This set up worked for a few weeks.  We would move the tractor about twice a week, just long enough for them to eat down the tall grass but not long enough for them to destroy it all together.  Its amazing how green some of those spots of grass were a week or two after we moved the chickens off of it.  In one spot there was a perfect rectangle of longer, darker grass where we kept the chickens for a full week.  But before we knew it there just wasn't enough room for them.  We would have loved to let the girls run free around our yard but our dogs would, most certainly, find them too irresistable.  We didn't want to risk it.  So we fenced in about an acre of land behind our old barn.  The land here was never used, it was always overgrown and covered in snails and other delicious bugs.  We ended up having to brush-hog it all down so the chickens could move around but they had plenty of grass and ant hills to enjoy as a result.

It seemed like every time I thought 'they must be done growing now' I would look at some pictures that were taken a week before and see a drastic difference.  Our girls had gone from fairly docile birds to massive, demanding chickens.  We love them, though.  Even Kyle, who never imagined himself as a person who would own chickens (or ANY farm animals for that matter) started really enjoying them.  They are good entertainment and the noises they make when they are eating or foraging just brings such a smile to our faces.  It is such a pleasing sound.

Our girls have just started laying eggs- so far only two (maybe three) chickens out of the twelve.  This time of year really isn't the typical high-production time for chickens, what with the lack of daylight, so we'll be lucky if we get many at all until spring.  But we look at our girls and think of how great it would be to get more.  Yeah.  More.  When we first started out we thought we would just want six or so.  But now we look at our twelve and imagine what it would be like to have double that.   Of course, in a couple years our current gals will start slowing down their egg production and we'll end up culling them all at some point so we'll need replacements standing in the wings.

I know it sounds crass.  But this is the way it is for homesteaders.  These chickens are not pets.  They are part of our lives, though.  We nurture them and they will, in turn, nurture us.  I'm not saying it will be easy.  In fact, it could very well be one of the most difficult things we'll ever do, but this is life.  In the spring we'll be ordering another round of chicks, some turkeys, and maybe some geese to add to our growing farm.  We'll never need all of the number of eggs we'll collect, but friends, family, neighbors, and co-workers are more than willing to buy them or trade for them.  So it seems this could be a good start for income from the farm.  So it begins.