The First Eggs

Let me first tell you that these chickens and ducks aren’t the first I’ve ever had in my life. Honestly I can say I’ve had hundreds of them. I used to have a small time pastured egg farm. When the Covid pandemic shutdown happened, the farmers markets all shut down and around the same time Facebook made advertising eggs a “jailable” offense. The cost of feeding hundreds of chickens with no output to sell all those eggs meant most of them went to auction instead. The foodbank got loads of eggs from me even when I was selling eggs.

I’m not complaining about the shutdown. I believe it was necessary but should have happened much sooner to actually do the job it was meant to do had a certain group of politicians not played games…. We may have been able to stop the devastation. But that’s not really the point of my post.

My point is that I’m celebrating once again having real, fresh, pastured eggs. And yes, pullet eggs can be wonky. Small. Funny looking. One had no shell at all. But their systems get it straightened out soon enough.

Eggs are a great protein source. Even as “expensive” as people complain about from the store they are still one of the best deals. I was gladly paying $5 a dozen before the uproar about the price of eggs. So the price didn’t phase me at all. Still much cheaper and healthier than a hamburger.

And yes, quality food for chickens costs. So raising them isn’t really cheap either. But you know what is going into them and the food can be supplemented with pasturing and foraging, leftovers from what we eat, and the garden scraps.

Of course you don’t have to feed them quite as well as I do, but they may not lay as well. People talk about the old days when chickens just ate scraps and foraged. They also didn’t lay as much. For optimal production you need optimal nutrition.

So that is something to think about if you want to raise this particular protein source.

If you would like meat, I would choose rabbits over chickens. They are actually easier to keep and feed. I’m not there yet at this new homestead. But I’d like to. I have done rabbits in the past. Alfalfa and grass is pretty easy to raise on a small scale for rabbits and weeds, veggies, wood, all easy to forage for them. I’d say they are one of if not the easiest to feed in a survival situation where you can’t get animal feed from the feed store.

But right now, I’m content with the chickens starting to lay, and soon the ducks will too. And might I add, the ducks are already reducing the number of giant slugs I’ve noticed. Just in the few weeks they have been out in the yard. That is the best job for them as chickens don’t touch giant slugs. No need for the rabbits, yet. Not this year anyway.

And honestly, I prefer ducks to chickens as far as poultry goes. But everything likes to eat duck even more than chickens so that is also something to consider. They are easier prey. Chickens replicate themselves quicker and more often. Just some things to consider.

Also, the tomatoes are definitely coming in strong as well as beans nowadays. I’m starting to freeze a lot of them. I just can’t keep up. Next year I won’t grow as many. I seem to be the only one eating very many.