If you’re looking for a local source for homegrown poultry and chicken, our Miami Co. Ohio homestead can help you!
We raise small (around 100) batches of chickens twice a year for meat. Small groups mean less crowding, better spacing and environment, and happier birds. We generally process in May/June, and again in Oct/Nov. Those months and the 2-3 months following that are when we are most likely to have meat available.
We raise our chicks in the barn until they are about 4-5 weeks. Then we move them out to pasture. We feed a high-quality non-GMO grain purchased at local feed mills.
Scroll on to read about our locally grown and raised poultry process.
We pick our chicks from a hatchery an hour south of us. While chicks can be shipped, picking them up makes for much healthier, stronger chicks in the long run.Chicks need heat for the first few weeks. Heat lamps are securely tied so they cannot be knocked down onto the chicks and bedding. And for the first few days, I keep the feed and water close by. As our chicks grow, we move the feeders and waterers away from the heat. This encourages the chicks to move around and not just lay in front of the feeders. It’s the nature of these birds to eat 24/7 and we’ve found that birds who move around more are less likely to die from overeating and less likely to have large fat deposits at processing. Once feathered out, we move the chicks to the outside shelter. This puts them on the grass and gives them more room to run around. We also keep the shelter under the trees, even when we move it. This helps keep the chicks cool and comfortable even in the heat.We use a moveable netted fence to give our birds even more space to move around and space their feeders and waterers out each day. They’ve grown so well and are ready for processing and the freezer in just a week!
