poultry in winter: eggs
Domestic poultry don't much care for snow. The chickens prefer to stay in their plastic covered Suscovich tractor, a sort of portable green house where, even at very cold temperatures, the ground thaws most days. Turned out in the morning, the ducks make a straight line from their little house on stilts to the open water in the barnyard pond. Half-way there they stop for a moment, huddling down so their belly feathers warm their cold, webbed feet.
Turkeys that have spent the night roosting on the rail fence gallop through the powdery snow in bow-legged haste, the only birds who seem willing to risk frostbitten toes.
Since mid-January, when sunrise times began to inch backward, one minute per day, the poultry have been offering us eggs -- the more protein in their ration, the more eggs they offer. Milk is beginning to be scarce, but there are still buttermilk, and whey from soft cheeses. And now that the winter pigs have been killed, there is offal -- ground organ meats -- to add to the chickens' fermented wheat. Without these additional protein-rich foods, the take in eggs, these cold, overcast winter days, would be minimal. With the boost in protein, even our three-year-old hens are giving us breakfast eggs.
Keeping free-range poultry in the winter takes some planning; come out for our April conference and let's talk about it.