nice farm. we have 15 chicks coming in about a month as well. our Roo is named Gorden Ramsey and is pretty good but needs more hens to spread the love around. He does like to rush me, but gets booted like a football and settles down. he does protect the flock, we are planning on seeing if we can get one of our girls to raise a few chicks.
you need a compact tractor with a loader. I have a Allis Chalmers 5020 with a loader. its old, but been totally worth the 6500 I gave for it.
we have Henry, an 120 lb Anatolian / pyre mix to protect the flock, mostly from the local hawk and eagle air force. they got one chicken last year, but have been chased off the rest of the time, Henry will run to where they are swooping and try to grab them right out of the air. we also have fox and coyotes.
on fencing, you find the 4 in is fine for chickens? I have been using 2x4 no climb horse fence, the outside of our property is totally enclosed by 5 foot 2x4 woven and 6 in posts every 8 feet. I have welded 2x4 for the garden, chicken run and chicken wire on top of the chicken run, chicken wire on the bottom 2 feet of the tube gates. TSC is a good source, or you may have other local farm supply stores, we have JAX and Murdoch's if TSC does not have something. Depot seems to be carrying more fencing now as well.
chickens get to till and fertilize the whole garden during the winter. meat rabbits incoming this spring as well. something you should look into, very cheap to feed, very sustainable and you can apply the waste directly to the garden or pasture.
the goats look like a lot of fun. are you doing dairy from them? meat?
it would be fun to do some tours in the spring of those of us with some livestock/ gardens. @bbhaag
*inhales* That's a bit of a WoT. Let's see...
I have 15 more chicks coming in a couple weeks. Would still have Pidge, but can't have him going after the kids, and they + wife won't punt so he had to go. Should have heard him try to squak after the third time he went after me... poor guy. My flock doesn't free range - yet. They have a run and we will be expanding their area to where our garden currently is, making their run approximately 5x what they currently have. But that's a todo...
Yes. Tractor. I know. Am poor. I do have a Farmall Super C sitting behind my workshop that needs rings, but really we got it because it was cheap and a paint job doubles what I paid for it. Good rings and no smoke puts it up a bit more and I can hopefully flip it for something more useful. If not, then it's a nice wagon puller for hay rides, right? If only I had a rich ATOT uncle willing to donate me 5k.
We did have a GP, tried him out for a few months. Pretty good boy, but he spent too much time being an indoor/family dog to survive outdoors. He had to find a new family. The only aerial issues we've had are with the guineas being murdered by owls. To be fair, the guineas are dumb as rocks. Build them a shelter, they sleep on top of it. Tree line? Don't care - we'll sleep on top of the chicken coop. Can't wait till they're all gone. Then I'll let the ducks handle the ticks. I'll get another LGD eventually when I have more time to invest in training it properly as a pup.
In terms of the fence - right now the ducks are the only ones that have access to it, and they don't go through it. Nor do the guineas, who did slide right on through the field fence). The chickens will have access to it come later this year, right now their run is 2x4 welded wire and the coop is 1x1 welded wire. I figure if the ducks can't go through the sheep fence, the chickens won't either. And we put it up also so that the orchard area will be compatible with the pigs eventually as well. 2x4 woven horse fence - and I thought that the sheep fence was expensive!!!
The goats are okay. We got them mostly for milk - they're ND/pygmy cross - wife plans on using them to make product. We're going to move towards registered pygmies, which Elvis is. Our farm is all about small, and they don't get smaller than pure pygmy. Unfortunately we learned the hard way if it's not registered, it's not a pygmy. So many people call ND pygmies. ... They also do a pretty good job cleaning up brush. We didn't even know about the pen that they're in when we bought the house. A couple months after getting the goats, pen was cleaned out. They're pretty good at it. Looking forward to getting my back nine fenced in and letting em loose back there.
Anyway. 73's. KB2FQX out.