My husband and I both hunt, fish and garden. We harvest only the game that we can eat in one year, and can, freeze, or root cellar all of the produce that we grow. We burn wood in our woodstove that we harvest only from fallen trees on the property behind us (or this year, in our own yard). Earlier this year, I went to the store to purchase chicken breast to make cordon bleu, and two breasts cost me a whopping $9.00. I was furious! We are not poor by the national standard, but we are working poor. We both work at the same place, which for several years now has been very rocky. I have seen my weekly hours as low as 18, and the average high has been 36 (and yes, I am a full-time employee). So, I went to Rural King earlier this year to pick up a few gardening supplies, and lo and behold, they had fuzzy butts. I am not one to have more than what I need, so I started out with 4 chicks and brought them home, they were buff orpingtons. I figured that 4 would give us all the eggs we would need considering that my older children were never home and we were down to just 3 at most times. Well, hubby had always wanted PBR's, so we went back, they didn't have any, so my son brought home 2 BA's. The next weekend, my car ended up back over there (don't know how that happened) and they had PBR's and RIR's. Two of each came home. Then I found BYC. I had never seen a SLW, until this forum. I had fond memories of being a child and my Aunt getting green eggs from one of her chickens, but I didn't know what kind. Well, I found a small hatchery about three hours away that had both SLW's and EE's. I now have 13 chickens. Things are still very rocky at work. My co-workers love the extra eggs that I bring in and give away. My whole purpose of starting a laying flock was to see if I would enjoy raising chickens. I figured that if we hated it, we could always find someone to give them to. I started out with a converted dog house for a coop for my small flock. I now have two coops with room to expand my flock if I choose to. I love having my laying flock. I enjoy relaxing in my back yard and watching them. I do not have an enclosed run, and I can definitely tell that before gardening season begins next spring, that will have to change. I have no fall crops left in my garden, except for one little struggling broccoli plant. They did not bother my garden plants this past year because the garden was established, but you should see the huge bald patches in the cover crop we sowed, it looks pathetic! Anyway, next spring, we are going to order meaties, now that we know we enjoy raising chickens. I have a friend that is setting up to raise meat rabbits in the spring. We have decided to trade. We are going to raise enough meat chickens for our family and his, and he is going to give us a steady supply of rabbit for our freezer. I do not have to go to the expense of buying/housing/feeding rabbits, and he doesn't have to equip himself to raise chickens. It's a win/win. I like being able to say that I know how to provide for my family, not only in a financial way. I will never be fully sustainable, because I do not have the land that I would need for that, but the little efforts that I am making are really making a huge difference in my monthly output. I only free-range my chickens when I am home (however, some of them do fly out during the day). The amount of time that they do free-range makes a tremendous difference in their feed usage. One of the benefits of using a cover crop on our garden this winter will be that the chickens can still get plenty of vegetation in their diet.