Farm Life – Page 5

Chicken Overview

Cows and crops are easy. My Forever and I have been around them our whole lives. Chickens, not so much. After we decided that we wanted to start sharing our beef at the farmers market directly to consumers, we decided we might as well have eggs as well. We found a converted stock trailer that was made into a chicken coop, complete with 35 chickens that hadn’t started laying yet, but almost. My Forever went and got it one night while I was at a meeting and we were in the chicken business!

Our chickens are free-range or pasture raised, whatever you want to call it. Their home has a photosynthetic eye on it that opens the chicken door automatically at dawn and closes at dusk. During that time, they go anywhere they want, eat anything they want and do what they want. It’s amazing the instinct they have to go roam and explore, but they come back to their home in plenty of time to not get locked out. Chickens are huge prey animals. They aren’t very big so are easy for just about anything to have for lunch or dinner.

Because we want our chickens to have the freedom to go anywhere and eat anything and do all things chickens should be able to do, we lose a lot more than those that are confined, of course. However, we take steps to protect them as much as we can. We give them multiple places they can take shelter quickly. We give them multiple spots to access water. We put up tin pans that bang in the wind and reflect the sun, hoping to keep away hawks and other flying predators.

Our latest attempt to keep them as safe as possible is to get a LGD, large guard dog. Poncho is a 4 year old mix of Great Pyrenees, Anatolian and Akbash. These breeds are all designed to keep animals safe. It is in his instincts to protect and guard. We haven’t had him very long (May 2018). Since we didn’t have him as a puppy, we didn’t get to train him. Some things we love, some things we wish he was more aggressive about. For instance, he appears to be much more active at night, and sleeps a lot during the day when the chickens are out, when the hawks seem to take them. The bottom of our deck isn’t covered so we used to have a lot of possums and other creatures that would live under there. Matt would never be home to take care of them so they would continue eating my chickens. Since Poncho has arrived on the scene, I haven’t seen any possums, raccoons, rabbits, etc. We think he does an excellent job of keeping the land animals away from the chickens, but we think there is still a hawk of some sort that snatches a few chicks here and there.

I come home before My Forever, on occasion. I don’t like coming home to a dark house by myself. We live in the country so would be a long time for help to get here if needed. With Poncho here I’m confident that he will protect me. Even with the limited amount of time that we’ve had him, we’ve had multiple people tell us they stopped by and he barked, growled and guarded the house! So excited to hear that! I feel so much safer being here by myself now!

Back to the chickens. We have gotten used to having fresh eggs available to us. Having eggs from chickens that get to act the way chickens should act, is SO amazing and I love it. So even though we are new to the chicken business, we are loving it and I foresee us having chickens for a very long time to come!

If you enjoyed reading this, we would love it if you would hit the share button and introduce us to your friends. You all are the reason we get to do this and we’re so appreciative of that! Please help us continue serving people by sharing us with your family and friends! Leave us a comment and let us know how this has impacted your life. It’s the little things that make me so happy to continue doing this, such as a like, comment or share! Please and thank you!

What Does a Farm Look Like?

Every farm is different, but here is a break down of what our farm in Northeast Kansas looks like.

Briefly, let’s do a whole farm overview. In the coming weeks we will break each segment of the operation down in more detail, but let’s start with a whole broad sweep.

My Forever and I both grew up on very similar farming operations. After getting married, I moved into his operation. It is a family operation with three generations involved. There are three of us full time on the farm, My Forever, myself and my father-in-law, Henry. My mother-in-law takes care of all the paperwork for the farm and keeps us well fed. She also helps in the evenings and weekends when she can. Matt’s grandparents started the operation. His grandpa had a four wheeler wreck and passed away before I came into the picture. His grandma remains a large land owner in the operation.

We have cow/calf pairs, row crops (corn and soybeans, rotated and mixed with cover crops), hay and pasture ground. Each operation will be broken down into much more detail in future blogs! Matt and I have chickens, but they aren’t involved in the family farm. They are a hobby for me basically!

Matt loves working in the shop on projects. He’s an amazing creator. He can fix anything that is broken. He can create, out of nothing, almost anything. He loves making and fixing things! We save quite a bit of money on repairs because he can fix a lot of things! He’s so talented in everything he does.

Here’s the thing…life on the farm is incredibly hard. There are a lot of dynamics involved in a multi-generational business. Working with family everyday is hard. Working with your spouse and then letting things go at night, is difficult. The days are long. The work is hard. The stress is high. There is always something to be done-we are never “caught up”. Matt does something on the farm everyday, weekends don’t mean two days off. He is always doing something. Since we don’t have kids, I work a lot of hours alongside of him. Because of this, we both pitch in with the house and keeping up with laundry and dishes and cleaning. But honestly, in the busy seasons, a lot of the housework gets skipped over. There are so many hours in the day and we have to take something off our plate.

Farming is a lifestyle that not very many people want. We have a multigenerational family business. Our business has to make money, otherwise three families are out an income. We put so much of our blood, sweat and tears into making this operation profitable so that we can continue the life that Matt has dreamed about living since he was a little boy. We are living our dreams. It’s hard, it’s draining, it’s exhausting, but it’s our dream and we love it!

What is Farm Friday?

And welcome to the last of the three days we’re posting on. Farm Friday will focus on the farm. It will be a collaboration of what we do during the different seasons and why we do it.

There are less than 2% of the American population involved in production agriculture. I have been involved since birth so I don’t know any different. There is a lot of misunderstandings in the world of agriculture. It is our goal to clarify and explain what we do and how we do it.

Farmers have to be experts in all sorts of categories and take great pride in making sure that they are up to date on the latest and most accurate information. I take great pride in the fact that I grew up on a family farm and married into another.

I swore I would never marry a farmer. I was going to marry somebody with set hours. Somebody that wouldn’t have to go pull a calf in the middle of the night or somebody that wouldn’t work 20 hours a day during the busy seasons on the farm. I swore I would never be tied to anyone that relied on the weather for so much. Never was I going to marry somebody that wouldn’t want to go on vacations with me. I was convinced I was going to marry somebody with a “real” job. And then I fell in love.

If you ever have any questions or topics that you want covered, we welcome your input. Send us a message or comment on a post. No question is a stupid question. We are striving to build a supportive community that won’t attack others. We highly encourage the curiosity and questions! Search #farmfridaytpstyle to stay up to date!