Meat Chickens Are Coming To The Homestead!

I am so excited to be able to share this news with you guys!

After long and strenuous research & saving our pennies, we FINALLY are taking the leap into raising meat chickens.

 

The breed we decided to choose was the Freedom Ranger. 'Why' you may ask....here are a few reasons why.

We are trying to be as natural and organic as possible here on the homestead. So, we wanted a breed that wasn't messed with to be bred into GIGANTIC chickens, such as Cornish X Rock crosses. So that is why we didn't choose the most popular broiler chicken.

The Freedom Ranger is developed from French genetics that go back to heritage chicken breeds. Being of heritage genes is very important to us. To me it means a healthier bird. Freedom Rangers are able to lay eggs as well. We eventually want to breed our own meat chickens, so being of heritage genes, you are able to breed the chickens. Where as the Cornish X Rock crosses are bred to not lay eggs and produce only meat. To me having a chicken that is suppose to lay eggs be bred not to...is just unhealthy to me....but that's another story.

One last reason on why we chose Freedom Rangers. They thrive  on free ranging, pasture grazing, and foraging. Being able to have our chickens be happy and healthy and free to roam is another important thing to us. Also, the feed cost is much lower then if you were raising conventional broiler chickens. You aren't sitting there and feeding them only grain all the time...they forage. These chickens produce tender & succulent meat and has more yellow omega 3 fat and less saturated fat than fast growing breeds.

Our chicks will be arriving on May 6th...and I am SUPER excited!!

I will keep you guys posted through our facebook page and on here, thanks you guys for following along with us!

"And on the 8th day, God looked down on his planned paradise and said, "I need a caretaker." So God made a farmer." - Paul Harvey

The Unique Differences in Homesteading

So, as I was putting our goats and chickens up for the night, I though of something cool.

2 out of 3 of my Aunt's (my Mother's sisters) are also starting their Homestead journeys. The cool thing I thought about was how we all are different from each other.

  Donna, who lives over at The Crooked Coop, a small scale Homestead like ours, specializes in all different kinds of fowl. She has chickens, ducks, guineafowl, and most recently, meat chickens.  She butchers and cleans her chickens on the Homestead (which I think is awesome!)

(The batch from 2014)

Her most recent endeavor is honey bees. She is the first in our family to try their hand at honey bees, and we couldn't be more happier for her. :) 

(Busy busy bees)

Joie, who just recently moved to an 80 acre Farm (Sufficient Graze Farm) in the mountains, is starting out with chickens, ducks, and donkeys. She is also in the process of trying to raise her own hogs for meat.

Her donkeys, Jackson and Noel will be used as protection as her livestock numbers grow. We are so happy for her as her farm is finally expanding. 

(Jackson)

(Noel)

Then of course there is us with our chickens ducks and goats.

Our Homesteads/Farms are striving for all the same things, growing and raising as much as we can. But yet we are all uniquely different at the same time. :)

"And on the 8th day, God looked down on his planned paradise and said, "I need a caretaker." So God made a farmer." - Paul Harvey

Spring Time Is Coming

 

Oh, how I can't wait for all the snow to be melted! The weather lately has been about 50 or 40 degrees, so much better than the below 20 weather we were having before. :)

Now that the weather is getting better all our critters are exploring the pasture again....they actually can see some grass...and the ducks are LOVING the mud. :)

 

As spring is drawing closer, our egg production is increasing, from our 24 girls we are getting about 8 to 10 eggs a day!! We have two customers that we are currently selling to, our first customer we sell 2 dozen a week to, and our second customer we sell a half dozen a week to.

We would like to increase our number of hens this year, so we will have more egg production...both for our family and to sell. We have a good number of people around us who would like farm fresh pasture raised eggs.

( Yes this picture is of OUR eggs :D )

 

Gardening time is almost here....there is a lot to plant, and we are so excited!! We already planted all our onions, red, white, and green. If all of them take we should get about 36 of each onion.....yes, we like onions :) 

 Throughout the next couple of months we will be planting like crazy. I will be taking pictures and will be doing a big blog post for you guys! So excited...I can't wait!

 

Until it's time to plant all our seeds, we are storing them all together in here. It is a shoe hanger, but it comes in VERY handy for your seeds and gardening tools!

Well, that's all for now, I will be posting when it's time to get the rest of the seeds planted, Happy Homesteading!

"And on the 8th day, God looked down on his planned paradise and said, "I need a caretaker." So God made a farmer." - Paul Harvey

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A Look Back on 2014

2014 was an eventful year for us! We had so many new experiences with animals, building, and just living the simple wholesome life :)

Our first big experience of 2014 was in the beginning of March, a local farm was advertising that they had goat kids for sale. So our whole family headed up to the farm to "look" at them. If we were going to decide to make the jump to being goat keepers...we only wanted one goat. However the woman at the farm persuaded us to get two goats. So that day we put dibs on two goats and about two weeks later came back to pick them up and bring them home to our homestead.

Now, before we brought Sassy and Clover home we built a stall down in our basement. But we knew they would out grow it real soon,

So we planned out our pasture, the cost of the materials and everything you could think of.... and soon we were all starting to build it.

Our homestead is full of shale so digging the post holes was not that easy. We rented a post hole digger to help out but it could only do about half of the holes we needed. We used shovels, we used  a hand post hole digger, we used a pick ax and some of the holes didn't even budge. Needless to say it was hard work.

Once we sunk all the posts in quikrete it was finally time to put the fencing up. Putting fencing up is not as easy as you may think...but we got it up in one day. It was such a relief when it was done.

The next thing we tackled this year was building the pole barn for the goats.  

It went up rather quickly after all the planning.  It's not completely done, we have a few things to add on to it come spring. You could say it's rustic ;) You definitely appreciate things more when you build or make them by hand. Hard work went into this and the goats LOVE it. :)

We also expanded our flock by about 22 chickens.

We ordered all different kinds of breeds from our local farm supply store.

Golden Comets, Red Sex Links, Welsummers, Barred Rocks, Cuckoo Marans, Buff Orpingtons,

Black Australorps, Silver Laced Wyandotte, & some Araucanas. The newbies haven't started laying yet, but hopefully in the next few months.

This year we also put all our work into building our gardens. In the past years we had always done gardens but never really kept up on it.

We bought good dirt/compost plus we used some of our own compost. We also got some free horse manure as long as we loaded it.

We increased our growth space significantly by building 4 - 4x16 raised beds to add to our original 16x30 garden. 

In the spring of 2015 we will be adding 1 more 4x16 raised bed and possibly a pallet garden as well.

With all the room we had added we were able to grow a few new items in the garden that we hadn't grown before. Such as 2 varieties of green beans, carrots, butternut squash, sweet potatoes, cherokee purple tomatoes, and all our herbs apple mint, chocolate mint, spearmint, lemon balm, chamomile, lavender, thyme, rosemary, and sage.

In 2014 we also founded our facebook page Woodpecker Willows Homestead. We are so happy that we have over 400 people that are interested in following our homestead journey. We love interacting with so many other homesteaders and farmers, and we love being able to share our knowledge and receive knowledge from experienced homesteader & farmers.

There were lots of other things that happened throughout the year, such as us adopting our pups Riggy and Rebel, us taking care of 4 wild baby rabbits, repurposing a old cast iron sink into a outdoor garden sink, and trying our hand at being a bit self-sufficient. In 2014 we made our own washing detergent, made goats milk soaps with essential oils, and even made some apple cider vinegar from our apple scraps.

2014 was a productive and special year for us and we can't wait to see what 2015 has in store!!

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

"And on the 8th day, God looked down on his planned paradise and said, "I need a caretaker." So God made a farmer." - Paul Harvey

3 Day Refrigerator Dill Pickles

We got quite a bunch of cucumbers from our garden this year, so after a while of having cucumber and tomato salad...we were looking for other uses for our cucumbers.

Pickles! We love pickles, and when they are made from the cucumbers and dill we grew in our garden...that's even better!

We were really excited when we found out that we could make pickles WITHOUT a pressure canner,  considering we don't have one at the moment. This recipe is super easy too, you only need a few ingredients.

Here is how we made them. (you can always adjust this recipe to fit your situation.)

You will need:

3 1/2 cups water

1 1/4 cups white vinegar

1 tbl sugar

1 tbl sea salt

4 cups cucumber spears (or you can do slices like we did)

2 garlic cloves

2 heads of dill

2 leaves off of a wild berry bush (optional) 

Slice your cucumbers and place them in a large mason jar.

Cover your cucumber slices with cold tap water and place them in the refrigerator until you are ready to use them. This helps the cucumbers stay crisp.

Now that your cucumbers are all sliced up and ready to go, you can start on the pickle brine.

Stir the water, vinegar, salt. and sugar in a saucepan and bring to a boil. Once it is boiled, remove from the heat and allow it to cool.

Once the brine is cooled take the cucumbers out of the refrigerator and drain them. Place the cucumbers back in the jar once you have drained them. To the cucumbers add the garlic, fresh dill, and the berry leaves. The berry leaves are a natural way of encouraging crispness in your cucumbers as they are turning into pickles.

Once everything is in the jar, cover with the cooled water and vinegar mixture. Place a lid on your jar and place it in your refrigerator for 3 days.

It is such an easy recipe and they turn out so yummy! I hope this inspires you to try your own refrigerator pickles. :)


 "And on the 8th day, God looked down on his planned paradise and said, "I need a caretaker." So God made a farmer." - Paul Harvey

Soft Ginger Cookies

It has been kind of dreary the past couple of days. The snow has been melting and we have been getting a little bit of rain/sleet. We needed a little pick me up, so I decided to make soft Ginger Cookies.  

( Click Here to watch me make the Ginger Cookies)

Soft Ginger Cookies

2 1/4 cup flour

2 tsp ground ginger

1 tsp baking soda

3/4 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp clove

1/4 tsp salt

3/4 cup soft butter

1 cup sugar

1 egg

1 tbl water

1/4 cup molasses

and an extra 2 tbl sugar

Preheat your oven to 350.

In a large bowl sift together all your dry ingredients.

Cream 1 cup of sugar and 3/4 cup of  butter together until light and fluffy.

Then beat in 1 egg and stir in the 1/4 cup of molasses and 1 tbl of water.

 Gradually add your dry mixture to your wet mixture until it's all combined.

Place your 2 tbl of sugar in a bowl and set aside.

Take 1 tsp of cookie dough and roll it in the sugar, then place on an ungreased baking sheet.

Bake your cookies for 8-10 minutes.
 

Enjoy your soft yummy ginger cookies!! :)

"And on the 8th day, God looked down on his planned paradise and said, "I need a caretaker." So God made a farmer." - Paul Harvey

Our Menagerie of Animals

We are getting quite a few new followers on our facebook page every day, which is really exciting! So, I decided, after I realized that we never really wrote about how many animals we have, to write about them. So here it goes....

(We live on a little over 4 acres of land...so there is plenty of room for everybody)


                                      We have 4 dogs...

Dandilion.

We adopted her from a humane society in KY about 9 years ago. She is our good ol' farm dog. She's a  protector and and big ol' goofball.

 

 

Buford.

We adopted him 3 years ago from a local humane society. We think he is between the ages of 5-7. He was rescued from a very horrible situation. He is a challenge because of his previous life, but we love him anyways.

 

 

Rebel (left) Riggy (right)

We adopted them about 5 months ago. They are 7 months old and are a BIG, lovable handful!

 

 

Next are the cats...we have 6 of them...

 

Scooter.

We brought him home about 15 years ago, he is known as our farm cat. He enjoys spending long hours outside "hunting" and then loves coming inside for his snuggles at night. He is our sweet boy!

 

 

Cedar.

She was brought home from a mission's trip to Cedar Rapids Iowa 6 years ago. She is our indoor mouser...she sometimes falls asleep while doing it too. ;)

 

 

 

 

The next four cats were born of our two outdoor cats 5 years ago. (Moses and Pumpkin who have since passed away)

 

Berlioz.

Chubby and loveable! He is just like his Daddy...purring all the time!

 

Toulouse.

Mr. long and lanky. A few times Toulouse actually caught snakes that were IN the house...and ate them. :P

 

 

Marie.

Our other purr box and our other mouse catcher. She also loves to climb on your lap to get some scratches.

Callie.

The smallest of them all. She was born with only 3 legs, but she gets around as well as the others. She LOVES people, always looking for attention. 

 

 

 

 

Now onto the farm animals....starting with the chickens and ducks...

 

We have 29 chickens (27 hens & 2 roosters) and 3 ducks.

We have about 10 different breeds of chickens, but only 1 breed of duck . Khaki Campbell ducks are known to be the best laying ducks.

 

 

Buttons, Abigail, & Amelia

 

 

 

 

 

Then finally there are the goats...

Sassy (front) & Clover (back)

We bought them from a local farm back in March. We weren't ready for them at all but we just couldn't resist! :) They are a cross breed of Lamancha and Saanen and they are 9 months old. We will be breeding Sassy in December and Clover in January. CAN'T WAIT for fresh goat's milk!!!

 

 

Well, that is our menagerie of animals...for now. ;) ;)

 

Every day is a new adventure...sometimes fun and sometimes not. But we are enjoying every day of  being closer and closer to being a working homestead!

 

 

 

 

"And on the 8th day, God looked down on his planned paradise and said, "I need a caretaker." So God made a farmer." - Paul Harvey