CHICKEN

We move our "Chicken Tractors" to fresh grass up to three times each day! The birds eat flies, larvae, mosquitos, wasps, spiders and any other insects they can catch! This controls the amount of bugs on our farm and provides an incredible protein supplement for the birds.

Chickens are definitely not vegetarians! 😉

We give our chickens the best organic feed from Coen Farm. We ferment it for 48 hours before feeding. Chickens are mono-gastric animals (like humans), so fermentation helps with more effective nutrient absorption and makes the feed easier to digest. This also means we can reduce our feed costs by as much as 30%! It takes a bit more planning, but it's totally worth it! 

Chicken manure as fertilizer can cost as much as $10+/lb to buy from a store. Each chicken will provide us with about 7.5+lbs of manure in their 12 weeks on the farm, which is spread evenly over our pasture and future food forest!

That's over $700 worth of nitrogen rich fertilizer.... AND we get protein at the end! 

We live our life in partnership with nature. We work together everyday to do our chores and produce the best food we can, as a family. 

We learn new ways to improve our practices, reduce the work load, time and costs associated with growing food; AND our kids learn valuable lessons along the way. It's not a sacrifice, it's a way of life and we love it.

Our chickens spend their days moving, scratching, and eating grains, grasses and grubs... all the things that express the "chicken-ness of the chicken". In exchange for protection from predators and an abundance of organic food- they provide us with fertilizer for our pastures and food forest, nutrient dense meat and nourishing bone broth for our family. 

Our heritage breed chickens are harvested at 10-12 weeks old and weigh about 5 lbs. We raise them so that each day is the best it can be. We try to mimic the life of a wild pheasant or grouse roaming in our forests.

Unlike a wild pheasant or grouse, we try to make their last day as pleasant as possible. We do our best to reduce stress and fear by harvesting on our farm and from their familiar tractors.