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!

Apple Picking!!

We spent the day with some friends at an orchard in North Carolina called Skytop.  It was a perfect autumn day to be outside!

 Graycie with her friends, Adoniram and Rilynn

 Classic Ben

 Ellie spent the day on momma's back!

 Christian lost his first tooth right before we left!  And he matched Esther!

We came home with over 40 pounds of apples!  Planning on dehydrating some into 'chips', making some into applesauce, a few pies for daddy and we'll keep our favorite, pink ladies, for snacking on :)

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 =)