I've been a chicken wrangler most of my life even as a child, we started with chickens as an easy, less expensive way to start building our homestead.  There is something special about holding a little chick that puts a smile on everybody's face.  They are fun to watch grow and it's interesting to see what they are going to look like once they get all their feathers.  It's so relaxing to sit and watch the chickens foraging and pecking at whatever bugs or morsels that they find in the grass.

 

The farm fresh eggs are nice to have too.  I like having a variety of hens so that I can have a colorful array of eggs. The yolks have such a rich dark orange color when they are left to free range and just seem so much healthier.  Our hens are free ranging most of the afternoon and evening.  They are happy when they are able to be out in the sunshine (and even the rain and cold).  

Our chickens are fed a diet of fermented scratch grains and commercial layer feed that supplies the vitamins and minerals that they need.  The grains are put into a bucket and water is added to about an inch over the top of the grains.  This is left for 2 days to ferment and then fed to the chickens.  They devour it.  The chickens eat less feed because their bodies can absorb the nutrients better.  They don't drink as much water as they are getting water from the feed also. They are also given kitchen and garden scraps and look forward to checking out what is in the scrap bucket each day.  Because I make cheese, they also get a lot of whey.  They love the whey and its very good for them and is high in protein. They seem to lay more eggs when they get it.

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