Foxhollow Poultry Farm

Our pastured poultry hoop house is finished. Photos show the completed project with the electric poultry netting, and the chickens.  The chickens are about 3 weeks old and are really enjoying their new digs. The houses seem to be a good design, wind resistant, rain proof, predator proof, provide shade and are large enough to house our flock without being too heavy to move every day or two. I like this idea better than the Salatin type pens that are moved daily where the chickens are on grass, but caged. This design allows for shelter and protection, but also allows the chickens to range in the grass and dust bathe away from their shelter. All in all I think it is the best way for our farm's poultry to be raised. 

The best mother's day gift is probably a relative thing dependant upon the particular mother in question. My best mother's day gift was made for me this year by my husband. It is a hoop house that we will use to pasture our poulet rouge chickens with the addition of electric poultry net. The photo below shows the work in progress. Although it is now finished and will be loaded with poultry in a few hours, the photos do not show the completed house. We added tarps, automatic waterers, feeders and a door on one end. Will update it when I get more batteries for the camera. (Now I dont run out of film, I run out of batteries!) Here are the pictures.

 

This weekend we put up the portable poultry netting in the rain. It was a simple process that took a minimum amount of time and made our chickens really happy. They didn't even care if it was drizzling rain, they just roamed around all day and enjoyed their new grass. We will move the fencing as necessary to keep them all on fresh grass all season long. It is electrified to keep out the predators.  Here is a picture of the hens enjoying their new pasture.

We finally started working on our website. It was an easy process although it is not finished. The main problem I have is trying to get google to index it and list it. I have submitted the Url for their perusal and made sure that it was search engine optimized, etc, but as of yet (1 week later) it is not listed on a search. Any suggestions?? How long do they normally take to index a site? I am impatient I guess.  http;//www.foxhollowpoultryfarm.com.

We started cleaning out coops again and building some "rooms" or dividers in the broiler house this weekend. Some progress has been made, but never as much as we schedule. Things seem to take twice as long as we think they will.

Daylight savings time has caused some upset for us, but not for the chickens. They know when the sun comes up and exactly what time it is no matter what the clock says.

 

 Spring is toying with us. Our weather has been anywhere from 7 degrees to the high 50's. The reality of spring will HOPEFULLY be here soon. This time of year is quite frustrating due to the wait for nice weather and wait and wait and wait. Our first planting in trays has been done indoors again this year. We didn't get  our hoop house up last fall so we will build it this August to extend our winter season. Greens, herbs, and radishes in November! What a treat.

We bought a large, used, Humidaire incubator this weekend. It was an unbelievable find! A gentleman in Fort Dodge was going out of business and wanted to sell most of his poultry gear.  This incubator will help us increase our flock this year with about 400 chicken eggs per setting, or a couple thousand quail eggs. After the tornado that went through here last year our flock was pretty low in numbers. We need to increase our flock size and conformation after that destruction. Our plan is to be able to sell some chicks to other farms next year (2010). Thanks for understanding to those of you who have inquired for chicks this year. We just don't have enough to go around yet. 

Our table poultry production schedule has been bumped up considerably from last year. We are adding two new types of ducklings to our roster this year. The French Grimaud,  a large type of Long Island Duckling is one of them. The other is a Barbary/Muscovy duck that has little fat, lots of meat, lots of eggs, doesn't quack but does fly. This should be interesting! We may need hardhats in the duck yard now.

Our heritage layer flock should start producing eggs within the month. Looking for those first eggs is more fun than an Easter egg hunt as I have been raising the chickens for almost 6 months. I ask them daily "where are the eggs?" No reply and no eggs....yet.

We will also be breeding and selling Red Golden Pheasant this year. They are a beautiful bird --Males are bright red, yellow, orange, and blue.

So far they are settling in to their new environment with the Peafowl, and Slate Turkeys. Everyone is getting along together pretty well.

All in all things are pretty much on schedule at present. The only problem I have is a list 5 pages long of things that have to be done when the weather warms up. Until then we are waiting!