Homemade holiday gift

They say that chickens are a “gateway” farm animal. But the gateway to what? When looking to expand your farm, waterfowl might seem like a natural addition. Ducks and geese do make a lovely addition to your poultry farm, but they are not just water chickens. Geese in particular require some different care than other …

You’ve built strong fences and a sturdy coop to address your chicken’s physical security, but have you taken the steps to implement flock biosecurity for disease prevention? This is an important step for keeping your chickens healthy. What is biosecurity? Chickens don’t just need protection from physical threats, there are plenty of invisible threats in …

Alpacas are undeniably cute and they are not particularly difficult to care for. But do alpacas make good pets? Are alpacas good pets? I’m going to disappoint a lot of people, but alpacas are not really good pets. At least not in the traditional sense. It mostly depends on what your expectations of a “pet” …

You’ve got your buckets of maple sap now you just need to turn it into tasty syrup! Don’t have your sap yet? You must have missed part one of this series! Click here to read all about how to harvest maple sap. Ok? Ready to go? Let’s make some maple syrup! Turning maple sap into …

When we were looking at our house for the first time, one of the things that I loved was all the mature maples in the yard. Not only were they pretty but my first thought was “we can make our own maple syrup!” As a lifelong New Englander, I have always wanted to try my …

Domesticated ducks don’t have many natural defenses against predators. It is important to take steps to keep your ducks safe. In the wild, ducks rely mainly on flight to escape hungry predators. They will not resort to fighting unless cornered (and they won’t stand a chance fighting most predators). Domestic duck breeds are too large …

Raising rabbits in a colony setting allows them to live a more natural life. They can move about and interact with other rabbits instead of living in separate cages. But it can come with challenges. For many generations people raising rabbits would keep each rabbit in its own cage, only bringing them together briefly for …

Can chickens fly? Many new chicken keepers are worried about their new bird friends flying away. Luckily, domesticated chickens as we know them today can’t fly like other birds. Chicken ancestors Chickens have been domesticated for over 8,000 years. In all those years, humans have selectively bred chickens to be heavier so they would have …

Alpacas are adorable, and not difficult to care for. They can make a great addition to small hobby farms and large farms alike. You might be asking how many alpacas can I keep per acre? How much space do alpacas need indoors? There are several things to consider when deciding if alpacas are right for …

We host several events for families on our farm each year, plus I have a toddler grandson that visits weekly and loves to play outside. I wanted to add a little playset to the yard for kids, but I wanted it to be farm themed. Kids love farms, so I was surprised when I looked …