Healthy soil and sustainable growing

["Gwen Giffen" <ggiffen@1st.net>]

Thanks Harvey,

I appreciate this information. Many magazines and articles have been posted, 
but they all sort of run together for me. So I don't mind being reminded 
they are there. A few days ago I followed signs for "laying hens and chicks 
for sale," that I'd passed up several times in the past couple of weeks. I 
had $8 on me, and thought I might get some chicks for $1 apiece as posted. 
As fate would have it, they had peacocks hatching that very day, and wanted 
to clean out the hutch. So I got 15 chicks for $8! Silkies, cochins, and 
bantams, all mostly black and white, and the last of the pickin's.

We've always bought hatchery chicks up to now, but I want to start trying to 
hatch my own with silkies and cochins. And I found a lady - on Freecycle of 
all places - who lives in town (albeit a town 60  miles away), and just 
likes to hatch chicks, but can't keep them. I posted on Freecycle looking 
for a broody hen or two, and she answered. I still don't have my "broody 
hen," but she gave me a silkie that is nearly grown, along with Welsummers, 
Barred Rocks, one that looks like a Barred Rock but I don't recall it's 
name, and she hatched some RIR's and White Pekin ducks from eggs I gave her 
too. So now I have about 30 chicks of various sorts, NONE from a hatchery.

We've been enjoying free range eggs for about a year now, since my DH and I 
got back into chickens; and some free range meat too; and would like to 
continue with it independently.

Maybe I'll subscribe to both if I get it together enough to get it mailed.

Gwen

> For all on the list who raise poultry, or aspire to, may I commend to
> you a new magazine, Backyard Poultry, a spinoff of Countryside magazine,
> founded by JD Belanger--most likely many of you know of it. I think
> Elaine Belanger is doing an excellent job of shaping the magazine to be
> a mouthpiece for the homestead perspective on the subject (as opposed to
> that of the extension agent/ag college crowd).
>
> This has to count as a shameless plug rather than a neutral post because
> I have been writing a lot for BYP. The fourth issue just came out, and
> to date I have had 7 articles, starting with the second issue--using
> electronet fencing to manage poultry; working with the cock(s) in the
> flock; a rebuttal of the ag college perspective on poultry feeding;
> working with broody hens; the homestead waterfowl flock; and, in the
> current issue, making your own poultry feeds, and homestead poultry
> butchering. Next issue will feature production of more of the flock's
> feed from the homestead's own resources, and a collection of "war
> stories"--accounts of our experiences of predator attacks over the
> years, what we learned and how we adjusted.
>
> Hope any of you who give the new mag a peek will find it useful.
>
> ~Harvey