Tag Archives: Eggs

2012 October Farm Day

Farm Day was a hit at Shady Grove Ranch! We had a small group, which was lovely for taking our time and having plenty of interesting conversations about sustainable agriculture. Once everyone had arrived, we loaded up onto the hayride to collect eggs. Matt hooked us up to the tractor, and away we went!

We had all the workers and the egg baskets. Toby, the farm dog, decided to join us.

What lovely weather here in East Texas that day!

Once we arrived in style at the chicken paddock, everyone headed over to the Egg Mobile to see some truly pasture-raised egg-laying chickens.

A couple of our older helpers grabbed the egg baskets, and Bailey showed them how to collect eggs without breaking them. It worked moderately well…

The chickens were busy foraging for breakfast while we were collecting ours. Shady Grove Ranch eggs are produced by non-medicated chickens that have a soy-free, GMO-free diet primarily based on forage. We give them a new quarter-acre paddock every week.

There is no helper too small at Shady Grove Ranch! These two helpers peer into the ventilated nest boxes in search of white, brown, and green eggs.

Next it was time to move the broiler chickens. More helpers! Their job was to encourage the chickens toward the front of the mobile pens while Matt pulled them to fresh pasture during their daily move. Clapping usually does the trick.

The kids observe the chickens happily pecking away at their new salad bar. They get a new one every morning.

Then it was time to see the beef cows. Matt tells us about his breeding and grazing strategies. Raising well-marbled, delicious grass-fed beef is all about good genetics and proper rotational management.

The best part about sustainable farming is that it is safe (relatively speaking) and kid-friendly because there are no chemicals, and the animals are not stressed. One of our visitors meets Bulls-Eye, one of our finest heifers. She should calve sometime before spring.

Gordita, our matron cow who has given us two beautiful heifers, came to check out the hayride and its occupants. Maybe she wanted to taste the hay.

She was a little too shy to come close enough to munch, but Toby decided to get in on the action and get a nice warm rub-down.

Pretty soon, he was totally buried.

Toby just loves to be loved. He makes a great farm dog.

.We enjoyed our time with our visitors! We hope to have more farm days in order to share our work and our passion for raising real food. Join us next time!

ETBU Students Visit Shady Grove Ranch

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Last week we were able to welcome some students from East Texas Baptist University (ETBU) who are interested in learning about sustainable food production. Earlier this summer, Dr. Cassie Falke contacted me about bringing some of her students to the ranch to learn a little bit more about the connection between people and food. We love to share what we do, and what better way for someone to learn about food than to help produce it? They gave up their Saturday sleep-in time to have a chance to share in our labor on a typical morning. Here are some photos of their adventure at Shady Grove Ranch.

First we relocated the laying hens. Their nest house is mobile, so while the girls leap-frogged the nets to an adjacent paddock, Matt moved the house with the tractor. Afterward we explained some of the Egg-Mobile’s functions, such as roost space, shade, predator cover, and nest boxes. It was too early in the day to collect eggs, but we had plenty of other chores to do!

Left to right: Krystin, Melissa, Dr. Falke, and Esther meet one of the older chickens up close.

Shevi is always excited for an opportunity to touch the infamous electric fence. His favorite question is, “Fence off? I’d like to touch it.”

Our next stop was to check on the turkeys. Along the way, we showed the students a common weed that we are dealing with. We call it “goatweed,” but even goats won’t eat it, which says a lot. It is really called Hogwort or Wooly Croton (Croton capitatus). Poor or bare soil will tend to grow lots of weeds in attempt to keep the soil from eroding. But if the weeds are not managed properly, they will shade out grasses and take over. Being a no-chemical farm, we manage our weeds mechanically—either by mowing or by pulling them up by hand. I offered Charlie, Dr. Falke’s son, a chance to earn some money during his visit. A penny per goatweed was our deal. He started yanking! He ended up with over 100 weeds, and I offered to pay him in eggs, which he was thrilled about. He got to choose his own out of the henhouse—a blue one and a brown one!

We arrived at the turkeys and refreshed their feed and water. I caught one of then hens to let her meet our visitors. Charlie got to pet a turkey!

Next we were off to the broilers to move them to new pasture. We explained some of the challenges we face with pasture-raised chicken, including weather, predators, and labor requirements. They jumped in immediately to help. Step 1 is to remove the water bowls and feed troughs to the new location. Melissa and Charlie helped with that as Matt positioned the dolly at the back of the pen.

Jermaca was in charge of keeping the chickens away from the back of the pen during the move so that none of the birds would get run over. Matt’s hat doubles as a chicken-herder, so she borrowed that and made effective use of it.

Laura, Esther, and Krystin watered the groups after they were moved.

Esther made friends with Zeke, our livestock guardian dog, and kept him company while we moved his chickens. He loves visitors, as long as they only have 2 legs!

As we do with all our visitors, we warned the ETBU’ers about the electric fence. They got curious what it feels like, so Matt showed them how to test it with a piece of grass. Kristin was among the brave ones.

Jermaca and Laura laugh about the experiment. Charlie is thinking he’d like to try it, too, but just isn’t sure. He ended up getting first-hand experience later down at the pig paddock, except he got the real thing!

Finally, it was time to check on the beef cows. Matt demonstrates how docile his cattle are. His favorite group is the bulls because they are the most interactive. Don’t try this at home unless you’re 6’5″ and have really heavy boots.

We had a great talk with the girls at the end of their visit, discussing what part college students might play in changing their food culture. I asked the question, “Does food production matter to you?” One of the girls had chosen to be a lacto-ovo-vegetarian because of the factory farming practices that abound in the meat industry. Another of the girls wondered what she could do as a college student. It was a rich time of conversation about a very real issue in our country—one that covered the topics of reproductive health, environmental protection, weight management, nutrition, and humane stewardship of our animal resources.

Some of the ideas we discussed were to shop at farmers markets for their non-cafeteria meals. Perhaps they could get involved with their school’s decision-making committees and vote for organic and/or local options for their cafeteria. I encouraged them to take small steps forward. Any step a person takes in the right direction is better than what they were doing yesterday. It doesn’t require a total overnight transformation to make a difference in the way food is produced in our country. One meal, one drink, one bite, can be a step toward positive change.

I hope that by seeing a direct-to-consumer small family farm they will be encouraged to think about their food choices and begin to build their eating habits around sustainable, local, and organic. We are excited to see college students get involved with real food!

How we do Soy-Free Pasture-Raised Eggs

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At long last, we finally have a chance to tell you about our new EggMobile, built during the visit of some of our relatives that visit each spring to help us with ongoing work projects.

Laying chickens have very specific and unique needs that must be fulfilled in order for them to live long, productive and happy lives. One of the things that makes Shady Grove Ranch different is that we keep our hens on pasture in a mobile pen. Contrasted with most other egg operations, which keep hens on one piece of ground continually, our mobile strategy allows the poultry manure to remain the asset that it was created to be, and it is spread across pasture with immensely less labor than would be required if the hens were in a permanent pen. It also allows the hens access to fresh new forage throughout their lives, which of course, results in delicious, nutrient-dense eggs. It’s a win-win situation!

We will walk you through our pasture-raised laying chicken operation. We have an assortment of breeds, mostly for the fun of having multi-colored eggs. But various breeds bring various traits into our operation. Some lay big giant eggs. Some are good setters, meaning they like to raise their own young (this will be good when we are ready to start hatching our own replacement hens). Some are wonderful foragers. And some are remarkably dependable egg producers.

In the picture you see, there are Barred Rock, Rhode Island Red, Americauana, Buff Orpington, Australorp, and Leghorn hens. They are out looking for bugs, seeds, and grasses on a lovely August morning.

Chickens need continual access to water, especially in the hot months in Texas. We use gravity-fed bell-style poultry waterers that keep their water as fresh and clean as is possible around chickens. If you’ve ever raised chickens, you know what we mean.

Chickens also need shade. Since we move their paddock around, we don’t always have access to trees. That’s what the extra-large roof on the Egg-Mobile is for. During the middle of the day, the hens often bed down in the cool grass under here to wait until the sun goes down a bit before going back out to forage.

In Texas, we have found that almost all animals need an external source of cooling in the summer months. We discovered a very low water usage mister system and placed one under the roof of the EggMobile. It’s made a huge difference in mortality rate of our hens during the summer. Not to mention egg production stays more consistent!

Hens are capable of making their own nests, but for production purposes, we want them to use the ones we provide. A hen needs to feel secure enough to rest for the hour or so that it takes to comfortably lay her egg. However, we have found that keeping the hens too secure and too warm makes them want to sit and hatch the eggs. So they sit, and they don’t eat or drink or lay any more eggs while they wait for their “clutch” to hatch. The way we decided to encourage them was to build nests with two solid walls and one wall that appears solid but allows significant light and air circulation into the box to keep the hen cool and aware and prevent her going into “broody fever.” It sure beats dunking the hens in cold water for 3 days straight! That works, too, but it’s a little violent…

Here’s a shot of the back of the boxes. You can see the chicken silhouettes in the boxes.

To help the birds get up to their boxes, we provided some stairs.

Chickens feel especially secure when they don’t have to sleep on the ground (No, they don’t sleep in their boxes. That would result in very dirty eggs!) Here are their roosts, staggered so the poop drops onto the ground during the night, not onto the lower hens!

We provide all our critters, including the chickens, with salt. In Texas heat, the heavy water intake of animals must be balanced by having a good supply of salt and minerals.

Laying hens need a good amount of calcium to produce all those nice strong shells. They do get a large amount of minerals from the bugs and pasture they consume, but depending on the season, they may need some additional help, provided in the form of crushed coral and oyster shell.

Chickens are omnivorous and need a source of animal protein. Bugs are a major part of this, but we also supplement raw milk as much as possible. It’s a great probiotic, too. They LOVE it!

To ensure that our hens get the nutrition they need so they don’t become weak or resort to cannibalism, we supplement a soy-free, non-GMO peanut-based feeds that is locally milled. It’s pelletized so the chickens don’t waste it and so that they get a complete ration and don’t sort the feed.

Matt moves the EggMobile about once a week, providing the chickens with a new paddock surrounded by electric net fencing. It’s pretty labor intensive, but worth it for the great eggs we get in return.

On to the new paddock!

All for lovely, pasture-raised eggs…