How fitting.....

 

Ever since our cat went missing I track down whatever it is the vultures are interested in. Been a few bucks this year, all gnawed on by coyotes. They make such a mess. Skin, fur, limbs scattered about.

I bought a "larger than a raccoon" trap today. I normally use wet catfood or tuna fish to capture raccoons. What does one use for "things bigger than a racoon"? It seems to have a separate trap in the trap for live bait which seems like a PITA.

 

100 Lb fishing line shark hook and hang a chunk of deer liver about 3 foot off the ground Roomer is this works well.

 

Next Tuesday will be 4 weeks and they will be heading to the front yard coop for there remaining 4 weeks, WOW they get big quick

 

butcher day is coming just a few more weeks

 

getting bigger

a little over a week and a half and they are off to freezer camp, it is a good thing they are killing a 50 Lb bag of food every other day.





RBB

 

Raccoons love marshmallows

 

Tomorrow is butcher day off to freezer camp for these little guys

RBB

 

What is your cost per lb of the final product between chicks, feed, and processing?

 

See post #38 for last years numbers but this year

I ordered 40 birds

$2 a bird as a chick shipped to me from TSC

= $80

2 - Bags of wood chips for the floor in the coop $6 each

= $12

7 - 50 Lb Bags of 24% chick starter @ $16 each

= $112

31 Poultry Shrink Wrap Bags @ $0.5 each

= $16

So around $220 for 31 that survived around 7 bucks a bird

@ around 6 Lbs per bird it works out to around $1.20 per Lb ish I will know better numbers after tomorrow.



RBB

 

photos from butcher day

this scored us around 170 Lbs of chicken at around $1.29 per pound



RBB

 

The best part is has it's all natural!

 

So about 2 weeks ago the amazon guy brought us this wonderful little battery powered light activated coop door probably the best 140 bucks I have wasted this year to date. Sun goes up door goes open, sun goes down door gets closed, if you are in you are in, if you are out you might make it to sun up, if the coyotes don't get you. Only one out of the thirty birds learned the hard way as the rest sat in the coop listening to the coyotes enjoy the slow learner. Have not had a problem with the birds going to bed, since that bloody night.

RBB

 

Wow! That thing is pretty cool!!

 

Well last night I pulled the trigger on 40 chicks and 10 turkeys they should be here in a week or so, 20 of the chicks are going to my Dad, and the other 20 are going to my neighbor in trade for walleye and salmon. A couple turkeys will end up in my freezer and the rest will get sold.


RBB

 

Sounds like a good deal to me!

 

45 of my 50 birds showed up on Friday some how a small box of 5 turkeys got lost in the mail. After about 100,000 calls, I found out the hatchery printed the label, stuck it to the box, sent the box to the post office, where the workers processed most of my order and then decided " Well that one can wait till Monday " The Hatchery said yep they do that to us all the time I will send you out another batch of turkeys next Monday. To date we have lost 3 of the chickens, found them dead in the coop sometimes they just kill over for no real reason, the rest of them look great though running around playing in the wood chips.

 

10 more turkeys just showed up in the mail we now have 15 turkeys and 37 chickens the chickens are all spoken fore but we will have around 9 or 10 turkeys for sale in around 16 weeks


RBB

 

So just a quick up date the birds are 4 weeks old and it is time for then to move to the yard where they will have lots of bugs and grass to eat. Friday after work was moving day they are so excited to have more space and be out of the coop. Unfortunately with the thunder storms the other night they got scared and trampled another one of the turkeys, I am now down to 9 turkeys remaining. The massive difference in size between the chickens and the young turkeys is a little more than double and that second batch of turkeys were doomed from the get go.

 

We just introduced our chicklets to our chickens yesterday. 9 weeks old.

 

butcher date is right around the corner

 

How big is your chicken tractor. I got 20 meat birds right now and I put them in my 16X16 run but I'd rather tractor them.

 

This Saturday is Butcher Day, if anyone wants to swing by and help out, I am all about teaching anyone that wants to learn, especially if you want to teach your kids "where food comes from" we will be starting around 7 and should be wrapping up around noon.




RBB

 

This Saturday is Butcher Day, if anyone wants to swing by and help out, I am all about teaching anyone that wants to learn, especially if you want to teach your kids "where food comes from" we will be starting around 7 and should be wrapping up around noon.




RBB

I'll honk when I drive past on my way to St. Clair for the boat races.

 

So for butcher day we had 3 adults and 3 kids show up to help, I think everyone learned a thing or two, which was my main goal of inviting anyone that wanted to come out and learn. As for the birds we had 35 to butcher with a total weight of 227 Lbs with a average of 6.5 Lbs each. My Dad got to teach my daughter how to butcher her first bird, I think she did 4 or 5 of then buy the end of the day. Our first bird through the butcher station went right to the smoker for an afternoon snack. All of the volunteers got to take a bird home and hopefully a memory or two of that Saturday.

I know I suck at getting photos but I was running around in circles trying to keep the production line moving. We had a great group of workers and plenty of laughs all morning.

 

these guys have 2 more weeks before freezer camp they are starting to get BIG

If any wants one let me know, I can send details


RBB

 

So Saturday was butcher day 8 birds totaling 148 Lbs of meet went to freezer camp, between Friends and Family we sold 7 of them keeping the 23# guy for our family. After some modifications to my plucker we tried a couple on the spinning wheel of death but it was almost impossible to hold on to that critter, so after the third one we just plucked them buy hand. With the 3 of us grabbing and pulling we could hand pluck it in about 3 to 5 minutes.

They sold for $6 /# for a total of $780 with a couple customers rounding up or not wanting there change. For the first 8 weeks these guys ate the chickens food but for the last 8 weeks. The little Man has been feeding them Turkey feed, with an initial cost of $80 for 10 birds and $200 in feed for the last 8 weeks, he turned a $500 profit off this batch of birds and supplied our table with a free 23# bird for Thanksgiving.