PayPal Button

Last night I added a PayPal button to the left hand side of the blog post. Here is a rundown of how purchasing a bird from us works.

1. Deposit
We cannot guarantee that we won't run out of birds. Last year we ran out of turkeys, we could have sold a lot more than we raised. With that in mind if you want a bird, your best chance to ensure that you get one is to put a deposit down, today.

2. Shipping
We don't ship. If you live local and are willing to come fetch your bird, then go ahead and put your deposit down.

3. Poultry Types
We sell two types of birds: Turkeys and Broiler Chickens. Broiler Chickens are fat balls of feathers and muscle. We are Free Ranging them for half their life so the leg meat will be a little larger this year than last year. The turkeys we raise are Mammoth Bronze and because we Free Range/Pasture them for the bulk of their life they will have equal amounts of dark and white meat.

4. Ready Dates
The Broiler Chickens will be ready mid to late June. It all depends on when my husband has time to process them. We will be doing a second batch of Broiler Chickens to be ready closer to fall so if you miss out this first time you will have a second chance. The turkeys will be ready before Thanksgiving. We will call you when we know an exact day and when you can pick them up.

5. Pricing

• Broiler Chickens (before deposit) are a flat rate of $15, unless it is larger than 6lbs and then it is $3/per pound
• Turkeys (before deposit) are $3/per pound. Last year the turkeys ranged from 14-22lbs (maybe some were  a little heavier too). When you come pick up your turkey, you also may choose which one you take home.
• The deposit amount is credited to you when you pick up your bird. So for a Broiler Chicken on pick up day your bird will cost you $5 (or more if your bird is huge) if you have put down a $10 deposit.

6. Taste

We did a taste test during our open house in March. I was nervous about it, what if our chicken didn't taste better? I will have a whole blog post dedicated to that experiment by the end of May 2014.

6AM

These are the images I wanted to have accompany my last blog post, but the day I wrote the post it was cloudy and yucky. The next day, the day of these images the sun was perfect. When I getup and do chores, it is my favorite part of the morning. The sun is so warm, the air so clean, and all the poultry so happy to greet the morning. 

If you are wondering how our flocks are doing, they are growing. We have twelve new chicks in the kitchen. The library hatched chicks for the second year and I told the librarian that we were interested in taking a few. She called me and asked if I'd take all twelve. They camp from a farm, laid naturally, and kept in an incubator. My Dad read that we have a 50/50 chance of them being roosters. If they are roosters then they will probably end up in the crock pot. I'm hoping that at least half are layers, they are going to be so pretty. 

The ducklings are growing so fast! They are huge! The broilers are nearing the end of their growth. It looks like we won't get a chance to get this batch outside. Hopefully the next batch will go out. We have fences to move and poles to place. And turkeys are coming next month! The chickens in the photo are the "Sixers" they are so fast! We are looking forward to putting all of our chickens together in a month. Our flock will be huge then!

What We've Been Doing

Things are a little hectic on the farm these days. Winter would not let go when we wanted it to and the chicks arrived before the snow was gone. Half of the birds are not where we want them to be. The ducks are in a tote in the kitchen and the new layers are in the broilers "new" coop.

We started the spring the six new layers in a box in the kitchen. We purchased six new ones because we lost a few chickens over the winter; one due to illness and another due to what we think was a birth defect, plus the original Rhode Island Reds are not laying as well. Recently we put the six new chicks where the broilers will be. 

The Broilers also arrived (and spent a brief two weeks in the kitchen) but have since been moved out the brood box in the barn. They will be ready for processing in less than two months.

The Coop Plan for this year: last years turkey coop will become this years layer coop. There are a few modifications that need to be made to the coop. Dad will make a man door and devise a way to add boxes for the chickens to lay eggs in. The fencing will be re-organized to make the turkey yard and most of the current chicken yard into one large yard. Moving the fencing will make the old chicken yard smaller so that the broilers can have a small outdoor space, but not so large that they won't gain the muscle weight required for a meat bird. We are hoping that with an outdoor space to run in the broilers will have larger drumsticks and thighs.

We have ducklings in the kitchen that will hopefully be moved to the blueberry bushes (so they are fenced in) before they are moved to the brood pen in preparation for taking over the pond. And what will happen to the current ducks? We are replacing them. We want friendly ducks, and the two in the pond are not friendly. We've been handling the ducklings a lot and it seems to be working. 

Thankfully we are waiting to get turkeys until summer, because some fencing still needs to repaired, purchased, and put up. 

In addition to all that going on. Dad bred two rabbits and a bunny (for those who don't know around here rabbits are food and bunnies are pets) so in a few short weeks we should have cute fuzzy things!

Not to mention that the garden is finally free of snow!

I have been knitting like a woman possessed. I decided that I would knit Stomper and Our Sweetie matching vests for Easter. The Saturday night before Easter found me weaving in ends. I cannot believe I finished them! In between knitting the two vests I've been working on a test knit. They are this really beautiful pair of fingerless gloves The gloves feature a cable that starts on the forearm and winds around to the top of the wrist. It's really neat. I was able to knit one before I had to set them aside to finish the vests. I will post pictures as soon as I can find a model.

For April vacation we have the teenagers. It was great to have them around for Mimi's annual Easter Egg Hunt. This year she prepared, and Jason and his brother-in-law hid, 300 eggs. The kids had a blast finding them.

Hope your spring is going well too!

Before the Storm

When it is warm enough we have afternoon snack outside. We see no sense in being in when it is nice out!

The season may be over, but football training never ends.

I took a few "before" shots, before the next series of snow rolls through.

No, we don't cage the cat. My Mom opened the bunny's cage door (she's wintering in the barn) to give the cats someplace snow free to hang out. Apparently the cat (Hinata) likes pretending to be a bunny.

White Blanket

When we went to bed last night it was snowing. When we woke up this morning we were greeted with a small layer of snow on the ground. It's just enough snow to make things messy while driving, delay school, make snowballs for the dog to chase, and build a few snowmen. Its pretty much the best way to start the morning. 

Today Jason took the day off to process the broilers and the layers. The broilers have reached their full size and so today he will process all twenty-two of them. It has been a short nine weeks with these chickens. At times it's been a little rough raising them in the cold of the fall. A few times when we've gone down to tend them they've been a little chilly and we've needed to add more warming lights for them. 

We are culling over half our laying flock today too. They aren't keeping up their end of the bargain, by laying enough eggs to pay for their grain. We will keep the seven hens we bought this year in addition to Charcoal the Rooster, and Twig the Broody Hen. In the spring we will purchase more laying hens. 

We are keeping Twig in hopes that she will raise the new chicks for us. We have a neighbor who let their hen sit on a bunch of eggs for the appropriate amount of weeks, and then slipped day old chicks under her. She then raised the chicks herself. If that works than we can do the same thing with her and broilers too and raise meat birds any time of the year.

The ducks don't mind the snow. This is their second year with snow. They waddle around the barnyard looking for scraps and morsels. There isn't much for them to eat under the snow, but they persist. It's quite entertaining to watch them dig in the snow with their bills.

In addition to all the chicken processing Jason's Dad hit a small deer with his truck on Friday. The deer is hanging in our garage waiting to be made into ground venison. Looks like the freezer is going to be full this winter. God certainly provides!

Around Here

We've been keeping busy around the farm. Between picking up pears, peeling pears, canning pears, and eating pears we've been making salsa, playing with our turkeys, and receiving a new batch of broilers in the mail. Nothing like a little work to make your day go faster!

Stomper loves pears. He eats four a day when he's outside. It's a treat for me to watch him pick one up from the ground and just take a big bite. The pears have really cut down on the grocery bill! The turkeys really like the pears too. If we throw just one in they will chase each other to get it! It's pretty funny. I feel certain that one of the reasons God gave us animals was for entertainment purposes. We love to watch our turkeys run. Mom thinks they look prehistoric and I agree!

We bought a second batch of broilers. Our freezer has one chicken left in it, we are saving it for our Harvest Party in November. Mom has a chicken soup recipe she wants to try and it will be perfect for our harvest celebration!

This week-end marked the first day in preparing for a new adventure. Dad would like to try and raise sheep. The first step is to clear the field. We rented a bush hog and set aside two days to cut, trim, and clear the field. The men managed to clear about half the field. The rest they will work on as they have time. Maybe, just maybe, in a year we will have sheep!

Turkey Race

Post by Hamberg Family Farm.

Turkeys and Apples

A local farmer allowed us to pick up some dropped apples from under his trees. The turkeys thought they had died and gone to heave.

Good Morning

Good morning, how about a little tour and update? We have a few new faces around the farm. The sun was perfect this morning and so after chores I took my camera out to take a few snapshots. 

You can see one of the four Toms slightly puffed up on the far right. Yes, you read that right, four toms. Out of nine turkeys we figure that four of them are male. Daily they strut their stuff to figure out who is boss, but they don't fight. We are hoping that Thanksgiving will come before they feel like fighting. Otherwise we will deal with them accordingly.

The pumpkins are growing, but we did not get as many as we wanted. Dad was really hoping for enough to let the daycare kiddos come out and pick their own. It looks like we will have just enough for our own needs. Jason's grandfather (who is an exceptional gardener) says that his didn't do too well either and wonders if we wound up with too many male plants. 

This is our rooster, Charcoal. Neighbors down the street from us had two roosters and didn't want any fights and asked if we'd like one. We were hoping to get a rooster in the batch of six that we bought this spring and so we happily said "Yes." Little Sister named him Charcoal after the black plumes on his tail. He is adjusting well to having so many ladies to himself, but he has not asserted himself yet over the older twelve hens.

This last month we added in the new six layers, the rooster, and removed a chicken who was pecking the others and it stressed out our flock quite a bit. They aren't laying as much as they used to, but they still are laying. We are getting between 6-9 eggs a day which is just enough for us to eat and sell a few on the side. Hopefully in the next week everyone will relax and get back to laying. The six new hens won't be laying until mid-September or early October.

The hens have not reduced their pen to dirt which has surprised us. They don't eat everything in sight either. The turkeys will eat everything down to stubble, but it seems like our hens are a little more picky. It has been interesting to learn which birds will eat what. For instance: the turkeys devour apples, the chickens just peck at them and the chickens devour bread while the turkeys just peck at them. Also the turkeys don't put themselves to bed a night we have to go out and encourage them into their coop, but the chickens go in as soon as the sun goes down.

 

This is Kee-La-La, Elle's kitty. The kitty is living here on the farm until my brother and his wife find a new apartment. She isn't too sure about the farm animals or my dog Vinnie. This morning she called me to her and I obliged in pets and rubs.

The garden is doing all right. We got sidetracked with our trip to MI and NY and then the wedding so it didn't get tended to well. We have a nice crop of tomatoes and I will be making salsa this year and some spaghetti sauce. It will be a nice change to do some canning around here. The pear trees are loaded so we will also be making tons of pear sauce. We have really missed pear sauce over the last year, since last years crop didn't do so great. We cannot complain since we don't prune, spray, or pick them, just let nature take its course.

This has been a summer of change and loss for us. Little Sisters kitty passed away in the beginning of the summer and her bunny passed away this week. One evening Jason came home with the above bunny for the daycare kiddos. The kids really enjoyed feeding Sara bunny so I thought it would be nice to continue to keep a bunny for them. Jason's bosses kids participate in 4H and one of the boys raises bunnies. He gave this one to us. Mom named her York Peppermint Patty.

I hope your day is lovely. I'm off to check for eggs and make lunch!