Author: Steve Hardin

Sasquatch assist.

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Who do you call when you need to open the barn first thing in the morning?  You call sasquatch!  No longer having a child at home has allowed certain clothing restrictions to loosen when it comes to errands first thing in the morning.  I can positively state that is not freezing outside yet. 

Sasquatch to the rescue.  

Annmarie grabbed my cell phone and rushed upstairs to our bedroom to catch this elusive creature on a digital image.  May many more assists happen in the future. 

I am still trying to catch the chicken killer.  Yesterday, I placed an egg in the trap and thought it had gotten eaten but no it had just been moved.  Tonight I baited the trap with some squirrel food.  I know it is a raccoon.  I found footprints down by the front ditch in the soft dirt this morning.  Now that it knows there is chicken inside that wooden structure it will come back every night looking for a way inside.  I found a couple of rocks that had been rolled out of the way so a tunnel was open underneath the chicken coop.  The raccoons did this a couple of years ago also.  The war has begun and I am to finish it. 

Predators 3, farm 0

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It has begun. War has been declared and I did not even fire the first shot. When your chicken yard looks like a feather pillow exploded it is never a good sign. I know why this happened, I started to like a certain breed over the rest. Both Annmarie and I really like the brahma chickens. They are pretty, mellow and fun to watch. I only had three white ones and two buff colored ones survive the brooder this year. I found the wings only of one, a whole body dead one and no body for the third one. This sucks as I really liked them.  The two buff colored ones are still alive, I saw them after investigating the feather explosion. I am suspecting a raccoon. I set the live trap but I had to bait it with horse treats as I could not find the sunflower seeds. I will try and pickup some sunflower seeds on Friday. The best part of the seeds is the cats don’t eat them so it cuts down on extra animals in the trap. 

I let the cows into the car area. Unfortunately, I did not stake the panel nearest to the oak tree. Our bull lifted the panel and then popped it open and pushed the tree over so they could eat the leaves off the tree. I came home the next day and staked up the tree. Put some tree wrap around the tree and tied it up to the stake.  I put in three T posts and then put in a second fence three feet out from the first one!  It should now be cow proof!   I have high hopes that the tree will snap back and survive this heinous assault. 

I have started discing the upper prime field. I would like to get it planted but it needs to be ready for seeding. I keep getting distracted from this job. My third load this summer. It needs to go to the back deck but it keeps getting pushed back.  
I need to concentrate on my battle plans for eradicating the chicken killer!

Last of the gravel.

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stepping pad so the gate can open and you don’t have to stand in the mud.

I went out and did a few things with the tractor yesterday.  I had left it in the middle of the driveway with a bucket load of gravel.  I had a little bit of gravel left, about 1 yard, and used it to make a stepping spot so you can get off the concrete and open the new fence gate.  I also made a walkway so you can get to the barn lot gate without getting muddy.  I really do hope it is going to rain soon and this will be a needed feature.  The barn lot gets sloppy but I am hoping the gutters and downspout and drain make this much better.  Only actual rain for a few days and weeks will really make it known if this is the fix or else I need another ditch on this side of the barn with another drain line down to the front ditch.  We would like the area to not be a solid mud pit, but it is just a little soil over an entire rock bluff so not a lot of natural drainage. 

I forgot to shut the chicken run human door and the horses pushed it open and went into the run.  The only real problem with this is the door will shut behind them and then they are stuck!  I went out to get eggs and there they were stuck.  The funny part is they cannot get to any chicken food just the grass in the run.  They went out with a little coaxing. 

 

Gravel walkway to the barn lot so you can stay out of the mud and still see the horses.

Chicken financials for the first nine months of 2015.

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On average I had 21.4 laying hens giving me 9.3 eggs/day for a productivity rate of 44% (no change in productivity.  I have not changed my collection methods).  I am feeding on average 150# chicken feed/month for a grand total of 1350# this year already (I have started to chase house finches out of the chicken coop, sometimes there is 30 of them in there!  They are eating a lot of the food, I need to hang some clear acrylic strips on the inside of the chicken door so the chickens can push through but the finches cannot fly into the coop).     My monthly feed bill is $35.75/month (almost a $2/month decrease).  My feed costs are $1.58/doz (35 cent/doz decrease since last report) with my total cost of production $2.05/doz (a 36 cent increase in cost since last quarter, attributed to another dozen baby chicks I purchased with very poor outcome).  My chickens are consuming 0.53lbs food/egg produced and it is costing me $0.13/egg in feed, this is great and hopefully I can keep my feed costs down. I have collected 1694 eggs to date (142 less than last quarter, poor collection and breakage issues, Sarah was in boot camp this entire time.  I am the only egg collector now, I really need to get more timely).  Total feed costs are $322, supply expenses are kicking in, new chicks for a total of $111, I purchased another dozen chicks this quarter. .  I currently have a profit of $243 (finally  $20/month for labor) for the year. I use my fancy chicken spread sheet.  It seems like every year I find something that needs to be added.  There are a couple of calculations that need to be changed.  It doesn’t count chick purchases as an expense against the chicken.  I had to make notes and now see if I can get Annmarie to make the changes.  Until that time I will continue to do the math myself. 

Chicken financials for first half of the year.

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I decided it was time to catch up on some accounting this weekend.  I am on the last day of my vacation and am trying to get all caught up.

On average I had 21.5 laying hens giving me 9.4 eggs/day (I had a couple of mysterious deaths of some unknown illness), for a productivity rate of 44% (I like to be over 50% during the summer but I am getting some egg breakage because I am not getting eggs every day.  I need to improve my egg collection timeliness).  I am feeding on average 158# chicken feed/month for a grand total of 950# this year already (50# of this is baby food for the new chicks, which I just throw in here as an expense for feed.  ).  The ton of food I bought from BiMart is still going strong.  I don’t expect to buy any more till next year.    My monthly feed bill is $37.64/month (only a 30 cent increase over lst quarter).  My feed costs are $1.93/doz with my total cost of production $1.69/doz (a 24 cent decrease in cost since last quarter).  My chickens are consuming 0.56lbs food/egg produced and it is costing me $0.13/egg in feed, this is great and hopefully I can keep my feed costs down. I have collected 1694 eggs to date (268 more than last quarter).  Total feed costs are $226, supply expenses are kicking in, I purchased bedding and new chicks for a total of %80.  I am keeping with the new charge of $4/doz I started last year.  I am not going to raise the prices.  I don’t see me making as much as last year, but I am now covering expenses so I will let it ride for now.   I currently have a profit of $138 (an increase of only $54 for the last quarter, not even $20/month for labor) for the year.  My expenses for babies will be more this year because I kept killing them in the brooder for some reason.  Annmarie thinks I was getting them too hot, so modifications will need to be made next year.