Tales from the Poultry Front

minismallholding (73)Honoraryin Homesteading • 2 years ago

We've had a bit of construction work happening in the garden. Our poultry enclosures have been in need of repairs and I finally managed to convince hubby that it would be easier to repair them if we stepped them in from the main garden fence, giving space around them for maintenance. I discovered after they were originally constructed that council regulations say we are actually supposed to have any poultry runs 1 metre away from property boundary fences, in case repairs need to be made to said fencing. Oops. Well that's now being remedied, anyway.

We started on the quail run, so the first step was to move the chickens from the neighbouring run over to their second run, mesh up the hen house gate to keep explorer quails out (not that the chickens care when they find a gap into their run), then move the quails and pigeons into the run they vacated. The pigeons aren't tame, so the easiest way to move them was to open up the mesh and herd them through. It didn't take them long to settle into their new home at all, so it seems there was no trauma experienced. The quails quickly got down to finding little spaces to lay and the pigeons were building nests in no time as well. All eggs got collected, because it was only a temporary move.

My dad came in to give my husband a hand and they quickly got to work seeing what could be salvaged and what was beyond repair. Some of the wood had weathered better than other bits and some of the mesh that was touching the ground was rusted through, but we didn't have too much waste in the end.

^{deconstruction starts with sagging beams and mesh to be removed. Some of the beams were salvaged by turning them upside down, so the weight will bring them back in line.}

^{The new support posts go in.}

^{The mesh goes back on over the frame. Some of the original gets to stay, but some new is needed as well to replace where the boundary fence was. Yes, that's a quail egg you might be able to see on the floor there, because once they were moved back in they did a full security test and some found an escape hole where the planters stopped my builders from getting easy access to finish the corner with the thicker base fencing.}

^{A temporary fix was put in place until I could empty and move the planters, then my husband and father could dig and run the base section in. This is a thicker wire than the rest and is partially buried to hopefully prevent foxes from digging or chewing through. No guarantees with a determined enough fox, but these measures have managed to keep one fox out previously.}

I'm thinking that I can probably put something up at the ends of the new path going around the runs and let the rabbits run loose in that area when weeds start to grow. It would give them space to run that they don't get at the moment.

While they were doing the work on the run, my husband kept complaining about the noise from the cock quails, who'd set each other off in a crowing competition. I'd already removed three that had wonky hips, so I selected three more of the loudest ones to go. Unfortunately, the complaints continued, so when the run was ready I transferred and counted the hens, who were looking worse for wear from the attentions of the males; bald necks on most and some bald backs too. There were 16 in total, and the ratio is usually 1 cock to 4 or 5 hens. At this point I realised just how many males we still had left! No wonder the poor hens were so stressed and messy! I sat and listened to the boys for a bit and ended up selecting 5 of the quieter ones to go back in with the girls. One was an old male, who likely is too old to harass them anyway. The girls seem much happier now and are growing those feathers back already.

I'd planned to sort out the male quails and some of the ever breeding pigeons that day and when I put the chicken rooster out for the day he immediately started challenging me again, even before eating. This had been an ongoing problem, so as I was already prepared in my mind for the tough job of harvesting poultry that day and had been thinking for some time that I would probably have to call it a day with him, I asked my husband to do the deed and I started the day prepping a chicken instead of quail. This meant that I then only got through the male quail and didn't end up getting to the pigeons. So now I'm procrastinating and making excuses to delay processing them.

As it turns out, it wasn't a bad thing, because I've discovered that our original pair don't seem to be fertilising their eggs properly at the moment, so I've selected some of the others to go back with them and have 7 left to sort out. Some of them were still a bit young, as well, so it doesn't hurt to let them develop a bit more.

Since moving the quail back over, one of the older hens has died, so it's probably a good time to hatch. My friend, the @ligayagardener, would like to add some quail to his set up as well, so that was all the encouragement I needed. I now have an incubator full of quail eggs, so fingers crossed for lots of little buttons running around in three weeks.

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Out of respect for life and the nourishment that death goes on to provide to other life, I won't let anything just get thrown away to go to landfill. The rooster was no spring chicken, so his meat would have been tough if not prepared right. The last time I had to get rid of an old rooster I ended up just doing stock, but I wanted to make better use of the meat this time. A bit of searching and previous experience led me to taking a different approach.

Firstly I discovered that the chicken should be rested in the fridge for a couple or 3 days to allow the meat to start relaxing. It needs to be covered, but also to breathe a little so one should avoid sealing it in something like clingfilm. Then it was into a large pot, with salt and pepper and any other flavourings wanted. The blog I was referencing suggested vegetables, but then seemed to discard the vegetables, which probably would have been mush after hours of cooking. So I just stuck with the salt and pepper. After a few hours, the meat was so soft I couldn't get the chicken out of the pan whole, it just fell apart.

Our first meal from the chicken was Chinese style chicken and sweetcorn soup. We have plenty of eggs, so it just made sense. It's a favourite of everyone's too.

Over the next few days we had Mexican style chicken wraps, chicken pizza and there was so much soup from the first day that the leftovers got frozen for another meal at a later time. So we got three meals and a starter from that one chicken. The bones and organs also went on to become stock and a base for some more meals.

^{Attempting to brighten up my terrible food photography. I may have to move it to the outside lighting, because this camera likes the indoor lighting even less than my last one. As you can see, my collages are made with Canva, just in case you were wondering 😉.}

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2 years ago in Homesteading by minismallholding (73)Honorary

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ryivhnn (71) 2 years ago

Your pigeons don't bother trying to fly off?

Upgraded bird run looks impressive :D

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minismallholding (73)Honorary 2 years ago

The run is fully enclosed, so they can't, but I've been told by a few people that they always come back to the roost. Probably not always, because one of our pigeons arrived here as a lost soul.

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