Chicken Herder

My volunteers and I just processed a round of beautiful broilers yesterday.  Right now you can get them fresh and unfrozen. This will allow you to do any further processing (quarter, make them boneless or skinless, etc) before putting them into storage…or just have the freshest possible chicken for grilling this week!

This round of chickens averages 5.25 pounds, with a fairly wide size range (from 3.5-6.5). The cost is $3.50/lb. I also have bags of feet and necks available for making the best and healthiest stock you’ve ever had. I usually sell them at the same price as the chicken, but for a limited time, they are $2.50/lb.

Use the Reserve Your Share webform or FaceBook me (FarmerSam.com), if you have any questions or want to schedule a pickup.

Blessings,
Sam

Here is a fun link:  http://www.naturalnews.com/032659_arsenic_chicken.html

If you are reading this, you probably don’t need more encouragement to eat food primarily from farmers you know, and whose farms you can visit…but it might help you evangelize a friend.

I can imagine someone saying, “Well, now that they’re removing arsenic from the chicken feed, there’s no problem in eating the chicken from the store.”  This person is not considering a few key questions.  1) If they’ve kept arsenic consumption a secret this long, what else is being hidden about their food or water consumption? 2) How healthy can an animal be when it is raised in a building its whole life, away from the sun, fresh air, and the option of eating grass and bugs?  3) Do you want to eat an animal that is medicated from the day of its birth (and likely given vaccinations as well)?  4) Should we pin our food security hopes on an industry that has proven itself to be unethical in its treatment of animals and humans?

I am sure there are more questions that need to be addressed, like the hidden costs Joel Salatin mentions in his writings…but these should get us started.

Here is where the young pigs were to have been living.  Fortunately, it was snowing Monday (when I was to take delivery), and so they have been delayed until Saturday.  Hopefully their lake will have receded a bit by then.

No deaths to report.  Well, none that matter.  Irony: with the flooding, I couldn’t drive the lawnmower to the back, so I had to carry their water by hand.

Finally, there is some pork available!  It turned out very nice and tasty.  If you are interested, you can look at the Our Products page for pricing information.  If you try some, I’d love to hear what you think of it, as this is the first time I’ve raised pork.  Below are all the boxes my three pigs came home in…heads and all…

The summer was so busy that I have  a serious backlog of blogging to do.  All summer and fall I’ve been taking pictures for posts I’m intending to write.  Hopefully, now that winter is here, I’ll get some of them written.  Here is a small start anyway…some pictures of my pigs.  The early one is from about a month into their time with me.  The more recent one is from late fall.  I am about to process them, so I’ll get some final pictures up very soon.

After a three-day fight for life, I had a little pig die. I don’t know from what. He got sick right after being moved into a new paddock. It is possible that he found something in that new area, or that something I fed them was moldy and went unnoticed.

On the last night, he was looking no good. I carried him into the empty chicken palace and set him in one of the brooders. He got up and drank right away, and I had some hope that he would get better. He was dead the next morning (Monday). A rough year all around.

I may be having trouble keeping chickens alive this year, but I’ve had no problem at all raising mosquitoes.  With all the water we’ve been enjoying, there are swarms of mosquitoes around me almost every time I go out to work (which is often).  The only time I consider using Off!® is when I’m going to be working outside after dark – it’s just too many chemicals on me all the time otherwise.  As a result they are landing on and biting me constantly.  I’ve almost given up trying to swat them, it just eats up so much time.  With this controversial policy, you’d think that I would be swollen on all exposed surfaces, but surprisingly, I’m not.  Once I became aware of this incongrous reality, I paid attention, trying to determine what was working.  Here’s what I’ve come up with: Dr. Bronner’s magic soap (peppermint flavor), and Tropical Traditions’ gold label coconut oil.

For the last couple years, I’ve been using coconut oil to treat mosquito bites…and it certainly helps, but it doesn’t make them go away…just lessens the itching.  What is new this year is Dr. Bronner’s soap.  When I’m finished working outside for the day, I shower using Dr. Bronner’s soap (you can feel the essential oils tingling).  When I’m dry, I apply coconut oil to any bites I still feel, and so far, I’ve had no itching.  I’m not sure what is actually doing it…but the only thing I am doing that makes any sense (to me) is the soap/coconut oil combo.  Just thought I’d share.

Here is a meal from the pasture…and I raised all of it, except for the salt, pepper, and butter.  Note the lucious chicken, garlic (in with the chicken), cupidon green beans, sundry tomatoes, and sweet corn!

Right now the pigs are in the turkey pen.  It works fine, but they will soon outgrow it, so I am in the process of moving them into portable electric fencing. 

From what I’ve read, when pigs are first shocked by electric fence, they try to run through it rather than away from it.   Rather than put them in the electric fence enclosure and then have them run right out of it (and then have to chase them down), I decided to train them on electric fence while they are still in the pen.  Basically, I took two step-in posts and ran two wires on them.  The idea is to let the pigs find out what it does in a safe environment.  They are really smart, so once they learn it, they will probably never forget.

I assembled it outside of the pen, and then thought I should test it to be sure I hooked it up correctly.  Apparently, I didn’t have my hand safely on the insulated part of the tester and got hit…hard.  Until now, I’ve only been shocked by the poultry netting, which is a poly-wire (a combination of nylon and small steel wire).  It hurts, but it’s really no big deal.  The premium aluminum wire I’m using for the pigs is a solid 16 gauge wire, and conducts electricity very efficiently.  It didn’t just hurt…I thought my heart was going to explode.  I wanted to fall down and lay there for a while.  I couldn’t believe how much it hurt and rattled my system (through leather gloves while wearing rubber boots).  On the up-side, I am confident that it will keep predators at bay.

I turned it off and put it in the pig’s pen.  Before I could turn it on, the pigs were chewing on the wire.  It didn’t seem kind to shock their little tongues, so I shooed them away.  Before I could get it on, they were back to it…chewing on it.  So, I got inside the pen and shoved them forcefully away from it.  Of course, by the time I could get out, they were back.  So then I gave them some fake food (straw) in their bowl.  That lured all but the blond away (I have three red-heads and a blond).   I was able to ward him off and then crank it up.  Right away he came over and sniffed it with his nose.  Now, for those of you who don’t know, electric fence is not always on…it pulses about once every second.  Well, for a moment, the little pig got to sniff the wire, and then BAM, Squeeeeeal!   He ran away and stared at the fence, then he came back to it and BAM, Squeeeeal!  Then one by one, they came.  Each one taking their turn at learning.  As I walked back to the manse, I could hear squeal, silence, squeal, silence, squeal, silence.  By the next morning, they wouldn’t come within four feet of the fence.  Quick learners.