Category: Farm/Country Living

Electric Fencing: Simpler is Better

Electric fencing has been around a long time, and has been used with chickens since at least 1960. The methods used then still work today.

The earliest mention I’ve seen of electric fencing with chickens was in a 1960 issue of “Egg Producer” magazine. The electric fence consisted of a single strand of wire 4-5″ off the ground. That’s it! This single low wire was enough to hold in the hens and discourage predators. Sometimes they added a second wire at 8-10″ off the ground, but it was mostly just for show.

I’ve tried it, and it works! And I got independent verification by stumbling across a site that talked about keeping raccoons out of your sweet corn. Same deal.

I once watched a coyote chase a hen that was outside the fence, but come to an abrupt halt when the hen raced past the two wires. The coyote stopped so fast I almost expected to hear tire squeal! Clearly the fence intimidated it to the point where even the prospect of a certain meal didn’t tempt it.

I cover this more fully in a follow-up post about electric fencing.

I also have an Electric Fencing FAQ with more details.

Better-Tasting Eggs: The Big Secret, Revealed!

I’m going to spill the big secret to producing better-tasting eggs: it’s the grass, man!

No, not that kind of grass! Ordinary grass, clover and other pasture plants, I mean.

Happy outdoor chickens that are allowed to run around on a grassy area will eat a lot of grass and other succulent plants. These plants don’t have many calories, but they’re loaded with vitamins, minerals, and flavor.

The eggs of such hens are bigger, have darker yolks, are more nutritious, and taste better. They taste like “real farm eggs,” which is not something you can say of the eggs in the store. The chickens are eating their veggies, and it makes all the difference.

This doesn’t seem like a difficult concept, but farmers, consumers, and even certifying agencies get it wrong every day. They think that “free range” is all about “outdoor access,” and that a barren yard is in the same league as a grassy field. Nothing could be further from the truth!

Why I Live in the Country: My Morning Walk

Just in case anyone wondered why I live in the country, take a look at my morning walk.

My neighbor’s horses are always worth a look.
horses next door to Norton Creek Farm

Our back pasture has some pullets on it at the moment, in one of our portable chicken coops.
portable chicken houses at Norton Creek Farm

The neighbors have a flock of sheep in their back pasture.
sheep next door to Norton Creek Farm

Our broilers are houses in hoophouses made by bending lightweight cattle panels into a semicircle and putting a tarp on top. The grass is getting pretty brown, but they still forage for what green stuff there is.
Broiler houses at Norton Creek Farm

Karen at the gate that marks the boundary of Starker Forest property. Starker has a “good neighbor” policy that must be experienced to be believed!
Gate at the boundary of Starker Forest

Inside the forest. Most of my morning walk is like this.

Walking through Starker Forest

Walking through Starker Forest

I walk until I reach this giant alder tree. It’s important to say, “Good morning, tree” before turning around.

Giant alder in Starker Forest

On the way home, the view is much the same, except for some good vistas of the farm, like this one:

Norton Creek Farm

I do this walk every day. It’s almost a vacation in itself!

Grass-Fed Hens Lay Bigger Eggs

Hens with the free run of a grass pasture not only lay more nutritious eggs, better-tasting eggs, they lay bigger eggs.

In spite of decades of selective breeding to ensure that most eggs fall into the Large size range, my hens insist on laying mostly Extra Large eggs. This is something of a nuisance, since customers prefer Large, but them’s the breaks.

The cause is presumably better nutrition. Like us, chickens should eat fresh greens in addition to processed stuff. Given half a chance, they do, and it improves the flavor, nutritional content, and size of the eggs.

Few people seem to know this, which is why people insist on building mud-yard free-range operations that have zero potential for producing a product that’s superior to what’s in the supermarket. The secret ingredient is not outdoor access, but grass.

Harvest Season vs. Seasonal Egg Decline

It’s harvest season on the farmers’ markets are packed. Hooray! Hey, where did all the eggs go?

Last week, for the first time this year, I ran out of eggs before the farmer’s market closed.

One of the sad things about being in the free-range egg business is that the seasonal peak in egg production (April and May) is horrendously mismatched with the seasonal peak in farmer’s market customers (August and September).

This is a hard problem without a very good solution. (Telling people that they should buy a whole fryer instead of eggs, because a chicken is nothing but an experienced egg, doesn’t work!) It’s made even more difficult because demand slackens after September, and it’s hard to engineer a two-month egg peak in the wrong season.

So it works out the same as always: get to the market early for the best selection. You snooze, you lose. That’s true of everything, not just my eggs.