Now that we own a feed store, we have lots and lots and lots of chicken feed.
Problem: we no longer own any chickens!
We got rid of our last few chickens over a year ago, after repeated predator attacks.
We went from about 20 birds to 5 in a couple of weeks, and I quickly gave the rest of the flock away before the mysterious nocturnal marauder returned. My guess is that it was a bobcat. Somehow, it kept pulling birds under the wire fencing.
We were so busy with other things – gardening and the nursery in particular – that we didn’t have time to turn our chicken coop into a predator-proof enclosure.
If I could live like Florida Bullfrog and raise free-range survival chickens, I would. We love the idea. Yet our lives revolve round gardening and our plant nursery. Free-range chickens would wreak havoc on both if they free-ranged.
But now we have a warehouse full of feed. And grains that regularly spill. This means we could affordably feed a flock of birds.
This morning I had a thought.
Why not put a chicken coop and run right at the store?
They’d live their best lives now!
All the faded vegetable transplants, food scraps from employees, spilled grains… they’d have it all.
Plus, kids would enjoy watching them. And we’d get basically free eggs.
As a bonus, the town should be much less prone to predators.
Anyhow, that’s the big idea for this week. We have lots of feed, a good bit of waste, and nothing to feed it to.
Chickens could solve it all!
Also, if you’re in the area and have chickens, we have a wide range of affordable chicken feed at the store, from non-GMO to organic to conventional.
8 comments
Na man, get geese instead you can still feed them chicken feed, but most of the year you dont even have to feed them. I also havent had really any problems with predators if I have a fence to keep out dogs and coyotes. They breed once a year and the meat is delicious. If you want Im happy to give some. They pretty much take care of themselves.
Geese – at the shop?!
I like the idea of geese, but I don’t think they would be good at the store. I need containable fowl.
I bet geese would do wonderfully at our homestead, though. But they might wreck my plant nursery with their grazing.
Ha youre right. I didnt scan the part about this being at your store. They would definitely not fit there.
I had a bobcat visit last summer, (I saw it multiple times!), and while it left lots of scratches in the sand trying to get at the birds, it wasn’t successful.
Raccoons… on the other hand, repeatedly killed chickens through the fencing, even dismantling the bird to pull it through the wire.
Belt and suspenders was the solution… work on varmint proofing the chicken fortress, and trap the raccoons and possums decimating the flock…
Congrats on the feed store.
It may be a raccoon, then. We have seen some evidence (foot prints in a nearby drainage ditch, about 1000 ft from the chickens).
Belt and suspenders is the answer to most homesteading problems.
Raccoons and possums are just as bad in town as they are out in the sticks… So… You’ll have to secure the birds at the feed store too.
I have a pic of a gate where the raccoon went between the metal fencing attached to the gate, and the frame of the gate… Those raccoons… are as capable as squirrels…
Makes sense – we’ll make sure it’s tight. Especially since we aren’t at the shop at night.
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