2021 was a busy year for lots of the world and here on Green Journal Homestead – we finally started a house! The plan had been originally to move into the trailer on the property and fix it up. Quickly we discovered that on the old 1970s trailer, homeowners insurance was going to be impossible. We spent the next few years trying to go through options that gave us the most control over the process. We looked into having an existing house moved to the property but those aren’t always available or close enough to safely move. We thought about maybe another mobile home but they don’t allow for the ..read more

We wanted our chickens and rabbits to have lots of time on grass but we can’t have them running loose on the homestead. Fencing off large chunks of the property isn’t really an option either. So we figured a chicken tractor would be the best way to go. And when it’s not in use for chickens, it can be used for rabbit litters to grow out. One key thing we did to make it rabbit friendly was put some fencing on the bottom. It is wide enough for grasses and clover to be reached but not so wide that the rabbits can dig through. It does make it a little tricky for chick feet. Have to move the tractor ..read more

We’ve enjoyed the chickens and everything they have been doing for the homestead and of course all the fresh eggs. We knew that the first hens we got should be slowing down their egg laying so we made moves to go ahead and pick out the next layers for us. We were pretty pleased with the last batch of meat birds we got from McMurray Hatchery and decided to use them again for the new round of hens. We love having the variety of colors and sizes of our current flock but ultimately went with a variety of brown egg layers with large/extra large eggs. We figure that will be the most bang for our buc ..read more

The layout of our property has two really good garden spots that are about 25ftx50ft. They are near the bottom of the property. We have a third one that is on a hillside that is the same size and it is ok. The sweet potatoes loved it and we got a few watermelons. We are hoping a year or two with chickens on it will improve it . We tried a spot on top of the little hill next to the orchard, for about 2 years but both years it failed or the wind got too bad up there and it destroyed everything that grew. So we planted more fruit trees in that area so we would not be tempted to use it again ..read more

2019 was a good year for the blackberries. Unfortunately, we lost 2 plants so blackberries will be in very limited supply in 2020. We also lost 2 blueberry bushes. The ones remaining look pretty healthy and do have some fruit on them. Hopefully we can get a few before the deer or other critters eat them. 2020 saw the first time the peaches really started to bloom. It almost seemed like too many for their first year so we made sure to pinch off at least every other fruit, before they got too big. Sadly, this was a year of a late frost, right before Mother’s Day. It really wrecked the peaches ..read more

With getting ready to garden, a large part of that was getting the chickens ready to move. With the easy coop we built. Read more about it, below. Chicken Coop The net moves quickly which with the rotational chicken grazing plan. That is why we bought it . The chickens enjoyed the move, at least we didn’t hear anyone complain, and within an hour the net and charger was set up and the chickens were in their new home. With three 25ft by 50ft beds they have plenty of work to do . The plan again is to let them stay on one garden bed and plant on the other 2. With only doing this on one plot so f ..read more

For GreenJournalHomestead? Nothing much new or different, really. We had our gardens, we added to the flock and really just kept doing what we already were doing. We had our winter crop of cabbage. We used some Christmas money to get metal barrels for the chicken and rabbit feed We kept up our rabbit breeding program Finally got to start seeds! Spring finally hit the homestead The orchard started blooming Things were off to a very good start ..read more

Once the barn expansion was done we started plans to do our first batch of Meat Chickens. We ordered Cornish Cross, online from Murray McMurray Hatchery. Chicks showed up happy and healthy with zero losses. We ended up with 27 and did have one loss as an adult , and the rest went to the freezer. It was an enjoyable process. They go from hatched to freezer in about 60 days so that is a lot of growing to do in a short time. We would like to add a way for them to be on grass to help the feed bill, but that will come in the future. There were not as easy to process as rabbits, but pretty close ..read more

Almost as soon as we nailed the last board on the barn redo, we started planning a barn expansion . We had talked about doing a round of meat chickens and needed a place to put them. We talked about putting them in the electric netting set up like our egg layers, but the place we like to purchase from were out of stock. So because it is never a bad thing to have another pen area to lock stuff up in, we decided to build one. The left hand side of the barn had enough space for what we were after. The barn made it easier by already having one wall up, so we just dug the holes and made it semi le ..read more

We originally got chickens for the eggs and improvement of our garden plots with rotational grazing. We also knew we would end up with some roosters in the mix for the freezer. We had no idea how many , which we covered in a previous post. The chickens were doing so good, we even got a second batch to replace the roosters and build the ranks. We are loving the eggs ( so are our friends and family) and how easy they are to take care of. We also loved that where we kept them for the past year is now a beautiful garden. Years prior to the chickens we couldn’t get anything to grow there. Now it ..read more