Author: Kerry

Emergencies and accidents sometimes happen, and it’s freaking scary when they do. Sometimes you need a vet…pronto! But sometimes you can handle it on your own if you have the right stuff on hand and some know-how. There are a lot of great items that can be used across species that I always keep on hand. I’m not vet by any stretch, but experience and learning from other’s experiences has taught me what to go to first. Sometimes it’s just to help my animal survive until a vet can get here. Each animal injury or illness I’ve dealt with has taught me something important. Sometimes a lot of somethings!

One year I had a goat sick with pneumonia – my Nigerian Dwarf named Tank. It was rough on the poor dude. Several injectable medications, vitamins, and emergency vet calls later and he finally was getting back to good. It was a close call and I’m extremely grateful he is still with me…Tank is my buddy! I learned a lot from that experience both from my vet, and my “Goat Dealer,” and my own observations of his symptoms. I am hopeful that if it would happen again, to any of my herd, that I would catch it sooner and know how to treat it. I didn’t know until that episode that pneumonia is more common in summer than winter due to the higher humidity in our climate. Now, during hot and humid stretches of weather the goats get extra attention from me for this reason.

As you can see in my picture my animal medicine cabinet is…ahem….extensive. Hey, I have a lot of animals!! Some stuff is for “just in case,” and some stuff I use regularly (like my dog’s heartworm meds, and my llama’s worming shots). Unless it’s a prescription, which I get from my vet(s), the remainder of the products are things I get from Wal-Mart, Fleet Farm, or Amazon. None of it is hard to find.
This is by no means an all-encompassing list, but it’s the basics that I make sure I have.

So what’s all in there?

I always have Blue Kote and Vetricyn on hand- both antibacterial sprays. They are the first line of defense for preventing and fighting infection. Blue Kote is especially good for chickens. Chickens are cute and funny, but they turn into little beasts of evil on each other if there is even a drop of blood on one of them. Blood thirsty monsters I tell you ! Blue Kote covers the wound and also stains it bluish purple, hopefully throwing the vampire chickens off. Using gloves are my recommendation with this product. EVERYTHING turns purple when using this, and it stains your skin. Talking from experience here peeps.
The Vetricyn I like use on cats, dogs, goats, llamas for any wounds. My cats especially have a knack of coming in to dinner sometimes with war wounds from a disagreement with each other. Vetricyn is nice because the cats can lick it and not have any ill effects. It gets applied several times a day, and is a gel like substance. It’s expensive, but it works!

I keep Meloxicam on hand for my llamas; mostly for my old gal Peach. It gives her relief from arthritis. It’s like people tylenol. It’s a perscription from my vet, and thankfully a low cost medication. It’s given by weight, so a llama needs 12 pills per dosage due to their size! I toss them into her feed and she gobbles them right up. Meloxicam is also used with cats and dogs, sometimes in liquid form, for pain relief.

Vitamin B injectable has been a lifesaver for my goats. Tank had pneumonia last summer and was lethargic. The vitamin B shots seemed to help with his energy level and to get him eating again. **Side note- goats have 4 stomachs and keeping those up and running is of utmost importance in goats. If a goat stops eating too long it can die.

Extra syringes, vet wrap, and needles are standard in my cupboard.
Fun fact I learned from my vet – needles are good for when an animal has a sudden large bump on it’s body somewhere. If it’s hot to the touch it’s likely an abscess. One way to tell is using a needle quickly poke it into the mass and see what comes out. If it’s pus it’s an infection and needs to be drained (gross, I know!). If it’s something else, blood or clear liquid, and there are other issues going on with the animal, a call to the vet might be in order.

Nutradrench for llamas, and another version for goats in case someone is suddenly ill. This is a liquid that is administered by syringe and is like a shot of pedialyte. It helps with energy and nutrition, and is an emergency go to as well. If an animal is “off their food,” or refusing to eat this is a good go to for them while you wait for vet care.
I always have Iodine on hand. Sometimes for wounds, and also if I’m expecting any babies on the farm. Right now we are expecting a baby llama- called Cria- this fall. After the cria is born I will dip it’s navel into a bowl of iodine to kill any bacteria and keep it from infection. The navel is one area to protect as infection would have a direct way into the body through this opening.
Pepto Bismol for diarrhea, and baking soda for bloat. Pepto is one of those all purpose meds. Goats and dogs especially get good results from it if there is an issue with diarrhea. It’s not a cure-all, but if the symptoms need attention it’s a tool at the ready. Diarrhea can be life threatening, especially in babies.
Bloat is something that can happen with ruminants where stomach gases build up. Baking soda helps release that gas from the stomach (s).

A digital thermometer – most often used on my goats or llamas. It’s never fun to use for either party, but sure helps you narrow down what’s going on! The thermometer is my first go to if someone seems under the weather. A too high or too low temp usually means a call to the vet asap. A higher temperature also can tell you if you’re looking at infection/sickness, compared to dealing with symptoms like diarrhea that might be nothing more than an upset stomach when no fever exists.

Pro-bios paste has been helpful for my goats. Especially the babies. The babies have a lower tolerance to hot and humid temperatures, and the tube of Pro-bios helps to deter any diarrhea in the babies and keep their rumen (stomach system) running.

Packets of Save-a-chick electrolytes help give a boost to baby chicks, or even adult chickens in hot weather who need the extra nutritional boost. I also use this during chicken molting season – when the birds lose their old feathers and grow in new ones. It helps to keep them hydrated during this stressful event.

Finally, I have some stuff that I found is just super handy. A magnifying glass to check animal hair, or, because I’m just old and need to see better. Tweezers, staple suture remover (got that because of a foster dog several years back – long story), pain medications, rubbing alcohol, extra syringes for administering oral meds, scissors, and garden pruners for goat and llama feet.

The two MOST IMPORTANT things I feel that I have in my back pocket are 1. a good relationship with my vet(s), and 2. the ability to give shots.
I have a large animal vet that comes to my farm to treat my large animals. I’ve been able to pick his brain with different situations, and have learned a lot. The vet also has after hours services, which has helped me tons in the past. Everything to just needing advice via phone on how to treat something, to emergency euthanasia has been utilized with this service for our farm. I cannot stress enough the importance of establishing a good working relationship with a vet! My vet knows my animals, and is familiar with my farm. He knows how they are cared for and if there has been any past diseases I’ve dealt with. He also has been willing to find out information to help us with our animals. This has mostly been for our llamas, as not too many people in our area have them. Currently, we are preparing for a llama to give birth in the next few weeks. My vet has been out to check our girl during her pregnancy, and he is ready to help for the birth if needed.
I think it’s also important that that your vet gets to know YOU as well as your animals. I’m a pretty calm person, so if I call my vet with a panicked edge to me he knows I have a situation that needs help NOW. He also has worked with me to decide on treatment options for long term arthritis management for our llama Peach. So when I need a refill on Meloxicam he knows what I need it for and won’t feel the need to visit to OK it.

The other most useful thing has been learning how to give injections to my animals. Certain medications require the shots to be sub-q, sub-cutaneous (just under the skin), and some requires IM, or intra-muscular. The places on each animal to give shots is also important to know by species. What works on a llama might not work on a dog for a shot location. Each medication, and situation, is a little different and I’ve relied on my vet’s advice on where to best inject, using that information for future shots.

Before I had my own animals, I wouldn’t have thought that shots were such an important thing to know, but it’s become a regular thing with the animals I have. Llamas require sub-q injections of a dewormer called Ivermectin every 30 days. Goats and llamas both require annual vaccination shots suq-q of CDT (protects against several diseases), and every few years I vaccinate my outdoor cats for distemper sub-q. I’ve even had a dog that needed regular IM shots for arthritis in her hind legs. Knowing how to give injections has saved me money and time in the past instead of having to call the vet and wait on them to do the shots.

Building my animal medicine cabinet hasn’t happened overnight. It’s been many years of finding what works, and learning how to use different things. Learning from vets, breeders, animal rescues, other owners, and reading whatever I can. Many medications can be used “off-label” (not for intended species) if you know how to do it.

Now, twenty years after moving onto our farm and getting the animals I have, I have a much higher comfort level in my own skills in an emergency, or just in regular care of my animals. While sometimes through lessons painfully learned, it has become my most valuable resource.
What do you think is a good item to have on hand?

At some point everyone with livestock has to deal with predators. Chickens, ducks, turkeys, goats are all prey animals, and always an attraction to a predator. A predator can be anything from a coon to the neighbor’s dog, but the threat to your animals can be just as real, and just as sad and frustrating.
Quite a few years back we had a fox problem. A big one. That fox was so brazen it would trot up our front walkway and around our house right to the chicken coop. I saw it do just that early one morning in late fall, and ran outside to scare it off. Armed with a flashlight I chased it into the surrounding tilled fields. I could just see it’s eyes reflecting the flashlight as it waited on a small hill for me to go back inside. Sure enough, I finally had to go back in and a minute later heard the chickens freaking out. The old saying “smart as a fox” is a true statement!
We lost quite a few chickens to the fox that year. And since I like to free range the chickens we had to put them on lock-down for their own safety. Nobody was happy that year.

Since that fox experience we have learned a lot about keeping our chickens safe. We’ve also dealt with possums, raccoons, skunk, a coyote, and even a neighborhood dog that would get loose now and then. We put several preventative measures into place to hopefully STOP the predators from even considering our yard as a buffet! The effort we put in has been worth it, but we’re always vigilant. Ever hear the saying “If you build it they will come?” I’m certain the local predators were cheering when they saw us putting up chicken coops!

Most predator problems we have had happened either during the dark of night, or early dawn when the light hasn’t completely hit yet. The fox would usually come around 6 am, which in fall is pretty dark here. We’ve had an infestation of coon here a couple times as well, and those guys are always active in the middle of the night. I set up a trail camera many times to see who I was dealing with, and most times it’s a raccoon.

So what can you do? The most obvious thing, and easiest, was to make sure our animals were put in secure pens at night. All of the poultry is locked in coops at dark, and the doors are secured with either bolt latches or snap latches (read: more coon proof latches- those guys have little hands and are smart enough to figure out locks!!). The windows on the coops are covered with hardware cloth (tougher than chicken wire!) so in summer the windows can remain open. The goats are in secure shelters with gates and locked in. I do a little less for my llamas against most predators. Most of the predators we have in our area would not mess with an adult llama. In fact, llama’s have been known to kill coyotes, so my girls are pretty safe. The only thing that worries me for my girls are dogs. We keep secure fencing, locked gates, and a shelter for the girls to go into at night.

Another easy thing to deter predators is to make sure your animal feed is secured at night. Our poultry feeders are all locked in with the birds inside the coops at night. During the day the doors are propped open and the birds can come in and out as they please to eat.
The goats are fed with grain in the evening and only as much as they can eat at one feeding. That way nothing extra is left out to attract any unwanted attention.

The largest thing we did on our property helped a lot, but was also a bit pricey. We installed a 5′ tall chain link fence around the back of our property where all the poultry is kept. It’s about 1/2 acre total, so the outlay of cash was a decent amount. However, there hasn’t been one fox problem since that was installed several years ago. I let my dogs roam in that fenced in area, which I had hoped would also put off any predator by just the smell of dog. In all fairness, the fence was also installed because we have a dog that is an escape artist and known to take off. A few times of dealing with that disaster and I was sold on the fencing – price and all! LOOKING AT YOU, CHANTI!!!! 🙁

An additional option, and I think also very effective, was to string lights through the trees all around the outside of the coops for all the birds. The lights are on timers to run from dusk to dawn. The expense was pretty minimal – it was more of a pain to get on ladders and zip tie the light cords in the large pine trees 😉 The added benefit of the lights was a nice ambiance in the evenings, and a practical way to light the area for chores in the darkness of winter. Win- win!! I did the same around the goat shelter to help deter anything from taking a stroll through that area, and it’s on my list for the llamas as well.

One lighting idea is battery powered motion lights. I have a lot of area on the property that I can’t get power to. I found some pretty bright spotlights that run on four D batteries. These have worked really well for us during chore time! I put these lights on tree trunks, fence posts, and the back of shelters facing outwards to the fields. If an animal comes within about 15 feet of the light it turns on. Coyotes especially are spooked by this and will likely run. Every now and then I take a stroll at dark with a flashlight to make sure all are working properly.

Hopefully prevention will work for you and you don’t have to deal with losses. Eventually most people I have talked to have had some losses, and then have to figure out how to get rid of the problem. On our land I’m always on the watch for tracks in the dirt surrounding the property. Coon and possum tracks are fairly easy to identify. Sometimes though I haven’t been sure what is coming in at night. If that is the case I usually opt for coon or possum. In our neck of the woods that is the most likely animal. When this happens I pull out the live trap. The traps we use are “Have a Heart” traps that we get at our local farm store. They are closed on one end, and on the other it props open, or sets, for when the animal goes in and steps on the lever. The door snaps shut and they get locked inside. The biggest thing with the traps is placement of them, and what bait to use. I usually go for peanut butter in small disposable plastic cups (disposable because anything that is stuck inside the trap with the container will usually destroy it). That generally works for coon and possum. I have some friends that insist on marshmallows being the ticket. Everyone uses what works for them I guess.
I try to place the traps in the areas closest to where I think the animal is coming in. Alongside the barn, or alongside the field edging to our property are two successful areas. Once set up, you will need to wait and have some patience. It sometimes takes me weeks to catch the animal that is coming in at night. I always make sure to check the trap daily too. If I catch an animal, I don’t want it to be in the trap so long that it’s inhumane.

Something that I don’t do is use poisons around my property. For me the risk is too great that one of my own animals will get into the poison. I personally don’t feel that it’s a humane way to manage a predator problem.
Along that line, what do I do with what I catch? It depends what it is. I generally let possums go. They don’t do much damage and are good for the environment. I haven’t had one ever kill my poultry. Well, at least not yet. The most they have done is eat the eggs. So I release these guys to run off into the woods. Raccoons are another story. I’m sorry to all my raccoon loving friends, but the coons are dispatched humanely courtesy of a .22 rifle and my husband. I’ve come face to face with a couple raccoons in my barn, and let me tell you I was worried about them ripping off my face. The pictures and videos of them gently taking food from humans has not been the experience I’ve had here. Quite frankly, they scare the poop outa me. On top of that, I feel a genuine responsibility for the animals I keep on my farm. They depend on my family to feed, water, and protect them. And that is what I feel I’m doing by removing the animals that would eat them.
I also don’t feel that it’s fair to trap and release raccoons “down the road” from our land. All that is doing is making it someone else’s problem, who likely are trying to do the same things as me to get by. It’s not very neighborly in my opinion.

I am extremely grateful that I live in a part of the U.S. that doesn’t have bears, or large cats, or wolves! I know people who do, and I’m certain my set up would look significantly different if that was what I was dealing with. I’ve been going with the idea that prevention is the best solution, and that has been working for me!

What have your experiences been like with predators?

Integrating barn cats on your farm….

I’ll be completely up front: I am a cat lover [sucker]! I think they are hilarious, make excellent companions, and are good farm chore supervisors. I have both inside cats and barn cats, and they are all very much loved – even if sometimes the love is only one-sided from the humans 😉
Cuteness aside, there are several practical reasons to have cats on your farm. Our barn cats have become true farm workers by helping keep the rodent population down. Livestock on the farm = animal feed on the farm = a serious attractant of rodents & wildlife of all kinds. Feed for our animals is one of the largest costs on our farm, and we really can’t afford to have rodents or wildlife getting at it. I rest easier now knowing that at some point the cats will take care of the rodents so they don’t spoil the feed!

I have barn cats that both showed up at our farm, and some that I “transplanted” here from various unhealthy situations. The ones that show up unannounced and start eating our cat food are handled differently than the ones that I bring in.
I get both friendly and non-friendly strays at least several times a year here. The friendly ones I’m usually suspicious of it being a pet, or dumped feline around my property. Sadly that is often the case. Most times I find these cats at feeding time as they follow the rest of my crew to food. Even the friendly ones can be skiddish at first. They have learned not to trust humans. Then it becomes a matter of gaining trust, but hopefully quickly. There are so many bad things that can happen to dumped housecats…they simply don’t know how to fend for themselves. It’s an untruth that cats just “know” how to live on their own, and a once spoiled inside cat is fine if left outside. They aren’t ok – they generally starve. Or get killed by cars, or by coyotes. Or oftentimes are bullied by the resident cats wherever they show up, causing injury or infection. It’s not a good situation, and certainly isn’t fun for me to find these poor abandoned cats hoping for a meal by us.

If the new stray cat is able to be handled I will immediately kennel the cat and get it all it needs: food, water, a heated bed if it’s winter, and a litter box. I use these amazing “Iris” kennels from Amazon that have 3 large shelves. The top shelf is the bed area and for food, middle shelf is water, and bottom of the kennel is litter.

The cats that can be handled get a once over by me and see if there is anything obviously wrong. I also can sex cats so I see what I’ve got. Generally it’s an unfixed male that comes to us who was looking for a girlfriend, or was forced out of another colony. Sometimes we get unfixed males that are ridiculously friendly, which tells me they might have been spraying at their old home and were tossed out. Unfixed males are trouble waiting to happen, indoors or out. Their hormones take over their brains!

Once I give the cat a good once-over, I cover the top of the cage with a blanket long enough to cover where the bed is. The cats feel more secure that way in their little cave, and it allows them to calm down.

If I get a non-friendly mystery cat in my barn it’s a little more complicated. I have to trap the cat in a live trap for both their safety and mine. I do this by feeding all my own cats first, and make sure they eat everything. Then I will set a live trap- raccoon size- and bait it with canned cat food or sardines. I almost always trap my own cats a few times when doing this (**sigh, usually the less smart ones of the group**) but patience pays off. Eventually the stray, who is presumably hungry, goes into the trap. Then I have to get the unfriendly cat into the larger kennel. Again, the kennels I have from Amazon are amazing. There are three doors on it. I undo the top door and put the trap up to the door with as little space between the cages as possible. Sometimes the cat will walk right in. The lure of a “cave like space” when there is a blanket over the top of the kennel is very helpful! If that doesn’t work a little nudge with a small stick on the cat’s back end gets it to move –
READ: not a poke! You don’t want a ticked off unfriendly!!
Assuming you get the cat in the kennel it needs all the same things as the friendlies, minus the inspection. The blanket over the top of the kennel is critical for these guys because they are highly stressed. They like the cave feel a blanket gives them and it calms them down.

Sometimes you get cats that are what I call true “chainsaws.” A Chainsaw is a super feral, ie- “stick your hand in that kennel and it will get chainsawed off!” They want nothing to do with humans, and will fight to the death – yours OR theirs- out of pure fear. They aren’t mean cats, they are just terrified. And if they are in my barn I know they are desperate for food or shelter. It’s a sad state for them to be in and sometimes disturbing to see. It’s certainly NOT a fun thing to deal with as the barn owner. Even these cats though need help, and I follow the steps above for getting them some help. I am the poster child of what NOT to do in catching a feral….do NOT get gloves on and just grab it.
**Full disclosure, I’ve done some dumb things. This was one of them. Trust me, gloves mean nothing to a feral cat. They will bite right through them, and then you’re bleeding like a stuck pig while the already scared cat freaks out and leaves you there with nothing to show but an injury. It’s hard to start all over and hope the cat comes back to eat. Save the time, and your blood, and trap them.

The next thing I do is try to secure an appointment with a local TNR organization. TNR is Trap, Neuter, Return. I am a BIG SUPPORTER of TNR for several reasons. Neutering the cat will help lower it’s aggression, and it becomes less of a target for other males when the hormones are lowered. Females that get spayed are going to have healthier lives not having countless litters of kittens. And kittens, while I love them and they are freaking cute, don’t make it too often as an outdoor cat unless someone cares for them.
Let’s be honest: there are millions of unwanted cats in the country. It’s only fair to help stop the overbreeding on your own farm by TNR. Finally, it maybe the only vet care some cats get in their lives. Any bit helps.
I might be lucky, but I do have one TNR non-profit group that helps cats out in my area. I am always hopeful that more of these groups get organized, and allow people like myself to get the cats fixed for a reasonable cost. So I’m blogging with the assumption, and hope, that you have this available to you.

Usually the TNR surgery is scheduled a few weeks out. This is OK! This gives you some time to give a good diet to the cat you trapped and add some weight. Sometimes I get cats that are disturbingly skinny. The cat also has an opportunity to safely get used to your daily farm routine, acclimate to your voice, and it slowly starts to feel like home. Feral cats need at least two weeks in a safe and secure kennel to acclimate to a new location. This will help ensure the cat will stay at your farm when you’re ready to release them.
I’ve even found that the cats who I trapped that I thought were feral were really just scared sweethearts. It takes that calming down time in the kennel to find this out.

The TNR group that you choose to go through will give you instructions about how they want the cat brought in, when to stop feeding prior to surgery, etc. Usually they want the cats brought in to them in a trap.
The day of the surgery the cat will be checked for a microchip, spayed or neutered, vaccinated for rabies and distemper, and given flea treatment if needed. If you really interested in the actual TNR process, I posted about the opportunity I got in late winter to geek out a a TNR event on our Facebook page.
You can see it here:

When you get your cat home follow the instructions you get from the TNR organization. For male felines I recommend that you keep them kenneled for an additional two days to ensure they are healing well. For spayed females I usually give them a week. Both sexes need to be kept warm after surgery as anesthesia messes with their ability to regulate their body temperature. I use heated beds with their blanket around the kennel. If it’s REALLY cold outside, I’ll move them to a smaller barn room in the kennel (it has wheels) and put a space heater in there.

So you’ve kept your cat kenneled for at least two weeks, had it vetted, and you can now release it! I usually just casually leave the middle door to the kennel open the day I decide to release. I leave everything else the same, and leave the kennel with food, water, litter even after the cat leaves. Some cats come back to the kennels to feed because they are used to the food there. I’ve had some that go back to the heated bed, because, well, HEATED BED!!
If you don’t see your cat for a bit don’t panic. They have a lot to explore, and if you have other cats they have to figure out who is going to be a friend or not.

The cats that I’ve brought in from unhealthy situations follow the same process I’ve described. I am sometimes asked to take in cats for a rescue, or maybe someone who has outside cats that need to relocate. In these cases I always insist that the cats be fixed before coming to me. Once here I still kennel them for at least two weeks, whether friendly or not, and release them the same way.
I have cats here that were victims of attempted poisoning and were rescued. Several cats came to me from a larger city farther away that the colony was going to be euthanized because their caretaker died. One cat was getting beat up by other cats at his old home and needed to be relocated. Another cat was getting shot at by a local constable and a concerned neighbor trapped it and it came to me through a cat rescue. One showed up starving and was just bones late last fall. I get all kinds of situations.

I try to keep a daily routine on my farm for all my animals. It comes in handy with my cats because they know when feeding time is. I feed my barn cats free choice dry food all the time. I choose to feed small amounts of canned food twice a day. I do this so that all of my cats come in to feed while I’m there, and I can see how everyone is. I can check for injuries or illness, and see who shows up. This is for my own peace of mind, but you can do what you like 🙂
I’ve found that with a routine, even the most feral cats tame down just enough that they come close. Maybe there is still a NO TOUCH rule with them, but at least you can get close. Food is a powerful motivator, and trust is always the most important.

At my place the cats have several water sources they can drink from. Most often the cats drink from the goat or llama water. These are cleaned regularly, and in winter are kept from freezing. If you don’t have other animals on your farm to do it like this, heated water bowls are cheap additions for your cats. Cats need the water, especially in winter to help regulate body temp. It helps to keep it out of the wind in cold areas. Here it gets below zero regularly in winter, so checking the water is important.

Finally, the cats need shelter offered year round. We have a barn that our cats use. Usually there are several hundred bales of hay that they can hang out on, but ours are extra spoiled so I go beyond that. I provide heated animal beds for them in the winter they can choose to utilize. Being in Wisconsin it can get REALLY COLD, so they take full advantage of the heated beds! I also put out folded blankets that are large enough to accomodate a couple cats at a time. I’ve found that they often curl up together to stay warm.
Another option for outside cats is a cat shelter. My husband built one a few years ago that is insulated on the inside with foam board insulation. I also used straw as a bedding material. It’s important to not use blankets or hay inside these shelters because once they get wet they lose any insulating properties. Straw stays dry and generally doesn’t mold.
I’ve even seen cat shelters made out of rubbermaid tubs with a small cat door cut in one side. Pinterest has some seriously cool ideas!

I find “gifts” of dead rodents left for me on my walkway sometimes. Or maybe just what’s left of it -icky But it’s satisfying knowing that the cats are taking care of what could be a big problem on our farm.
Plus, did I mention how cute they are?!

What tips do you have to care for barn/outside cats?

Eggs are a big deal at Black Frog Farm. In fact, I call my husband the “Egg Nazi.” He is [overly] serious about keeping track of how many eggs, what size, what colors, and overall egg production. When ordering chicks it’s a stipulation of Nick’s that the chickens produce LARGE BROWN EGGS!!
(emphasis is his!) I personally like the rainbow effect of having several breeds of chickens that lay multi colored eggs. So I offer him a “Yes, Hon” and go about ordering the chicks that I want anyhow. Egg Nazi tendencies aside, the eggs are a staple here on the farm. We sell a lot of them, and use them for baking and eating, and even exchanging with others for their produce.

So what’s it take to get eggs from chickens? Should be simple, right? Surprisingly, chickens can be picky layers. They don’t like to lay eggs when it’s too hot, too cold, too dark out, too humid….well, you get the point.
Chickens lay the best when they are young, say six months to about two years. They also lay the best in the daylight heavy times of the year, so late spring, summer and early fall. We supplement light for our chickens in their coop by hanging Christmas lights on timers. When the light starts to fade at the end of the summer, I usually put the timer on so the lights come on early morning for a few hours, and again on during late afternoon and go off late evening. This is enough to keep the girls laying close to normal level. In winter, not only does the overall darkness make egg production slow down, but the cold sometimes freezes any eggs we get before we can even pick them. This is when it becomes handy to have a lot of chickens, because we can still get several dozen eggs a week when production is at it’s lowest….if we can get to the coop fast enough before the eggs freeze.

What do we feed them?
Another consideration of how our eggs taste is what the chickens are fed, and how the girls are kept contained. We feed standard layer feed year round, which has calcium added in to help keep the egg shells hard. Our girls get access to grit as well. Grit is just a fancy word for gravel. You can buy grit at a farm store, or just give them an opportunity to find it naturally in the soil. We also give our chickens kitchen scraps, pulled weeds, sunflower seeds, any fruits in the yard that we aren’t going to use (they REALLY like elderberries!!) and a lot of their diet comes from free ranging. Basically it’s a chicken buffet of what’s in season. Our chickens have large enough coops for them fit comfortably in at night, and large runs that they can scratch the ground and run around for exercise when we choose to keep them contained.
We are big believers in free ranging our chickens. Free ranging means that they get the opportunity to get out of their coop and into a fenced in 1/2 acre to eat grass, bugs, weeds…pretty much anything they want. The more pasture the chickens get, the darker their egg yolks = healthier and yummier eggs. They also eat less commercial feed while free ranging, thus saving us money on feed and time to feed them.
You’ll see eggs at the stores labeled as “cage free” and that isn’t the same as free range or “pastured.” Cage free just means that the chickens are kept in a coop without being individually caged. They eat only what the farm provides for them. The largest chicken farms do either cage free or caged. Caged is just how it sounds- chickens are kept in individual cages called battery cages, and fed and watered certain amounts only. The cages are just enough to fit the bird. Their eggs are collected daily for commercial use. I don’t think I need to explain what it means for the bird to live like that, and the eggs don’t have the same flavor or color as pastured birds. If you’re buying eggs from the store and they are not labeled as pastured, this is what you are getting. I don’t know about you, but I’d rather have products from animals that are well treated and happy. This is just my humble opinion.

So what’s the rooster for?
Can you keep chickens without a rooster? YES! I have friends who live in the city and can only keep hens. Roosters gotta go according to the city ordinance. That always makes me laugh because hens can be just as noisy and annoying as a rooster. Ever hear a hen cackling after she lays an egg in pride? If not , I’ll try to video it sometime. Talk about mouthy….er I mean beaky! But, I digress. City hens will live happily and lay just as many eggs without a rooster around.
We keep roosters on our farm for a few reasons. First of all, well-sometimes you just get a rooster in the mix! We order chicks from hatcheries usually every other year. I like to order sexed females, so I know that I’m adding to my egg production. Sometimes we get a surprise and get a male in there too. Oops! This just happened to us with the batch we got in spring. Yep- there is a dude in the mix. He just started learning to crow…sigh.
The opposite of sexed chickens is a “straight run.” That means that you get whatever is hatched of that breed with no regard to males vs. females. More talented people than I can probably tell what’s a rooster and what’s a hen early on. I usually wait for a few months and find out who starts crowing 🙂
We get males more often if we hatch out our own chicks on our farm, which is essentially a straight run. While it’s cheaper to hatch our own chicks, we have to deal with the roosters that come with using that method. Sometimes we use them to replace older guys, sometimes we sell them, and sometimes we give them a good life for as long as possible and they end up in soup. I usually like to sell them, especially if they are a nice looking bird. I’ve sold several roosters to kids doing 4-H and wanting to show them in the fairs. While I’m not opposed to eating our birds, I do feel an obligation to give them the best life I can.
We do like to keep some roosters around. The obvious reason for this is fertilization, so we can hatch out our own chicks. Sometimes you get a “dud” guy though, and those dudes meet the selling or soup ending. We also use them for protection for the hens. Roosters are surprisingly protective of their hens, and even sometimes tender with them. They will roam the yard keeping an eye out for predators, and if they see anything that worries them they let out a loud alarm that sends the hens running for shelter. This has been particularly helpful in protecting our hens from hawks. We have a lot of trees the girls can take cover under, but the rooster is the one telling them when to do it. We have even had a rooster give his life for his hens when we had a fox invasion several years ago. RIP Little Man. He was a good guy.
Roosters will alert any hens nearby when he finds something particularly tasty in the yard and wants to share it with his girls. Many times I’ve seen our rooster cluck loudly and his hens come running for a worm or grasshopper or some such tasty thing.
There certainly can be issues with keeping roosters on your farm. We have to make sure that each rooster we keep has a group of hens he can call his own. Too many roosters always equals fighting among them. While roosters can be gentle with their hens, it’s no holds barred between each other. Fights can be vicious and bloody, even to the death. It’s important to manage this by using different coops and preventing interaction, and also by not having too many males.

I’ve had people ask me about roosters who have turned nasty and come after people. Yes, we’ve dealt with that. Those guys meet their maker quickly. Any rooster that shows any aggression towards humans gets no second chance here. It’s just not worth the risk. Thankfully, that isn’t a common problem. We currently have Dave and Bob as our full sized roosters and they are kept separate from each other with their own set of hens. They are both nice guys to their hens and humans. We also have two bantam roosters, Chick Norris and Hercules, and they tend to run between the coops hoping one of the girls will notice their rooster sexiness. They don’t seem to cause any issue, so I leave them be.

Eggs are such a good selling item here at BFF that we are expanding our egg operation to include duck and hopefully turkey eggs. We also have a pair of geese whose eggs are huge and delicious! Geese are seasonal layers, so we only get the nice big goose eggs in the spring and early summer. With geese there is the added hazard of having to retrieve the eggs from a high security protective male goose!
Hopefully next spring I’ll be able to add pictures and stories of several different kinds of eggs we will be offering.
What do you think of the free range eggs?

We’ve been busy working on big things at Black Frog Farm ~ Welcome to our new blog!
I always get questions from people about different happenings on our farm, or animal care, or even plant questions. I love that people ask me questions! It makes me happy that I can help someone with a particular problem they might be having with their own animals or plants. In fact, the questions and talking to people about our farm has been my favorite part of growing Black Frog Farm 🙂 It inspired me to start this blog and hopefully reach more people. I plan to blog on what WE do on our farm and how WE handle things in Northeastern Wisconsin. I am by no means an expert, but I’m working through different things all the time on our farm. I’m constantly figuring out what works for us, and maybe it can help you too. So spread the word for us! And please, keep those questions coming!!
A little about us….There are three of us that keep this place running! My name is Kerry, and I’ve been married to my husband Nick for over twenty years. We work our farm together, along with our 12 year old daughter Aubrey. She also helps us with animal care and some good old heavy lifting 🙂
Our farm currently houses five llamas, seven (soon to be eight) goats, five Indian Runner ducks, one turkey, a pair of American Buff geese, a LOT of chickens, three dogs, two hives of honeybees, and a heck of lot of cats.
Nick and I both work outside the home, and Aubrey goes to school. We obviously enjoy being busy!
It wasn’t always this crazy here, but “normal” would be a stretch. We bought our home in 2000 and just had cats and dogs to start with. Then, we added….chickens. People I’m telling you that chickens are the gateway drug. We got more chickens. And more chickens. One chicken coop grew to two coops, and then a full sized brooder coop. Chickens all over!!
Then we added a human CHILD! (This one has been the most work of them all! LOL!)
Then….. geese, and a goose coop. (**full disclaimer** the geese are utterly hated by everyone but me because they can bite….hard. But I think they are adorable and love to pick them up and force my love on them! )

Then a few years ago I had an idea I pitched to Nick:
Me: “we should get some goats”
Nick: “Goats???”
Aubrey: “GOOOOOAAATSSS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”
And so we started with two Fainting goats. Then for my birthday that summer Nick got me two Pygmy goat twin brothers. And while at the goat farm checking out the baby goats we were introduced to Tank, a baby Nigerian Dwarf goat that had nobody interested in him. Well, you know how that worked out. Little did I know at the time that Stacy, the lady who runs that goat farm, would become my Goat Dealer. Yes dealer. Can we say addiction? She is proud of that name;)
This year we added two more Fainting goats to our herd – courtesy of Stacy the Goat Dealer. And yep, while there:
Stacy: “Hey you need to check out Tanks full brother that was just born!!”
Me and Aubrey: “heck yeah!”
Nick: rubs his hand over his face looking up at the sky
Stacy: “I haven’t advertised him yet. Look at his cute little face!”
Me: “He looks like a little square on legs!”
Stacy: “Spongebob it is!”
Aubs (whispering): “He is MINE”

And so Spongebob will be joining us in September when he is weaned.

Similar happenings with the llamas. I was interested in one llama for a guard for my (then) five goats. I did a ridiculous amount of research on llamas to see how to handle them. I made sure to read llama books within eyesight of Nick so he could come to terms with the idea. Dude, it was happening.
Then in early 2019 I found a llama named Lady Jane not far from our place. She was unregistered, 8 years old, gigantic, and miserably grouchy. She was perfect. She affectionately came to be known as Banana. To be 100% clear, the affection was completely on the human side. Banana hated us.
Me: “Banana, wanna go for a walk?”
Banana: *SPIT*
Me: “Banana, time to halter”
Banana: *SPIT*

As for the goats, Banana tolerated them at best. So I thought, let’s get her a friend! Preferring one that could be handled and NOT get covered in spit – enter Peaches-N-Cream. “Peach” is everything opposite Banana, and she was perfect too. She had a cria in fall of 2019, but we unfortunately lost him to unseen defects within a few weeks. I bawled my eyes out. It sucked. So what else to do other than get another adult llama? I mean, I had planned food for winter for three of them, right? In comes Star Fawn Princess – or just Princess. She is a gorgeous girl, kinda a mix between Peach and Banana in attitude, and thankfully no spit. She is perfect too.

That brings us to 2020. Crazy year! And we are still growing at BFF. We moved our llamas to a new pasture that took us all winter to cut trees out of. New pasture, new shelter. Well how about more llamas! Enter Sweet Kisses and Cloud. Both are perfect! Llama-land is quickly becoming a favorite place for everyone. More goats added, a Turkey named Scott is added- who is a serious favorite of Aubrey. And GOOD GOD more chickens added!
I’ve got big plans for the next year! I am hoping they work out like I’m thinking, but if not I’m certain something else crazy will happen here and some new creature will join us.

One more thing you need to know about us. Well, me in particular, but Aubrey is reaching my level quickly. We are cat people. Yes I will completely OWN the crazy cat lady title! My mini-me is right after in my footsteps (so PROUD!! *wiping tears of joy from eyes*). Now, there are three things you need to understand.
1. I am a sucker for anything cat.
2. I did cat rescue for many years with a local group and ended up with a lot of feral cats here that would have been put down. I also got a ton of experience with that group that has helped me immensely in taking care of our cats.
3. I have a lot of cats that mysteriously show up at our place. Not “mysteriously” (air quotes), but for real mysteriously. Dozens of them. I get everybody fixed and vaccinated. If they are friendly I try to find them a good home. If not well fine. Stay and eat here. Just be nice.
Gossip clearly spreads quickly in the cat world by us, as each year the number of strays that show up here never lets up. And now I have a pile of cats. (refer back to number 1.)
So that’s our story sofar! What else do you want to hear from me about? I’d love to hear your comments!!