Permaculture Chickens | Foraging in the Food Forest (Daily Vlog @mountainjewel)
^^^ Video is @dlive
Hey everyone! If you saw @birdsinparadise's post yesterday you know we got some new ladies around the homestead!
@birdsinparadise writing her article last night at our homestead after a rain bringing the most beautiful fog.
view of the food forests from the gazebo
nest of eggs found this morning
We picked up 10 hens yesterday from a local chicken breeder including: Americaunas, Buff Orpingtons and Black Australorps.
one of the americaunas
We've moved around our existing chickens in a "chicken tractor" to help slowly manage the landscape. They our great allies for as they scratch and poop, they help to regenerate the soil, till it a bit and add fertilizer.
another americauna on the move
I had an idea to fence off a spot beneath our native Persimmon tree path as the persimmons weren't giving any fruit. I read up on this and they need more phosphorous and perhaps nitrogen. I bought some bone meal which we'll spread around and let the chickens scratch it in and obviously they'll add nitrogen over time as they eat and poop.
a white americauna near the chicken tractor
Join me this morning as video finding a nest of eggs from our newcomers (they still need to learn where to lay!) and show you the understory of our budding food forest beneath the native persimmons.
logain the rooster being ever-vigilant
We hope to keep the chickens here for a couple months to let the clear the understory, which will make for easier planting when we have plants ready for this section of our food forest!
two of our previous black australorps- their red combs stick out amidst the greenery
It's really cool to align with the nature of the animals we bring here and with the spaces to reduce our labor while "thinking smart" about how things can be done. We'll of course keep you updated!
here's lookin' at you!
Also I want to say that I tried for hours today to get this video up on DTube to keep up with our DTube daily to no avail. I experienced multiple errors and eventually switched to Dlive. So here is our first video uploaded using DLive!
My video is at DLive
And at YouTube.
Really great to have your chickens just out and about. We let ours run as much as we can but we can't have them in the pastures. Finding a few Easter eggs for the hogs is great protein and a great feed source but if a goat gets ahold of an egg is will cause lots of problems in their rumen. Nice looking growth you can barley see all the chickens hiding in there.
oh wow didn't know that about the goats- thanks for sharing. i bet the pigs love those little eggs :) yes ,we weren't letting ours run freely because they totally mess up our annual garden beds. this seemed like a nice solution- they're running with a lot of space and yes in some great undergrowth! but corralled enough to not do damage to the things they shouldn't touch ;)!! thanks for the resteem! :)
It's just simply fun to watch chickens searching and scratching around! Ours have been happily tearing up the slope behind our barn and helping "till" the sort-of-compost-pile. I had missed that your lovely mom was visiting you! Those fog photos are very pretty.
i agree! i sat in there for a long while today just watching them. i love it! yeah! she and my dad were here for a week in "waiting mode" as my sis may have her baby any day! love that scratching they do!! so good on the homestead (in the right areas lol!).
I agree with you! It's sooooo cool to change to a harmony mindset and to work with nature which is also much more non-violent. I deeply enjoy watching your journey unfold! Congratulations on your first Dlive post! The images of the greenery in the countryside that surrounds you seems like such s dream!! The landscape and climate are so different in your part of the world. I love how peaceful you are amidst your life. ....and those chickens bless the fluff butts of those red waddled chickens!!!
"fluff butts of those red waddled chickens" - love it! It is a great joy to see these creature do their thing and had that be of benefit to the whole. Thanks for the support and interest. The natural order of things certainly has any human-designed system beat, hands down, and we're happy to be a part of a much bigger picture than just the 2 of us. We are blessed to have so much green around us indeed!
Chickens look like they moved right in and are enjoying themselves :) Do you have any predators to worry about?
our dog really keeps them away. none to speak of! hoping it stays that way. we just fence them in/focus them on this area to keep them out of our annual gardens and away from baby perennials
Don't you guys raise chickens there? I made an incubator project for my dad couple years ago, works like a charm, every year he manages to incubate eggs and increase his chickens number.
I'd send you the project but my old computer burned the HD, I have to ask dad if he has the project, it's really simple and a good DIY one.
thanks. i'd love to see it if you can find it. no we don't raise chicks. haven't branched into that-- too much else to do! it would be cool though eventually, but perhaps even better to let them brood a bit and propagate themselves!
Absolutely, I'll ask Dad tomorrow is he still have the blueprints or pictures.
As much as I'd like to let the birds run free here, the predator load is such that we'd not have a flock in a week. So we do the best we can to get them new areas but keep them protected.
The important gardens are fenced against mammal pests, but the 37 flowerbeds would be decimated if they were allowed to roam. But not for long, the predators would clean them out...
yikes, I hear you on not letting the chickens destroy beds. We had a rough go of garlic this year cause our hens had their way with it... After that we had them in a chicken tractor I moved once or twice a day, but this new enclosure is much easier on us. plus they get good shade.
Sorry to hear your predator load is so heavy. Our dog keeps most beasts away, and we're lucky not to have many sneaky raccoons. The chicken is such a defenseless creature, it can be such a compromise to keep them healthy and happy without exposing them to predators.
I may have missed it, but I didn't know you had a dog.... It would make a difference, from what I understand.
Our predator load is such it's easier to say what we don't have: wolves, wolverines, and lynx. That, of course, doesn't include the aerial ones...
Sounds so complicated but wow theres some good earnings there??? I dont really watch many of the videos as i never seem to have the time. Good on you for making it work. I love your chookies though...soooo good for the garden. Plus.... eggies!!!!! Xxx
The upload process can be a challenge but worth it. The vids are really fluid for us and more natural as it allows some of the flavor of our lives to be shared, not just our writting. It has for sure been great so far and certainly fun to post many of the vids. Yay for chookies and eggies. We have been enjoying watching them peck, scratch and generally be chickens and it's neat to see the flock merge. Really appreciated the eggs we ate with oyster mushrooms for breakie today.
I have no idea how to do this aaaagh - the video will go but not the snap and I'm not sure how to do that. I'll try to persevere... xx
Yummmm... eggs and mushies - so good. I highly recommend garlic chives with eggs! xx
Dm me // are u doing it on your phone or comp?