Saturday, March 6, 2010

Third Week Chicks


Another week for the chicks. None were lost last week, which is awsome. Added a screened window to the brooder to allow vapors to leave. The chicks have been scratching the deep bedding well. Manure has mixed through the layers of sawdust instead of becoming capped and wet on top. Pretty happy about that. Tomorrow morning though they are going to get a few inches of fresh sawdust. A lot of the chicks look like they have ruffled feathers. Generally not a good sign. It can mean they are stressed, lacking something in diet, in need of sun, etc. So I want to start with some new bedding, put in a uv daylight for the day. I have been feeding them vegetable cuttings from the college: tomatoes and watermellon today. They run away from it at first, and then make idle pecks at the pieces until they realize they are edible.

Next week going to work on opening up the brooder in the day so that there will be even more airflow, and for the ability of the chicks to come out to an unheated alcove. I want to acclimate them away from the lights continuously, and let them get some real light, winder and air now. Still nervous because this is the first time I am starting chicks in the winter. So far going well. I check on them everynight before I go to bed. Allows me to sleep through the night without worrying.

Future plans: The chickens have been an asset on the farm, and I would like to see their presence continue and increase. (both layers and meat birds) So I was in the barn today, and realized that the roof is taking on at least some water- the sheathing was damp. So at some point the roof will have to be replace. Not the biggest deal. I can at least give it a pitch now, but if I am going to go through that trouble, then I might as well jack part of the building up, knock out the westward foundation, and dig in a walk out basement. And if I am going through that trouble then I might as well take down the westward wall, extend the South/North walls by about twenty feet, have a hell of a basement in the barn, and get that much more in the barn. And if I am going to go through that....

The idea is to build an area to house pigs underneath the barn. The land is sloped so that a walkout basement would not be terribly difficult to do. The barn drains into this area already. I'd like to rework the drainage so that it will empty into a cistern instead of making a wet field area. This will give an awsome farrowing area of piglets under the barn. If the concrete is poured so it slopes gently southward, then their pens/living area will be dry. The upstairs of the barn will be mostly for hay storage. However, I want the south facing part of the barn to be used for the chicken brooder. We'll start nearly a thousand birds this year. We're getting to a number of birds where it is unrealistic to rely upon the same housing as when we started batches of 100. Additionally, when you start a lot of birds your overhead gets divided by that much more. For example, if it costs 2,000 to do the brooder conversion in the barn, then that cost gets divided by the 1000 birds we need to raise, and the extra 500-1000 we'd like to sell each year. The costs get spread out very quickly.

I think we do well on our farm because we realize how to cut costs while still staying productive, and then passing those savings onto our (beloved) customers. i.e. I had two pigs that were not growing well. Instead of pushing them, and having expensive pork, we sold them to a family at a lower price. They got inexpensive pork, we were relieved of a burden. We use the same halfway house for our meat birds and pullets to save money/get high quality birds. We start extra chicks in the spring in fall, two seasons where we want extra manure for fields/gardens, and rotate the poultry through field/garden areas. We save on fertilizer, and the CSA sees that in the price of the vegetables. It works.

Anyways, I want to build the seed starting greenhouse on the south face of the barn. This way we're collecting a solar mass to help heat the brooder, and give the chicks real sunlight. Secondly, we can use the same woodboiler or propane burner to heat both the seed start house and the brooder. That way also the two areas that I'll be working with, at the same time of the year, will be adjacent. Also, if there is a heating/power problem then the backup can be used for both.

No comments:

Post a Comment