Chicken / Rabbit Tractor

We wanted our chickens and rabbits to have lots of time on grass but we can’t have them running loose on the homestead. Fencing off large chunks of the property isn’t really an option either. So we figured a chicken tractor would be the best way to go. And when it’s not in use for chickens, it can be used for rabbit litters to grow out.

One key thing we did to make it rabbit friendly was put some fencing on the bottom. It is wide enough for grasses and clover to be reached but not so wide that the rabbits can dig through. It does make it a little tricky for chick feet. Have to move the tractor carefully so no feet get caught.

We used some of the tin that came off the original barn. It went across the whole top and half of one side.

The tractor is 8 ft long, 4 ft wide and with the lid, 26 in tall.

We made a split top, to open on the left half or right half.

We’ve used it successfully for chicks to grow out and also for rabbit litters to grow out. We plan on building more because they have really worked great for us. And the grass is so much better the next time around.

New Chicks

We’ve enjoyed the chickens and everything they have been doing for the homestead and of course all the fresh eggs. We knew that the first hens we got should be slowing down their egg laying so we made moves to go ahead and pick out the next layers for us.

We were pretty pleased with the last batch of meat birds we got from McMurray Hatchery and decided to use them again for the new round of hens. We love having the variety of colors and sizes of our current flock but ultimately went with a variety of brown egg layers with large/extra large eggs. We figure that will be the most bang for our buck.

We used our tried and true method of keeping them in a big plastic tote. They are on wood chips and we have a cover with a heat lamp or 2. They have plenty of room while they are bitty and we can keep them close by.

Once they get bigger and older, they go into the brooder box, on the porch, with a heat lamp for a little bit. The brooder got an upgrade this year with a fancy, bright green paint job. We needed to protect the wood and get some more use out of the box and this paint was the right price for the job.

We got them ordered just in time too. During the winter, the flock was down to laying just a few eggs a day. Once spring hit, they all started up again but then we noticed our oldest hens had slowed down a lot. They had been awesome layers for us but we wanted to keep up the higher level of egg production.

Once they outgrow the brooder box, they take a turn in the pen addition to the barn. They get more room to grow and can take advantage of garden scraps, just like the big hens.

We’re looking forward to them being good layers for us and having egg production high again.

Adding a New Garden Spot

The layout of our property has two really good garden spots that are about 25ftx50ft. They are near the bottom of the property. We have a third one that is on a hillside that is the same size and it is ok. The sweet potatoes loved it and we got a few watermelons. We are hoping a year or two with chickens on it will improve it .

We tried a spot on top of the little hill next to the orchard, for about 2 years but both years it failed or the wind got too bad up there and it destroyed everything that grew.

So we planted more fruit trees in that area so we would not be tempted to use it again. It works out well, because the very top of the hill doesn’t seem to like the orchard trees lots and this gave us lots more room to expand.

With the three garden spots, we are rotating our chickens to a new spot each year. So we really only have two a year we can plant on.

There is a spot between where the grapes start and the herb bed that could work. It is on a slight hill , and will be shaded the first hours of the day. So while it isn’t ideal, it’s what we have at the moment. Maybe it can be for lettuces or a long term bed for asparagus.

Eventually after the house is built and we know where all the water lines will we can have more options on where to put garden spots.

We’re still very happy with our process of using the chickens to improve the soil. It’s about as natural as you can get and while it does take some time, we love getting the eggs and just enjoy the chickens.

We got the new spot tilled up. Going to plant it this year. Will be interesting to see this year compared to the next when the chickens have had time on it.

Orchard / berry update

2019 was a good year for the blackberries. Unfortunately, we lost 2 plants so blackberries will be in very limited supply in 2020. We also lost 2 blueberry bushes. The ones remaining look pretty healthy and do have some fruit on them. Hopefully we can get a few before the deer or other critters eat them.

2020 saw the first time the peaches really started to bloom. It almost seemed like too many for their first year so we made sure to pinch off at least every other fruit, before they got too big. Sadly, this was a year of a late frost, right before Mother’s Day. It really wrecked the peaches. They all split and seemed like they were oozing their sugars. They basically stopped growing and stayed rotting slowly on the branch. We’ve been giving them to the chickens though and they seem to like the treat.

One of the pear trees did great! We got so many pears! They are not the prettiest pears but they tasted good.

We had a few little apples on one tree. We had several turn red but stay the size of a golf ball. We also have some issues with cedar rust on the apple trees. We’re still holding out for the apples to start producing. They could do with another year or two of growing before they really start producing.

It seems like were losing a different pear tree. We had another apple tree there the first year and had to replace it.

We’re figuring the highest part of the property maybe just isn’t a good location for the fruit trees. We’re not sure if it’s too windy or maybe all the nutrients in the soil run downhill and nothing good stays at the top. Also, a power line runs along the back edge and the county periodically comes out to spray under the lines to keep the plants down. Of course, we can’t tell the herbicide to skip over our trees so they certainly get some of that exposure.

Chicken move timeline

With getting ready to garden, a large part of that was getting the chickens ready to move. With the easy coop we built. Read more about it, below.

Chicken Coop

The net moves quickly which with the rotational chicken grazing plan. That is why we bought it .

The chickens enjoyed the move, at least we didn’t hear anyone complain, and within an hour the net and charger was set up and the chickens were in their new home.

With three 25ft by 50ft beds they have plenty of work to do . The plan again is to let them stay on one garden bed and plant on the other 2. With only doing this on one plot so far, we are already seeing improvement in our plants.

As you can see the chickens are already fast at work . Only a month in and they have already picked everything they wanted.

The only thing left for us to do is go in and knock down the things they did not want and then to start giving scraps, wood chips, and give them a compost pile to work .

The garden results this year were fantastic. We planted two sections – one that had the chickens on it for 6 months and one that only had compost spread by us on it. The chicken prepped garden grew over twice as fast and produced ten times the vegetables. We knew it would help, but the level of success was even more than expected.

With the limited land we have getting ten times more out of the same space just makes sense.

As you can see, it is time for the chickens to move again, to till this plot up and let us get to planting!

Meat Chickens

Once the barn expansion was done we started plans to do our first batch of Meat Chickens.

We ordered Cornish Cross, online from Murray McMurray Hatchery.

Chicks showed up happy and healthy with zero losses.

We ended up with 27 and did have one loss as an adult , and the rest went to the freezer.

It was an enjoyable process. They go from hatched to freezer in about 60 days so that is a lot of growing to do in a short time. We would like to add a way for them to be on grass to help the feed bill, but that will come in the future.

There were not as easy to process as rabbits, but pretty close. It is nice to have variety in the freezer.

As we said we ended up putting 26 in the freezer, with an average weight of 6lbs and a total weight of over 150lbs processed. The smallest was 3lbs 14 oz and the largest was just over 8 lbs!

After we have been eating these , it will be hard to every go back to store bought chicken again.

Barn Expansion

Almost as soon as we nailed the last board on the barn redo, we started planning a barn expansion .

We had talked about doing a round of meat chickens and needed a place to put them. We talked about putting them in the electric netting set up like our egg layers, but the place we like to purchase from were out of stock.

So because it is never a bad thing to have another pen area to lock stuff up in, we decided to build one.

The left hand side of the barn had enough space for what we were after.

The barn made it easier by already having one wall up, so we just dug the holes and made it semi level.

We went with the metal around the bottom just like the rest of the barn. We like the look and it helps with splash up form the rain stopping eventually rotting boards. Around the top was easy with some fencing wrapped around. The roof we put up the same clear panels as the green house and used some tin we had taken off the barn to give more light in the rabbit area.

Lined the inside of the bottom with rocks, to make it harder for anything to scratch out or dig in. Finished the floor with wood chips, added a door big enough for a wheelbarrow and it was ready for chickens.

We raised out 25 Cornish cross in the pen without much trouble. Only had one loss towards the end , not sure what happened. After processing we had over 150 lbs of meat in the freezer.

In the future we might do a round of ducks or maybe turkeys in the addition, we prefer to raise them on grass which will be the plan, but its nice to have a place to lock them up if need be.

The bonus is the deep bedding that is being broken down by having the animals in there, all the plants on the homestead will benefit from it.

2020 Garden

I think we can all agree 2020 has been an interesting year so far. Lots going on around the world and around the homestead.

We started seeds in February like usual, but did not get them planted until nearly the middle of May. The weather here just stayed wet, and could not till up the garden in the mud.

Then the weekend after we planted, had two nights of historic frost for our area. Looks like we should have waited even longer to get them in the ground. We will certainly keep that in mind for next year.

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We ended up having around 125 plants to cover with pots. We got several of those from a last minute run to a dollar store. Cleaned them out of 31 pots! They’ll get put to use later for transplanting as seeds start to outgrow their starter block.

Our lettuce bed we covered in a tarp as the bed itself is a little set in the ground. Lots of the more tolerant plants just got some hay spread around them.

Most things made it, more than we would have thought. Some decisions had to be made, and some plants did not get the best cover. We have had a few die but that is part of gardening anyway. No one anticipated a frost right before Mother’s Day.

We did not change much in the garden this year. We worked on getting more proficient at what we are already doing. We invested into more of the black fabric we had so much success with last year. This year instead of skipping rows we decided to cover it all and torch holes on where we wanted to plant. Took more time upfront but is already proving to save us time weeding. We even did the corn plot the same way, but a storm the very next night ripped up all the paper. So now its just a wait to see where corn pops up so we can weed around it. No way we could have gotten the paper back down exactly lining the holes up to where we already planted.

One exciting difference this year is we have so much lettuce!

We are pretty sure we can thank the farm cats for that. They are doing a great job of keeping the rodent and rabbit population down.

The only real new things we added this year were some GIGANTIC pumpkins for fun, a new cucumber variety we wanted to try, and eggplant. Oh yeah, and a beet variety. We’re also trying potato and sweet potato again this year.

So far we have had plenty of rain and not enough sunshine but we will see. Hope all of your gardens are doing just as well or better!

Anyone planting anything new this year?

Favorite Dishes from the Garden: Squash

One of the fun things our first few years of growing our own food taught us was how to get creative with meal time.

When you’re looking at your 12th consecutive day of having yellow squash for dinner, you want to spice things up – literally and figuratively!

We’ve got the fried squash down perfectly. In fact, it’s usually requested by the June birthday girl since its the best thing.

Sadly though, we can’t live off fried squash so we started looking at other flavors we liked and tried them with squash.

One of the earliest attempts was squash pickles.

They were a start but not really a meal.

One of us got to craving pizza but this mound of produce kept staring at us. We then had the idea of taking some of the bigger squash and turning them into pizza boats!

This was a great way to use up the larger squash that weren’t as tender as the smaller ones but are still just as delicious. We also cooked these on the grill since it’s just too hot to run the oven in the house.

We took 2 good sized squash and cleaned and prepped them. They were washed, cut in half and the insides scooped out for either the compost pile or chickens.

They were seasoned with salt, pepper, onion and garlic powder, as well as since Italian seasoning, since we’re making pizzas, after all. We drizzled with olive oil and set cut side down on the pre-lit grill over medium heat for about 6 to 7 minutes. Try to avoid any burning at this step. It’s not a yummy taste.

After that, flip the squash over so the skin can cook and so that the pizza toppings can get started. We used some ready made pizza sauce but of course homemade will be just as good. Spoon 2 to 3 spoonfuls then start layering in toppings. Pre-cooked Italian sausage or ground beef , pepperoni slices, basically any protein that you like on a pizza goes great here. Then some veggies. We love mushrooms so those were a given. Peppers, onions, spinach would all be great too. Top with any kind of mild, easy melting cheese like provolone or mozzarella and a little more Italian seasoning. Return to the grill and finish off for about another 4 to 5 minutes or until the squash is fork tender and the toppings are melted and bubbling slightly.

Cool for a couple minutes and then dig in!

We also a squash hamburger bun and even squash “mac and cheese”.

We used our own frozen squash, cut into slices and then halved. They went right into a pot to cook in their own juices from frozen. A little salt and pepper to season.

After the squash had cooked through, we lightly drained it and added a can of cheese soup. Just a splash of milk was used to thin the soup. Not much was needed since there was so much liquid from the squash. From there, we seasoned to taste and were ready to dig in!

The squash mac was in pretty heavy rotation because it is so easy and tastes good too.

Do you have any squash recipes we need to try? Any other twists on a favorite that we missed? Share in the comments and let us know!

2019 wrap up

Little late with the wrap up post on 2019, which is about perfect because 2019 seemed to be the year of being a little late.

Just as with any place there was several successes and failures on the Homestead.

Greenhouse was finished and worked great for the head start on spring planting.

We also got to experiment with putting down black ground cover, which we liked and will be getting more for the future gardens.

Wild rabbits did eat at least 50% of what we planted, but the greenhouse worked.

We started breeding rabbits on the homestead, took it slowly but did successfully raise and process three litters.

Our first group of chicks had zero losses. We bought 3 different breeds and supposedly no roosters. Ended up with entirely different breeds and six roosters. So surprise for us we also got to do our first rooster harvest in 2019.

Bought 6 more chickens to replace the rooster fiasco this time they were all hens, but again not the breed we thought we were purchasing. They lay eggs though, so we are calling it a win.

Also, we started getting eggs!!

We were able to finish the barn and immediately started planning an expansion …. Might get to that this year.

Planted a few more trees and bushes, but to be completely honest we did not take care of the ones we already have. The blackberries were taken over by weeds, the blueberries were all eaten by something. Even had a plum tree that was real dead before we noticed. Strawberries grew, but they did not have much flavor, so they were mostly ignored for the rest of the year.

Berries and orchard have to be more of a priority this year.

Fall garden was non existent. We started some seeds, but it stayed into the high 90s all the way into October, then rained for what seemed like a month. We probably could have still planted, but just got disgusted by it and took the fall off garden wise. We did a small raised area for cabbage and another for carrots.

Land clearing we did not do much. Really just maintaining what we had already cleared. Bandit, the farm dog, uses the brush line as his boundary. We really dont want to get rid of that boundary without the fencing to keep him in. Money was not in the budget in 2019 for what we needed, so nothing additional got cleared.

House building we did a lot more planning, over planning, and then planning it to death. 2020 something tangible has to happen with the house. The trailer is slowly falling apart and still not worth putting any money into fixing.

We will do a future post on plans for 2020 as of now the top 5 are (we know this will probably change several times.)

Start on a house – actually for real get started
Raise more rabbits/ chickens for the freezer.
Add to / take care of orchard.
Barn expansion.
Start nut trees

Hopefully in 2020 we can get more accomplished, which I think that is the goal every year. Still loving the adventure!

What’s something else we could work on for 2020? Let us know what you think! Drop us a comment!