Raising Cornish Cross Chickens – Week 5

12 August, 20132 January, 2017 ~ Grace ~ 12 Comments

I think the two words to describe week 5 would be ugly and messy…….I might throw in smelly too!

I’m moving their pen two and three times a day now to keep them on fresh clean grass. Sadly we had our first casualties this week…..yes, not just one but two. 🙁 I went out early Thursday morning and there was a dead chicken?? We don’t know why it died, but this breed is prone to heart attacks so I’m guessing that was it. Saturday morning I went out and a barn cat had some how reached under the pen and snagged one of them and had managed to eat half of it……super grooooss!! I also lost two hens this week….it was NOT a happy chicken week around here…..sigh.

He obviously wanted the rest of the food to himself!

The eight remaining Cornish cross are doing well and gaining weight FAST. We are now taking extra precautions to make sure they are cat proof!!!!

If you would like, you can read about the first four weeks of our meat chicken experience….they were much cuter on week 1 and 2! 😉 Week 1 – Week 2 – Week 3 – Week 4

Here is a link to Week 6

Raising Cornish Cross Chickens – Week 4

5 August, 20132 January, 2017 ~ Grace ~ 3 Comments

Our 10 Cornish Cross meat chickens are now a month old…..one more month to go!

You can read why we chose this breed and see pictures of their growth on these posts: Week 1 – Week 2 – Week 3

They are outside full time now and love to munch on the grass!

They are still much more active than I expected. I have read that all they do is stand or lay down at the feeders and eat all day. Ours are not like that at all, maybe it’s because they have room to run and fresh grass to eat, or maybe they just haven’t got to that point yet?

They are ugly little buggers and not very bright! I weighed one a couple days ago and it was almost 2 pounds. They are going through the feed pretty quickly now, I think it’s going to cost more than I originally expected to feed them. But I also expected to loose a couple and so far no casualties. The five that my mom took to her house are also doing very well. Thanks for following along on our meat chicken journey. 🙂

Here is a link to Week 5

Raising Cornish Cross Chickens – Week 3

29 July, 20132 January, 2017 ~ Grace ~ 8 Comments

On to week 3! Click here to read about Week 1 and Week 2 of our meat chicken raising experience.

They are still growing fast and their feathers are filling in a bit more. We have moved them outdoors and changed their feed from chick starter to a flock raiser. They are still fun to watch jump and run around, and every once in a while they make a “big chicken” noise. 🙂

Not so cute anymore.

For this picture on day 18 I tried to pick out the biggest one and the littlest one. The one standing in the back weighed 11.4 oz. and the bigger one sitting down weighed 18.4 oz. What a huge difference considering they hatched the same day and arrived at our house all looking identical. From everything I’ve read the small one is a female and the big one a male. That explains why the roosters are more expensive from the hatchery. The male kept plopping down and trying to sleep, the little female was more active and alert.

We built them a bigger pen so they can be moved around on the lawn and always have grass to eat. The girls painted it and I thought it turned out cute!

They love having more room!

Well, so far so good! We still have 10 healthy growing chickens. I’m glad they are outside now and not in the shop, (they were getting a little crowded and allot STINKY!).

Here is the link to Week 4

Raising Cornish Cross Chickens – Week 2

22 July, 20132 January, 2017 ~ Grace ~ 10 Comments

If you missed Week 1 on Raising Cornish Cross Chickens click here, to read why we chose this breed and how our first week went, plus lots of cute chick pics!

We have not suffered any casualties as of yet and they are growing remarkably FAST! They are about to outgrow the brooder and will need more space soon. My mom took five of them to finish raising them at her house, so that helped to make some extra room. I’m hoping they will have enough space until they are 3 weeks old and can go in an outside pen during the day. I want them to be able to free range as much as possible once they are big enough. It’s been so warm we haven’t used the heat lamp since they were 11 days old. They are such messy little things we have to check their water every few hours because it gets full of bedding and poop very quickly. I seem to remember the same thing with my egg laying chickens when they were little.

Here are pics of week 2:

Some of them are a little bigger then others, which is what I expected when I ordered a “strait run” (some male some female). I got a strait run so they would vary in weight and we could pick the right chickens at the right weight for my girls 4-H projects.

As you can see they are starting to out grow some of their cuteness! Oh well, I didn’t get them to be cute…..right?

We enjoy watching and laughing at them running at each other and flapping their wings. They are pretty comical!

Here is a little cost break down so far:
Each chick cost: $3.83; so for our 10 chicks it cost – $38.30
The chick starter cost $10.45 for a 25# bag. After 2 weeks there is still some feed left and I subtracted what my moms chicks ate and ended up with $6.10 feed cost for 2 weeks.
We also bought a bale of pine shavings for $7.95 and I figured we have used about a dollars worth so far.

This comes to $45.40 for the first 2 weeks for 10 chicks.

Of course this doesn’t include the cost of a brooder, heat lamp, heat lamp bulbs, waterer, or feeder. We are using all the supplies from last years egg laying chicks. So if you were raising chickens for the first time you would have to add in these expenses. As you can see, the first year is the most expensive!

So far we are still pleased with our decision to raise Cornish Cross!

Here is the link for Week 3

Raising Cornish Cross Chickens – Week 1

15 July, 20132 January, 2017 ~ Grace ~ 10 Comments

Why are we raising Cornish Cross chickens?

I spent a lot of time trying to decide what breed of meat chicken to raise this summer. I did lots of reading about the good, the great, the bad and the ugly aspects of raising the hybrid Cornish Cross chickens. There are so many opinions out there and I didn’t want to make an uninformed decision, especially since a couple of these chickens are to be my girls first 4-H market projects. I finally came to the conclusion that I need to form my own opinion and I can’t do that until I have had hands on experience raising them. So I decided to start with Cornish Cross vs. a heritage breed. They are the most cost effective breed to raise, and if it goes well we will continue to raise Cornish Cross. If not, we will try a different breed next year.

For the next 8 weeks (that’s how long it takes for them to be ready to butcher) I will be sharing our meat chicken raising experience with you. I will be posting pictures and giving updates weekly on our little adventure!

Here is Week 1 of Raising Cornish Cross Chickens:

We ordered our chicks from McMurray Hatchery to arrive on the week of July 8th. This will make our chickens 6 weeks old for our County Fair, and hopefully the correct weight which needs to be between 4 and 7 lbs for my girls to be able to sell their chicken at the livestock sale. I had never ordered from McMurray Hatchery before, but they had the right breed available at the right time. The ordering process was easy; they kept us informed of shipping (with emails and texts) and their website was very informative.

Early on the morning of July 8th we got a call from the post office that our live birds had arrived. Of course I wasn’t exactly prepared (I’m such a procrastinator). I very quickly cleaned up our brooder “play pen”, washed up the chick feeders and waters and headed to town. We first went to the feed store to buy bedding and chick starter, then picked up the peeping box from the post office. When we got in the car I bent the lid back and was pleased to find 15 live peeps!

15 Cornish Cross chicks arrived safe and sound.

They were all active and looked healthy. As quickly as we could, we prepared their pen and got them settled in…..sooooo cute! Am I really going to be able to eat these guys in a couple months??

Here’s the pics of this weeks growth:

We have had a fun week watching these little birds grow. (Notice the growth of their feathers in these consecutive pics!) Contrary to what I have read these little guys seem to be hearty, active, and very curious. So far I have no regrets picking this breed. We will see what happens in the next few weeks!

Click here to read about Week 2

Chicken Troubles

16 May, 20131 January, 2017 ~ Grace ~ 15 Comments

We get 12 to 16 eggs from our 16 chickens every day. They have been very good and consistent egg layers, so I was very suspicious when we collected only 9 eggs the last 2 days.

A good friend of ours brought us a HUGE pile of straw bales (for free!!!) which Digger shoved off the trailer with his excavator. The result of this expedited removal left quite a mess…

I suspected that the chickens found some great hiding places in the straw to deposit their eggs instead of using the nesting boxes. This wouldn’t be the first time we’ve had to go egg hunting. This is a down fall of letting the chickens free range; sometimes they decide not to go back to the coop, and around here there are PLENTY of hiding places. I figured a quick search through the pile would produce several missing eggs, on my way to search in the straw I heard a weird chicken disturbance in the barn. I took a little detour to check it out and this is what I found:

How she ended up upside down in the wall of the barn I will never know!

I pried her out of her ridiculous predicament and realized it was Ginger (of course).

Here she is looking dazed but not hurt. Ginger is by far the most curious, and I always thought the smartest (but maybe not) of all my chickens. When I set her down, she ruffled her feathers, glared at me like it was my fault (or maybe she was just mad cause I stopped to take a picture before rescuing her), then went about her business. I was so glad I went in the barn….I don’t know how long she would have survived squished in there upside down…

I then proceeded to the straw pile to start my egg hunt.

Soon I had help…..lots of help!

As you can see we performed a thorough search, but came up with nothing. There were several holes we couldn’t see into though, and I wasn’t terribly anxious to move the whole dang pile for some missing eggs!

It was time to head back to the house and start school, but I decided to stop by the chicken coop to collect any recent eggs. When I opened the door our dog “Oddie” was in the coop! I yelled and she quickly dove for the chicken door. I had no idea that darn mutt could fit through the chicken door. I now know where all those eggs went!

Here’s the little egg sucker, still licking her chops and looking shameful.

The only way to solve the problem was to make the door smaller so she couldn’t fit through. We have called her “Houdini Dog” since she was a pup, so I shouldn’t have been surprised that she found her way into the coop. She has been known to climb 8′ no climb fence to get out of a pen, and she has managed to get out of every collar we’ve ever put on her (that’s what happens when your neck is bigger than your head).

So the lessons for the day are: Never underestimate the clumsiness of a curious chicken, and always measure your dog before you build a chicken door!

A Chicken Named Stinky

21 March, 20131 January, 2017 ~ Grace ~ 25 Comments

With the exception of our barn cat incident, we have had an uneventful chicken raising experience, up until a couple weeks ago……

It was dark and VERY cold the night I went out to shut up the coop and realized a chicken was missing. I called for her and looked around with a flash light, but there was not much I could do at that point. So thinking she had found a nice place in the barn to spend the night I shut up the coop and went in. The next morning I fully expected her to be standing at the coop door wanting in,… but she wasn’t… After collecting eggs I started searching, and after about 20 minutes (beginning to worry I’d only find feathers) there she was! She was stuck behind some chain link gates that were leaning against a rock wall, alert but making no sound. Just quietly hanging there with one wing above her head and her feet dangling off the ground. I couldn’t get her out by myself, so Digger came out and lifted the gates up while I pried her wing out of the gate. I immediately started inspecting her injuries when my husband politely asked me to move out from between the rock wall and the stack of gates he was balancing for her retrieval.

Day One: Chicken Hospital

She was very cold but alert. One of her legs wasn’t working so she couldn’t stand at all, and the one wing seemed tender. We took her into Diggers shop and set up a “chicken hospital”, and she immediately started eating and drinking. As cold as she’d been I figured when she warmed up she would bounce right back. But that was not the case.

Later that day in the nice warm shop, she wasn’t looking so good. We tried to get her to walk by tempting her with scratch. She really wanted it and would try to stand, but would just flop over, and then give up. In spite of all this, she LAID AN EGG that afternoon!?

Day Two: Discussions

She still wasn’t looking good the next morning….maybe worse. She was now sitting on the floor with one leg strait out in front of her and the other stretched out behind her. It looked painful and she was not even trying to get up. Digger and I had a few discussions that day that sounded about like this:

Digger: “Do you want me to wring her neck?”

Me: “Well, I don’t know……..let’s see how she’s doing later today”

Digger: “Just let me know, I’m not sure I like having a chicken in my shop”

A few hours later…….

Me: “She doesn’t look so good, maybe we should put her out of her misery”

Digger: “She’s still alert and she doesn’t look like she’s giving up, maybe we should give her a couple days?”

It went back and forth like this all day.

Day Three: Stinky Chicken

By day three she was not so affectionately being called “Stinky”. This was Diggers idea…. (He was the one stuck working in the shop with her.) Lets just say the name suited her well! She spent most of the day sleeping, yet seemed alert and very interested in whatever nibbles were presented to her. Despite not being able to move, she managed to lay another egg, but still wasn’t looking so good. The discussions continued until that evening when Digger paused to tell her she was going to be soup if she didn’t buck up soon, (the smell was getting to him). As if on cue, she pulled her legs up under her body and tried to stand. I guess she didn’t want to be soup.

Day Four: No Chicken Soup

A good day! She kept her legs under her and even took a couple steps. Digger managed to get her to roost for a couple of minutes on the handle of his forge. It was hard for her to grip and balance, but she managed it. It was amazing how amiable she was to all our fussing and fiddling with her. I was finally convinced that she was going to make it, so I put my soup recipes away. 😀

Day Five

She was now standing up and taking very slow, careful steps, but still sleeping most of the day. Digger did the math and realized the replacement value of all her eggs should she die would be well over $200.00, but was still anxious (to put it mildly) to get her healthy and OUT of his shop!

Day Six

Slowly getting better, walking a little more. When it got dark out she started looking up for a roost. (It’s a wonder how she knew it was getting dark with the shop lights on for hours after sunset, and only two small windows she couldn’t even see.) She hopped up on a little tool box wanting to get higher but had to settle there for the night. It was nice to see her trying to act like a chicken again.

Knowing she couldn’t go back with the other girls until she could balance on a roost all night, we kept encouraging her rehabilitation. Digger would place her on the handle of his forge several times a day, and even shaped a tin to hang from a higher handle that she could only reach from the “roost”. She became very determined to stay up there when a pinch of scratch was dropped in the tin.

Day Seven

It was a nice day out so we took her outside to get some fresh air!! The other hens seemed happy to see her. She hobbled around and nibbled at grass but was soon worn out.

Day Eight

Spent most of the day outside. She couldn’t keep up with the rest of the girls but was VERY happy to be outside. 😀 It’s absolutely unbelievable how fast she is healing!!

Day Nine

It snowed out and she was not fond of the idea of being outside. So she spent the day hanging out with Digger and playing around in the shop. Well, maybe I should say “pooping around the shop”. The name Stinky is still very appropriate!

Day Ten

The sun was shining bright and I went to the shop first thing to see if she wanted to go out. She was waiting right by the door and quickly walked out with barely a limp!! She still couldn’t manage to get up on the roost that evening so we brought her in to the shop for ONE more night. Digger wasn’t to happy when she hopped up on the counter knocking a bunch of stuff on the floor and of course pooped on his bench! No more nights in the shop for Stinky. 😀

Day Eleven: Back With the Flock

Back with the flock and laying eggs!!

Digger now officially has his very own chicken….whether he likes it or not! She follows him around outside and if the shop doors are open, guess who walks right in and makes herself at home. 🙂 I’m so glad we didn’t put her in the crock pot!! Think of all those eggs she’s still going to lay, and the wonderful story we have to tell of a sweet, determined chicken named Stinky!

How to Cook and EASILY Peel Farm Fresh Hard Boiled Eggs!

6 March, 201323 November, 2016 ~ Grace ~ 105 Comments

First of all I want to mention that this method is not just for farm fresh eggs. Store bought or strait from the coop, your end result will be beautiful hard boiled eggs!

Have you ever tried to peel a farm fresh hard boiled egg? I have, and it’s not a pretty sight. Unlike older, store bought eggs, no matter how hard you try the shell will not let go of the egg, leaving you with a lumpy, broken mess!! With my new egg laying machines and tons of fresh eggs the only thing I could think to do was hide a dozen eggs in the back of my fridge and wait for them to get old (the older the egg the easier it is to peel). This works as long as you know two weeks in advance when you are going to want a hard boiled egg. I don’t know about you, but when I want egg salad, I want it now, not two weeks from now!!

That was not my only problem with hard boiling eggs, I usually over boiled them and ended up with a green ring around the yolk….for some reason greenish colored, lumpy, deviled eggs are not very appetizing. So I started researching and experimenting, and experimenting, and experimenting…….and this method left me with sun colored yolks and EASILY peel-able eggs!

Start by placing a pot of water on the stove to boil. Make sure it’s enough water to cover the eggs. While your waiting for the water to boil take a (clean) thumb tack and poke a small hole in the fat end of each egg.

Be careful, you want to make a hole but not push the tack all the way in. The goal here is to put a tiny hole in the shell where the air sack is and not poke through the membrane inside. When the water is at a hard boil, and you have a tiny hole in each egg, gently (VERY gently) place the eggs in the boiling water and set the timer for 15 minutes.Keep them at a low boil for the entire time. If you pushed the tack in to far you will see streams of egg white floating in the water. It’s no big deal, that egg will just not be as pretty as the rest. After you do this a few times you will get the hang of it.

While they are boiling prepare a bowl of ice water in your sink. When the timer goes off immediately remove the pan and drain the boiling water. Then place the hot eggs into the ice water.

Wait about 15-20 minutes and take them out one at a time to peel.

These are eggs that were laid this morning….see how nicely they peeled.

This is an egg that I poked the tack in to far and some of the the egg white escaped. Not a good look for deviled eggs, but will still taste great in egg salad. 🙂

See how nice and pretty the yolk is!!

I’m so glad I can make deviled eggs whenever I want instead of having to plan ahead and hide them in the back of the fridge to get old. I hope this works as well for you as it has for me. The tack trick takes a little practice, but if all you have is fresh eggs to peel it’s definitely worth the effort.

I found this method at: Paths of Wrighteousness

“Chicken People”

2 January, 201323 November, 2016 ~ Grace ~ 3 Comments

I have a confession to make, I used to think “chicken people” were weird. What’s all the fuss about? Aren’t chickens dirty, stinky, noisy and dumb? Who has the time or money to mess with chickens when you can easily buy all the chicken and poop free eggs in a quick trip to the store? And all chicken people seem to do is talk and brag about their chickens…

Oooooops!!

I now find myself driving my husband nuts running in and out of his shop showing him eggs and telling him stories about my wonderful, funny hens. Then I text my family and friends pictures and brag about all the nice big brown eggs they are laying. Oh, and by the way, MY hens aren’t dirty, stinky, noisy or dumb; and there is no comparing a farm fresh egg (even with a little poop) to a store bought egg!!

So maybe “chicken people” ARE weird, but what’s wrong with being a little weird if you are having a good time and supplying your family with good wholesome food….Right?

As long as I’m admitting that I’m a “weird chicken person” and my family is sick of hearing about my hens, I guess I have to do all my bragging on my blog. So here are a few pictures of my girls…and my other girls (wow, I have a lot of girls). I guess weird chicken people also take TONS of pictures of their chickens (and their kids). 😉

9 day old Golden Buff chick.

Look how fast their feathers grow!

1 month old chick

15 weeks old

Here they are being very cautious on their first trip into the harvested garden.

Thanks for letting me share.

Chickens in the Snow

1 January, 201323 November, 2016 ~ Grace ~ 2 Comments

When I go out to the chicken coop first thing in the morning I open up their little door and they all rush out. Usually walking and jumping on each other, trying to cram through the door two or three at a time.

But the other day when it snowed a couple inches, it took them a few hours to wander out and most of them headed strait for the barn so they could take dust baths, dig around in the fire wood for bugs and harass the barn cats. That night we had to carry a few back to the coop, they didn’t want to walk back through the snow!

On Christmas day we received a foot of snow (we blame this on our 9 year old, she was praying for a white Christmas 😉 ) and it’s not melting off very fast. The chickens now refuse to come out of the coop. They will step out, look around, fluff up their feathers and jump right back in the door. You can’t blame them, that white stuff is cold and deep.

With no free ranging going on they have been going through a LOT of feed and water!! I highly recommend that if there is any possibility that your chickens can be let out to forage around….let them!! I’m guessing it cuts the feed costs by half, if not more. (I am keeping track and will let you know exact numbers later). Not to mention it makes for very healthy, happy chickens and more nutritious eggs. Anyway, I got worried about the hungry little buggers getting bored all cooped up. Bored chickens are not a good thing, they will start pecking at each other and if it gets to bad the results could be deadly. 🙁 So I cut open an acorn squash and gave that to them, and they spent hours picking at it; the only part left is a thin layer of peel. The next day we hung up half of a large cabbage in the coop. They seemed disinterested at first, but when I went out that night to shut the door most of the cabbage was gone. We hung up the second half of the cabbage the next day. This one didn’t last long!! Hanging them up is purely for the entertainment value, (for the chickens, not us….well maybe for us too). Watching chickens chase a spinning, bouncing cabbage around the coop WAS very entertaining.

These little treats seem to be keeping them happy and occupied during these snow bound days. To my surprise, being stuck indoors has not affected their egg production at all.

This spring I intend to plant tons of cabbage, pumpkins, and squash just for the chickens to have next winter (and maybe enough for us to have some too).

Queen Of The Red Double Wide

A rural, food loving, wife, mom, and teacher sharing her experiences as she stumbles through this wonderful, crazy life.

raising chickens