Chick Time!!

Our chickens are finally old enough now that we could attempt to hatch our first eggs!!! Eeeeek! We were so excited! We had a ton of research to do...what incubator is best, what do we need to do to have a successful hatch, do we need a fan or an automatic turner?

I checked out books from the library, read blogs and forums, asked questions in Facebook groups, and read tons of online reviews. Ultimately, we decided that the best incubator for our current situation would be the HovaBator 1602N with automatic turner and fan kit. If you are looking for one, you can find it here:  http://amzn.to/1W1SAKc  We chose the automatic turner because, although I could manually turn the eggs, I know with our schedule one of us wouldn't always be available to turn the eggs 3 times a day.

I am part of an amazing group on Facebook that teaches the "SimpleHatch" method, which is what we have used. The short version is that we use two old school thermometers (not digital), both calibrated to be accurate at 100 degrees. One is set up as a dry bulb for an accurate temperature reading inside the incubator. The other one is set up as a wet bulb: you slide it into a 100% cotton wick (we use an old t-shirt hem) that falls into the water well inside your incubator and gives you your "wet bulb temp", which can then be converted into a humidity percentage. You want your humidity around 65% (or approximately 90 degrees on your wet bulb) for heathy and happy chicks. We also only candle our eggs on day 17 (so hard to wait, but the more you handle, the more of a chance to injure your precious chicks). The only eggs we candle on day 10 are our blue and green eggs because they are more porous and more likely than other colors to become contaminated...and no one wants a bacteria bomb in their incubator...yuck!! If you are interested in more information, comment below or message me and I'll be happy to help and share the group info with you!

Still wet in the incubator...our first two chicks!

So, once we got our incubator all set up and our thermometers calibrated, we set our very first batch of Breda eggs on February 16. During incubation, we added water as needed to keep our humidity up and then after we candled eggs on day 17, we ended up with 13 eggs developing normally (we had one that had quit developing earlier on). We pulled the egg from the turner and put them in lockdown. No one opens the incubator for any reason during lockdown.....surprisingly, Little Farmer G and Little Farmer T did really well with this. Little Farmer G just kept peeking in the windows on the incubator and saying "Awwww, how cuuuuuttteee!!! Look! Another one hatched!" If we have to add water for humidity during lockdown, we use a straw or tubing to assist through one of the air holes in the incubator. After the 21 day incubation period, we woke up one morning to 2 fully hatched chicks and many more pips!

Two of our cuties at just a couple of days old. 

After it was all said and done, we ended up with 9 healthy chicks. 4 didn't end up hatching. One of them was turned toward the wrong end of the egg away from the air cell, the others we aren't fully sure what happened. We would have loved it if everyone had hatched, but for our very first hatch ever, it wasn't too bad! We learned a lot and will change a few things the next time around, but we ended up with these cuties! Three of them have made their way to a new home, but the remaining 6 are still part of our farm.

Here are a couple more pictures of the Bredas as they have been growing up! It's so fun to watch their little personalities coming out! They love foraging, dust bathing and practicing their flying! 

Here are some of the chicks at a week or so old!

And here they are now...almost 5 weeks old and spending their days outdoors now. They look so silly at this stage!

Spring Forward

Spring time is quickly approaching here in the Pacific Northwest! When we start seeing beautiful flowers and having lovely sunshine-filled days, we know it is quickly approaching. And, now that we have our new house and property, spring doesn't only mean warmer, longer days....it means CHICKS!!! 

The last few weeks (yes, even here in western WA), we have been having a some beautiful days that tease us of the coming months. The boys and I have been enjoying a few more ventures to local parks and soaking up the sun when it comes. This southern born and raised girl LOVES her sunshine! 

Daffodils bringing the promise of warmer days!

One of the first signs around here that the warmer days are on the way are the daffodils that begin to pop up everywhere. On the side of the road, in fields, yards, and even in the woods. My favorite flowers are still tulips, but I sure do love when these little rays of sunshine start showing themselves! 

This year, as winter is winding down, we got to enjoy a long weekend visit from my brother. Although, we didn't spend a lot of time here at Peck Place, we explored the area with him and enjoyed a few little sunbreaks. We had about 3.5 days to explore with him while he was here.

The first day, we did the "expected" thing and went to Seattle. However, we went beyond the typical Space Needle and Pike's Place outings and visited spots like the Fremont Troll, the Starbucks Reserve Roastery & Tasting Room and took him to Evo's distribution center south of the city in Auburn.

We started the day by stopping at Evo in Auburn so that Uncle A could look for some ski gloves. They have a small storefront where you can find great deals on snowboarding and skiing gear. It is also where we have picked up your online orders when we needed an item quicker. Our next stop was lunch at 8 Ounce Burger Bar in Capitol Hill. Do not miss the garlic fries when you are there!! They are right up there with the garlic fries at the Mariner's games...hot, crispy, delicious and will make you breathe garlic for a week. You can thank me later.

The kids with Uncle A at the Fremont Troll

Let me just tell you, the Starbucks Roastery is a place you should definitely visit on your next trip to Seattle. You will pay a little more for your coffee than at your normal coffee shop, but you will get to see coffee roasting in action, try special drinks that are not on their normal menu, and there are many unique roasts to choose from that you won't find in every Starbucks on the corner. Even the boys found it interesting because they could watch the entire roasting process and learn about how coffee is made (ahem, homeschool field trip for the day - check!)

Our last stop of the day was at the Fremont Troll. The kids had fun running up and hiding behind the troll and then posing for silly pictures. We then completed the day with a lovely 3 hour ride home (normally about an hour) in the rain on Friday afternoon...no idea what that was about, but lets just say it was NOT the highlight of our day.

The next day we took a the ferry from Point Defiance to Vashon Island. We had beautiful sunshine on the ride and could even (briefly) catch a glimpse of Mt. Rainier.

We explored a few spots on the island and saw a few sights, including the bicycle tree, which has seen better days. In recent years, vandals have messed with the bike so it isn't in the best condition anymore. Apparently, the story goes that a little boy left his bike in the woods and the tree grew around it....we may have used the story as a lesson for why you should pick up your toys. Anyone think that it will actually sink in?!?

Little Farmer G and Farmer T in front of the Bicycle Tree on Vashon Island

For our return ferry, we returned from the other end of the island to the Fauntleroy terminal to make a stop for dinner at Sunset Cafe - a great little Ethiopian restaurant off Rainier Ave. The food is AMAZING, the prices are great and the kids thought it was pretty awesome that they got to eat with their hands. Plus, no peanuts in the cuisine to worry about for Little Farmer G!!

Sunday of our weekend found us at White Pass Ski Area, enjoying a snow day. Thank goodness, spring coming doesn't mean the snow season is over yet! It was overcast and snowy throughout most of the day, but the clouds did lift enough a few times for Uncle A to enjoy some beautiful views....and some sunshine to squint through.

Farmer John took one for the team and stayed with the kids so that I could spend the day on the mountain with Uncle A. We had a great time, the snow was coming down lightly though the day so almost every run was perfect!

Little Farmer T advanced from the carpet to the platter and did great at his second snowboarding lesson - so proud of him! Little Farmer G even went up the carpet a few times on his snowboard!

It was also Winter Carnival weekend at White Pass, so there was an awesome snow castle for the kids to check out and sled down (for FREE!) Mom and dad even got in on the action!  

Our last morning with Uncle A in town was spent touring one of the new Amazon towers in Seattle, complements of one of our friends who works for them. It was right up his alley, since he works in programming. It was also pretty neat for us to see how some of the rest of the world works. Let's just say that I don't think hospitals would ever let us take our dogs to work or have a room just for playing video games to decompress, haha! We had a lot of fun! However, Little Farmer G was a little perplexed on the way home. "Um, where were the kindles at Amazon? Our kindles came from Amazon, but we didn't see them there." Hmmmm....how to explain the intricacies of Amazon to a 3 year old? Lol!

Saying goodbye until next time at the airport.

We had a blast spending the weekend exploring some old favorites and new adventures with Uncle A at the end of the Winter...now, it's time to Spring Forward!! Remember those chicks I mentioned at the beginning? Well, we welcomed our first batch of chicks from our own flock this past week...and, as expected, they are adorable little fluff balls! I can't wait to share the process of our first hatch with you next time!

Here are a couple of sneak peeks into our next blog post:

The first two hatchlings!!

In Little Farmer G's words "Awwww, it's so fluffy! It's so cuuuuutttteeee!"

Homeschooling at Its Best

Last Monday was Presidents Day. Most schools in the area had the day off. But, since we homeschool, not us! However, we did decide to do something even better. Ski (Snowboard) School! Why not?!? We decided to take Little Farmer T and Little Farmer G to the mountain to try out snowboarding for the first time. On the way up to the mountain, we did take the opportunity to do a few extra spelling and math drills, but the main part of our day was Physical Education and learning a new (and fun) skill.

Little Farmer T has been asking (aka begging) since last winter to try snowboarding instead of skiing this year. And, as all good little brothers do, Little Farmer G wants to do everything his big brother does, so of course, he wants to snowboard too. They decided to take some of their Christmas money and big brother is taking a series of lessons and little brother got a Burton Riglet

to play around on. It's not the exact one in the link, just a different color. It's super cool because there is a reel on the front that you can use to pull them around. We even tried it out at home and the boys loved making us race them down the hall! 

While Little Farmer T was in his lesson, Mommy & Daddy took turns pulling Little Farmer G around so he could work on his balance. He did really well!

Little Farmer G trying out his Riglet!

Oops! Snowboarding definitely has a learning curve!

Little Farmer T spent his day attempting to master the magic carpet, learn to skate and be a falling leaf on the way down the slope. He did great with the magic carpet and skating.

See that cutie on the magic carpet in the red jacket? 

Just made it to the bottom of the hill with his instructor!

Gearing up for another go on the magic carpet!

By the end of the day, he realized that he was gonna need more practice, haha! Poor boy was wiped out at the end of the lesson...but nothing that a very special (and rare) treat of french fries and hot chocolate couldn't cure! When we asked him if he wanted to go again, we got a very enthusiastic "Sure! Just not today." Can't blame him...those first couple of days on the board are rough. Pretty sure he was happy that this was how we spent our school day, though! 

Love in the Air

Valentine's Day at our house is not usually traditional. We aren't big on spending money on things like candy, big stuffed teddy bears (what would I do with it anyway?!?), or flowers (unless they are potted or can be planted...with the exception of tulips. Tulips are always welcome in our house, cut or potted. Just saying!)

So, what does a day about love look like at Peck Place? It starts with Farmer John getting up with the boys so that Mommy could sleep in (of course, thanks to two Little Farmers, I've been trained to wake up anyway so it wasn't that late, lol!) When I walked into the kitchen, this is what I found:

Little Farmer T made this card all on his own....came up with what to say and draw. I love it! 

Not to be outdone, Little Farmer G made his with a little help from Dad. When he told me about it, he said "It's so silly!"

Farmer John has been working on his own labor of love for the past few days...a new smaller coop so that we can house our two breeds separately and keep both gentlemen happy! He has dubbed it "The Love Shack"...can't get much better still a work in progress, but I think it is going to be adorable! Stay tuned for updates! 

They say that the way to a man's heart is through his stomach and if that holds true, I think I was successful today! While Farmer John was working on "The Love Shack", I was menu planning, gathering tax info and cooking a tasty dinner. A friend suggested this recipe (http://goop.com/recipes/winter-minestrone/?mbid=social_facebook) from Goop this week and I made it using homemade bone broth. It was so good!

What's a good pot of soup without bread? I looked at several recipes on the web as starting points and came up with this herbed garlic loaf....it was a hit! 

Herbed Garlic Loaf

Ingredients:

3.5 cups whole wheat flour
1 cup of warm water, plus 2-4 T as needed
1/2 cup of melted butter
1-2 tbsp chopped herbs (I used 1 T of rosemary and thyme, but would definitely double that next time)
2 tsp sea salt plus more for the top
1 tsp active yeast
1/4 cup whole cloves of garlic (You could roast the cloves ahead of time if you prefer, but we did not)
Sprinkle of raw sugar

Directions:

Place warm water in a measuring cup and add yeast and the sprinkle of sugar. Let stand for 5-10 minutes to proof yeast. Meanwhile, in a stand mixer, using dough hook, combine flour and salt. Add water, butter, garlic and herbs to mixture and kneed 5-10 minutes until dough forms a ball in the bowl, adding water as needed.

Place bread in a warm area and let rise, covered, until doubled (approximately 1-2 hours). Kneed and let rise a second time (approximately 1 hour). About 45 minutes into the second rise, preheat oven to 450 degrees with dutch oven or cast iron pan inside to preheat.

Don't be jealous of my wood trimmed countertops! 

Lightly kneed dough and form into a ball.

Pull pre-heated pan out of the oven and place a sheet of parchment paper inside. Transfer bread to pan on top of parchment. Drizzle with olive oil and sprinkle lightly with sea salt.

Cover with lid and bake at 450 degrees for approximately 30 minutes. (*Optional: Roast 2 heads of garlic in foil while it bakes.) Remove lid and cook an additional 15-20 minutes until lightly browned on top.

Attempt to resist cutting until cool...or don't and just cut into it. Like me. No judgement here...

Remember that roasted garlic? Mix it into 4-6 T softened butter and spread on sliced bread. Mmmmmm! You're welcome.

The flu and the stomach bug have both been going around locally, so we are trying to get in lots of healthy goodness. This soup and bread with garlic, onion, bone broth and lots of veggies was the perfect way to ward it off...fingers crossed it works! If nothing else, it was a perfect way to end our Valentine's Day...a family meal and delicious food. Everyone loved the bread. And, almost everyone loved the soup...maybe it will grow on Little Farmer G!  

Vacation - Yay!! Now What?

Everyone looks forward to time away from it all. Vacation is, every now and then, a necessity for our sanity. So, when we finally booked a vacation back to North Carolina to visit family and friends, we were so excited! Almost two weeks away from it all. It's gonna be awesome!

Oh...

Wait...

What about the chickens?!?! We can take the dogs to the kennel, but chicken boarding....yeah, not so much. 

We've taken short trips for a few days and had someone just check on the birds every couple of days, but for an extended trip, it takes a little different planning. What can you do if you have chickens and you are going to be away overnight, for the weekend, or even longer? 

Here are our suggestions to make it easier to get away...even with chickens (and dogs)! 

Overnight Trip

For an overnight trip, we have done a few things that make it easy to know the chickens will be okay. 

• First, and foremost, we made sure that we have a secure coop. 
• Large feeder and waterer be sure that they won't run out. We make sure we fill both fresh before we leave. 
• An automatic chicken door from http://adorstore.com...seriously, this thing has been the best thing ever. Not only does it open and close for our birds when we are out of town, it also keeps us from having to drag ourselves out of bed to the coop every single morning or rush home from a nice dinner (or, let's be realistic - grocery shopping or work is more likely). Worth. Every. Penny.
• A covered run to keep the overhead predators at bay. We often see hawks and other large birds flying over our property, so a covered run was a must for us.

Long Weekend

Over Thanksgiving, we traveled for a long weekend. Although the chickens would have likely been just fine during a normal weekend, the weather was supposed to get below freezing at night. So, we felt we needed someone to check and make sure that they had unfrozen water. Here is what we did:

• All of the same items we had for an overnight trip. 
• Since we wouldn't be home to let the chickens free range everyday, we wanted to have a boredom buster for them, so we cut a pumpkin in half for them to peck at. Pumpkin is a natural de-wormer and it keeps them from getting too stir-crazy. 
• We enlisted the help of a good friend to come by at least every other day to make sure that they had enough food, remained safe, and had access to fresh water.  

Week (or longer) Vacation

In January, we made a cross country trip to visit friends and family. We were gone a total of 13 days, so our plan of action was a little different. At first, we thought we would just have someone check on the birds periodically and we would leave our dogs with Farmer John's parents or board them. Honestly, that probably would have been fine, but, as we thought about it more, we decided for that length of time, we would feel more comfortable with having a house sitter. Plus, our 6 year old received a fish (Optimus Prime - yep, that's a boy for you!) for his birthday and let's just say if we came home to a transformer who had met his demise, we might have a major tragedy on our hands. So, here are our recommendations for being gone more than a week: 

• All of the same things we did for a long weekend. 
• Enlist the help of a house sitter. Our house sitter came highly recommended from friends and is a member of our church. She was eager to help, trustworthy and worth her weight in gold! 
• Make sure you have plenty of feed available. Seriously. Have more than enough for what your chickens normally eat. Then double it. Learn from our mistake. Apparently, our chickens decided to turn into little pigs while we were gone and we ended up having to call and pay for a bag of feed at our local feed store for our sitter to pick up a few days before we returned. 
• Take the time to walk your house sitter through your normal routine and show them where to find everything and how you do things before you leave.
• Last, but definitely not least, take 10 minutes to type out (or write down) everything that you have discussed with your house sitter. I learned this from a family I used to house sit for in college. I loved taking care of things while they were gone because there was never any question as to what needed to be done. A complete list of daily and weekly tasks, as well as contact info, emergency numbers and veterinarian information goes a long way toward a smooth vacation for you AND your house sitter. (Because, inevitably, your normally easy to care for pets will have some sort of injury or illness while you are gone - just ask our Boston Terrier, Suzie, about her toenail issue and trip to the vet.) 

Then, step back, take a deep breath and enjoy your vacation! You've earned it!

Little Farmer G enjoying a big snow at Nana's house!

Might as well bury yourself in the snow...

14,515,200 Seconds

Has anyone ever told you how LONG 24 weeks is? 24 weeks is deceiving. It doesn't sound like that long, right? Just in case you have never done the math, it's 168 days, 4,032 hours, 241,920 minutes or 14,515,200 seconds. Amazing how that suddenly sounds so much longer!

Well, let me tell you - there are 2 times that I am absolutely positive that it is longer and time slows down to a crawl. That 24 weeks seems more like 24 months (that's 63,120,000 seconds, just in case you were wondering). 

Pregnant with Little Farmer T

The first one, as every mom or mom-to-be knows, is pregnancy. The first trimester can seem a little slow, especially if you were "blessed" with morning sickness - or, in my case, "all-day" sickness. But, that 24 week stretch from 16 weeks until 40 weeks?  Let's just say I'm confident that all calendars, doctors and everyone else who "thinks" they know how time works is wrong. Completely. And. Utterly. Wrong. When you are waddling around like a duck at 38 weeks pregnant and nothing fits...when you have no room to even eat more than a few nibbles of waffle fries and lemonade popsicles (No??? Maybe that was just me?)...when you are drained of every once of energy by a parasite (who you are sure is adorable, but you want OUT), time definitely does not move at a normal pace. It......c...r...a...w...l...s. 

And, then, when that delivery day comes, and you finally meet that little parasite (who, by the way, is the CUTEST baby ever), you are completely enamored and everything is completely worth it. The nausea. The vomiting. The constipation. The countless OB visits where your privacy is totally invaded time and time again. (Yes, I went there - I'm a nurse, what did you expect?!?) The varicose veins. The sleepless nights that you tossed and turned trying to get comfortable with a basketball under your skin. The contractions. Oh, the contractions! Somehow, none of that matters anymore. You would do it all over again in a heartbeat. So, you do...

Little Farmer G

And that pregnancy drags on. And on. And on..............and on.................and on..................and on.............and on...................and.......well......you get the picture.....pregnancy seems to last FOREVER! 

They were so teeny! I think it's time for more! 

The second instance where time seems to slow to a crawl, is waiting on that first chicken egg. I know, it doesn't seem like it could possibly be similar, but hear me out! First, you start with these adorable fluff balls under a heat lamp in the garage who need to be checked on several times a day in the first few weeks. You feed them, water them, cuddle them, clean their bedding, excited about when they will grow up and give you fresh eggs! They are so stinking cute!!

Enjoying the great outdoors!

Until they start stinking and you kick them outside!  You spend waaaay more than you planned to build them a mansion of a coop (cha-ching!) and chicken run (cha-ching!), let them free range whenever possible, feed them organic feed (cha-ching!) and veggie scraps straight from the kitchen (yay, finally something that's free!), keep their water fresh, and clean out the coop once a week (which includes purchasing your bedding...cha-ching!)). At first, it's no big deal, because you'll soon be getting those farm fresh eggs, right?!?!?! Well....yes, but how soon is soon? For the breeds of chickens we have, most sources say somewhere around 20-28 weeks. For us, it was right in the middle - 24 weeks (and some of our ladies still haven't hit 24 weeks since we added more pullets later on). So, after cleaning and feeding all these ladies and one gentleman for 23 weeks, we were starting to give them strongly worded hints that they better start laying soon! Early morning chicken runs may (or may not) have consisted of "conversations" something like this. "Heeeeerrre chick chick chick....no eggs yet? Better get on it! You have to earn your keep on this farm! You don't want the same fate as the broilers, do you?" Thankfully, our ladies are smart and kicked in into gear shortly thereafter! ;) So, after waiting (impatiently) for 24 weeks (168 days, 4,032 hours, 241,920 minutes or 14,515,200 seconds, but who's counting), we finally found this beauty one morning.

Our first egg the morning of Nov 14 following a
full moon on Friday the 13th! Coincidence?!  

Now, when we go out to collect eggs, it's rare that we don't find any. And, somehow, all of that other stuff (the waiting, the cleaning, the feeding, the money, the building of the coop) doesn't seem to matter anymore, and we would do it all over again in a heartbeat....and, we will. 

Freezer Camp

Shortly before moving into our new house this summer, we started talking about the possibility of raising our own chickens for meat. Although, I grew up vegetarian and I could go months without eating meat and not feel like I'm missing out, it has become quite clear that I'm alone in that sentiment....my house full of boys does not agree that tofu will suffice!

So, we embarked headfirst on another chicken adventure....thinking we had already done chicks once with the layers, so it should be easy! (Someone really should have told us the vast differences between the two, lol!)

We went in with another local farm and ordered our broilers (meat chickens), which were a Cornish Rock Cross. We ordered 15 of them, thinking it was better to start small this year. We set up a new brooder for the chicks - a 4x4 plywood box, lined it with a waterproof drape and shavings (with the goal of just lifting it out and dumping everything into compost every day or two and then putting down fresh shavings), hung a heat lamp, and filled waterers and feeders.

We brought home the broiler chicks and placed them in their new temporary home....a few hours later, we went out to check on them and found one of them had not made it. We were very disappointed and kind of worried that the rest of them would be sick, but quickly chalked it up to most likely be a genetic issue. Cornish Cross can be predisposed to heart issues, plus the little ones were only a few days old and there may have just been something wrong with that one from the time it hatched. Within the first week or so, we learned they were growing at such a fast rate, they would need to move outside - and SOON!

We learned that the Cornish Cross chicks grow a lot faster, eat a LOT more (easily 2-3 times what our layers eat), and, somehow (probably all that extra food), they seemed to be so much messier! We used to spot clean the brooder for the layers (who were actually in a smaller area as well) every day or two and clean the entire thing a couple of times a week....not so much with the broilers. We were cleaning that brooder out every day, sometimes twice a day, and the last few days I could barely stomach the smell....ugh! There literally was SO. MUCH. POOP.  We thought we would be prepared after working in the hospital for 9 years and being parents for the last 5...apparently, we were mistaken, lol! In addition to eating so much more, we kept reading that you actually need to restrict their access to food because, if food is left out free choice, they are known to overeat and cause significant health issues, including death. (#Murica)

So, we quickly got to work on a moveable chicken tractor. We chose a chicken tractor so that we could relocate it fairly easily every day (or a few times a day) and give the broilers access to fresh grass, dandelions and bugs. You need at least 2 square feet per chicken, and we really wanted to give them more than that, plus have the ability to have more birds next year, so we decided to build a (roughly) 8x10 tractor. They ended up being just a little spoiled this year at almost 6 square feet per bird....so much better than the commercial chicken farms (most sources say they only have about 0.8 square feet per bird)!

Here is Farmer John's account of what we (well, okay...he) did:

• I browsed the web for a bit and found a tractor that was simple and easy to build. My projects sometimes get away from me (Palace de Pollo, stay tuned) and I didn't want to spend months building the tractor. I gathered most of the supplies from my Coop scrap pile. The design is fairly basic - 2x4's, 2x2 cedar for the door frame, simple plywood door, conduit for hoop style roof, chicken wire (or welded wire if you have it), and a tarp to cover and keep the weather out. I used some leftover screws for the base and the door, and some zip ties for the wire and the tarp. I chose cedar for the door frame because it weathers well and won't warp easily. 

The start of the tractor....8 ft long 2x4's on the ends and 10 ft long 2x4's on the sides. 

Apparently, our dog, Hazel, thought she better try it out, lol!

We kept the birds inside for about 3-4 weeks while we got the tractor ready, but truth be told, they should have moved outside earlier (like around 2 weeks)...and next year, if we do them again, they will!

The chicks outside enjoying their new home while the boys help attach the tarp for shade.

In just 8 short weeks, the birds were ready for processing (we got the chicks the week of July 4 and the went for processing the weekend of Labor Day). The local farm we got the chicks with was processing the birds at a very reasonable rate and you could help as much as you felt comfortable with.

The finished product ready for the freezer!

All of our Cornish Cross are in the freezer currently. This coming weekend, since we had such an over-abundance of roosters, they will be sent to hang out with their friends at freezer camp...but until then, they are enjoying life eating yummy veggie scraps, fresh grass and bugs every day. 

Although the process was not always pretty, we now have a freezer stocked with several chickens (and a few more coming soon) to help us through the winter...and, even this tofu loving girl has to say...they are pretty tasty!