Monday, January 7, 2013

Meet the Farm Hands- er Feet...

The morning greetings from our girls



And our great little Rooster, Pudge


As you can see from the look on their faces they have a really good life. We are good to them because of all the work they do for us. They have been one of the best bug controllers we could find. As you can see we try to let them free range as much as possible. But as many of you know humans are not the only ones who like to eat chickens. Where we live Bob Cats have eaten a number of the flock. So we have fenced in a large area that is going to be a garden plot, and made access for them to free range. This has been great. They not only eat any unwanted bugs but also scratch the ground to remove any weeds that are starting to grow. At the same time they fertilize the area and scratch that in as well. Once the garden plots are scratched clean we planted our cover crop of rye grass and clover. Look how beautiful;



Of course the dogs love the fresh feel of the grass


It's hard to believe it is January the 7 at 8:00 AM in the morning. Anyway, in a few weeks we will turn the cover crop (a green manure) in, along with some of the compost we have been preparing. Then, we let it sit for a few weeks, impatiently wait for planting time.
In the meantime our girls are still working. 



We reward them by allowing them to roam in the afternoons outside the garden areas.
Plus this helps get bugs that may have escaped their earlier efforts.


To keep the flock young we try to add some new girls each year.




As you can see, one of the hens is checking out the competition. Maybe she'll go lay more eggs to show us her worth...


Hope you enjoyed the tour....


Pickles Did!!!
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2 comments:

  1. Lets see how many egg recipes you can come up with.

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  2. Hehe, you ain't kidding; we are filling up the fridge right now. Perhaps an Angel Food cake and some quiches? Mmmm, sounds like a tasty assignment!

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