Pullets for Sale

What’s a pullet?

A pullet is defined as “a hen of the domestic chicken less than one year old” (Merriam-Webster). That’s actually a pretty vague definition that allows for a wide variety of interpretations, but folks in the egg-raising community consider pullets to be lady birds that are between 15-22 weeks old. In the life of a chicken, pullets are pretty much teenagers. They haven’t necessarily started laying eggs yet, but they’re close.

What are the advantages of buying pullets rather than chicks?

  1. You’ll be months closer to producing your own eggs.

  2. You can avoid the loss of baby chicks. (When you purchase day-old chicks, you run the risk of losing some of them in the first two weeks of life.)

  3. You won’t need to coddle these girls the way you would baby chicks. No need to worry about setting up a brooder with a heat lamp and checking on the chicks regularly.

  4. You won’t end up with a surprise rooster.

Living Conditions and Health

  • Our girls are raised on standard chicken feed and open pastures.

  • They’ve been vaccinated for Marek’s disease and Coccidiosis.

  • They are handled regularly by our resident chicken whisperer, Olivia.

  • Their wings have been clipped, a painless process for them that removes their flight feathers.

For more information on how we raise our birds, check out this blog post.

Breeds of Birds on Offer

  • Whiting True Green Females

    • These ladies mature at 22 weeks, which means they started laying around August 23.

    • They lay large green eggs, and they lay them well! (You can expect between 281-365 eggs per year.)

  • Cuckoo Marans Females

    • These birds mature at 20 weeks, meaning they started laying around August 9.

    • They lay extra large dark brown eggs. (You can expect 221-280 eggs per year.)

  • Black Australorp Females

    • These girls should start laying at 24 weeks, which means around September 6.

    • They lay large brown eggs. (You can expect 281-365 eggs per year.)

  • Black Minorca Females

    • They mature at 20 weeks, which means they started laying around August 9.

    • They lay extra large white eggs. (You can expect 221-280 per year.)

All of these breeds are excellent free rangers, which means you can set them loose on your lawn and they’ll eat the greens and bugs they find. The food you provide will supplement their diets.

Whiting True Green

Cuckoo Marans

Black Minorcas

Interested?

If you’re interested in purchasing pullets from Fail Better Farms or you have questions, please contact us at mary.failbetterfarms@gmail.com. Customers should plan to pick up the birds at our farm. (Pro tip: bring cat carriers if you have any, as they are the best way we’ve found to transport chickens in a vehicle.)

Read More About Life at Fail Better Farms

Rain Water Collection

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As a student of permaculture, Aaron loves to find ways to use naturally occurring systems in our favor. I mean, who doesn’t want more free time? And fewer things breaking is a huge win! Since we have garden beds to irrigate and animals to hydrate, thoughtful rain water collection quickly became one of the more obvious systems to experiment with. The latest rain water prototype may be upgraded to a more permanent set up as it proves its usefulness and we continue to tweak our systems here at Fail Better Farms.

What does rain water collection look like on our farm?

We have four 55 gal water barrels and one 330 gal IBC tote tank set up at downspouts where needed on the property. When it rains, these guys fill up relatively quickly. It’s kind of shocking actually. For every 1” of rain and 1,000 square feet of surface, about 620 gallons can be captured. If the rain barrel is kept up slightly above the ground, we can irrigate on head pressure alone. When it’s warmer we’ll add BTI as a monthly pollinator-friendly mosquito control. (Read about how and why we use BTI here.)

Our current largest reservoir, the IBC tote tank (in photo below) is strategically located. We’re in agricultural zone 7A, meaning we should expect a few hard freezes throughout the winter. Our current solution is to keep the tank on the south-facing side of our garage, out of the biting cold north wind. Using gravity alone, this tank supplies the rain water stored for crops and/or animals.

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Water destined for the crops passes through an irrigation filter, a battery-operated irrigation timer (sometimes set to irrigate 3 times a day), and some layflat hose (blue hose seen in photos) before it arrives at on/off valves at the foot of every veggie row (so that only those actively growing get the water). A row of drip tape extends from every on /off valve (right photo below) down the row so every root zone gets a slow steady leak of water. This sounds like a lot, but aside from replacing a 9V battery once a year in the timer, this system has been boiled down to two constants: rain & gravity. Thus, there are NO moving parts to break or be replaced. Win!

Pup Proofing

We’ve also had to get creative because our Great Pyrenees enjoys chewing on (ev.er.y.thing…including) the hose that runs from the tank to the fenced garden. We’ve had success by blocking the front of the tank with wooden pallets and covering the layflat hose with upcycled conveyor belt material. (See photos below.)

How can you plan your water collection system?

  1. Make sure water collection is legal where you are.

  2. Place your rain barrels in logical locations. If you’ll be using the water for thirsty chickens, then collect the water on your chicken coop. If the water is for your garden, make sure it’ll be flowing downhill to your beds. You know…work smarter, not harder.

  3. Be creative. A well-placed gutter is well worth the time it takes to install.

Check out what it looks like:

How We Created the Best Nest for Our Hens

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What’s a Best Nest Box?

Aaron and I had debated whether or not to get a Best Nest Box for about a year. A Best Nest Box provides chickens a place to lay their eggs, which then get immediately whisked away. The reason the “immediate whisking” is imperative is because chickens poop on their eggs, folks. That’s the gross underbelly of raising egg layers. Dirty eggs equate to more time spent cleaning eggs before we package them up for customers, and time is a limited resource.

What was the hold up?

Just like everything else, it came down to finances. We knew we’d be spending over $200 to purchase the box, and we’ve been strictly budgeting around here lately. After much discussion, we decided if we were going to eventually pay for it, we might as well start reaping its benefits immediately.

Problems

We were experiencing three problems with the Best Nest Box: (1) at least one of our hens was pecking the laid eggs from beneath the mesh of the box, (2) depending on the angle of the chickshaw, some of the laid eggs were getting cracked in their descent, and (3) some of the eggs developed lines on them from rolling down the wiry mesh.

Solution

I used jewelry wire to secure a long piece of fleece to the mesh. (Check out my video below.) This softened the eggs’ descent (No cracked eggs!), provided the eggs a soft surface to rest on (No lines on our eggs!), and created a barrier so that the hens couldn’t see the eggs (No pecked eggs!). A win-win-win!

The Life of an Egg-Layer at Fail Better Farms

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We’ve been raising egg-laying chickens for several years now, so we’ve made enough mistakes and learned enough lessons to feel confident to share our process.

Different Stages of Birds

  1. BABIES! We receive a new batch of chicks every year between January - March. In this early stage of life, our sweet chicks need be kept warm and protected, so we raise them in a barn stall with heat lamps and a lot of attention. Starting the birds early in the year is key because they grow up before snakes come out of hibernation. (We learned that the hard way.)

  2. TWEENS! When our girls are about 3 or 4 months old, it’s warmer outside, and they’re smarter and more resilient, so we introduce them to a chicken coop that’s half walled and half chicken wire. This acclimates them to the idea of being outside without letting them roam free.

  3. TEENS! When our pullets are able to fly up to roost, they need their wings clipped. After clipping their wings, we open an exterior door on their chicken coop to give them access to lush pasture when they want it. (See “Clipping Pullets’ Wings” video below.)

  4. ADULTS! Once our girls start laying eggs (around 5 months), we introduce them to the flock of egg-layers that are rotationally grazing on pasture with 24 hour access to a chickshaw. Drama ensues as a literal pecking order is established. The rooster is thrilled at his growing harem. Eggs are collected at least daily so there is no chance of incubation.

What is Rotational Grazing?

Rotational grazing is a natural pattern where all parties involved benefit from controlled periods of intense distubance followed by a year long period of rest after the disturbance has passed. A Zimbabwean ecologist/livestock farmer named Allan Savory (see TED Talk below) made a crucial observation while watching the herds of herbivores on the plains of Africa. He noticed the landscape sprang back to life following the intense disturbance of grazing herbivores eating and pooping on a single piece of land. Just when the landscape looked like it was getting degraded, the predators push the herd forward, leaving the land the rest of the year to rejuvenate. Other animals followed the herd, making easy meals of maggots in poop and scattering the fertilizer as they gleaned. Allan applied this observation to his livestock operation and found that the process was transferable.

Why We Rotationally Raise on Pasture

Rotationally raising chickens on pasture serves many purposes. Everybody on the farm is benefiting from everybody else. Our chickens follow in the wake of the rotationally-raised pigs. It works like this: pigs get fresh ground to eat grubs and roots and grass, spreading fertilizer (poop) the whole time. As soon as the ground has been significantly disturbed by the pigs, they are moved to a new fresh piece of pasture to repeat. The chickens move onto the land the pigs just vacated, where the birds truly free-range to eat a balanced diet of protein (bugs) and greens (grass, weeds, seeds, etc.). All the while our customers are benefiting from the heightened nutritive value of the eggs being produced.

How we Clip Pullets’ Wings

Watch the video below to see how we prepare our birds to live on pasture.

Check Out Allan Savory’s TED Talk

Watch minutes 8:30-12:45 if you don’t have time to watch the whole video.

The Hog Blog

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Here at Fail Better Farms we raise our hogs like we raise our kids. We give ‘em plenty of space to roam, we feed ‘em as well as we can, and we love ‘em even when they’re gross. This season is our third for raising hogs, and we finally feel like we know what we’re doing, so we figured we’d share what’s been successful.

PigsChickensRotationalGrazing.jpg

Rotational Grazing

We practice rotational grazing. This means our pigs and chickens separately spend up to a week on a specific patch of land before moving into a new area. The documented research as well as our anecdotal evidence shows that rotational grazing provides the following benefits.

  • If you let pigs or chickens linger on one plot of land for too long, they’ll lay waste to it. If you keep them moving, on the other hand, they don’t pulverise any one patch of land, and the land can rest and regenerate before the next time the pigs are on it.

  • It creates a food cycle that benefits our chickens. After the pigs move onto literally greener pasture, the chickens follow behind them. Naturally prone to scratch everything on the ground, the chickens scratch through the pig poo, which helps to distribute this natural fertilizer AND provides a source of protein (any maggots unlucky enough to be laid on the poo) for our birds. Gross, we know.

  • Pigs love digging up the ground, eating bugs and roots as they go, so the regular exposure to fresh plots of land makes them happy (& healthy) as clams.

  • Because the pigs are contained in a small section of land, they don’t run long distances, which results in tender, tasty meat.

Balanced Diet

In order to get them up to an ideal finishing weight (about 250 pounds), we feed them a locally-milled mixture of whole grains, bruised/ugly fruit from a nearby orchard, and fallen chestnuts in the fall. As mentioned above, they also get a kick out of scouring the ground for bugs and roots.

Attention

We show affection to our pigs regularly. Our newest trio of piglets is still warming up to us, but, as soon as they’re more comfortable, we’ll be petting them and using high-pitched voices to repeatedly ask them, “Who’s da sweetest piggy on da planet?”

We know some folks think it’s weird to treat future food as pets. We’ve been asked often how we can raise an animal, grow to love it, and then send it off to the butcher. Truth? That’s exactly why we feel comfortable with eating our animals. We absolutely know they lived pleasant lives.

A quick explanation of what rotational grazing looks like and why we practice it.

Not Eggxactly a Huge Profit Margin

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Aaron and I have been meaning to figure out how much money we actually spend on producing a dozen eggs. We’ve been charging $3 per dozen because *shrug* that’ll probably cover our costs, right? Since you can probably guess where I’m going with this, I’ll get to the punchline: we spend more than $3 per dozen. If you’re interested in seeing what investment goes into producing eggs, check this out:

  • We spend $0.63 per paper carton.

  • We pay $0.25 per sticker that we adhere to the cartons.

  • We spend approximately $1.90 on chicken feed for each dozen eggs our girls produce.

If you’re keeping track of the math so far, you can see that already we’re spending $2.78 on each dozen. But wait! There’s more!

  • We spent $166 to purchase our flock of 25 hens in the first place. Because our girls should live several years, I’m not even going to try to calculate their cost per dozen eggs.

  • We invested in materials to build the chicken tractor, chickshaw, waterers, water heaters, and appropriate fencing. (I seriously don’t even want to know what we spent on this stuff.)

  • Egg cleanser costs $9.16 per 16 fluid ounces. (This is admittedly not a huge cost because it lasts for a pretty long time. I’m just trying to give you a thorough idea of what goes into a dozen eggs.)

  • We bought a livestock guardian dog to protect our flock. His presence has proven worthwhile because predators have been leaving our ladies alone, but he eats a lot of food and requires vet visits.

  • Then you have to factor in the labor, which is on average 4 hours per week.

The bottom line? If this side hustle of ours is going to be sustainable, we need to increase our egg prices. We value the work we do here, raising happy, rotationally-grazed, antibiotic-free hens, and we hope our customers do too.

Just for the Shell of It

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I’m not sure how long I’ll be able to handle my own overuse of puns. This is only my second post, and I’m already starting to think this is going to become like one of those can’t-stop-smelling-my-own-armpit-stank scenarios. You know…you’re aware you have a certain funk, but you can’t stop going back for more. I can’t fight the compulsion, and I’m not entirely sure I want to.

Let’s press on. Aaron and I ordered egg layers a few weeks ago, and they’re due to arrive the week of February 18th. Some girls look forward to flowers and chocolates in mid-February. Me? I use heart-shaped eyes emojis over receiving a box of forty-some feathered ladies. I ordered girls to lay us blue, green, and chocolate brown eggs! Tell me you’re not jealous.

We decided we’re going to focus on egg layers and produce this year, and I figure multicolored eggs are bound to be a hit with customers. Now that Baby Coll is less needy, I can play a more active roll on the farm. I’m beyond thrilled to be the chicken lady.