numerous announcements of stock availability for them, both to my personal chicken list and to a couple of state-wide homesteading online venues. By far the most successful part of their promotion has been word-of-mouth. They have found especially that children love it when they are allowed to pick the specific birds their parents are going to buy, making for a more memorable buying experienceand increased buzz in the area about what they are offering.

Over the years I have encountered so many people who want to keep a small layer flock, but who have been deterred by the necessity of starting with a lot of twenty-five (typically the minimum order of chicks through the mail) or by nervousness about raising vulnerable, totally dependent baby birds in a brooder. Since the inception of Brooklin Farms small-lot, alreadybrooded service, Ive been delighted to respond to inquiries about getting just a few layers: Hey, I know just the thing for you! Based on the grateful and enthusiastic feedback Ive been getting from Brooklin customers Ive referred, I believe this is a niche in the market begging to be filled.

Game Birds: A Niche Market Opportunity

The following article was published as Game Birds: An Income Opportunity in the June/July 2011 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine.

Table of Contents for This Page

The Three Species Management Procuring Stock

Health Issues Feeding Slaughtering Sales Face to Face Marketing

If you enjoy raising birds, and youre looking for an income opportunity, supplying a niche market with a specialty product might make more sense than producing a standard product for a market crowded with competitors. My friend and neighbor Denton Baldwin has found such a niche market: He raises three species of game birdscoturnix, chukar, and pheasants. Though he is continually refining his production techniques, he is selling all the birds he can raiseand all the quail eggs he can produceto five top-end restaurants. Denton works three farms, and may soon add a fourth. One is a family farm, on which he helps raise horses. On two leased farms he raises beef cattle, pigs, and the game birds. He grows as well much of his own hay for his livestock. He calls his combined farming enterprise Freestate Farms, located in northern Virginia.

The Three Species

Though quail, pheasants, and partridges have not been domesticated as intensively as other domestic fowl, they are in the same avian order, Galliformes, as chickens, turkeys, guineas, and peafowl. Wild relatives include grouse and prairie hen. All these species are primarily ground dwelling, and fly short distances onlyto escape predators, get past barriers, or roost in trees at night. They all eat an omnivorous diet of green plants, seeds, fruits such as berries, and a variety of animal foods such as worms, slugs, insects, and even such small vertebrates as lizards and rodents.

Coturnix
Coturnix is shorthand for Coturnix coturnix japonica or Japanese quail, a domesticated subspecies of the common quail, Coturnix coturnix. Though often called coturnix quail, that is a redundancy, since the Latin coturnix itself means quail. Coturnix are astoundingly productive. Incubation is a mere sixteen or seventeen days. The birds mature in six weeks, and begin laying as early as five weeks, and are ready for butchering as early as six to eight weeks. Dressed weight depends on strain, from seven ounces up to ten. Denton says he typically slaughters at eight weeks, and sometimes gets carcass weights of three quarters of a pound with some of his hens, which are a little heavier than the cocks. Coturnix are also excellent producers of eggs, which range from snow white to brown, but most usually are mottled tan, dark brown, and blue. The average weight of eggs from mature hens is about ten grams or one-third ounce, about eight percent of the quail hens body weight (compared to the chickens egg, which is about three percent of her body weight). As with chickens, rate of lay is keyed to day lengthproduction will be highest when day length (or apparent day length, with the use of artificial lighting) is at least fourteen hours. Though laying begins earlier, Denton finds that the best egg production is during the last two weeks before slaughter at eight weeks, when production averages an egg per hen per day.

Denton often reserves some of the laying hens for a couple of additional weeks beyond their ideal slaughter date, when their egg production is even better.

Chukar
Chukar partridge (Alectoris chukar) is a gallinaceous upland game bird in the pheasant family which originated in Eurasia, larger than quail. It has been widely introduced as a game bird, and has established feral populations in the United States and other countries. Incubation is twenty-three to twenty-five days. Chukar take twice as long as coturnix to reach slaughter weight, at about sixteen weeks, but dress out to a larger size. Denton aims for a dressed weight of one pound, three or four ounces.

Pheasant
Ring-necked pheasant is the collective name for a number of subspecies and hybrids of the common pheasant (Phasianus colchicus), native to Russia and the Caucasus but widely introduced elsewhere as a game bird. These pheasants readily breed in captivity and naturalize in many climates. Incubation is twenty-three to twenty-six days. Like the chukar, pheasants take at least sixteen weeks to reach slaughter sizeDenton has at times had to hold them to as long as twenty weeks to get the fine finished carcass his restaurateurs demand. Average dressed weight is one pound, nine ounces to one pound, eleven ounces. Top of page

Management
Denton does not like the tight confinement of the most common system for raising coturnix, in wire cages with low tops to prevent flying. Since one of the farms he leases is a former horse farm, he has developed a system instead in which the birds range freely inside horse stalls. The stalls vary a bit in size, with the largest 12 by 18 feet. Denton raises coturnix year-round. He prefers to buy in three- to five-day-old quail chicks from two local sources. In the winter, here in northern Virginia (Zone 6b), he broods chicks in a large stock watering tank with kiln-dried pine shavings litter and a 250-watt lamp. This is the time of year in which his losses of chicks are sometimes high, and he recognizes that an improved brooder setup is essential for future winters. After a week to a week and a half, he moves the chicks into the horse stalls, with 200 in each stall. Note that in parts of the year other than winter the chicks simply go directly into the stalls. Each stall is equipped with at least two and sometimes three heating, feeding, and watering stations, each consisting of a 250-watt heat lamp suspended over a special game bird feeder, designed to admit the birds heads only and thus minimize waste, and a waterer designed to prevent wading or splashing. Denton has found that having an insufficient number of stations causes piling up around the feeders, which can lead to suffocation of chicks. The earth floor of the stall is covered with a deep layer of pine shavings.

With eleven stalls in use, the maximum number of coturnix Denton has had growing at one time in the past is 1100. He plans to raise about 5000 during the current calendar year. There are eight additional stalls in a separate barn, which he plans to use for expanded production of pheasants, and possibly for housing breeders. Initially Denton provided nestboxes for the mature quail, but found that the hens ignored them, preferring to lay instead in a corner of the stall. Frequent topping off with fresh litter, and frequent collection, are the keys to clean eggs. As the quail grow, Denton splits the original group of 200 into two stalls. At that point they each have more than two square feet per birdconsiderably more than allotted to chickens in so-called free range layer houses (which means simply that they are not confined to battery cages). As he markets his birds, he continues to split groups among available stalls, so that the birds always have the maximum amount of space possible. Denton uses the same stalls for raising his chukar and pheasants as well, allowing more space per bird and some opportunity for flight. For example, he keeps sixty to seventy pheasants in two adjacent stalls with their wire partition removed. This spacing allows for enough flying for necessary exercise, but not so much as to toughen the breast muscles and reduce the quality of the finished carcass. Denton has found that having more space tends to calm them down and prevent panic flying. The chukar get quite aggressive toward each other past the point of sexual maturitythe hens as well as the cocks engaging in serious fighting. Unless Denton slaughters these birds as soon as they are ready to market, he has too many losses to combat. With all three species it is crucial to be quiet and unobtrusive when working around them from the time they are chicks, so that they are comfortable with his presence. Once several children got into a stall and ran around excitedly. The birds in the stall never did relax after thatthey were always in a panic when being serviced, and had to be netted when it was time to gather them for processing. Birds which have never been panicked are much less stressed, are more pleasant to work with, and in the end can be gathered by hand and produce a more tender dressed carcass. Top of page

Procuring Stock
Denton prefers buying his chicks in rather than incubating his own. He has two suppliers. One is a farmer in a neighboring county with a walk-in incubator with the capacity for hatching thousands of eggs at a time. The farmer supplies game birds to local hunting clubschukar, pheasants, and bobwhite quail (the coturnix is not a hunters quail)about 10,000 a year. He has no interest in producing meat birds for a market, so he and Denton are not competitors, but he is happy to hatch coturnix chicks to supply Denton and other local growers. This year he will probably supply chukar and pheasant chicks as well. The other supplier is a retiree who simply likes working with animals. She enjoys hatching batches of game birds of all types for Denton and other area growers. She has supplied him with several thousand quail, chukar, and pheasant chicks per year, usually about one batch per

month. At present she is trying to locate breeding stock for Pekin ducks, which Denton is considering adding to his growing enterprise. A major factor in Dentons purchase of stock for his three game bird species, and his consequent marketing strategies, is that chukar and pheasant hatching eggs and chicks are available only in the spring. He makes his best estimate of the number of birds he can efficiently raise and market, purchases the chicks he needs to meet those goals, raises them to market age at four months or so, then waits until next spring to repeat the cycle. Coturnix eggs and chicks, on the other hand, are available year-round, so he can keep production cycles going for both dressed quail and eggs. A problem seems to be emerging, however, which could push him toward breeding his own stock and producing his own hatching eggs. His major supplier is reporting difficulty getting enough hatching eggs to fill her incubators. At the same time, she is finding a huge increase in genetic flaws in the birds she hatches. Denton speculates that both problems result from the growth in the market for game birds, which both creates shortages in the supply of eggs, and brings a number of unscrupulous or inexperienced producers of hatching eggs rushing into the market, whose focus is on maximum production of eggs and chicks, rather than on quality breeding. Denton is concluding reluctantly that, to protect both his steady access to the numbers of chicks he needs to supply his markets, and the quality of the stock he grows, he may have to breed his own birds and produce his own hatching eggs. If he does begin producing his own stock, Denton will probably buy an incubator with a 300 to 500 egg capacity. He will need as well to organize spaces in the horse stalls for breeders, allowing only one cock per breeding space to prevent lethal fighting between cocks. Dedication of space for breeders will have to be coordinated with the overall production cycles. His hope is that he would have to produce his own chicks only in parts of the year when he is likely to have most difficulty buying in from trusted sources elsewhere. Top of page

Health Issues
Game birds are susceptible to diseases which affect their more common gallinaceous kin. Denton has had no disease problems to date, and believes that a continual emphasis on prevention will help him keep it that way. He never buys his stock at auctions, but only from sources he knows and trusts. He applies the same precautions when bringing in used equipment from elsewhere. Periodically, he tests his flocks for avian influenza. Like other gallinaceous species, the game birds need access to dust bathing to prevent lice and mite infestations. Denton finds that there is enough dust available from the earth floor under the litter for dust bathing, and his birds do not have problems with external parasites.

Feeding
Denton feeds a game bird feed made at a feed mill that serves several counties in our area. He avoids feeding the game bird starter mix, however, since it is medicated (contains coccsidiostats). Instead, he starts his birds on the second stage game bird grower mix, 22 percent protein, and boosts protein to 25 percent by adding soybean meal. Some growers use several different feed formulations, depending on stage of growth, but Denton is satisfied with

the excellent results he gets by feeding the same modified mix to all three species. Feeding this high protein mix, straight through from brooder to slaughter, produces a nice fat bird, which is what Dentons restaurateurs are looking for. The only group to whom he feeds a different formulation are the reserved layers kept beyond the usual slaughter date. They get a standard commercial chicken layer mash, boosted in protein content by adding soybean meal, plus granite grit and oyster shell free choice. In addition to the commercial feed, Denton feeds his birds a millet hay, which he has been growing for some time for his horses and beef cattle. He round-bales the millet just as the seeds ripen, before they begin shattering but while the stem is still green. One day while feeding the hay to the cattle it occurred to him to offer it to a stall full of coturnix. They went nuts! he laughs. Ever since, he loves to feed millet hay to all of his game birds. They thrash about in it and tunnel through it, obviously having the time of their lives. In the process, they eat not only the seeds but the green stems as well, and reduce the hay to a pulverized residue which becomes part of the litter. Clearly the hay not only contributes to more natural feeding, but as well helps provide for the contentment, the mental health, of the birds. Denton hopes to expand his farm based feedingto get access to more acreage and start growing other small grains, corn, and soybeanswith the long-term goal of making the feeds needed for all his own livestock, including the game birds. Top of page

Slaughtering
An interesting thing to note is that Denton has not been able to find any inspections or regulations with which he must comply to grow, process, or market game birds, in sharp contrast to complex regulations for more domesticated fowl such as chickens and turkeys. If that is the good news, the bad news is that for that very reason, commercial poultry processing plants wont touch game birds. That means Denton has to see to his own processing. In the past, if he has had a relatively small batch of birds to process, hes hired a couple of day laborers who are skilled at the task. For dressing out large numbers, he crates up his birds and takes them to a farmer in the next county who specializes in custom processing. His friend uses a game bird plucker from Eli Reiff of Mifflinburg, Pennsylvania, who sells a series of pluckers (and scalders) he designed to fit the needs of pastured poultry producers, this one modified by doubling the number of fingers (so the small birds do not get caught between the plucker fingers), and using softer, more flexible fingers. Working with the farmer, Denton and his two assistants can process 200 coturnix in a couple of hours. With anticipated increases in production, Denton thinks it may be a good idea to invest in one of Reiff's game bird pluckers and a scalder so he can do all his own processing, without the added time and effort expended on transporting the birds. (Check out Eli Reiff's Poultryman pluckers and scalders, including his 23-inch Quail Picker, or call Eli at 570-966-0769. For a more affordable, but production grade, plucker, check out David Schafers Featherman Pro pluckers and scalders, also including a specialty game bird plucker.)

Sales
At present Denton supplies his dressed game birds and quail eggs to five top-end restaurants in our area. Chefs at such restaurants are always looking for something special, something to add cachet to their menus. As interest in local foods grows, increasing numbers of chefs are looking for local ingredients of integrity. They know they can get mass-produced commodity ingredients from commercial suppliers, but they want instead foods with a story, foods with a face, foods with a connection to where their customers live. That is why I hear time and again from small producers of my acquaintance that they supply chefs who say simply Bring me all you can grow! That has been Dentons experience as well. His chefs tell him, I can work my menu around anything you want to supply meon any schedule. Dentons chefs are ecstatic that he aims for diversity in the game birds and other livestock he grows for market. They like to mix it up, to avoid the boredom of the same menu week in and week out. If Denton can supply quail for two weeks, chukar for the next two, and pheasants the two weeks after that, his chefs are ready for another round of quail. In addition to his restaurant sales, which account for most of his production, Dentons Freestate Farms offers quality meats through Farmer Girls, a local online broker for foods from small producers in our area. Sales have been modest in this venuean order of two dozen quail eggs and a packet of two dressed quail is typicalbut they are gradually increasing. (You can follow the evolution of Freestate Farms on Facebook. You can also email Denton at freestatefarms@aol.com.) As word spreads that Denton has top quality meats and game fowl available, he receives mixed orders to supply family holiday gatherings. Recently, for example, a host planning a big family festivity ordered three pheasants, fourteen quail, and two pork loins. Such orders as well are on the increase. Denton sells all his game birds into the above markets, but during parts of his production cycles when he produces more quail eggs than his restaurateurs require, he sells all available surplus to a nearby Whole Foods, which features a section of exotic eggs of all types. Top of page

Face to Face Marketing

Ive told you about Denton Baldwins fascinating and evolving enterprise to suggest that you consider game birds if you are looking for a niche market income opportunity. But even more, I want to suggest that, if try your hand at market production, you should avoid static models, and diversify as much as you possibly can. The benefits are numerous, beginning with earnings. Denton observes that, if he were selling through a broker into a wholesale market, he would be making $4.50 each for his quail. Selling directly to his restaurants, he gets $7.50. If he were producing on a contract basis, he would have to move the quail through on something like a rigid eight-week rotationmeaning he would at times have to send to market birds who at eight weeks were not well finished. Denton insists on selling nothing but highest quality dressed birds. For his chefs, that means the birds have put on a nice layer of fat over the breast. Without that fat, the bird cooks dry, the skin cracks, and the resulting dish is not as savory. So if Denton palpates the breasts of a batch of quail he expected to furnish to a

chef this week, and finds that they havent yet finished with the desired layer of fat, he will advise his customer, Hey, this group needs another week to finish. Why dont I send you a nice veal calf this week instead? And the chef is likely to respond, Sounds good, Ill feature veal dishes this week, and be ready for the quail next week. This is personal marketing, in which the evolution of each new season is a mutual process between the grower and the buyer. Denton meets periodically with his chefs when planning the season. Last year he raised 200 pheasants, and now his chefs are telling him they could use many more, and he plans 500 for this season. They can use more chukar as well, and he plans to increase production to 400 this year. They are all clamoring for rabbit for their larders, so he has purchased his first batch of rabbits to begin meeting their demands. They are asking for duck as well, so he will soon raise a trial batch of ducks in order to find a production model that works for him. One of Dentons major chefs has indicated he might like to set up a contract for him to supply him on a weekly basis, rotating through the various offerings from his farms: something like a veal calf in week one, a pig the next week, then fifty game birds (any of the three species), then fifty rabbits, then start the cycle again. Once the duck production has become a settled routine, he would add a fifth week to the rotation, and supply fifty ducks. Denton likes the idea of dedicating a large portion of his output to a single restaurant with which he has an excellent working relationship. If he developed the same arrangement with another restaurant, at most two others, he would have assured outlets for the entire production from his farms, and would not have to scramble about seeking market openings elsewhere.

Poultry Miscellaneous
*Table of Contents for Poultry Miscellaneous Section is at bottom of this page.*
I have created this new section, and moved into it two articles from elsewhere, The Homestead Waterfowl Flock and Caponizing: Reviving a Lost Art. New Kid in the Flock discusses strategies for adding new birds to the flock without too much mayhem. I anticipate adding a Question and Answer page in this section as well. So much to do, so little time. ~Harvey, December 31, 2008

Table of Contents for Poultry Miscellaneous Section

The Homestead Waterfowl Flock New Kid in the Flock

The Homestead Waterfowl Flock Part One

I wrote this article for the June/July 2006 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine, a great resource for the homestead flock owner.

Table of Contents
Part One Part TwoPart Three

A Multi-Purpose Flock
A small waterfowl flock is a great addition to the homestead. You may prefer either ducks or geese to start, but I like keeping both: Their needs and care are similar enough that it is easy to run them together in the same flock. When I refer to the homestead waterfowl flock, I have in mind utilizing them not only as a part of the household economy, but incorporating their natural behaviors to assist with the work of the homestead. The waterfowl recommend themselves as homestead poultry especially because they are healthy and vigorousalmost entirely disease freeare easy to raise, and can forage a lot of their own food after the brooder phase.

Breeds (and Species)

Before you decide on your choice of breeds, there are some facts about these species you should know.

Muscovies Although all domestic ducks except Muscovies are descended from the wild mallard (Anas platyrhynchos), they have been bred for greater size and weight, and hence have largely lost

the ability to fly. A low fenceonly a couple of feet or sois sufficient to contain them. Muscovies have an entirely different wild ancestor (Cairina moschata), considered by some more closely related to geese than to mallard type domestic ducks. Though comfortable in water for brief periods, their plumage is less water-repellant than that of mallard type ducks, hence their needs for shelter in extreme weather are greater. Unlike mallard types, Muscovies retain the ability to fly, and I have sometimes found it necessary to clip wings in order to keep them grounded where I want them. Absent such restraint, they may prefer to roost in trees at night. You may prefer to raise ducks primarily for eggs. You may be surprised to learn that the more productive laying ducksespecially Campbells and Runnerslay more eggs than many breeds of chickens, from 250 to 325 eggs per year. Duck eggs are especially prized for baking. Heavier breeds lay many fewer eggs and are raised primarily for meatAylesbury, Muscovy, Pekin (the fastest growing of all duck breeds), and Rouen. Just as with chickens, there are also dual purpose breeds that do fairly well as both layer and meat birdsSaxony, Swedish, Orpington, Magpie, etc.

Two Goose Species Most domestic geese also derive from two separate ancestors. Embdens, Pilgrims, Romans, Toulouse, Pomeranians, and other common breeds descend from the European Graylag (Anser anser); while Chinese and African geese descend from the Asian Swan Goose (Anser cygnoides). An identifying characteristic of the latter two breeds is the large, forward inclining knob that develops where the upper bill meets the skull. (Two feral speciesthe Canada and the Egyptianhave also been domesticated and are kept by some fanciers.) Geese are not kept for egg production. Their eggs are perfectly edible (and they make a large omelet), but their laying season is restricted to the spring, and they produce relatively few eggs. Keeping of domestic waterfowl has been declining for decades. You can help to preserve these valuable birds by adding a small flock to the homestead. See the American Livestock Breeds Conservancys website for a list of the different breeds and their preservation status.

Getting Started
Like chicks, just-hatched ducklings and goslings that have not been fed or watered can be sent through the mail, so you can order them from numerous hatcheries around the country. The artificial brooding of these hatchlings is similar to that for chicksreview Gail Damerows excellent introduction to brooding chicks (Chick SuccessStart Those Birds Right!) in the

April/May issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine. You will find the brooding of waterfowl hatchlings at least as easy as that for chicks. There are, however, two key points to keep in mind: While it is typical for commercial chick feeds to be medicated (contain antibiotics), it is imperative that medicated feed not be fed to waterfowl hatchlingsit can kill them.

Brooder Waterer Second, waterfowl hatchlings are incredibly sloppy with their water. Be sure to use a waterer that doesnt allow them to get into itif their down gets soaked, it loses all insulating value, the hatchlings become chilled, and they can die. Even with the best designed waterer, however, the playful hatchlings will splash a good deal of water out over their litter, creating unhealthy conditions in the brooder. Take up this wet litter regularly and replace it with fresh dry litter. It can also help to set their waterer on a platform over a catch basin. I have seen advice from some quarters that you brood ducklings and goslings separately. I always brood them together (they arrive in the same shipment), and have never had a problem. (Indeed, I have even brooded chicks, ducklings, and goslings in one brooder.) The key is to make sure there is plenty of space in the brooder so the hatchlings are not stressed by crowding; and that they are allowed the opportunity to self-regulate their need for warmth that is, there are cooler areas in the brooder they can circulate in, or spend more time underneath the heat source. Frequent monitoring of the brooder is the key to success.

Feeding
Dave Holderreads The Book of Geese and Raising the Home Duck Flock have excellent chapters on feeding waterfowl at all ages, including sample formulations for homesteaders wishing to make their own feeds. He recommends a 20-22 percent crude protein feed up to 3 weeks; 16-18 percent protein from 4 to 12 weeks; and 16 percent protein from 13 to 26 weeks. The earlier the birds get onto high quality pasture, the sooner they can forage a good deal of their nutrition on their own. Since I like to keep things simple, I make a compromise feed for both my chicken and waterfowl flocks. Note that the major difference in their nutritional requirements is that waterfowl need more B vitamins, particularly niacin, so I add cultured dried yeast to the mix to boost B vitamin content. Currently I am feeding my adult birds a mix that per hundredweight contains: 12 lbs of a pre-mix made of Fertrells Poultry Nutri-Balancer, kelp meal, salt, cultured yeast, fish and crab meals, and whole flax seed; 6 lbs alfalfa meal; 30 lbs whole corn; 22 lbs whole peas; 20 lbs wheat; and 10 lbs mixed oats and barley. I grind the corn and peas coarsely and combine with the pre-mix. The small grains I sprout and feed separately. (The birds go for the sprouts by preference every time.) This formulation is about 16 percent protein. When I receive my ducklings and goslings later in the spring, I will boost

the protein content with more fish meal, and with earthworms harvested from a large vermicomposting project.

Part Two
Table of Contents
Part OnePart Two Part Three

Pasturing the Flock

I like to get my young ducklings and goslings on pasture as soon as they are featheredabout five or six weeks. (You can start giving them outings during nice days considerably earlier than that, returning them to shelter at night.) They benefit greatly from pasture. Indeed, once past the brooder phase, goslings can subsist entirely on pasture grasses (though they will grow faster with some supplemental feed, which is my practice). Muscovy ducks are also great grazers, and will put pasture grass to good use. Mallard type ducks are not grazers to the same extent as the geese and the Muscovies, but they do eat a good deal of green forage. Unlike the geese (who are vegetarians), ducks thrive on the live animal food to be gleaned on pasture earthworms, slugs, etc.

Pasturing the Flock Waterfowl on pasture can be confined and protected using electronet fencing. It is especially important to use the newer versions of electric net fencing, with closer horizontals at the bottom, to prevent entanglement of young waterfowl with the net.

Shelter
During the warm season, the only shelter needed is shade from the sun on hot summer days: Fully-feathered waterfowl in the warm season do not need shelter from the rain, and indeed will not use it if available. In a summer rain, they run around excitedly, flapping wings and honking or quacking. Indeed, I provide no shelter at all for ducks and geese, if they have shade from trees at all times as the angle of the sun changes, especially in the afternoon. I have also used a mobile 10 by 10 foot hooped structure covered with 20-mil woven poly fabric to provide shade for my waterfowl. In the winter, any shelter is adequate for these cold-hardy birds which is dry and provides protection from the wind. On many winter days they can be released to the outside if there is space available.

I strongly recommend a deep organic litter in the winter house. Pine shavings are excellent, as are oak leaves, or a mix of the two. Unlike chickens, however, waterfowl do not scratch in the litter, so it can develop an overlay of caked manure after awhile. I occasionally use a spading fork to turn and fluff up the litter. Another option is to allow the chickens onto the waterfowls litter, and they will provide turning services, especially if you scatter a bit of scratch grains.

Water
Provide your ducks and geese the maximum access to water that you can. At the very minimum, waterfowl must have a water source deep enough to submerge their headssay a 5 or 6 gallon horse watering tub. If geese and ducks cannot submerge their heads, their nostrils can become clogged with feed, and eye infections will be more likely. Much better is an amount of water sufficient for bathing. All keepers of chickens are familiar with the way chickens will make a dust bath if permittedtheir way of preventing external parasites such as lice and mites. Waterfowl achieve the same results through bathingessentially, drowning insects under their feathers that might otherwise be a problem for them. If you have natural open water on your homesteada stream or pondyou are lucky, and your birds will make good use of it. If you want to add a mini-pond to your place, there is plenty of information on the subject. (Just enter pond building, pond liners, or similar into an online search engine.) If you plan to breed your ducks and geese, note that the heavier breeds almost require water deep enough to swim in, in order to mate successfullythe male finds it difficult or impossible to mount the female on the ground.

Lawn Flock Accessories I do not have natural water on my place, and have not decided as yet to make the investment of effort and funds for an artificial pond. My solution to my waterfowls water needs is a 50gallon sheep waterer: 48 inches long, 28 inches wide, and 10 inches deepjust deep enough for a large goose to swim and mostly submerge in. Accessories include ramps (-inch hardware cloth over a light wooden frame) for the birds to get into the tank, and wire mesh platforms (more -inch hardware cloth) around the tank. The latter prevents drilling by the birds in the wet soil around the tank and making a muddy mess. If in an area where it doesnt matter to you if sizable holes are drilled in the soil, omit the platforms. A couple of other important points about water: An open container of water such as I have described is great for the waterfowl, but can be lethal for young chickens who have not learned how to keep from falling inI had several drownings before learning this lesson. The solution is either to keep the waterfowl flock separate from the chicken flock (at least when there are young chickens in the flockadult chickens seem not to have a problem with

drowning); or to fill the duck splash only when you are going to be working in the area to supervise. Ive used both approaches, depending on the needs of the moment. [See also A Drown-Proof Waterer for a watering solution that serves both the needs of the waterfowl and young chickens.]

Winter Waterer Water for the waterfowl is particularly challenging in the winter housingthey just love to splash, leaving the deep litter in the winter house soaked. (Wet litter is anaerobic, thus more likely to support growth of pathogens.) I have tried scattering the wet litter where the chickens can scratch it out sufficiently to dry, but the chore quickly became prohibitively labor intensivethe ducks and geese splash a lot of water. My current solution: I set the 5-gallon water tub on a wire mesh platform, over a 40-gallon horse waterer as a catch basin. The splashings from the birds frolic are retained in the catch basin rather than soaking the litter. (Periodically I empty the catch basin by hand, using 5-gallon buckets to transport it outside. A further refinement would be the addition of a drain line leading from the bottom of the catch basin to an appropriate outflow area outside.) [Addendum February 2007: In accordance with winter practices outlined in Current Feeding Practice, I am now watering the waterfowl outside exclusively.]

Part Three
Table of Contents
Part OnePart TwoPart Three

Homestead Services of the Flock

There are several ways of utilizing the natural behaviors of ducks and geese to assist with homestead needs. Ducks are excellent for slug control. They cannot be allowed in the garden when seedlings are young and tender, so put them on the garden plot before planting (it will take most of the season before the slug population re-establishes itself), or after plants are large and well established. Probably some crops (such as lettuce and other salads) are always incompatible with ducks. When the Japanese beetle plague is upon us in the summer, I gather the beetles by the quart, shaking them off grape vines and fruit tree branches into a 5-gallon bucket with a gallon of water in the bottom. (The cool times of early morning or evening are the best for gathering,

since the beetles are less likely to fly away when I approach. Once they hit the water in the bottom of the bucket, they do not fly.) After I dump the beetles out over the grass, the ducks seem to inhale themthey look for all the world like little animated vacuum cleaners. (The geese look on appalledtheyre strictly vegetarian.) Dropped fruit can be a vector for transmission of both diseases and overwintering insects, so part of good orchard management is picking it up. Last fall I let the waterfowl onto the orchard to take care of this chore. Now it was the geeses turn to take the lead. The ducks ate the dropped apples and pears as well, but it was the geese who seemed to inhale them. Geese can be protective of other birds on the pasture. A couple of years ago I had a group of geese on the pasture with the chicken flock, including four mother hens with several dozen chicks. As I watched from our kitchen table, a hawk stooped on the flock, eager to lunch on one of the chicks. Did those geese scatter in panic? They did notalong with the mother hens, they converged, honking in outrage, ready to take on the intruder. Who quickly concluded he was badly out-matched, wheeled in a tight mid-air U-turn, and flew off looking for easier pickings. I have recommended keeping waterfowl on pasture if at all possibleuse any grass available to you as a resource for these grazing birds. And if you dont have any pasture? What about the lawn? In my opinion, its a shame for any homestead to allow big, labor-intenive tracts of lawn to take up space as a non-productive asset. Last year I grazed my ducks and geese on our lawns (now called our close-in pastures): I divided the grass areas around the house into five plots. Fencing each plot in rotation with electronet fencing, I raised a dozen ducks and half a dozen geese on areas that otherwise would simply have been a mowing chore. The 50gallon sheep waterer described above was easy to move from one plot to the next, and to keep filled using long supply hoses connected to a float valve of a type available at any farm supply. Because I didnt want the birds drilling holes in the lawn, I placed wood frame platforms with wire mesh around all sides of the tank. Rotating to the next plot once a week, the birds loved the access to fresh grass, and I did far less mowing than in previous seasons. Top of page

Waterfowl On the Table

And they turned all that lovely grass into wonderful winter meals, a trick I wouldnt have been able to pull off. I slaughter geese and ducks in the fall, usually in the week before Thanksgiving, when they are about six months old or so. The process is essentially no different from butchering chickens, there are just thousands more feathersyou really pay your dues when plucking waterfowl! (Incidentally, the feathersespecially the fine down from the breastcan be reserved for stuffing pillows, quilts, and cold-weather clothing.) We always roast geese, whole.

Making Duck Confit However, I almost always cut up ducks for different culinary uses: I filet the breast in two halves; then cut wing, thigh, and leg (I call them the bits and pieces) away from the back. The backs go into the stock pot (along with the feet). The breast filets are reserved for the lord and lady of the manor (thats us!) and are usually simply grilled quickly in their own fat. The bits and pieces are passed on to the peasants (thats us, too!) for more humble preparations such as braised with red cabbage, onions, and apple. Lately Ellen has been using them to make a mean confit. When preparing these birds for the table, please dont discard their fat. Pull out the fatty deposits in the body cavity, and render them for one of the highest quality, most nutritious cooking fats you can use. Potatoes fried in goose fatyou owe it to yourself to try!

Breeding
If you decide to breed waterfowl, be aware thatjust as with chickenssome breeds have retained the broody instinct, while others have largely forgotten the skill. I have had success with Rouen and Muscovy ducks (the best of all duck mothers), and with Pilgrim geese. Note that among geese, the gander helps rear the goslings as well as the goose. Neither broody ducks nor broody geese can be moved once they go broody, so plan ahead and provide a nest with adequate privacy and shelter, and let them get used to using it before they get the inclination to be mamas. Ducks and geese are among the most personable and entertaining of all domestic fowl. Maybe this is the year you should give them a try.

New Kid in the Flock

This article was published in the June/July, 2008 issue of Backyard Poultry Magazine. It was posted to the site December 28, 2008. Aficionados of poultry husbandry inevitably face the challenge of introducing new members into their flocks. Perhaps the new birds are destined to become replacements for older stock; or one wishes to experiment with a new breed or mix new blood into his breeding lines; or there is any other wise and necessary reason to expand the flock (despite the wrongheadedness of ones spouses view on the matter). Typically when new birds are introduced, the established birds immediately start beating up on them. How serious is the resulting threat to the health and safety of all concerned? Is there a way to avoid such barnyard conflict? Are there strategies for helping the flock get settled after introducing new members?

First Step: Relax!

The flock owner introducing new birds should remember that poultry are intensely social creatures, and an individuals place in the social hierarchy is a critical part of her identity and role in the flock. What we are seeing in the hazing of the newcomers by the established

flock is the shaking up of an established social order, and its reordering as the newbies find their places in the social structure. The behavior is entirely practical, necessary, and usually will not be cause for undue concern. It will help the flock owner to think of the hazing of new members not so much as combat as conversation. We might imagine Matilda saying to Henrietta, a newcomer, Nice to meet you. Please keep in mind Im Number Three in this flock. And Henrietta might reply, Delighted, Im sure. But Ive concluded I should be Number Three because. . . The ensuing scuffle serves as further discussion of the matter, during which they come to an agreement about the desired place in the hierarchy. Next day, theyre scratching for worms side by side and gossiping contentedly. Despite the apparent aggressiveness of the conversation, it is not likely to be injurious if some care is taken with the introduction. Frequent monitoring is essential, so plan ahead for the introduction. Do it, say, on the first day of a two-day weekend rather than in the middle of a harried week. As long as hazing does not get truly vicious, you should let the debate among the birds take its natural course without interference. Intervene only if it seems absolutely necessary to prevent injury.

Strategies
Chickens under stress are more likely to do each other (or at any rate the weakest members of the flock) injury. Introduction of new members is, yes, a bit stressful, but not nearly so much so as other potential sources of stress. A period of extreme weather change, for example, would not be a good time to introduce new birds. Make sure feed is plentiful and there is easy access to water. At least for the first couple of days, provide multiple containers of each, to reduce the possibility of competition for these resources. Remember that the ratio between the newbies and the established birds has a lot to do with the intensity of the hazing. The more new individuals coming in, the more diluted will be the response from the established flockthe fewer, the more the roughousing will focus on those few individuals. If introducing only a couple of new birds to a sizable flock, be especially vigilant for excessive harassment. Learn to recognize the point at which the natural competition for place in the hierarchy (two birds square off with each other) turns into an equally natural culling of weakness from the flock (multiple flock members mercilessly zero in on a single individual). Be ready to intervene to protect a bird destined to become lowest in the pecking orderif she avoids getting defined early in the hazing as the weak sister who must be eliminated. I have heard it recommended that the best way to introduce new birds is to place them on the perches at night when everybody is asleep, the theory being that the established flock will wake up assuming that the new birds have always been there. Nice try, but such a strategy ignores the fundamental nature of the birds identities in the social order. Even if they dont remember whether a given bird was there before this morning, they certainly will not know on awakening the answer to the all-important question: Where do these other individuals fit into the hierarchy (in relation to me)? That question has to be resolved, no matter the circumstances in which the new members enter a hens awareness. Top of page

My preferred strategy when introducing new birds is to maximize both the space available for the introduction, and the time available to monitor during the most critical initial phase. Close confinement is itself stressful on the flock. Thus I like to introduce the new birds onto the pasture, first thing in the morning, when my established flock goes out as well. Managed in this way, the birds are not crowded as they have their discussions, and a new member who is being heavily pressured by other hens has plenty of room to retreat. Do note, however, that in my management situation, the flock is confined by electric net fencing. Since the net is only 42 inches high, I clip wings on the new birds to ensure they do not go over the net in a panic retreat from a too-bossy rival. Note as well that, if you rely on complete free-ranging during the day, initially you should not release the newcomers with the flock in this way. They have not yet come to think of the new setting as home; and if they scurry off in retreat, will have no natural tendency to return to your place in favor of any other. For poultry, to find a place in a flock is to find home. Until your new birds fix on the established flock, they are completely lost in the world. Keep them penned in the coop a few days, then release them to range with the established flock. If your flock is confinedor as a fallback anytime things arent going well and you have to interveneI suggest a strategy of isolation-in-view: Isolate the new birds for a couple of days in the same space with the established flock, but with a wire partition between them. The two groups can see each other and interact, but cannot get physical with each other. Once you release the newbies to the general flock, there will still be some hazing, to be sure, but it will not be as intense as it would have been initially. (I believe there is some communication on the subject of place in the flock hierarchy that goes on even through the wire partition.)

Special cases
Folks often ask me whether it is okay to put a mother hen with her chicks back into the main flock, fearing that the other adult birds will harm the vulnerable chicks. There are indeed a couple of cautions for this situation: Do remember that growing chicks must never be fed a commercial laying mashmake sure to feed a compromise mix that everybody can eat. To afford the chicks the extra boost in protein they need for rapid growth, I use a creep feeder shelter.

Creep Feeder Shelter

Hen with Chicks As for threats to the physical safety of the chicks, however, fear not: Other flock members are keenly aware that Mama will kick butt for anyone so foolish as to mess with her babies! Another common situation involves introducing into the established flock young birds just out of an artificial brooder. Wont they be terribly disadvantaged in a confrontation with older, tougher birds? In my experience, while the established birds give the youngsters a bit of pro forma bossing, they do not seriously rough them up. Why should they? Its a foregone conclusion that the whole group of younguns are the low birds in the pecking order. The only questions to be worked out, really, are the respective rankings among the young newcomers, who strut self-importantly and spar. Maybe the older ones place bets, but they dont waste energy getting seriously involved.

Old English Game Cock

Cuckoo Marans Cocks Introducing new hens may bring some nervous moments, but rarely occasions real problems. Introducing new cocks is a different matter. Even established cocks in the flock may have dominance/submission issues that can end in injury or even death. (See Working with the Cock(s) in the Flock.) The most hair-trigger part of the year for cocks is the transition from late winter into early spring, when the testosterone is rising and the boys strive to establish dominant breeding access to the hens. This is not the best time to bring in a new cock, unless you plan simply to keep him isolated.

The breed of the cocksthose introduced and those already in residencehas a large effect on the potential for violence. Generally, the more gamey the genetic background of the cock, the more likely he is to play for keeps when challenging other cocksamong these breeds (e.g., Old English and Modern Games, Kraienkoppes, Malays, Shamos) the possibility of bloodied combs is the least of our worries; whereas cocks bred more as dual-purpose, utilitarian farm fowl tend to work out dominance/submission issues without too much mayhem. I have found my Cuckoo Marans cocks unusually mellow, for examplethey find their respective roles after a bit of not-quite-serious sparring, and never cause each other significant injury. It is a good idea to utilize the isolate-in-view strategy routinely when introducing a new cock to the flock. Indeed, you might put into place two separate wire barriersor make the barrier of quarter-inch hardware clothto prevent cocks from fighting through the wire. After the boys have had some time to get used to each others presence, release the newcomer and monitor closely. Id advise keeping that isolation corner in place awhile, just in case.