Anyone raise Chickens for eggs AND meat on 2 acres or less?

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mnmom4

mnmom4

Chirping
11 Years
Mar 2, 2012
38
1
77
Columbus, MN
We recently moved from an anti chicken city to a "country" home on a 5 acre lot, 3 of which is wooded and 2 is grass around our home. I'm thinking it is entirely feasible that we could raise both chickens for eggs and meat with the amount of space we have. How much space do you have for your meat birds? Do you free range or use a chicken tractor? This is our first experience with chickens ... been in the planning phase for about 3 years and can't wait to FINALLY get started.
 
We have about an acre. I have about 28 chickens "free-ranging" in an area about 1/3 of an acre. We have built a chicken tractor to move around the perimeter of our property with meat chickens in it.
 
shouldn't be much of a problem raising around a thousand chickens per acre.

Personally though, I think I'd throw some (hair) sheep in with the chickens to help with the feed cost.
 
Ekim said:
shouldn't be much of a problem raising around a thousand chickens per acre.

Personally though, I think I'd throw some (hair) sheep in with the chickens to help with the feed cost.
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Oh man, I think my husband would have a conniption. He's been a really good sport about the chickens, excited even! But everytime I come to him and say..."So honey, I was thinking...." he has a darn near panic attack. lol

We've gone from 32 sq ft of garden space to nearly 500 sq ft and growing in the last 3 years. Mini fruit orchard is being planted this year and gonna try to tap some birch trees for birch syrup next year. Long term, I think adding some other meat livestock is definitely a possibility.
 
mnmom4 said:
We'd just like enough for the freezer- maybe 1 bird every 2 weeks.
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You will know the needs of your family. We are a family of 4, and I started with 16 Cornish X. They are nearly 4 weeks old, and I added another 15 meat chicks just in case. We will probably do another 25 in the fall. I think that will suit us just fine.
 
Coralietg said:
You will know the needs of your family. We are a family of 4, and I started with 16 Cornish X. They are nearly 4 weeks old, and I added another 15 meat chicks just in case. We will probably do another 25 in the fall. I think that will suit us just fine.
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I don't want to get in over my head for our first go round. 25-30 seemed like a good number to start with, but I suppose we could do 1 flock and then another in the fall. We live in MN, so our warm weather season is pretty short...

I'm paying $3-$4 per pound for organic, free range chicken at the moment, so we really have to limit the # we can buy and store based on that cost. Do you think I would be saving any $ by raising and processing ourselves? Cost isn't the only factor... knowing where our food comes from, what it did and didn't consume, and how it was raised are the most important things.
 
well, there's 43,560 square ft per acre. So 43 sq ft per bird for 8 or so weeks ain't bad. the sheep can have it for the other 44 weeks of the year.

point is, 1 acre can support a heckofa lot of birds, with some left over.
 

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