A life-long love

daffodyllady

Chirping
11 Years
Apr 5, 2010
4
25
89
Hi, Just here to introduce myself.
I grew up on a 60 acre Mennonite family farm. We had a greenhouse, acres of vegetables and fruit, a family milk cow... and about 750 laying hens.

Mom ordered about 300 baby chicks every spring, and that's how I learned just how much heat, shelter, feed, etc baby chicks need.
We had three 10 x 16 brooder houses... and when those first eggs came in, it was time to cull the old hens from the back half of the big free-range chicken house, then move the young hens to the back half, so the pullets could be put into the front half.

We 7 daughters lined up alongside planks set on sawhorses, to butcher chickens assembly-line style. We could process 50 in a day. We wouldn't pluck - too much mess. Just split the skin down the breastbone and pull the skin off like a jacket. We helped freeze and can the meat... with 9 children, Mom valued that chicken meat!

Mom found I was good with animals, so I found myself being assigned to feed and water the chickens, gather the eggs, and milk the cow (by hand, of course.)
Every day as soon as I got home from school, I had to change into a barn dress, and go gather all those hundreds of eggs into wire baskets and carry them down into the cool cellar. Mom would take one daughter with her to clean the eggs every evening. It was valuable alone time with Mom! After gathering the eggs, I helped make supper - which was served promptly at 5:00 - and all of us cleaned up together afterward. (Mom would start us singing to avoid arguments.)

Exactly at 6:00 was time for me to milk the cow. I loved this chore! I would put the feed down, let Buttercup in, lock her into the stanchion, and sit down, talking gently to her. I found I could plant my head into her flank and sense her mood and impending movements, thus avoiding foot-in-the-bucket incidents. We'd settle into a symphony together, as I sang to the rhythm of the milk swish-swishing into the pail. It usually took only 10 minutes to milk about 2 gallons. She'd chew in rhythm with me. How I loved her!

Milking over, I let the cow out, poured the foam off for the cats to eat, and went to the house to strain the milk. We had an extra refrigerator in the utility room for extra produce and for chilling milk. Mama made soured-cream butter... we guzzled that raw milk several times a day!

Now, I'm single, and my 2 children are grown. I live alone, with my chickens and 2 cats.
The older flock (5 hens) I have is a motley crew, hatched out from eggs I got from a stranger. I get light brown, medium brown, and blue-green eggs. They simply don't lay as well as they ought to... so I got a Leghorn rooster to put with them... and collected eggs to hatch in my incubator.

The hatch was pretty successful: 15 very healthy chicks! I raised them in a very large wood box under a light until they reached 5 weeks old, then moved them to a 4' x 4' x 2' high simple chicken tractor which I move daily to fresh grass. They're growing rapidly, and are very healthy. I could tell at 3 weeks which ones would be the roosters, so I've started dispatching them to save on feed costs.

So, the plan is that this new flock should start laying around the end of July or into August. So in July, the old flock will need to be put into canning jars, so the new can get settled into the hen house (which I myself built with these two hands!)

I'll attach a picture I took of the hen house 2 years ago, when I just put the girls in... they hadn't eaten the grass down yet!
 

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