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I commend you and your family for the awesome work and care you have given your birds.. like I said, it is what has inspired me to try my hand at doing the same for my family. I love these little peeps of mine. I spend time with them, and give them attention while I'm feeding them, changing their bedding, etc and at 1 week old I can't even believe how much bigger they are. Total of 3 losses so far, but the others are growing and thriving (with the exception of a few recovering pasty butts).
Not going to lie, I did read this last post, and I know I'm going to be feeling the same as you. Love, triumph, and loss. I'm likely going to cry like a baby. But I've been telling myself, and my husband, and my kids that these are babies who have a good life with us, and it's our job to make it as good as we can for them in the short time they are here. If they were at a factory or even possibly someone else', they might not have the love that we give them now and freedom we intend to give them once they go outside. I look at them and I see adorable little puffs, but in each tiny bird I also see a week's worth of chicken, chicken soup, and such that will feed my family and help us to be the best we can be with our healthy food. It's beautiful and stark in the symbiosis of it.
You chronicled your experience so thoroughly and wonderfully. Thank you for doing the same with the final page of your first round of birds. On happy note---our babies are the same age! My little brood is 1 week old today.
Thank you Plaid. It was really weird to not have to go haul buckets of water and food out to the tractor this morning. I just checked in on the peeps and everyone is good. With everything going on yesterday, i realized that I had left the heat lamp on in the brooder even though there were reports of 107 degrees in my town yesterday. I almost had fried peeps! I decided it was time to shut that off as all of them look strong. Unless it is to plummet to 40 in the brooder, which it won't. I'm not going to worry. Now that batch 1 is processed, I can focus more attention on these little guys. I've been pretty wrapped up having 60 chickens to manage, a business to run and my family to care for.
Now I will regroup. My emotions are under control after some sleep and my goal was accomplished. It feels great. Tonight I'm having steak. I think I can go a week or so without chicken.
Yes, plaid, for the next few weeks, we are actually in this together! Yay! I finally have a chicken raising buddy.
I've been waiting for the best time to order mine...I heard they don't handle heat well, and I'm in North Texas, where it's up to the 100s some days.
However we also had an unseasonably cold winter last year. Would it be better to wait until early Spring to order and raise?
Or just get more into fall?
I guess I'm asking, when does everybody do their broilers? Is it once a year type thing?
Sorry for all of the questions...lol
Hi Brookshire, You never have to apologize asking questions on this thread. This is meat bird question city here. I believe that there is no better time to do things than the present. We worry about too many things and never do what we really want to do sometimes. So with that said, order those birds! Lol!
I started my first batch in June when evening temps were still in the high 30s and days were in 50s/60s. The past month here in Oregon we have rare high temps with day after day in high 90s. Yes, my chickens are hot but they have done fine. Keep their water filled and available shade. My second batch is doing fine in these crazy hot temps too.
I think the time of the year you do it is personal preference. Many people would say to do it when it's cooler. Many people raise them all year long. I say, do it whenever you want to. These chicks will survive whatever you put them through if you take good care of them. Good luck!
