Teresa & Mike CHS - Our journal

[CntryBoy777]

The closest animal markets close to us is in Blue Mountain and Tupelo areas....from here they are more over your way there. There are some down around Jackson and W Tn where my sister lives. They have cattle auctions in every county, tho.

 

[Mike CHS]

We originally were only planning for our personal flock till we decided that we can do better using the damaged trailer as a chicken tractor rather than sell it at a discounted price. It's mobile and we can move it around the pasture with the birds in it. A 16' long trailer with 7' ceiling can hold quite a few chickens.

 

[Mike CHS]

The closest animal markets close to us is in Blue Mountain and Tupelo areas....from here they are more over your way there. There are some down around Jackson and W Tn where my sister lives. They have cattle auctions in every county, tho.

We watched the 3 Farmers Markets fairly close to us last summer and there was a surprisingly small number of people selling eggs but they seemed to sell all they had. You won't make much money but it can help with the feed bill plus you get some good Tennessee social time.

 

[frustratedearthmother]

I love your chicken tractor idea!!

 

[Bruce]

Nice looking birds.

Are your Farmer's markets open year round? And what does it cost to have a "booth"? You've probably done your research but unless you give them light (some say 12 hours, some say 14 minimum) they likely won't lay in the winter past their first. So your business plan has to incorporate that and culling of birds that aren't putting out as they GENERALLY taper off a year two or later depending on the bird. True of most of my now almost 5 year olds though the EE was still cranking out 4-5 a week last year (she's not a winter layer) and has been doing at least that since Jan 11th so far this year. She's never started back up before the end of Feb before.

Your 4 RIRs will start laying any day now, don't be surprised if they ramp up to 5+ a week each pretty quickly though the egg size will be small to start with and increase in size. My 2015 blue laying EE was the first to start at just over 23 weeks. She stayed in the USDA Medium range for the first 2 months and held pretty steady in the Large range (sometimes XL) through the rest of last year. This year she's laying XL's to Jumbos.

 

[Mike CHS]

Our markets are open basically through the farm season here from May through October and are free unless you use one of the county owned tables and then there is a $5 fee.

There was 3 eggs in the coop this morning and they are on the medium size range.

 

[Bruce]

OK so what are you going to do with the dozens of eggs you get outside the Farmer's Market season? My girls have been laying since the end of January.

 

[Mike CHS]

Cook them and feed them back to the chickens as well as the 5 dogs we will have by that time.

Worst case cook them and dehydrate for the End Times.

This whole thing isn't a for profit for us. We want to be as sustainable as possible and beyond that we can feed eggs to just about anything including the neighbors pigs.

 

[NH homesteader]

I was halfway through your post thinking... Pigs LOVE eggs!

And um... 5 dogs?

 

[Mike CHS]

We are looking for a couple of Border Collie pups. We will need to have the replacements for the herd dogs we now have. We want to trial and you need several dogs to be able to do that. We really don't NEED dogs now since our sheep are so spoiled but that is all changing.