Search results for query: *

You're right, I shouldn't have laughed. But it still sounds quite well suited to some kind of animals and plants (evidence: all of your points about what people did raise, plus what other people are actually producing & selling there.) Every climate has its problems, and they aren't all the...

I would expect that. They are strongly selecting the birds, and tweaking the feed, to get a combination that gives the most eggs for the least cost. But that means any hens who need extra nutrients are going to perform poorly and get culled. If you want to find differences among individual...

In the example with deficient soil, all parts of the plants should be equally deficient, so whether the chickens eat the vegetation or the roots will not matter. And where would the bugs and worms and other creatures get the missing minerals? They can't get them from the plants (which don't have...

Yes, but: This would be one of those nutrients with a wide window. Both amounts are less than toxic, but high enough to avoid deficiencies.

Considering what "diversified" means, I think that is the correct usage. In my mind, a "diversified small farm" is also a complicated operation, with many kinds of food being produced (plants and animals.) Even when the focus is on producing food for the people, there is plenty that can be...

Then what do YOU call it when people grow grains and other plants for themselves to eat? And they often grow those grains and other plants to sell to other people. I call that "farming" as well. Do you think there is a fence around that area? If so, it was not the norm for most of human...

I agree that a chicken in that environment is not being supported by a wild or natural environment. But if you consider people & their waste to be part of the environment, then that environment sometimes does support chickens without the people having to consciously do anything for the...

Some people just want cheap eggs. Some of them are willing to put in the work to raise chickens, if they will have eggs that are genuinely cheaper than the cheapest store eggs. For people who just want cheap eggs, I would usually recommend they keep buying eggs from the store, because their...

I think it depends on which eggs a person would buy. When I buy eggs in the store, I buy the cheapest ones. Chickens are only a money-saver for me if they produce eggs cheaper than the cheapest ones in the store. I have a friend that buys organic free-range eggs when they don't have chickens...

Whether foraging and free ranging is bad for their diet depends on what they are finding when they forage. For example, eating green grass and scratching up worms from a compost pile is likely to be fine. But if they find a lot of grass seeds and not many bugs, that has about the same...