Why do roosters crow? It’s a question many have asked along with wondering what time of day roosters crow. In fact, not only will a rooster crow all day long, but he has distinct crows for different purposes.
Here’s a quick summary of how roosters talk, in case you were wondering why your own boy (or your neighbor’s) sings his song all day long.
Rooster crowing tends to start an hour prior to dawn and continue until the sun has fully risen above the horizon. As sunrise changes times throughout the seasons due to the earth’s proximity to the sun, so do the hours at which a rooster crows.
Research has shown that morning crows are induced not only by external stimuli—the sun’s rays coming up past the horizon—but also by the bird’s own internal circadian clock.
In other words, the rooster has evolved to instinctively crow as the sun rises. Why they do so is uncertain. Perhaps they feel they must alert everyone within hearing range that daybreak is about to occur.
Whatever the reason, it’s instinctual and not a learned response.
This Land Is My Land
Just as chickens have a complex social hierarchy or pecking order, they also stake out territorial claims. Any newcomer to their coop, to their pen, to their yard better be aware that they are entering that rooster’s territory.
A rooster will therefore belt out a territorial crow should he see any kind of movement anywhere he considers his property.
This includes:
wild birds, rabbits, chipmunks and other native fauna
anyone mowing a lawn anywhere within the bird’s sight or hearing range
kids playing nearby
package couriers and meter reader
even you, walking in your own yard
If anyone in your vicinity owns a rooster, be prepared for an exchange of territorial claims to fill the air every day, all day.
A rooster not only defends his land. He also cares for his hens. Part of that responsibility includes informing the girls whenever he comes across a tasty tidbit to eat.
This could be a fresh bunch of dandelion greens, some juicy grubs or even kitchen scraps tossed out to the flock as a treat.
A rooster’s chow-time crow is not as shrill as a territorial crow nor as long as a morning crow. But it definitely communicates its message clearly to the hens, who come running at the sound of their rooster’s call.
Ana Hotaling
Shooting the Breeze
When you have more than one rooster, either in the same flock or in different, separated flocks, the boys get to talking. I’ve lost count of how often I’ve worked in the runs and heard the roosters hold some sort of conversation with each other.
Again, the vocalizations differ completely from the morning, territorial and chow-time crows. In this case, it seems as though the roosters are actually conversing and exchanging information with each other.
Whether this may be “I’ll stand watch over this human while you keep the girls on the other side of the run” or “Hey, you guys in the other runs, be ready because the human is messing around in the coop and she’ll be heading your way next” I’ll never know.
I have heard our roosters strike up a conversation without me in their midst. For all I know, they might be discussing the hens, talking about the weather, or complaining about how stupid the ducks are.
Danger!
There’s no mistaking the high-pitched shriek a rooster lets out when he perceives a threat to his flock. Even my kids have learned to tell that crow apart from our roosters’ other calls.
We usually end up running to the windows to check whether we need to grab a shotgun, baseball bat or other form of flock defense.
Fortunately, our roosters usually have everything under control. The girls have taken cover and the boys are puffed up, hopping up and down and from side to side, shrieking at whatever might be putting the flock at risk.
Often, it’s the carrion-eating turkey vultures which circle overhead throughout the spring and summer. Currently, it’s the sandhill cranes that pause in our yard as they migrate south. Every now and then, it’s a green heron or Canada goose.
They’ve pretty much determined that our family of fat groundhogs and our resident doe are not a threat. The few times a hawk has landed on one of our coop roofs, the cacophony continued long after I’d run outside, arms waving, to chase the bird of prey away.
Farewell, Daytime!
Yes, a rooster does indeed crow as the sun sets. This vocalization is not a strident call but more of a low, throaty warble. It’s almost as though roosters are sad to see the day end.
Whenever I hear that deep, melodic trill, I can rest assured that our hens understand it’s time to call it a day and head into the coop. The boys remain outside, warbling their farewell to the sun, before heading in themselves.
It’s almost plaintive and sorrowful in nature, almost as if they’ve forgotten that, in just a few hours, they’ll be loudly greeting the dawn once again.
This article about why do roosters crow was written for Chickens magazine. Click here to subscribe.
A buff Orpington chick seaches for bugs in the grass. Adobe Stock/The Bohemian Lens
Facts about chickens can be fun to learn and informative, too. From personality assessments and exceptional egg facts to famous chicken breeds, here are twenty-five facts about chickens that you may not know.
Breeds That Failed
One of the most interesting facts about chickens is that several breeds that are popular today failed before they became popular.
#1 When the White Leghorn first came to America in the mid-1800s, the breed did not gain popularity and soon faced extinction. It wasn’t until the breed was imported the second time in the 1950s that the breed gained popularity.
Today Leghorns are one of the most popular breeds for backyard flocks and factory farms.
#2 The Plymouth Rock first appeared in the show ring in 1849, before disappearing for twenty years. In 1869 they were bred again, where they became increasingly popular. Plymouth Rocks were the most commonly kept chickens until the start of WWII. After the war, Plymouth Rocks’ popularity took a dive with the development of broiler hybrids.
These days, Plymouth Rocks are one of the most commonly kept chicken breeds in backyard flocks for eggs and pets.
Famous Chicken Breeds
#3 Rhode Island Red chickens are the most popular chicken breed in the world. Not only is this breed the most famous, but it is also the most popular breed kept at petting zoos due to its friendly and confident disposition.
#4 Black Australorps are so popular in their native country that the breed has actually been named the “national chicken” of Australia.
#5 It’s hard to have fun facts about chickens and not include the two breeds that are named State Birds. Delaware announced their state bird as the Blue Hen of Delaware in 1939. Fifteen years later, in 1954, Rhode Island became the second state when they announced the Rhode Island Red as their state bird.
Full of Personality
Some of the most interesting facts about chickens are none other than facts about different breeds’ personalities. Whether quirky or intelligent, these breeds have delightful temperaments for both the novice and veteran chicken-keeper.
#6 Delaware hens are known for their fun and quirky personality, but better watch out! These hens are notorious for becoming grumpy when they don’t get their own way.
#7 Pet chickens are increasing in popularity as more backyard flock owners are realizing that their flocks are just as affectionate as a dog. When selecting a breed for a pet, look for gentle breeds such as Silkies, Orpingtons, Golden Comets, Barred Plymouth Rocks, and Speckled Sussex.
#8 Speckled Sussex hens are highly intelligent and can even be trained to do tricks on command. With their fun, people-loving personalities and never-ending energy, these delightful hens make wonderful, interactive family pets.
Australorp Trivia
The Black Australorp is one of the most popular breeds kept in backyard flocks. Check out these facts about chickens to learn more about this breed.
#9 While many chickens are outstanding egg layers, a Black Australorp hen set a record when she laid three hundred and sixty-four eggs in three hundred and sixty-five days.
Australorp chicken hen that is free-ranging. Adobe Stock/ Guy Sagi
#10 Black Australorps were created in Australia from the Black Orpington. Australian breeders crossed the Orpingtons with Leghorns, Rhode Island Reds, and Langshans to create a chicken with higher egg production. The new breed was originally named the “Australian Black Orpington,” but later was changed to Black Australorp. With the “orp” added for the original breed.
Instant Success
While some breeds failed immediately after being developed, others had immediate success.
#11 Orpingtons gained immediate popularity when they first appeared at a show at the Crystal Palace Poultry Show in England. The breed went on to win the grand prize cup at their first showing!
#12 Golden Comet chickens became popular after being developed in the 1950s. With their high egg production, large brown eggs, and friendly personalities, it’s easy to see how the Comet has continued to be popular.
All Chickens Big and Small
Chickens come in many different sizes, with the average breed weighing in between five and eight pounds. But these three facts about chickens feature the smallest, largest, and tallest chicken breeds.
#13 Seramas are the world’s smallest chicken breed. Hens of this tiny breed can weigh as little as half a pound, while the roosters weigh in at about one pound. On average, Serama chickens stand about six to ten inches tall.
#14 Jersey Giants are the world’s largest chicken breed, with hens weighing about ten pounds and roosters averaging thirteen to fifteen pounds. When castrated (also known as capons), roosters tip the scales at eighteen to twenty pounds.
#15 One of the most interesting facts about chickens is the world’s tallest chicken breed, the Malay. Malay chickens stand an average of three feet tall. (About six inches taller than the average picnic table.)
Extraordinary Egg Layers
A lot of facts about chickens include their extraordinary egg-laying abilities. Here are a few fun egg-laying breed facts.
#16 Golden Buff chicks (a sex link hybrid bred from Rhode Island Red roosters and White Leghorn hens) hatch from white eggs but will grow up to lay brown eggs.
#17 Marans lay the darkest brown eggs of all the brown egg layers.
#18 Penedesenca hens lay black eggs in the beginning of the laying season that slowly fade to chocolate throughout the season.
Ancient Breeds
Looking for some interesting facts about chickens that have stood the test of time, these three breeds have done just that and are still popular today.
#19 Nicknamed the “Pilgrim Chicken,” the Dominque was the first breed developed in America.
#20 The Java is an old American breed and played a role in creating many breeds, including the Rhode Island Red, Plymouth Rock, and Jersey Giant.
#21 With records dating back to 55 B.C., Old English Game Fowl are the oldest living breed. Not only is this ancient breed still popular, but it also comes in more color varieties than any other chicken.
Unique Physical Characteristics
#22 Naked Necks (often referred to as Turkens, due to their naked neck resembling their turkey cousins) have only forty to fifty percent of the feathers other chicken breeds have.
#23 Did you know that while most chickens have four toes, some breeds actually have five toes? That’s right! Dorkings, Faverolles, Houdans, Silkies, and Sultans all have five toes.
#24 Sebright roosters lack the long hackles, saddles, and sickle feathers common in most breeds. Instead these roosters look almost identical to the females.
#25 Wyandotte and other rose-combed breeds do not always sport a rose comb. The reason for this is roosters do not consistently carry the gene for rose combs, resulting in offspring sporting single combs.
A Truly One-of-a-Kind Chicken Bonus Fact
No facts about chickens list would be complete without mentioning this exceptional breed.
#26 Sumatras have several characteristics that make them unique compared to all other chicken breeds. From their black crow-like appearance to their extraordinary flying abilities (they have been known to fly across rivers and can fly as far as five miles), these chickens are truly one of a kind.
Facts about chickens are so much fun to learn about. Every day, chicken enthusiasts are learning more about these extraordinary barnyard birds. With their fun personalities, exceptional eggs, and unique physical characteristics, chickens truly are a marvel.
This article about facts about chickens was written for Chickens magazine. Click here to subscribe.
Poultry keeping changes from year to year and the New Year is a great time to reflect on the past seasons and plan for what’s upcoming. Here are a few goals from this author’s farm that can be adapted to a backyard flock.
1. Focus on Breeding Geese
Kirsten Lie-Nielsen
With more than a dozen geese of various breeds, it is certainly safe to say that I am a goose keeper. But I have always wanted to focus on preserving certain breeds of geese, rare and heritage breeds that need conservation. Up until now, we have kept geese for their abilities as guardians and their large eggs, but we have not done any breeding on our small farm.
Every winter, part of the fun is browsing through hatchery catalogs and websites, picking out what breeds to get for the coming spring. This year as one of my poultry-keeping goals is to expand my holdings of a few specific breeds, purchasing sexed females, and using only the best farms to ensure quality stock. With a good ratio of male to female birds of the same breed, I can start breeding my own line of these birds and hopefully help maintain their breed’s integrity. In particular, I’m interested in more Dewlap Toulouse and Roman Tufted geese.
2. Add More Ducks
Despite our large flock of geese and more than two dozen chickens, we have very few ducks on our farm. It is a shame because ducks are reliable egg layers that produce even in winter. They are also quite hearty and have amazingly friendly and curious personalities.
So, continuing with our poultry keeping, this year we’d like to add various breeds of ducks to the flock, focusing on types that are good for egg laying. Our chickens do a great job of providing us with eggs, but their production slows down in the winter months, and I don’t like doing too much in the way of supplemental lighting. A flock of female Runner ducks ought to help us keep up with the demand for eggs and also take in some good entertainment as they make their way around the barnyard.
3. Complete a Pond
Our biggest barnyard project and another of our poultry-keeping goals is having a pond dug for our property. This pond is partially for irrigation purposes, but it will be just off the back side of the barn in easy walking distance for our birds. The geese will love being able to bathe in a space larger than a livestock trough, and being able to swim during mating season should increase their fertility rates.
4. Use More Eggs in the Kitchen
Kirsten Lie-Nielsen
We use many of the eggs that we collect for breakfast and dinners, making lots of quiches and omelets and custards. But as one of my resolutions, I want to expand my culinary egg horizons and start trying some more unusual egg-based recipes. This will definitely include pasta, and hopefully many more desserts.
The goal of every year is to keep the birds happy and healthy, continue being a productive homestead and enjoy the company of the animals that we keep.
This article about poultry-keeping goals was written for Hobby Farms magazine. Click here to subscribe.
How to order baby chicks through the mail can seem a little daunting the first time. But knowing what to expect throughout the process will make the experience less stressful and worry-free and make you more prepared.
Common Terms When You Order Baby Chicks
How to order baby chicks is easier if you fully understand everything the hatchery is telling you. Even though chick terminology is easy for veteran chicken owners to understand, for the novice it may seem overwhelming. Here are a few common chick terms you might see.
Pullet: Sexed female chick
Cockerel: Sexed male chick
Straight run: Unsexed chicks (straight-run chicks are a mix of cockerels and pullets, but usually contain more cockerels due to more eggs hatching as males versus females).
Grogel: Pronounced grow-gel, this supplement is critical for feeding chicks stressed from shipping.
Broiler: Meat chickens
Layers: Hens that lay a lot of eggs
Dual-Purpose: Breeds that can be used for meat and eggs.
Marek’s vaccine: The Marek’s vaccine is an optional choice for backyard flock owners. However, it is critical to ensure that vaccinated and unvaccinated chickens are not mixed or reside on the same property.
Where to Order Baby Chicks
How to order baby chicks begins with choosing a reputable hatchery that sells the breeds/varieties you are looking for. Bear in mind that if choosing a rare breed or color variety, there is usually a two or three chick maximum.
Whenever possible, ordering from a hatchery that is in your area (the state you live in or a neighboring state versus cross-country) is the best way to reduce stress from extreme weather conditions and prolonged traveling. Selecting a hatchery that is certified by the National Poultry Improvement Plan (NPIP) is the best way to guarantee healthy chicks. Parent stock and chicks from hatcheries that are NPIP certified are tested for avian influenza, salmonella, and other diseases to ensure healthy birds every time.
Prevention is key to helping day-old chicks grow into production chickens, so err on the side of caution and choose a hatchery supported by the NPIP.
When to Order Baby Chicks
When to order baby chicks is critical depending on your geographical location. Summer heat can be difficult for baby chicks to survive, leaving them dehydrated and stressed. Chicks shipped in the summer months are more prone to heat exhaustion and dehydration and experience a higher mortality rate.
Chicks shipped in winter can experience stress from the cold and even freezing to death.
The best time to purchase chicks is in the spring and fall when temperatures are neither too hot nor too cold. Keep in mind that chicks arriving in the fall will need to be fully feathered and old enough to withstand the chill of winter before the cold sets in. (about eight to twelve weeks of age.) Therefore, raising chicks in the autumn may not be ideal for northern climates, where winter sets in quickly.
How to order baby chicks begins with placing an order at a hatchery, so be sure to place the order several months in advance, as chicks quickly sell out.
Hatchery Mistakes
Even though no one wants to learn about hatchery mistakes when discovering how to order baby chicks, mistakes can happen.
While many hatcheries guarantee one hundred percent sexing accuracy, it doesn’t mean you won’t get a cockerel in with your pullets. Chicks are difficult to sex accurately, and unfortunately, mistakes do happen. The sexing guarantee is there to ensure if the hatchery does make a mistake, your money is guaranteed to be refunded. Be sure to report any sexing errors within the hatchery’s guidelines so your money can be refunded.
Fun Sexing Fact: Did you know? Almost all chick sexers are Japanese. Vent sexing was first developed in Japan and continues to be most accurate when performed by a trained Japanese sexer.
On occasion, hatcheries may send you the wrong breed. While this can be disappointing, there is no way to return the chicks. The best way to handle the situation is to report the mistake to the hatchery (with photo proof) and move on.
Shipping Day!
The shipping process is not only stressful for chicks, but it is also stressful for the soon-to-be chicken owners. How to order baby chicks is less stressful when knowing what to expect throughout the shipping process.
The shipping label is often created before the chicks finish hatching, as the hatchery must move quickly to package new hatchlings and send them to their new homes. Shipping labels may be created as far in advance as the day before. Before you know it, the chicks will ship and be on their way.
Once arriving at the post office, chick orders are rarely scanned throughout the shipping process as post office employees have less than forty-eight hours for chicks to arrive at their destination. It’s not uncommon for tracking information to only update once or twice a day, but take heart; even though there are records to prove it, your little poultry passengers are working their way through the postal system.
Setting Up the Brooder
Now that we have answered how to order baby chicks, it’s time to set up the brooder. Brooder supplies you will need include:
A safe brooder
Heat lamp or brooder hot plate
Chick-sized water fountain
Chick-sized feeder
Starter Feed
Probiotics
Electrolytes
Aspen wood shavings
Be sure to have the brooder set up before the chicks arrive to ensure the brooder is warm and ready for the new arrivals.
The Long Awaited Call
Once arriving at the local post office, a postal employee will call the telephone number you provided the hatchery with when you placed the order. This call may come through as the local post office branch or an employee’s personal phone number.
This call can come as early as four in the morning or anytime throughout the day. Be prepared, whatever time the post office calls, by having the brooder set up and ready to go to ensure the chicks can move in as soon as you bring them home.
Tips and Tricks
#1 When filling out the order form, always give the hatchery the phone number that will be easiest to reach you on. Not only is this important for mailing, but it is also critical in case the hatchery needs to contact you if there is a problem with your order.
#2 When the chicks arrive at the post office, be sure to pick them up immediately to ensure one hundred percent livability. Always open the box(es) inside the post office in case there are any casualties. If deaths have occurred, a post office employee will have you fill out a form to send to the hatchery to replace birds.
#3 After chicks have arrived, check their vents often throughout the day for the next few days to ensure no chicks have contracted pasty butt. If vents are messy, gently clean them with a damp cloth.
#4 Spending time with your chicks is essential for them to get used to you and being handled. Pick up chicks several times a day, and gently talk to them or pet them while handling them. Be sure to speak your intentions to avoid scaring your new arrivals.
How to order baby chicks through the mail can be slightly stressful for both the chicks and the anxious owners, but knowing what to expect and how to prepare and care for your new arrivals will make the experience easier and more enjoyable for everyone.
This article about how to order baby chicks was written for Chickens magazine. Click here to subscribe.
Small farm income ideas are vital. Let’s face it. We could all use some extra cash. And having one or two reliable side hustles can help—especially when you’re able to leverage resources you already have.
Here are some side hustles (and saving tips) for farmers to consider to make a quick buck or two from the farm.
Take the Scenic Route
Got honeybees, a rare sheep breed or fields full of sunflowers? Shooting some eye-popping farm photos could pay off on your list of small farm income ideas.
Stock photography websites such as iStock.com pay photographers small royalties for their images. Earnings depend on how many photos you’ve uploaded for potential use and how many times customers download them.
Stock photo outlets’ average pay ranges from a few cents to a few dollars per licensed photo. Provided you meet their minimum payment thresholds, most payout monthly.
Doug Sandquist is a Las Vegas-based dentist with a landscape photography side hustle. Although he’s sold some of his travel photos on stock image websites, he admits it’s not the most lucrative of side hustles. “They’re a hard way to go.”
Instead, he recommends selling through websites such as Society6.com or Redbubble.com. These enable you to upload and feature your photos on T-shirts, mugs, canvas prints and more.
When customers order your photo products, you earn a percentage. Again, most sites pay out monthly, as long as you’ve reached minimum payment thresholds. For instance, Redbubble.com’s threshold is $20.
Many people wish they could garden, but they lack the land to do so. Some are apartment dwellers who aren’t allowed to dig up the grounds. Others are homeowners with too much shade, too many munching deer or both.
But if you have soil to spare, consider staking off some 10-by-10-foot parcels and renting them to gardeners for the duration of the growing season. Renting just one plot from, say, April through October at $20 per month would bring in an extra $140 in all.
Be prepared to provide car or bicycle parking spaces, access to water and a few essential garden tools as needed. Also, make sure your farm’s insurance policy covers this type of arrangement.
(You don’t want to leave yourself unprotected in the event that one of your guest gardeners is injured while working in his or her rental plot.)
Get Your Goats
Plenty of homeowners joke about replacing their lawnmowers with goats. But, as it happens, employing goats to clear brush is a viable—and potentially profitable—addition to your small farm income ideas list.
David A Litman/Shutterstock
“As far as cost that you can make in this business, it varies from state to state and region to region,” says Tammy Dunakin. Dunakin is the owner, operator and franchiser for Rent-A-Ruminant, LLC, in Seattle, Washington.
Dunakin typically charges clients $820 per day for either 60 or 120 goats. “And I have a 1/4-acre minimum and a three-day minimum,” she adds.
If you already have goats, perhaps you’ve been curious about trying this work.
“There are a lot of moving parts to it,” Dunakin says. “What you really don’t want to have, if you are doing a job for somebody, is something that involves harm to the animals or harm to somebody’s property or goats getting hit by cars or causing an accident.”
Tethering your goats and relying on someone else’s fencing are both nonstarters.
“Don’t imagine that you will just drop your goats off and leave,” she says. Instead, you’ll need to set up portable, clearly marked electric fencing to coral your goats. You also need to be able to identify the plants they’ll encounter in advance. Many plants are actually toxic to goats.
It’s also just as important to check your insurance coverage. Some custom farming plans will cover you on and off of your farm.
Finally, you should also plan to do some of the brush removal yourself. “You have to help clear some of that by hand, so that the goats will be able to reach it,” Dunakin says.
Forage Your Forest
Do you own or have access to wooded land? Look for seasonal delicacies such as morel and chanterelle mushrooms, pawpaws, persimmons and other natural treats. Once you know where and how to find these, you can either sell them directly yourself or supply local grocers and restaurants.
If you’re not sure where to begin, check out Start Mushrooming: The Reliable Way to Forage by Stan Tekiela and Incredible Wild Edibles by Samuel Thayer.
Say you’ve grown and canned tomatoes for 30 years. Or maybe you know nearly everything about raising poultry. You might consider putting together some online courses to help others succeed with these kinds of skills.
And you can get paid in the process.
Platforms such as Udemy.com host online courses created by experts like you. When students pay to take your course, you get a percentage of student fees.
To develop a Udemy course, you need to be able to create 30 minutes of video and five lectures. You’d then submit your course for quality review.
The percentage you make from student enrollment can be as high as 97 percent, but 25 percent per student is more typical. (You get more for students you refer versus those finding your course through Udemy’s promotional efforts.)
It takes a couple of months for payments to begin. But you can expect to be paid monthly once they do.
Try the Honor System
If you have extra bedding plants or odd-looking veggies that might not sell at the farmers market, put them in an unattended farm stand.
Dee Dalasio/Shutterstock
In part, the need for social distancing during the global pandemic made such old-school, honor-system farm stands more attractive. And, by and large, they work.
Mike Record, co-owner of New Ground Farm in Bloomington, Indiana, operates the Bethel Lane Farm Stop. The self-service shop is housed in the front of one of his barns. And the shop’s cashbox is built into part of the wall itself.
“It’s inside a part of the barn that gets closed up at night,” Record says. “You should try to come up with a place for people to put their money that is pretty much bombproof.”
If you set up your own unattended shop, price items using whole dollars or simple fractions of dollars. That way, people can more easily offer exact change.
“Our policy is if you don’t have the right change, pay what you can and make it up next time,” he adds. “What tends to happen is people overpay rather than underpay.”
If you are able to, you might also want to accept mobile payments via smartphone applications such as Venmo or the CashApp.
Offer a Farm-cation
Have an extra room? Perhaps, a converted barn or outbuilding to list as a temporary vacation spot?
Plenty of would-be renters are looking for off-the-grid getaways.
According to Airbnb, hosts in the rural U.S. earned more than $200 million in June alone. Despite the threat of COVID-19, that amount was up by 25 percent over June of 2019.
Certainly, it takes work to prepare, photograph and list your space. But more than 170,000 rural hosts in the U.S. took the plunge and earned roughly $1,000 each in just one month from their rental side hustles.
Plant This Fast-Grower
Looking for produce-based small farm income ideas? In a pinch, kale is one of the easiest, most forgiving crops to grow. It’s a great choice for selling in late fall and even during much of the winter when your other crops are long gone.
Because kale is both drought- and cold-tolerant, it’s well-suited for nearly year-round harvest. (To prolong kale in colder climates, protect it with heavy, clear plastic. Or you can grow it inside a hoop house.)
Marcus Holman/Shutterstock
You can pack a lot of this cut-and-come-again vegetable into a relatively small space. So you should be able to grow enough to supply a few of your area grocers or restaurants, too.
Deliver Aged Manure
As far as small farm income ideas go, selling aged manure isn’t exactly speedy. But if you happen to have a lot of extra manure on hand—particularly manure that’s had the chance to age for about a year or so—gardeners will pay top dollar it.
(Fresh manure isn’t nearly as valuable, because its high nitrogen content can burn plants.)
And if you’re willing and able to deliver that aged manure? That’s even better. Depending on your location and the amount of competition in your area, you may be able to charge upwards of $40 to $50 or more per cubic yard that you deliver.
Go Natural
Take a spin around Etsy.com and similar online markets and you’ll see the usual handmade art prints and quilted purses. But you’ll also discover sellers with small farm income ideas, too.
A jar filled with cicada shells? Check!
Boxes of real fall leaves? Yep.
And bits of petrified wood, newly shed deer antlers, owl pellets and other “natural curiosities.” Turns out city slickers and macabre crafters alike will snap up these surprisingly high-priced items.
So, whether you want to sell the dried gourds you grew or some interesting fossils you found in your corn field, listing such items on Etsy will cost you .20 each.
Expect to spend some time photographing, describing and categorizing anything you hope to sell. Payments can be set up to arrive daily, weekly or monthly.
Small Farm Income Ideas to Stretch Your Dollars
What do you do when your small farm income ideas start bringing in the bucks? Stretch them as far as they’ll go, of course.
Form a Tool Share
Before buying that new weed wrench or pallet buster, consider how often you’ll actually use them and whether your neighbors could also benefit.
Certified organic inspector Gary Ogle works on variety selection and catalog production for Veseys in Canada’s Atlantic region. “A lot of our growers use plastic mulch when planting vine crops,” Ogle says. “But not everybody can afford the equipment that lays down that plastic mulch—equipment they’re only going to use once a year.
“Having a piece of equipment that a community can share is a great way to save money.”
You can split the cost of seldom-used tools with fellow farmers and store them in an area you can all access. “Join your local growers’ co-op or talk to other farmers in your area,” Ogle says.
“Get to know each other. That way, you can share equipment, find out what other people are growing and not get into their market if it’s already [too] competitive.”
Make It Rain
Install a rain barrel or cistern to save on your water bill. A single 55-gallon drum can collect hundreds of gallons of (free!) water during the summer months.
And some counties offer free or deeply discounted rain barrel systems.
Eyeball Your Insurance
Examining the insurance you’re carrying for your farm, vehicles, liability and so on isn’t exciting, but it can pay dividends.
Have you added any new product lines or equipment lately? Make sure you still have all of the coverage you need. And take the time to comparison shop along the way.
Solve Recurring Mysteries
“Free” trials are only free for so long. Check your credit card and bank statements to be sure you’re not paying for services or subscriptions you don’t use.
Pinch Pennies—Literally
Scattering coins in the truck’s cup holder or in random pockets is no way to save.
Instead, put your change in one place and regularly take it to the bank. You’ll soon notice that even small amounts of money can grow.
Ditch Your PMI
Have you checked your mortgage statement lately? You might be paying private mortgage insurance unnecessarily.
On a conventional 30-year mortgage, if you’ve reached year 15 or your remaining balance equals 80 percent of your home’s value, you might be able to kiss that PMI goodbye.
Plan Ahead
Holidays, anniversaries and birthdays happen like clockwork. But it’s still easy to be caught off guard.
Rather than panic buying expensive last-minute gifts, plan gift-giving in advance. Record a year’s worth of special occasions on a gift-giving calendar and you’ll have time to give more thoughtful, creative—and frugal—gifts.
Grab Those Freebies
Take advantage of any free energy audits your local utilities or rural electric cooperatives may offer. You just might have some hidden energy “leaks” to plug.
Go Bigger
As with buying in bulk, group-purchasing a pallet of product and divvying it up yourself can save you and your neighbors big. Think of it as creating a hyper-local farm co-op.
Do you all buy similar kinds of chicken feed, canning supplies or potting mix? Pool your money for extra-deep discounts.
This article about small farm income ideas originally appeared in Hobby Farms magazine. Click here to subscribe.
When buying land for farming, hunting or otherwise, we’ve got the top five things from one of Minnesota’s top real estate agents, Adam Benedict, with RE/Max Advantage Plus, to consider to help you make a wise choice.
There are many factors to consider when buying land that will vary depending on your intention for the land, but here are some blanket items to investigate that you’ll want to consider regardless of what your land use.
1. Think of the long term. What do you intend to use the land for? Do you want to grow gardens or raise livestock? Is it land strictly for hunting? Regardless, you’ll likely want to have a water percolation test conducted, also known as, “perc test.” This will test the soil to measures how quickly the water will drain into the ground.
Why this matters: It’ll determine the type and size of septic system you can install. It’ll determine where you can build structures on the land. It’ll also help you determine what parts of the land are suitable for growing food or raising livestock. Even if you don’t intend to ever develop the land, it’s still worth knowing what your options are for resale value.
Soil testing is also key when planning to grow food or raise livestock. Soil testing will reveal any contamination or lack of nutrients in the soil.
2. Zoning regulations. You’ll want to know what the regulations are on the land in case you decide to build.
Why this matters: This determines what type of buildings you can build on the land. If you were hoping to run a small business from your farm, for example, you’ll need to know if that’s legally allowed. The zoning regulations and laws will impact the development of your land in general and it is imperative to know your limitations.
3. Easements. Look into easements on the land. Make sure there is direct access to road frontage to put a driveway, for example. Even if you don’t have any long-term intentions of adding a house or any structures, look into it for resale purposes down the road.
Why this matters: An easement on the property could drastically decrease the value of your land if it limits the use of the land.
It’s also important to understand utility easements. This allows companies to dig, remove and install things on your property so it’s important to check with the county before you buy.
4. Understand the topography of the land. Let’s say you are buying land to hunt on. Depending on the type of game you are hunting, each animal will have different needs. Understanding the animal’s habitat will help you determine if the land is a good fit or not.
Why this matters: If you’re looking for land for deer hunting, deer live in forests with natural vegetation and tree coverage. If you’re hunting ducks, make sure that the land has water access since ducks live near ponds, rivers, and marshes.
In addition to the topography mattering for animals, it’ll also impact your ability to build any structures on the land. It will directly impact site planning, the cost to build, it’ll help reveal possible construction challenges that may be an obstacle, and it’ll show floodplains, wetlands and so on.
5. Survey the land. Know the exact parameters of the land before you buy.
Why this matters: This will help you avoid legal issues down the line if you have the exact parameters of the land before you purchase it.
There is much more advice to offer on the topic of buying land, but these five tips will help you get the process started. For more information on the subject, you can follow Adam Benedict.
Fresh-cut Christmas trees present a dilemma at the end of each season: What to do with your Christmas tree. Owners of plastic artificial trees can pack their trees away for the next holiday season, but what about the millions who bought cut pine, spruce or fir trees? The following are some green ideas to keep cut trees out of the landfill and help make Christmas trees a renewable crop by giving old trees a second life.
1. Christmas Tree Mulching
For many folks with fresh-cut Christmas trees, the simplest option is grinding your old Christmas tree into mulch. Many cities and towns have mulching programs that collect trees via curbside pickup on announced days or offer centralized drop-off sites. Mulch is then used for city beautification projects or on facilities such as playgrounds. Some cities even offer their mulch for sale, so that individual homeowners can take advantage of this green product. If your municipality doesn’t offer a mulching program, ask around for the popular neighbor who owns a wood chipper and make your own.
2. Christmas Trees as Wildlife Habitat
A fresh-cut Christmas tree can make a useful habitat for a range of animal life, including birds, small mammals and freshwater fish. The easiest method is placing your spent fresh-cut Christmas tree in your backyard and staking it upright, so that birds and mammals can take shelter from winter weather and predators. If having your old tree in the yard for a few months doesn’t sound appealing, some dedicated regional programs exist where trees are collected for use in larger wildlife preserves. Freshwater fish can also take advantage of your old fresh cut Christmas tree if you place it in a large pond or lake for use as nesting habitat—but be sure to get permission from the public jurisdiction or landowner before doing this.
3. Branches in the Garden
The branches from your fresh-cut Christmas tree can be put to use in the garden, protecting cold-sensitive overwintering perennials. Just cut the limbs off your Christmas tree with loppers or a saw and then lay several branches gently over your perennials to help insulate them from the coldest weather of the year. The remaining tree trunk can be then be set aside for mulching.
As an important final note, double and triple-check your tree for any remaining light strands or ornaments, as these plastic and metal items should not end up in a farm pond or ground up in a mulch pile.
This article about uses for spent fresh-cut Christmas trees was written for Hobby Farms magazine. Click here to subscribe.
Chicken keeping is popular today just as it was over 100 years ago. While times have changed, much of the advice hasn’t. If you plan to build new digs for your chickens and you want sound advice, check out some old-time materials written when most folks in the country kept chickens in their backyards or on small farms. Much of the advice still proves worthy today—even though it’s more than 100 years old.
Chicken Keeping – Coop Interior
In 1901, Myra Norys wrote Pocket Money Poultry, a guide for women who raised chickens to sell the eggs. She seemed amused by how much of the poultry information during her time described what was supposed to be a “woman’s poultry-house.”
“The idea underlying it was that a woman’s long skirts unfitted her to enter a building where there was necessarily more or less filth, and the building described was to be made so that she should not need to enter it,” Norys wrote. “It was small enough to be cleaned from the outside through a drop door, the floor being raised, not to necessitate too much backbreaking work. Possibly, this might do for very small work with a very few fowls, but the poultry mistress who did not enter the houses could hardly have sufficient grasp of her business to insure success.”
Norys had her own ideas of what made a poultry house more suited to a “female” chicken keeper during that time: “Perhaps the best way to adapt a poultry house to a woman’s needs is to make certain of absolute simplicity and convenience in its inside fittings,” she wrote. “The necessities are roosts and their platforms, nest boxes, drinking vessels and feed troughs, grit and shell containers, and dust baths. Whatever is on the floor soon comes to be a nuisance, for it is disturbed and fouled by the birds, besides being in the way. Nest boxes are better at a little height than if placed upon the floor.”
That’s sound advice for any chicken keeper, male or female. Norys continues to explore the coop interior, noting that feed troughs should not be subject to overturning, roosting or befoulment of any sort. She even described a way to build a feed trough.
“A feed trough … may consist of a single board, with a furring of lath about the edge,” she wrote. “This may be hinged to the side of the building, about 8 inches from the floor. Eight inches above it may be stapled a wire frame, a little wider than the board, and made like one leaf of a wire gridiron without the handle. When the hens are feeding, the board is at right angles to the wall, the wire frame dropped at an angle over it. After the fowls have finished, both trough and frame are raised and hooked to the wall. Such a trough needs very little cleaning, for the average hen does this part of the work very well!”
These wall shelves, as she described, did need a little support below, which she advised be furnished by attached legs or including a small box underneath them.
Chicken Coop Roosts
For sleeping, Norys suggested a simple modified ladder roost: “I do not mean the old style of ladder roost, one portion of which is higher than the other, but something like a ladder laid horizontally. On this, the hens can roost compactly, yet without crowding, especially if the ‘rounds,’ which are flat, are a little wider than the sides of the ladder, rising above the sides and seeming to divide them into spaces.”
If the roosting platform, when in position, is set to slightly slope toward the front, it can be cleaned much easier. The roosting frame and its platform, as described by Norys, has another advantage: It can be moved out of the way during the day.
For the nest boxes, she relied on a series of boxes placed on a level against the side of the house, with sufficient space to allow the hens to enter at the back. A single drop-door at the front gives the chicken keeper easy access to the eggs.
Norys recommended that nothing be kept on the floor except the dust-bath box, which should be moderately large and deep—“so that the hens can really wallow in it”—and kept in a sunny location.
“With these fittings, it takes but little time to care for the houses, a large proportion of the vexations of poultry keeping are avoided, cleanliness is insured, and all the work made comparatively easy,” she wrote.
Where to Put a Chicken Coop
In 1913, Clifford Perkins wrote How to Raise Profitable Poultry and addressed coop positioning, windows, floors and fencing.
When positioning your chicken coop, Perkins suggested that it face either south or east, preferably south, to permit a maximum amount of sunshine to enter the coop during the greater part of the day.
“The windows of the coops should be placed as high in the front of the building as possible,” he wrote. “This will permit the sunshine to reach the farthest back in the coop, especially during the winter months. Care should be taken not to put too many windows in a coop, or it will be cold, particularly at night.”
Perkins explained that glass radiates heat at night as rapidly as it collects it in the daytime. With the windows properly placed, about 1 square foot of glass surface can be allowed for every 16 square feet of floor area.
Chicken Coop Floors & Fencing
“Floors may be put into the coops if desired, but they add considerably to the cost,” he wrote, noting that you could instead just keep them covered with sand or straw at all times. “Concrete floors are sanitary and usually rat-proof but are very cold in winter and in this respect may interfere with a good egg yield. A good dry dirt floor will generally give the most satisfactory results, all things being considered.”
Perkins noted that fences should be of 2-inch mesh wire for grown fowls. For little chicks, 1-inch mesh is necessary, at least the first 2 feet up. Today, we have hardware cloth with smaller holes that is even more protective.
Fanny Field wrote in The Excelsior Poultry Book in 1891 that chicken keepers don’t need fancy coops if they let hens free-range.
“When the poultry house is so situated that the fowls can have the run of the barnyard and cattle sheds, the poultry shed will not be necessary. I know that much has been written against allowing fowls to run in barn yards and scratch in manure piles, but all the same, hens take to such places as naturally as ducks take to water … I have never yet seen any sickness that resulted from allowing fowls to run in well-drained, well-littered barn yards and cattle sheds.”
This article about chicken keeping 100 years ago was written for Chickens magazine. Click here to subscribe.
Chicken farming received a pop culture boost when actress Jennifer Garner said in an interview that she received baby chickens and remarked on how tiny and cute they are. She is raising them as a folly to have a few beautiful colored eggs around the house, but as a child, it was a different scenario.
“My mom said we would have 100 chicks arrive in the mail at a time,” Garner said in the interview. While her mom raised chickens for the necessity of feeding her family from their eggs and meat, Garner now enjoys them primarily as pets. “Just to think (that) in one generation, for me, it’s ‘I live in L.A. and aren’t I cute and I am organic,’ and for my mom, it was just food.”
Garner’s chickens have names; her mother’s chickens did not. And that is only in one generation. If we go back over 100 years, a 1918 government poster declared: “Uncle Sam Expects You To Keep Hens and Raise Chickens.” Let’s take a look at some other ways the hobby of keeping chickens has changed in the past century.
1918-1930: Chicken Farming
In Art and Science in Breeding: Creating Better Chickens, author Margaret Derry says that with the invention and modification of the incubator, there were 250 hatcheries by 1918. Nine years later, there were more than 10,000. Today, poultry hatcheries are a multibillion-dollar industry. Because of competition and the ability to provide chickens almost year-round, chicks were inexpensive. Hatcheries also vied to have the finest birds.
Shutterstock
Around this time, it took the birds 16 weeks to reach a frying weight of 2 pounds. Today, a Cornish cross can reach 4 pounds in just six to eight weeks. In 1922, vitamin D was discovered, which aided in keeping the birds healthy throughout the winter.
Until the mid-1920s, raising chickens was thought to be the work of a farmer’s wife. Agricultural experts in the Midwest told farmers to focus on corn, cattle, hogs and wheat. They didn’t believe that chickens—that were being fed for free via food scraps and free-ranging and providing free labor, turning the soil, fertilizing—could be a major revenue earner.
The Delmarva Peninsula—east of Chesapeake Bay on the East Coast, shared by Delaware, Maryland and Virginia—at this time was a truck farming region. Truck farming is the practice of growing one or more vegetable crops on a large scale. This was a feast or famine operation and varied year to year, based on the weather and market. Farmers in this area were looking for a steadier source of income, and meat chickens were the answer.
Up until this time, chicken meat was a byproduct of the egg production. Old birds became dinner. Farmers started focusing on single-purpose chickens, either layers or meat birds, as their production was more efficient than the average production of dual-purpose breeds. Delmarva Peninsula became the birthplace of the broiler we know today.
1930-1949: Backyard Bonanza
Chicken nutrition came to the forefront as chicken farming became more specialized. More farms kept larger flocks of chickens, which could not source enough food on their own. Feed companies’ filled the void. In 1933, it took 6 1⁄2 pounds of feed to produce 1 pound of broiler meat. In 1943, it took 4.
Today, because of breeding and better feed formulas, it takes less than 2 pounds to produce 1 pound of meat. This was a big step forward for the progress of chicken keeping.
Before the 1930s, people eating chicken would often butcher and prepare their own birds. For the elite, starting in 1902, chickens were “New York dressed,” a process where the birds are rough plucked and blood drawn, costing between 15 and 23 cents per pound. Many ducks and chickens are still sold this way in Asian markets.
According to the May 1943 issue of Popular Mechanics, Americans grew 18 million victory gardens—12 million in cities and 6 million on farms. Many of them included chickens.
When World War II ended in 1945, the government promotion of victory gardens stopped. The majority of Americans didn’t plant a garden in the spring of 1946, and the demise of backyard chicken-keeping and homesteading began.
1950-1969: A Falling Out
Kevin Trotman/Flickr
Following the war, the modern era began, and societal changes had far-reaching effects. Supermarkets replaced corner butcher shops, and many people traded the farm life for suburbia. The sprawl of the suburbs pushed the farmlands farther away from the cities, separating the farm from the table.
We became a mobile society with cars inhabiting every driveway. People could travel more easily with the aid of the interstate highway system. Those who hung onto farm life in the suburbs soon realized that it was easier to purchase cellophane-wrapped chicken than to raise their own.
So many eggs were being produced that egg prices fell. Growers continued to raise more birds, which made the egg prices drop even further. Only companies with large flocks could compete. Companies started to mix antibiotics and growth hormones into the feed. Supermarket refrigeration systems allowed meat to be transported hundreds or thousands of miles. People grew accustomed to cheap eggs and meat, and backyard chickens continued to fall out of vogue.
Starting in the late ’60s, Frank Perdue used the rise of television commercials to turn chicken into a brand name. His homespun commercials made him a celebrity and made Perdue Farms the third-largest poultry distributor in the country by the 1980s, according to Bulls, Bears, Boom, and Bust: A Historical Encyclopedia of American Business Concepts.
At the same time, Don Tyson began to make his father’s small 1935-founded Arkansas poultry company into a worldwide business. In 2007, Tyson was listed by Forbes as one of the 1,000 richest people in the world. Today, Tyson Foods Inc. is the largest chicken company in the United States, according to Watt Global Media.
Bruce Szalwinski/Flickr
1970-1989: Chicken Farming & Fast Food
By the early 1980s, consumers favored cut-up and processed chickens to the traditional whole bird. Chicken tenders and other ready-to-eat frozen foods were invented. Rotisserie chicken, another convenience item, became a big hit.
1990-2000: Paltry Poultry
Unfortunately, the ’90s were a low point in the poultry industry. The progress of chicken keeping reverted. Because of breeding and diet, many chickens experienced metabolic disorders and heart attacks, both associated with rapid growth.
With American consumers becoming more aware of the treatment of their food, they began to look for ways to take production back into their own hands.
In 1990, Martha Stewart launched Martha Stewart Living. In a few years, it grew to a monthly publication, highlighting homesteading tips such as raising chickens. In December 1994, HGTV launched and highlighted themes such as landscaping and gardening.
Although the term “organic farming” was coined in 1940 and the practice can be traced back to the 1800s, the organic movement began in this decade in response to industrial agriculture’s shift toward nitrogen fertilizers and pesticides.
2000-2025: Chicken Farming Returns to Favor
Massachusetts Office of Travel and Tourism
Although news organizations, such the Washington Post and New York Times, have published articles stating that raising backyard chickens is a growing trend, there are few studies to provide statistics on these flocks.
The Poultry Science Association recently published a survey from about 1,500 chicken owners nationwide. Most respondents owned fewer than 10 chickens and had kept chickens for less than five years. Major reasons for keeping chickens were as food for home use, gardening partners, pets or a combination of these. Not surprisingly, rural respondents had larger flocks.
Owners believed eggs and meat from their chickens were more nutritious, safer to consume and tasted better than store-bought products. They were also concerned about the health and welfare of their chickens, which didn’t seem to be the case on commercial farms.
Thankfully, chicken farming has never been fully removed from America’s consciousness. They’ve been a constant source of companionship as well as wholesome food. Today, some chickens in their McMansions have heated perches, swings, treats and beechwood nesting box curls so they can rest comfortably. Many hobbyists allow them to free-range, and some only feed organic. Many even have names. Feather Locklear and Hen Stefani, I’m talking to you! As chicken keepers, it is our responsibility to keep the progress moving forward for the next 100 years.
This story about chicken farming history was written for Chickens magazine. Click here to subscribe.
Chicken boredom busters for winter may seem funny and cute, but there’s more to rearing poultry during the winter months than just opening their doors and leaving them to their own devices. Without yards to explore and runs to scratch and dustbathe in, chickens grow bored very quickly.
And chickens suffering from winter boredom are indeed dangerous chickens. Not to us, mind you, but to its fellow flockmates.
Winter Boredom Bothers for Chickens
Pecking-order wars, feather picking and—in the worst of cases—cannibalism can occur when chickens get stir crazy. This is why, in addition to nurturer, housekeeper, egg collector and matchmaker, we poultry-keepers need to don an additional hat during the colder season: social director.
We might not schedule round-the-clock entertainment. But we can do a few simple things to keep our birds busy in a constructive and healthful way. Here are four of the chicken boredom busters that my family uses to keep our chickens active during the winter.
1. The Trail of Mystery
An adventure awaits those chickens courageous enough to venture out of their coops on a snowy day. One of us—usually my husband Jae or I—will have shoveled or snowblown a path that winds around the yard.
The chickens have never been able to resist setting off on this trail of mystery, wondering where it might lead. We change it every time, but it does eventually circle right back to their coops.
Our birds get some fresh air and exercise. We get a few hours of amusement watching the hens stroll around as if enjoying a sunny Sunday in the park.
We found out quite by accident that our hens adore original-style Cheerios, much in the same way that we discovered never to carry a sandwich or a slice of pizza in your hand as you walk in our yard.
One of our roosters will stalk you, snatch it and dash off with it before you even know what happened.
In the case of the Cheerios, it was a paper cupful. Or, rather, it used to be until Davey Orpington knocked it out of my son Bryce’s hand and proceeded to call every hen in existence to come share his newfound treat. Now, every couple of weeks when it’s winter, the boys and I will string Cheerios onto strands of 14- to 20-gauge jewelry wire, then wrap the end of each strand around a specially placed nail inside the coops.
The birds have a blast jumping up for the Cheerios and gobbling them down. It’s like reverse bobbing for apples. And winter boredom is a faint memory for chickens while they play.
If you choose to do this, make sure you do not use string. Those omnivorous chooks will try to chow down on that, too. Wire of a thinner gauge won’t hold up to a horde of jumping chickens and can become a hazard, so select a thick gauge.
You can use any type of circular cereal. But do your best to avoid the sweetened and colored types with artificial additives.
3. Ice Cream Corn
Another fact we learned yet again from firsthand experience is that chickens can quickly demolish an ice cream cake cone. Those darned things are wafer-thin and crush far more easily than the thicker sugar cones.
Utilizing the same nail we use to hold our Cheerios strands, we hang up circular loops made of 14- to 20-gauge wire. Each loop is just the right size to hold a cake-style ice-cream cone.
We fill each cone about 2/3 full of scratch grains (too much scratch causes the cone to fall). Then we let the birds have their fun. They get twice as much exercise with this treat: jumping up to peck at the cones, then scratching in the coop litter to find the tasty grains.
They always seem so surprised when the scratch grains come tumbling out.
These special delights resulted from my attempt to keep my children from going stir crazy several years ago, when we were snowed in for almost a week. We’d played endless games, read several books, watched plenty of television and videos, and had even cleaned the house (I might have been the only one excited about that).
The boys were now bored and grumpy. And like chickens experiencing winter boredom, this, too, can get dangerous!
One afternoon, I got out our individual mini-loaf pans and the following heap of healthy snack items from our pantry:
sunflower kernels
peanut butter
pumpkin seeds
raisins
dried cranberries
dried cherries
chopped nuts
My instructions to the boys were to mix whatever they wanted together, using peanut butter as the mortar to hold the ingredients together. They happily made a huge mess. Then we placed our overflowing pans in the fridge to chill and harden.
Well, that didn’t work. (Don’t tell the boys it was almost impossible to get those messy loaves out of the pans intact.)
I’m a firm believer of “if at first you don’t succeed,” however. When the roads were finally clear, I bought some beef suet at the market and rendered it. I then told the boys to make more miniloaves because the “chickens devoured the first ones.”
I explained to the kids that the fat in the suet is a high-energy food that helps our roosters and hens keep warm in the winter, and that we’d keep the peanut butter for another time. My little chefs had even more fun making their “chicken cakes” with the suet and, this time, the cakes turned out quite beautifully.
And the chickens did indeed devour them. They were perfect chicken boredom busters!
Special Notes (Kid Considerations)
Heed these special notes if you choose to make chicken cakes with your kids:
First off, wear disposable gloves if possible. It does get pretty messy!
Secondly, make sure you use seeds, nuts and fruits that have no added salt, sugar, sweeteners or preservatives.
Next, carefully wrap the cakes in cling-style plastic and store them in your refrigerator. They’ll soften if left out on the counter.
Finally, don’t serve all the cakes at once. Slice up one cake and offer a few slices placed strategically around the coop. These are meant as winter boredom busters for our chickens, not replacements for their nutritionally balanced poultry feed.
This article about chicken boredom busters was written for Chickens magazine. Click here to subscribe.
