Hello everyone! I'm new to the site, homesteading in the Ozarks of Missouri for almost a year now - living totally off-grid with my husband & 2 children. We are working our way on being totally self-sufficent - we started out with just chickens, & now have rabbits, will be getting even more chickens, ducks, geese, & goats in the future.
My husband & I have built our home with our own 2 hands, from the ground up. All of our scraps have gone to building the animal houses we have (cats, dogs, chicken coops, etc). Nothing goes to waste on our homestead.
We started off with our chicken journey in the fall of last year. We got a mix of chickens (we get our chickens for our homestead, for eating & eggs) that are free-ranged: 4 fryer roosters, 2 barred rocks, 2 RIR, 1 silki, & 6 buffs. We were suppose to have all hens, except for the fryer roosters. We got them all as day old chicks...but as more & more started crowing, things got out of hand fast with too many roosters. We started with what we thought would be 11 hens & now only have 6 hens...I was really disappointed to find my broody silky crowing one morning! Oh, the disappointment lol.
We did slowly cull all but the silky rooster, which was the least aggressive rooster & the only one that hasn't tried hurting the hens (the rest had become too aggressive with too many roosters in the flock...I feel like once 1 of the more aggressive fryer's temperament turned, then they all just learned from that & spoiled the whole bunch - that was just my experience though). The hens are now much less stressed! We culled the last 2 roosters last night, & amazingly today our hens have layed their first eggs today! I was so excited! & it's been a much relaxing day without hearing the hens getting picked on or someone getting attacked from a rooster.
I hope to be able to get to know & meet a lot of you...& learn more in the process! xx
My husband & I have built our home with our own 2 hands, from the ground up. All of our scraps have gone to building the animal houses we have (cats, dogs, chicken coops, etc). Nothing goes to waste on our homestead.
We started off with our chicken journey in the fall of last year. We got a mix of chickens (we get our chickens for our homestead, for eating & eggs) that are free-ranged: 4 fryer roosters, 2 barred rocks, 2 RIR, 1 silki, & 6 buffs. We were suppose to have all hens, except for the fryer roosters. We got them all as day old chicks...but as more & more started crowing, things got out of hand fast with too many roosters. We started with what we thought would be 11 hens & now only have 6 hens...I was really disappointed to find my broody silky crowing one morning! Oh, the disappointment lol.
We did slowly cull all but the silky rooster, which was the least aggressive rooster & the only one that hasn't tried hurting the hens (the rest had become too aggressive with too many roosters in the flock...I feel like once 1 of the more aggressive fryer's temperament turned, then they all just learned from that & spoiled the whole bunch - that was just my experience though). The hens are now much less stressed! We culled the last 2 roosters last night, & amazingly today our hens have layed their first eggs today! I was so excited! & it's been a much relaxing day without hearing the hens getting picked on or someone getting attacked from a rooster.
I hope to be able to get to know & meet a lot of you...& learn more in the process! xx
