Chickens and Weather, tips for keeping your hens healthy

Thank Goodness!
This weekend has finally begun to feel that Spring has arrived.
One of the cherry blossoms at the front of Thornhill House is in full bloom, it's sister, however, is ready to burst, but she is still holding on. I think this must be due to the fact she is in a more windier position and therefore is a week behind.

We've been able to get out into the garden this weekend and the purple sprouting broccoli is in and under plastic, the hanging baskets are planted up and living in the greenhouse until the risk of ground frost is completely passed and I noted that two snakehead fritillarias are through alongside all my alliums.

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I think that, despite dodging the hailstones, the chickens are grateful for the ever decreasing quagmires that have been around for so long. I caught them having a crafty bask in the sun dodging the April showers yesterday.

Although most chickens are hardy creatures, they don't like snow particularly and hate standing around in wet muck for hours on end. So when you site your chickens, make sure that you put things in the coop if they aren't free ranging, where they can get shelter and stand on higher ground.

In our large area, the girls have trees to shelter under and there are low branches where they often perch, we also have some old rabbit hutches for them to go on or in and two old beams at 45 degree angles which, not only gives them an area to perch off the floor, it also gives them some variety of things to do.
Chickens that stand for long periods in wet and muddy ground, can be more susceptible to a condition called Bumblefoot which is particularly painful for the chicken. This isn't specifically caused by the poor ground conditions, but it can make the coop a breeding ground for Staphyloccocus which is the bacteria that gets into wounds and causes Bumblefoot.

On a lesser important note, muddy ground means a muddy hen house and muddy eggs too, so it's always nicer when the drier weather comes.

In an ideal world, if you have the space, it is a good idea to move your chicken's home around, this way they are on fresh land every 3 - 4 months  and the ground not only gets a chance to recover, there are less opportunities for Staphyloccocus to build up.

If, like us, you are unable to do this, we go for the next best thing and remove the top layer of the run area (which is a long slog when it's as big as ours!), spread a coating of Staphylosan F, then a layer of fresh chippings or whatever you use. Make this at least a bi annual job, once around March after the snow and mankiness of the winter and once again in September before the weather turns.

The other thing the girls love in Spring is our grass clippings. We mow and then give them the fresh clippings from the garden which they love to forage through and eat.

Hope that you enjoy your weekend

Spreading our wings

We're live on other people's websites now and have new dates to add to our courses.

Check us out over here! And whilst you're there, hang around on John's site as he has lots of great info on his site on chicken keeping and allotment keeping.

Don't forget to spread the word if you know of anyone who is toying with the idea of keeping a few chickens in their back garden. We are not affiliated to anyone so we won't try to sell you a particular type of hen house or brand, we started with a back garden just like Joe Bloggs, therefore your questions will be answered by the tried and tested means and we're a family run business with kids so understand their needs as well as yours.

Also watch this space for our new smoking courses starting in the summer.

Spring beginnings

We hope you have had a wonderful Easter, we certainly did. We were back in the house, all completed after the flood renovations and had a lovely time with family and friends, hence the lack of blogging.
The lamb, ordered from our local farmer's shop was absolutely delicious done on the Smoker. It went for many meals afterwards too. We hope to begin some Smoking courses in the autumn, so if you are interested, please email us so we have an idea. We will start by offering morning courses looking at smoking things like fish, cheese, nuts and garlic and maybe offer a full day next year where we can show you how to hot smoke things like chicken or sausages as well as cold smoke.

The new chickens are settling well and we have had our first novice egg from one of them. A tiny egg in comparison to some of the old timers! Still delicious all the same. I'm currently growing beans through the Jack in the Beanstalk topic at work. I wonder if I could get any of the girls to lay a few golden eggs for us?

One of the new Sussex crosses thinks she is a cat and will always come running for a stroke when I go in to feed them or shut them up or throw some corn! It's quite comical to see her running for attention and trying to climb on my lap.

We are building up quite a client base for our eggs now too, which is lovely to see. People are happy to support local growers and want to know where their produce has come from. We now have several regular orders and still manage to sell any surplus at the gate.

The seeds are now all planted under cover in the greenhouse. It is still too early to sow outside here as there is still a potential risk of frost. However, the way the wind is gusting I would suggest they're more likely to be blown away at this point! I have built the wigwam for the beans and it is still standing this morning, so I feel especially proud that my girl guide lashing has held it all together!

We have also taken delivery of our beehives. We won't be getting any bees until next Spring, but it is exciting to have this chapter in the adventure starting. I am on a beekeeping course this weekend myself and then I will paint them and set them up in the garage. There is no point putting them outside until next Spring as they'll just end up having an unnecessary winter battering, I'll just have to suppress my urge!

All the cider from last autumn has now been bottled and we have graded it according to taste and superiority. It has been given a good session of tasting both from us and friends and has the Thornhill House seal of approval! Watch this space for courses on making cider in the future.


There are still places on the Spring Chicken beginners course, please email if you would like to take up a place.

Have a lovely week and weekend and be back soon!

Pig share day

Here on our little homesteading, we don't have the acreage to accomodate anything much bigger than poultry or waterfowl or...next Spring...bees.

We are, however, keen to eat meat that has been farmed and looked after well. When we found the opportunity to  join a pig share scheme we jumped at the chance and have joined with some of our bestest of pals to go halves on a pig.

The pig, a Gloucestershire Old Spot  is being raised on several acres of open farmland in Somerset, so today myself and the kids went down to Cats Drove Farm in Somerset to meet the piglets and the mum and to start our journey.
The Gloucestershire Old Spot is a very old and rarer breed so the double whammy is that you're also helping to keep this breed going by buying their meat. It might sound a bit of an oxymoron, but if you want a breed to continue, there needs to be demand. Apparently, once you've tasted GOS, you'll never eat a regular pig again - I can't say I can vouch for this in pork, I only know that our farm shop's lamb far out ranks anything we have ever eaten, and they're a rare breed - so fingers crossed.

We also want our children to know how food gets on their plates and to have an interest in what they put in their mouths rather than just thinking that food comes in pre-packed polystyrene from the supermarket.
Obviously they know that from the eggs, preserves and veg, so the next logical step was for meat.

We felt that pork was our best starting point as we do eat it in a huge variety of forms and for children, particularly, knowing where sausages come from or bacon is, in my mind, the best meat to begin with.

So, enough about that, here are a few photos of our day which was lots of fun despite the crazy drive there and back in a day.

The farmer will send us updates through the next six months and we'll receive photos too, we will visit again when we go down to Somerset in the summer and then just before the pigs go to slaughter we'll receive a leaflet with information about cutting and we can state how we want it butchered. We then go back in September to pick up the butchered meat for our freezers.

Okay, so this is a DOG, but isn't she beautiful. 

Not sure who was the most crazy, the gorgeous Frieya or the  mad Beehivers!

The piglets

And we're back!

Well, after a very eventful winter with Thornhill House flooding, we are back in business.
The flock has expanded and we now have two new light sussex crosses to join the brood.
We are also running a new Spring Chickens in your Backyard course on Saturday May 18th from 10 - 12.
The course is suitable for adults and children, although children under 18 MUST be accompanied by an adult.
You'll need wellies if it's muddy and old clothes as well as a pen and pencil and all your questions.
To book, just follow the link on the sidebar of the blog, email us or call.
10 spaces are available.