Our 2012 tallies
23-24 hens, 2 roosters
3 female ducks, 2 drake ducks
1 African gander, 2 African geese
1 Slate turkey tom, 2 slate hens
1 nubian buck, 1 saanen wether
Culls (for meat):
12 roosters
2 turkeys (hens)
3 ducks
Losses:
1 nubian doe + babies
2 cockerels, 1 hen
2 turkey poults
1 duckling, 1 female duck
Yearly totals:
26 bags of corn = 1300 lbs = $304
78 bags chicks starter= 3900 lbs = $1325
12 boxes baking soda= $7.08
1 bag of goat minerals= $15
1 bag of oyster shell
1 bag of chick grit (when we brood babies, they get grit and greens)
hay $100 (our field, we pay for cutting)
What's the point of all this? Reflection. Reflecting on the year, using that information to make decisions, hopefully wise ones. I'm blown away by the sheer quantities of feed we use. I was telling my husband we should consider buying by the ton, as you see, we use about 2.5 tons of feed to raise all those birds. It also forces me to think of ways to get those birds to offset their feed costs more.
This also is the reality of keeping animals. This doesn't include medications or wormers. I think I spent somewhere around $150 to build up my vet box after Kissee died so we would be more prepared when we brought on more goats and some things for the birds too.
I haven't been tracking how many eggs we get but we averaged last year about 10 a day for hen's eggs and 1 a day for duck. So approximately 3600-3700 eggs. Since we use the same feed for all of our birds it's hard to get a real cost for a carton of eggs but when we had those first 7 hens, we yielded around 9 dozen/per 50lbs of feed. Right now, our feed mix is about $14.50 for 50lbs. So our cost before considering any physical efforts is around $1.60 - 1.80 a dozen. That's not bad really.
One of the problems with a mixed flock that free ranges is that I can't tell how much it cost to raise these heritage turkeys. No idea. I don't have a clue how much they eat. I can only estimate.
If you have any questions, just ask in the comments or email me.
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