Record Keeping

[rjohns39]

@rjohns39 brought up a thought for tax purposes. I use Stride a free tax app that allows me to collect and record tax deductions in real time throughout the year while calculating my tax payments. It also produces regular reports. Tracks even mileage etc. offers free webinar tax advice etc. Big help to me! I use it for my Rover dog business but it can be used for any field of work as long as an independent business owner. Just snap pic of electronic or hard copy receipts and go. Always save original receipts.

Good point, I do save original receipts, but way too many of them are thermal transfer. I did a really good job the first year numbering all the originals to correspond to the digital. Kind of failing in that department now. And it's horrible to grab and old receipt and it's pretty much blank.

 

[aart]

I use Excel with multiple sheets, some sheets are linked for costs, some are just for notes. I like to be able to configure the sheets and calculations, and amend them myself if/when needed.

The main purpose is to track cost of feeds and egg sales to see how far I am out of pocket. But only a dozen or so birds over wintered and I don't sell the the general public or claim any of it on my taxes....just a hobby that mostly pays for itself.

I use zipties from when they go from bator to brooder, right leg/left leg for year of hatch and various color combos for other notables....there's a sheet(s) for those too.

 

[PittyLova]

Thanks for all of the information! I guess I need to evaluate what's most important to me first. I have a neighbor whose chickens wander over to join my flock regularly. They're white rocks and leghorns....I have white rocks and leghorns as well. So I went and banded all of my ladies last year just so I knew which ones were mine and which to shoo away. I was constantly finding bands that fell off. I ended up ordering colored zipties that are numbered for this year. Although I wish I had only gotten a few colors and more of each instead of what looks like a rainbow package!

I'll be looking into a lot of the apps that were shared and will be considering all of the tips give! I'm a huge fan of excel and have sheets started already