Farm to table: not as easy as it looks

Ok let’s try this again. Last spring we brought some chicks home to raise for our own freezer. Well, they didn’t make it to the freezer. In fact they didn’t even make it to one pound of body weight. Some critter snuck into the shed in the middle of the night and murdered them all. I’m just glad the massacre happened the day AFTER I sent my daughter in there to feed them. I wouldn’t want her to witness that carnage.

This is not the first time we have lost all of our birds to a predator. It seems to be the norm lately, no matter where we house our chicks – in the log cabin, the barn or the shed. We can stuff the cracks, line the pen with chicken wire, and the beasts still get in. It’s probably raccoons. They are extremely dexterous.

In addition to the predators, we have to consider the cold. We are at the end of summer now, and the nights are chilly. We can put heat lamps over the chicks but we have to make sure the drafts are all covered in the shed, or disaster will happen. The chicks will start piling on top of each other to keep warm, smothering one another in the process.

The Farmer has been busy for a few days now, building a new chicken coop in the shed. He has covered the floor of the horse pen with wood shavings. Chicken wire has been pulled across the walls and it forms a ceiling overhead. As I watch, I’m thinking of the video our daughter shared of a raccoon she caught in a live trap. It had been killing her laying hens so it had to go. There, caught on her live cam, was a full sized raccoon, prying the metal cage apart with its tiny hands. After he escaped, he threw the mangled cage to the side, out of his way, and waddled out of the shed into the moonlight. I’m not sure our chicken wire will be able to withstand raccoon hands.

My solution was to bring the chicks into the house, at least until they are a good size. We can fit the chick brooder in the old dog kennel cage. That will keep the chicks safe from curious house cats. They will be sheltered from the elements, and hungry wildlife.

Will this be the year that we manage to raise our chickens successfully? It seems like it has been ages since we were able to fill our freezers with meat we raised ourselves.

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