Do you make a living off of raising chickens?

[Country Living Farm]

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The person is making at least 1000.00 a month profit. He retired to do this full time. He buys rooster and hens for close to nothing and sells for 10.00 each. I have been to his home and learned from him on how he is doing it to turn the $$ he is. He will also hatch out about 100 chicks per month and free range them. He does lose some but not much as the turkeys and other large animals on the farm keeps predators away. He free ranges almost everything and spends very little on feed bill for the roosters and hens. Now the goats and other things, that is a different story. But he manages to pay for all his feed and pay his normal living expenses on just livestock.

 

[Tuffoldhen]

I've never gotten close to paying in full a months feed bill by selling hatching eggs, but it's my hobby and something I enjoy doing.

Unless your a big time operation NOPE! Never have broken even never will.

 

[SquirrelGirl]

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100 chicks a month! WOW!! How cool is that?? How many acres does he use for them? Any idea how he gets cheap feed? You are so lucky to beable to learn from him!

 

[ChickenToes]

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100 chicks a month! WOW!! How cool is that?? How many acres does he use for them? Any idea how he gets cheap feed? You are so lucky to beable to learn from him!

This sounds like a guy who really knows his market. Around here, if I hatched out 100 chicks, I'd probably sell about 10. It's something you have to think about- what will you do with all the chicks that don't sell?

 

[muell112]

I've just started selling eggs - I found a local shop that will give me $3/doz. And my 15 hens (mixed, not great layers) are producing 5-8 eggs a day at this point (they're 5.5 months old). I think I'll be able to make ~$500/year. My bf is happy that the chickens are going to be able to buy their coop back, and all the special treats they've been getting like flock blocks.

 

[corancher]

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We buy our feed in bulk from a local Co-op. We get 1500-2500 pounds at a time. Not all is for the poultry. It is delivered and put into bins. We don't have it bagged as that is an extra .50 per 50lb bag. It is certainly cheaper than bagged prepared feed but when you're looking at a $1000.00 to $1700.00 feed bill it can be a bit stressful.

I sure don't know about the growing your own either. With the cost of equiment ie tractors, plows, etc. and parts when they break I not sure anyone can make money at that either.

As Katy said maybe big corporate farms can make it. They buy such a large amount of feed, or grow it. They have the money to buy the equipment and make their own feed. They are the ones growing the grain that is going into most of our feed.

We have found that there is a "small" amount of people that don't want their food supplied by the corporate farm because of concerns about the things that the animals are fed and how the animals are treated. These are the people that we sell to because they are willing to pay a higher price and they understand that we can not compete with the mass produced price. You will certainly come across people that will think that you should be able to sell it cheaper than they can get in the grocery store. I don't waste my time any longer trying convince them otherwise. I just set my price and they can take it or leave it.

 

[Katy]

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We have a cow herd that we make a profit from.

 

[tomcio]

I make money from selling eggs. About ~120$ a month or so. This offset by the cost of feed for the month ~50$ give or take leaves me with a nifty sum to account for the initial coup & flock cost.

We are a year into the chicken adventure and about close to break even on the costs if you look only at the monetary side of the equation.

What I didn't mention in that sum of money is the extras I use in the house:
-meat birds from the summer which yielded at about 1lb meat to 1$ (compare to >5$/lb for organic chickens)
-60lbs of dog food from discarded meat bird carcasses (bonus of processing birds yourself)
-quail birds which gave me a return of 1lb to 2$
-quail eggs I pickle and sell at $3/doz.
-chicken eggs we use each week
AND
-chicken manure which will fertilize my gardens next year.

Overall, it's easy to 'make a profit' so long as you aren't expecting it to be cash-only. If you factor in the food savings for your family and extra byproducts of the 'trade' the equation turns positive very fast.

On a side note, we keep a laying flock of 25 birds alongside varying amount of quail, pheasant and partridge.

 

[mypicklebird]

During the summer, we are able to pay for feed cost by selling eggs. It almost covers the cost of the food during the winter... with selling the occasional chicks/hatching eggs- we cleared about 50$ for the year 2008. We were very excited to be in the 'green' for the chicken hobby. Make a living- no way, have fun- YES!

 

[SquirrelGirl]

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Wow I wish I had a feed source like that around here! Yes.. growing feed would probably be pretty pricey in the long run. Water is sort of expensive here.