Bird Farming and other market animals

[Ace]

gotcha

you sure can't eat the profits if you want to breed.

I just raise chickens for eggs for market....we have 400 as of now but do not raise other birds.

what all do you raise and is there a good market for "different" birds?

Wow! 400? The most i've kept is 200.

Well there are a few advantages of different birds. Though it can be tricky. I keep a little of everything and sell them at my shop. I usually have something that someone is looking for. A lot of the birds can be fed the same feed though some require their own food. The downside is all the expense in building up pens for different birds. And mainly I love birds so having them around is lot of entertainment lol!

What I have so far:

115-125 Chickens and chicks: always in demand most of the year.
55 quail: seasonal is seems. Bobwhites seem more favored for eating and coturnix and others for pets
3 goslings (4 more to arrive tomorrow): seasonal demand
12 ducks: Like chicks in demand most of the year.
5 Muscovey Ducks: Didn't sell very well and most likely the rest will be just pets and for eating.
7 turkeys: seasonal demand
13 guineas: seasonal mostly summer people get them to eat bugs, kill snakes and rats.

I'm learning what to get lol. When I ran my livestock shop a few years back I would only sell chickens, ducks, and turkeys and once in awhile goslings. These days working on getting things that are in demand and I have a lot of people asking for certain birds. I'm just being cautious. I had a lot of people ask for muscovey ducks and soon as I had them for sale I sold 3 which was beyond disappointing.

What I'm looking into:

Peafowl
pheasants
partridge
pigeons
doves

Non-poultry I own:

16 Rabbits
4 Goats

I keep a few different kinds of rabbits some pet types and the bulk are meat rabbits. Their housing was mostly free and the rabbits themselves I got 14 for free. I plan to breed them in the next few months an hav bunnies for sale and for the table.

The goats I plan to breed and use them for milk and also make some cheese. I'm on the fence still about eating goat meat. Never had it though my family has mostly tried it at some point. I would love to get pigs again but I just don't have the room anymore. Pretty much everything I own has a purpose for putting something ont the table or at the least can produce young that can be sold as pets. It's my self sufficiency plan to eventually be able to have a variety of meat for my table and market extra offspring.

 

[ticks]

I am planning on getting my sellers permit next year and sell Pheasant and Quail as well as eggs

 

[Colored Egg Farmer]

I have 700 egg layers and room to grow

 

[ticks]

I have 700 egg layers and room to grow

I bet you make some money off those birds.

 

[Colored Egg Farmer]

yes

 

[FarmerChick]

CEF---where do you sell your eggs?

just wondering....we do very, very well off our eggs also!

 

[FarmerChick]

Ace---do you raise your own chicks or buy them young and raise and sell.

I bought chicks and raised and sold...even at $10 per buff orphington I barely made a profit, in fact, add in my time, I was in the hole..LOL

WOW on the fowl etc. My 400 egg layers make great money on fresh eggs, we have about 100 hogs for sausage, pork chops--we process 1 hog per week and sell out, and then 70 goats, some cattle and then pet critters.

But the chickens I didn't make good money on at all just "selling" the birds when mature. How is this for you?

Edited to say...I eat goat. It is delish. very lean so you must be careful how it is cooked of course and we smoke it. YUM

 

[patandchickens]

At the local (very local) farmers market last weekend there was a guy sitting there with a table taking orders for free-range poultry (sold off his farm, I assume). THere was a great big sign on the front of the table, "Free Range Partridges -- $14 each". All I could think was, Man, we live in an excessively affluent area

Pat

 

[Colored Egg Farmer]

I will sell mine out of our farm store and maybe a few will go to a grocery store or anybody that wants my eggs. Alot of people we deliver our eggs want my brown eggs.

I also raise chickens and sold for $5 and made a huge profit. The only difference was I had all the stuff and had to buy very few things and I can get my feed by the ton.

 

[FarmerChick]

$5 per bird and you made money?
wow.....I buy chicken feed by the ton also. I just bought 2200 lbs. for $309 (that included our discount for the farm--it ain't much)--LOL

I barely made money on the chicks when I got $10 on them...you surely are doing something right. Are you hatching your own? I got tired of that...I put up my incubators and closed down that operation....I just bought some for like, $2 each or something....

We produce only brown eggs. All white layers were sold and replaced....farmers market people and my stores only wanted brown...HA HA

You own a farm store? Cool......Tony wants to build one for the farm and I said no, I wasn't manning a store all day, 6 days a week....I told him the freedom of no store appealed to me more..LOL--just me!!!

Do you have a website for your farm?