Hello hello~! I don't think I ever properly introduced myself so lets get that out of the way first. My name is Jaime and I live in a family of 8, I have 2 sisters and 3 brothers. I am the second youngest in my family and the only one who took interest in farming. My parents were both raised on small hobby farms and a couple years after moving into my mother's father's house we began to raise chickens. We started out with five acres of land and only 8 chickens. I was young at the time so I couldn't do much to help on the farm but as a got older I began to help out more with the farming. I took time out of my day to do some research on chickens and all the basics, I help out with watering and feeding them and collecting eggs. I soon realized that our chickens weren't living in proper conditions. They lived in a weather rotted barn with a small section of it blocked up and were kept their. The room the lived in was almost never cleaned and smelled horrid and I swear you Couldn't step in their without getting cobwebs stuck in your hair! And their run was poorly built and small and grassless So with much planning and research I spoke up and suggested making a coop and giving them a bigger run. Pointing out the major wrongs to my father he had agreed to build them an actual coop big enough for at least 40 chickens and bought a new flock of 16 chickens. Our neighbors began to purchase eggs from us so we moved our newly built chicken coop way back from the front of our house and began to let them free range more often. Lets skip 4 years ahead. My father had gone out of town for two weeks and I had pretty much taken control of raising our chickens. We now had a healthy flock of 26 layers that were laying daily. But of course chaos stirred the second day my dad left for work. I woke up at around 6:00 AM and went to check on my chickens. Everyone was still roosting and few were just getting down. So I opened their door to their run and filled their waterer. 2 hours past and I went to feed them but came to see nothing but feathers and a few frightened chickens in my coop. I quickly surveyed the fence and found part of our fence had been bent up far enough for a coon to squeeze under. Devastated I took my dog out to find the rest of my missing chickens and after about 15 minutes my dog found a pile of 3 chickens. one half eaten, one missing it's head and one that wasn't even touched. This broke my heart and so I went ahead and called up my friend who happened to be a trapper. He set 4 traps all around the coop and said to call him right away if a coon was trapped. After setting the traps I thanked him and went to bed waking up extra early in the morning. I was soooo happy to see two raccoons trapped traps. I called my friend over and he 'took care' of them. The second, third, and forth night we caught 5 more. One on the second, two on the third, and one big one on the fourth. The fourth one my friend was away and could make and so I had to 'take care of it' (I still have the pelt of it hanging up) 
. Lets go ahead and skip about a month later me and my mother were ordering some chickies off from www.mypetchicken.com and ended up with 16 chickens. but unfortunately a stray had wondered into our property and managed to get into our brooding coop and kill 5 of the 16. after that we went and ordered another 16 and thats how I ended up with Moma my favorite Jersey Giant who had earned the name Moma by hatching out 2 clutches of eggs. Taking in abandoned ducklings. and took over our 10 ducklings we ordered and decided to claim them as hers. (Getting a little sidetracked whoops!) About a month and a half ago my mother watched the news something very very interesting came up and so she told me about a grant of anything from a minimum of 15k to 50k for new farmers. So hearing this we went ahead and searched up how to sign up for it. We have to be clarified as farm and would have to prove that we made 10k by selling our products. We aren't clarified as a farm Yet nor have we made 10k by selling eggs. But we are trying to get that done right away. We now had 35 acres at the time but didn't have a big enough coop for the amount of chickens we would need in-order to sell enough eggs and make 10k. So me being me I suggested why not turned of duck coop into another chicken coop and give the ducks our shed (Since we cleaned it all out) and my parents agreed. Each coop have two long trees that act as roosts that go all the way across the coop and could fit 60 chickens easily in both (8' x 20'). We currently have 30 adult standard size chickens and went ahead and bought 60 just yesterday. I honestly can't stop smiling and can't wait to show you (if you bothered to read this far) Our progress. Now since I will be doing mostly all the work I of course got to chose the breeds of what we would get and I picked the the following: (All will be arriving around Nov the 20th or earlier ( Or later... Lets hope earlier )
6 BBS Andalusians (We went with mostly heritage breeds)
6 Welsummers
6 Australorps
6 Barred plymouth rocks
6 Easter Eggers
6 Buff Orpingtons
6 Road Island Reds
6 Siver laced Wyandottes
3 Black Copper Marans (There were only three left sadly)
(Non heritage)
6 Austra Whites
and 3 Buff Brahmas (Sadly only three were left again)
And to top this all off Here are some pictures of our animals and property~
A nice picture at the end of our gravel path towards the pole barn.
I think my favorite feature about the coop is the door <3
It took SO long to find the perfect trees for the roosts!
Yes, yes i know the roof was done lazily, I plan on fixing it but for now you can enjoy one
of our young Jersey giants trying to figure out how to lay an egg.
By the time we finished the interior of the coop these lil' buggers hatched!
Thank you all for sticking around to the end ( you really have nothing better to do huh?
)
All I have to do now is make a place for the 60 chickies to stay... Wish me luck!
. Lets go ahead and skip about a month later me and my mother were ordering some chickies off from www.mypetchicken.com and ended up with 16 chickens. but unfortunately a stray had wondered into our property and managed to get into our brooding coop and kill 5 of the 16. after that we went and ordered another 16 and thats how I ended up with Moma my favorite Jersey Giant who had earned the name Moma by hatching out 2 clutches of eggs. Taking in abandoned ducklings. and took over our 10 ducklings we ordered and decided to claim them as hers. (Getting a little sidetracked whoops!) About a month and a half ago my mother watched the news something very very interesting came up and so she told me about a grant of anything from a minimum of 15k to 50k for new farmers. So hearing this we went ahead and searched up how to sign up for it. We have to be clarified as farm and would have to prove that we made 10k by selling our products. We aren't clarified as a farm Yet nor have we made 10k by selling eggs. But we are trying to get that done right away. We now had 35 acres at the time but didn't have a big enough coop for the amount of chickens we would need in-order to sell enough eggs and make 10k. So me being me I suggested why not turned of duck coop into another chicken coop and give the ducks our shed (Since we cleaned it all out) and my parents agreed. Each coop have two long trees that act as roosts that go all the way across the coop and could fit 60 chickens easily in both (8' x 20'). We currently have 30 adult standard size chickens and went ahead and bought 60 just yesterday. I honestly can't stop smiling and can't wait to show you (if you bothered to read this far) Our progress. Now since I will be doing mostly all the work I of course got to chose the breeds of what we would get and I picked the the following: (All will be arriving around Nov the 20th or earlier ( Or later... Lets hope earlier )6 BBS Andalusians (We went with mostly heritage breeds)
6 Welsummers
6 Australorps
6 Barred plymouth rocks
6 Easter Eggers
6 Buff Orpingtons
6 Road Island Reds
6 Siver laced Wyandottes
3 Black Copper Marans (There were only three left sadly)
(Non heritage)
6 Austra Whites
and 3 Buff Brahmas (Sadly only three were left again)
And to top this all off Here are some pictures of our animals and property~
A nice picture at the end of our gravel path towards the pole barn.
I think my favorite feature about the coop is the door <3
It took SO long to find the perfect trees for the roosts!
Yes, yes i know the roof was done lazily, I plan on fixing it but for now you can enjoy one
of our young Jersey giants trying to figure out how to lay an egg.
By the time we finished the interior of the coop these lil' buggers hatched!
Thank you all for sticking around to the end ( you really have nothing better to do huh?
)All I have to do now is make a place for the 60 chickies to stay... Wish me luck!
