TLR Newsletter

We used to sell eggs, but we ran into a problem several months ago of chickens eating their own eggs, which can be a challenging problem to deal with. Fortunately, we found a fix! By placing fake chicken eggs in their nesting boxes, chickens can't eat them like before, and the eggs they lay are mixed with unbreakable fake eggs. The pecking is reduced, as the fake eggs break the association of eggs with food, and the pecking that does occur is often on the fake eggs, reducing the likelihood that a chicken will break a real egg. We are finally getting back to the point of being able to offer eggs to our customers, but this month, half a dozen are free for our customers!

Early in our time building the farm, we used an incubator to hatch out eggs, fed the chicks a special diet, and released them once they were old enough to forage on their own. Now, our chicks are all natural, incubated, fed, and taught by their mothers. Chickens are naturally "hard workers" that spend all day hunting insects and foraging grasses and forbs. But mother hens go above and beyond, working tirelessly to protect their hatchlings, feed them naturally from the land (the mother picks up edible bits, and tosses them in front of the chicks to eat), and teaching them the layout of the farm. The chicks will be with their mother for about 2 months, at which point they form a "click" with each other (independent of their mother), and eventually they separate into pairs or trios that socialize with each other permanently.