Counting Your Chickens

We all know the old saying, "Don't count your chickens before they're hatched."  I'm here to tell you, you can't always count them after they're hatched either!  Once little chicks start moving around, they don't stop until.they are back under the hen at night.  They just run and peep all the time!

I am happy to share a simple way I count chickens.  I have different breeds, so every time a brood hen sets, she hatches a rainbow variety!  If your are raising only one breed, this advice will not work, so well.  I really enjoy the variety.  When I first got into the chicken ranch part of homesteading, I went with heavy meat and good egg layers.  There are breeds that have bigger egg production, but they don't dress out as full.  In order to raise enough chickens for meat for a year, there are enough hens in production to exceed my egg needs!  My decision was determined figuring 50-100 chickens in the pot a year.  To have enough brood hens to do that, I need about 12-18 hens.  Even not laying daily or when two or three are setting, that's still at least 1/2 dozen eggs a day, usually more.   Three to four dozen a week, and that is more than enough for the needs of this homestead.  Spring is even a bigger time of egg production, because the hens are all laying and not brooding yet, and organic eggs will last refrigerated up to two months if the protective coating is not washed off.

That's a note to remember.  If you decide to start chicken ranching, don't wash the eggs until you get ready to use them.  YHWH created a special seal of protection on them.

Now, back to our counting.  When a brood hatches, and the chicks start scattering and peeping, I count them for a couple of weeks, to make sure none of those little peepers finds an escape route in the fence and gets lost.  They are tiny little cotton poufs for a couple of weeks.  After that they are pretty hearty and if there is a problem, it would be individually noticeable.

When counting chicks running, don't try to count the full size of the brood.  Notice variances and group them.  For instance, in my new brood, I have two yellow chicks, two blues, two blacks, and four variegated.  It's easier to count to two than to ten, and once each of the "twos" are accounted for, my eyes don't even focus on them, as I make sure the rest are there.  It's so much easier than trying to count to ten, several times!

As you do this for a couple of weeks, you'll find you just know your flock better and any detail out of the ordinary becomes much more noticeable.  Our Creator made everything so unique, it's an added blessing to see the individuality of each creature.