L7 Farm
Chirping
Heighdy ho
We are a micro farm in upstate New York, surrounded by the suburbs but adjacent to about 1000 acres of open space. The town we are in, despite having been predominantly a farming community for most of its existence, banned chickens a couple of decades ago as the suburbs took over. We moved in about eight years ago. Thanks to some enlightened town leadership, chickens have now been re-legalized on parcels less than five acres but with a maximum of six hens, no roosters.
Our farmlet once spread over 151 acres but it was subdivided over the years since World War I and now our part is just the original homestead and the area where most of the buildings were - from old, old aerial photos we know there were once 19 buildings on the lot, and our former chicken coop is now the neighbors' garage! The farm lost many of its buildings in a tornado in 1960, and there are only five outbuildings left, counting a more modern detached garage. The lot is now shaded in so we have a poor garden, but we try. We do have a full farm five doors down, and the area adjacent to us is zoned rural, but the reality is we're boxed in by modern suburban homes for the most part.
Our farm's "crop" is American Black Walnuts -- time-consuming to process but delicious, we harvest enough from 30+ heritage trees still on our lot for a small cash crop every year.
Getting back to chickens...
My spouse grew up on a larger farm, where they always kept chickens, and so she knows quite a bit about keeping them. We're in good shape there for "new" chicken keepers, but are aware there's always more to learn.
We do have quite a large number of potential predators because of the open space both to the rear of the property and across the road from us -- the usual raccoons (very adept at stealing our pears), skunks, etc, plenty of raptors (we see at least 1-2 squirrels taken from our lot every year), and some more exotic ones -- we've spotted a fisher on the property twice, and foxes and coyotes are around as well. So we're keen on picking up tips here to keep them away. (We unfortunately do not have a dog.)
Because we're limited to six, and there are restrictions on placement and use (we can't sell eggs commercially), we are only looking for eggs for ourselves and neighbors. There are concerns about annoying the neighbors, who are fortunately relatively far away on both sides (and we have nothing in our rear). We don't seem to have a lot of neighborhood outside cats, are there are a couple, and one dog that tends to stray off its property from time to time.
.
My wife has her favorite breeds but we're starting out with Buff Orpingtons to both keep the noise down and placate one of our kids, who's very apprehensive about chickens (and is afraid of his grandparents' birds, even though they're very docile.) We've got an order in for chicks in the spring and are just squaring things away now, since the process of getting the permits for a Coop are a little involved.
So, that's it, happy to be here and back in the fold of chickendom.
We are a micro farm in upstate New York, surrounded by the suburbs but adjacent to about 1000 acres of open space. The town we are in, despite having been predominantly a farming community for most of its existence, banned chickens a couple of decades ago as the suburbs took over. We moved in about eight years ago. Thanks to some enlightened town leadership, chickens have now been re-legalized on parcels less than five acres but with a maximum of six hens, no roosters.
Our farmlet once spread over 151 acres but it was subdivided over the years since World War I and now our part is just the original homestead and the area where most of the buildings were - from old, old aerial photos we know there were once 19 buildings on the lot, and our former chicken coop is now the neighbors' garage! The farm lost many of its buildings in a tornado in 1960, and there are only five outbuildings left, counting a more modern detached garage. The lot is now shaded in so we have a poor garden, but we try. We do have a full farm five doors down, and the area adjacent to us is zoned rural, but the reality is we're boxed in by modern suburban homes for the most part.
Our farm's "crop" is American Black Walnuts -- time-consuming to process but delicious, we harvest enough from 30+ heritage trees still on our lot for a small cash crop every year.
Getting back to chickens...
My spouse grew up on a larger farm, where they always kept chickens, and so she knows quite a bit about keeping them. We're in good shape there for "new" chicken keepers, but are aware there's always more to learn.
We do have quite a large number of potential predators because of the open space both to the rear of the property and across the road from us -- the usual raccoons (very adept at stealing our pears), skunks, etc, plenty of raptors (we see at least 1-2 squirrels taken from our lot every year), and some more exotic ones -- we've spotted a fisher on the property twice, and foxes and coyotes are around as well. So we're keen on picking up tips here to keep them away. (We unfortunately do not have a dog.)
Because we're limited to six, and there are restrictions on placement and use (we can't sell eggs commercially), we are only looking for eggs for ourselves and neighbors. There are concerns about annoying the neighbors, who are fortunately relatively far away on both sides (and we have nothing in our rear). We don't seem to have a lot of neighborhood outside cats, are there are a couple, and one dog that tends to stray off its property from time to time.
.
My wife has her favorite breeds but we're starting out with Buff Orpingtons to both keep the noise down and placate one of our kids, who's very apprehensive about chickens (and is afraid of his grandparents' birds, even though they're very docile.) We've got an order in for chicks in the spring and are just squaring things away now, since the process of getting the permits for a Coop are a little involved.
So, that's it, happy to be here and back in the fold of chickendom.
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