Healthy soil and sustainable growing

["Art Corbit" <art_c@cox.net>]

Hi Carry,

 

Sounds like you have a good operation going there with the chickens. I love those rich golden yellow egg yokes. I used to think the feed is what caused the yokes to be real rich but it isn't. The sun shining on the backs of the hens is what produces it. All the eggs we by now are from hens kept in these big houses. All we are actually buying are the cull eggs that are not suitable for hatching. The better eggs are hatched to produce all this chicken people ear.

 

Most of the eggs are laid on the floor in all the mess. The shells are contaminated to a point they can make you sick if you don't handle them right. I hope to have a place pretty soon where I can have some more chickens.

 

Art

 

 

 

 

----- Original Message -----

From: Carrie Shepard

To: Healthy soil and sustainable growing

Sent: Monday, July 24, 2006 7:28 AM

Subject: [Livingontheland] chickens and soil building

I'm still figuring this out, but chickens were what I started with for livestock when we first got our own place.

 

Since we've lived here, I've increased the amount of shrubs, vines, and flowers each year and noticed that my place will sustain more and more chickens each year.  I coop them in the winter and put a bale of hay or straw any time I notice the coop getting to just bare soil again.   The first year we lost baby chicks to the coop flooding and that's never happened again since  I started thinking in terms of building soil and the amount of rain has lessened with the climate changing.  

 

The soil has 'uppened' and continues to do so and right now is growing sunflowers while the chickens are free-ranging.   I throw them a little whole grain such as milo each day, and I am getting several dozen eggs a day and growing and have about 50 mixed breed juvenile birds.

 

They've definitely helped keep the tick population down as well.  Love my raw egg supply!

Carrie

 

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