100 Chicks have arrived!

The broilers are here!!  This is a big step in the right direction for our family farming business...100 meat birds!  

Nothing but cuteness in the barn!! (for now anyways!)

The broilers will be kept safe in the brooder for 2 weeks then put out to pasture to graze on bugs and grass.  If you're local, and are interested in getting naturally raised chicken for your family be sure to place your preorder for a discount by this Monday, March 4th!  Check out our facebook page here to see ordering information.  

Broiler Processing Day

Looking at this collage, I'm glad we chose to take a picture of our broilers each Thursday for their whole (short!) lives.  They really do grow. so. fast.

 Processing day went very smooth, and it was actually fun!  Thanks to some generous friends at Bethel Trails Farm, we borrowed some equipment that made the whole process go faster.  The most time consuming part is the plucking.  The "Featherman" takes care of all of it in 25-30 seconds!!  It saved us a ton of time.  We ended up doing all our birds, from start to finish, in 4 hours.  Everyone took a turn on each part of the process, from the kill cone all the way to converting ounces to a decimal scale for pricing and packaging. 

We had some fresh chicken for our Thanksgiving feast!  So glad we got to share some with our friends the Schaafs!!

 my little helper :D

Ben was a trooper on processing day...it was also his 9th birthday!!

 His very own Bowie knife!

Yes, that's right friends, when you live the rural life, you get a new knife for your birthday :)

Now, on to the next project for our farm...

                                                                       ...the Eggmobile!

The boys were challenged to come up with a model.  I think they're all great and very detailed!  We'll have to come up with a combination of all three!

Whew! What a busy couple of days!!  Hope you all had a fun Thanksgiving!

Thursday's Broiler Biography

It's just about time....

We have decided to wait until Wednesday to process our broilers.  They will be exactly 9 weeks old that day.  It'll be chicken on our Thanksgiving table this year!!

Took some pictures with Ellie to give a visual of how HUGE these birds have gotten in just 58 days!  

Ellie's not quite sure...

 ...well I'll give it a try...

 ...classic!!

Thursday's Broiler Biography

These birds only have one week left!  Next Saturday, November 17th is processing day.  This poor guy is a bit on the dirty side because of the rain and cold the last few days.

It will be an adventurous day!  We are as ready as we can be with butchering and packaging supplies...hopefully we'll have good weather since it will all be done outdoors.  If you want to try your hand at it, come on down to the farm next Saturday!!  No, truly, I realize butchering and processing chickens is not for everyone...thank you Shannon for pointing that out to me!  But if you live locally and plan on purchasing from Kornerstone Farms in the near future you're welcome to come pick 'em up as early as Sunday afternoon after church!  Can't get any FRESHER than that my friends!

Thursday's Broiler Biography

It seems every time I head out to check on these guys, they have grown.  It's hard to tell in the picture, but there is a daily difference in their appearance.  Their feet are ginormous!

6 weeks old

Our farm animals seem to have something with 1st.  

1st litter of bunnies was born on the 1st day of spring...

1st egg hatched from a broody hen on the 1st day of summer...

And now tonight, November 1st, our beagle Nia is having puppies!  So far 7 of them!  Megan will be sure to post about it this weekend!

Thursday's Broiler Biography

Yes, I know, it's Sunday, not Thursday...but I promise these pictures were actually taken on Thursday! We just haven't had the time to get to this post until now :)

Isn't their growth astounding?!?  I can't believe butchering day is less than 3 weeks away!  Come for a visit for the holidays...there will be plenty of chicken to go around!!

Thursday's Broiler Biography

Here it is! These birds are now a month old.  No, there is nothing wrong with his chest!...they all were in the middle of eating when I had time to go out and catch a snapshot so his throat is full of feed!  And the older they get, the more they seem to want to eat!  They do grow fast, just like all the books and hatcheries claim. 

Here are our cute barred rocks, our egg layers come February!

Thursday's Broiler Biography

Our cornish cross rocks are now 3 weeks old.  You can see by the size of their legs how big their bodies are going to get!  And their legs are spread far apart in comparison to our other breed of chicks, showing us just how much room there will be for the breast meat.  These little guys LOVE to eat.  We actually have decided to cut back on their access to feed.  They need to peck around more for bugs and grass!  By taking the time to observe them we've noticed they prefer to just sit by the feeder and eat from it...choosing not to get much exercise.  We don't like this.  

Yes, they are healthy by being out on pasture the way God intended them to be.  

Yes, they are healthy because we are feeding them the best chicken feed that we could find that is locally made.  

No, they will not be healthy just sitting around getting fat!!  

So limiting their access to the feeder is going to force them to move around and look for food!  True, they may not fatten as quickly, but we're willing to try it out for the sake of a healthier meat.  We are what we eat, right?!  

Thursday's Broiler Biography

Here it is, Thursday again, already!  (does having 7 kids make time go faster??)  These broilers are what I would call, at the in between stage...kind of fluffy, yet their real feathers are there as well.  As you can plainly see, they have grown tremendously in only 7 days.  I was having my doubts about being able to actually butcher them in only 8 weeks, but at this growth rate, they will definitely be large enough!

Today was also their first day on pasture!  They were beside themselves.  It was fascinating watching them peck at every little ant and bug that they could find.  Amazing to see them instinctly know what to do!   

 I still can't get over the size difference in the two breeds.  We started calling our barred rock hens our pipsqueeks!

 Ellie loves her chickies =)

Thursday's Broiler Biography

Time flies when you're taking care of chicks!  Hard to believe it's already Thursday again!  There has been definite growth in these little guys.  They are still little yellow fluff balls, but a lot more active.  They love to sleep on top of each other...it's so cute!  When they hear us coming they start "peeping" all at once.  It's like a little song for us!

 

Here is a good picture of the obvious difference in size between the broiler and our barred rocks, both hatched the same day...and they are being fed the same exact feed!!

We have been decreasing the temperature of the brooder slowly to harden them off before putting them out to pasture...that way they're not in complete shock from the cold grass that is full of dew in the mornings!  Probably sometime in the next two weeks that will be done.  What a neat experience to have the kids raise their own food...nothing like it!

Chicks have arrived!

THEY'RE HERE!! We received a phone call this morning from the post office informing us a package of rambunctious chicks was waiting for us to come and get them!  How cute are they?

The black with white spots are our barred rock hens for egg laying.  The pale yellow ones are our cornish rock cross for meat...aka, the broiler.  We got 25 of each.

Graycie's just a bit excited!

Starting with today, every THURSDAY for the next 8 weeks we will post a photo of one of these cuties, our cornish rock cross, or broilers.  They are bred to grow extremely fast and we want to document it!  Check back next Thursday to see what this little one looks like in a week!!