Hobby Farming Projects Ideas - In my Garden

[jardinier]

Hello friends,

All my projects did in my garden since 10 years.

For sure, should be interesting for members.... useful probably..

Projects: My smallholding projects ideas

 

[amelia88]

A chicken coop is something I would love to have one day. My husband eats a lot of eggs, so that would save us a lot of money! It's again tying into the fact that I really want to operate a self-sustainable garden and home, and this would help significantly!

Thanks for the inspiration!

 

[Corzhens]

I would also love to have chickens but not in coops. When I was young, we would go to the province where my grandparents reside. They have a big yard with loose chickens. An whenever we would arrive, they would catch a chicken or 2 for our lunch. And the morning eggs come straight from the nests. However, as much as I want to, having loose chicken in our yard is not practical anymore because of the modernization of our place.

 

[IcyBC]

I live in the city so having a chicken coup in the yard would bring the neighbors to a huge protest, and I will be getting a hefty fine!

I always find it interesting to see how the chickens all live in a coup like that, but I am sure the clean up after the winter would not be fun

 

[Chuck]

I gave up on chickens. Between the snakes, hawks, coons, foxes, possums and ringtails it was a loosing proposition. I wish it were not so

 

[marlingardener]

We have a small farm, and we keep chickens. We converted two stalls in the barn into inside coops with their feeders and waterers, roosts, and deep litter on the floor (grass clippings and leaves). The hens have access to their outside coop through a hatch door and can come and go during the day, but we shut the hatch at night when they are all inside. The outside coop is made of chicken wire and secured at the bottom with 4x4's. The top is covered with wire, also.
I clean the inside coop daily, make sure the feeder is topped off and their watering stations are full, and collect yummy eggs. Our ladies are getting older and laying fewer eggs, so we will add to our flock in the spring. I dearly love having our ladies--they are funny and rather affectionate if you happen to have a treat in your hand!

 

[Buggs81]

We have a small farm, and we keep chickens. We converted two stalls in the barn into inside coops with their feeders and waterers, roosts, and deep litter on the floor (grass clippings and leaves). The hens have access to their outside coop through a hatch door and can come and go during the day, but we shut the hatch at night when they are all inside. The outside coop is made of chicken wire and secured at the bottom with 4x4's. The top is covered with wire, also.
I clean the inside coop daily, make sure the feeder is topped off and their watering stations are full, and collect yummy eggs. Our ladies are getting older and laying fewer eggs, so we will add to our flock in the spring. I dearly love having our ladies--they are funny and rather affectionate if you happen to have a treat in your hand!View attachment 10558

I love your chicken coop and I am happy to hear that you shut your chickens in at night, so that they are safe from predators. You definitely need a safe and secure place for chickens at night because there are so many predators that would like a tasty chicken for their dinner!

 

[Beth_B]

Lol @ cackleberries...a friend of mine gets free range eggs from a little farm near her (omg so good) for us and that's what we call them.

Anyway, I've had chickens in the past and they're lovely birds but between predator protection, winter care and care in general it doesn't make sense economically. I can have up to three chickens where I live and I have considered it...but I can get awesome cackleberries and support a small local farm at the same time so that's good too.

Back when I did have a flock of free ranging chickens, one - a very stroppy Rhode island red - was an excellent mouser. Really. She'd catch and kill a mouse and spend a great deal of time strutting about and cackling over its poor little corpse. She did this repeatedly.

 

[marlingardener]

Buggs, our coops are so secure that Ft. Knox has asked for the coop plans to upgrade their facility!
Beth, when we got our first egg we figured it was worth about $69.45, and we may have been underestimating a bit. Farm eggs are better tasting and supposedly better for you. I give a half dozen eggs to someone and the next week they are back, wanting to buy a dozen or more. I think it's called "pushing" on the street!

 

[Trellum]

Awesome projects! I think those projects will be super handy for people who live in a big place, for people like me not so much I will be living in a tiny house (Dutch houses are like that), so no space for chickens or anything like that.

 

[Beth_B]

Buggs, our coops are so secure that Ft. Knox has asked for the coop plans to upgrade their facility!
Beth, when we got our first egg we figured it was worth about $69.45, and we may have been underestimating a bit. Farm eggs are better tasting and supposedly better for you. I give a half dozen eggs to someone and the next week they are back, wanting to buy a dozen or more. I think it's called "pushing" on the street!

Lol at the $70 egg! That's probably about right.

The difference in taste of free range/well fed eggs (and chicken meat) compared to store bought is really striking. Store eggs and chicken meat tastes bland and watery. We had auracanas for the beautiful blue and green eggs, and Rhode Island Reds for big brown eggs...plus those chickens just have so much personality. And Cornish Rocks for meat.

When I was a kid and we raised poultry (chickens, ducks and geese, in the UK) for both eggs and meat and also income, they ran around free range in fields and had a stream and pond to play in and eat from. So compared to factory birds, they had a pretty great life up until they became dinner.

I still sometimes noodle with the notion of getting a few hens - for eggs and as person - I have the space, although they couldn't be free ranging. Building a large, secure coop and outdoor area would be the biggest expense, that's what holds me back.