March 9-13 Happy Hen Farms Newsletter: Perennials vs Annuals...or Both?

Photo by: Wallpaper Flare

Good Evening, 

Everyday this week is available for delivery to the school except Friday (no school!). My grandparents store in Nampa is open Tuesday, Thursday (10-3) and Friday (10-5). 

Eggs: 

To start the week off, I have about 20 Md dzn and about 11 Lg dzn. Total egg production has risen to 6-6.5 dozen per day, with about 1.5 to 2 dzn of them being Large eggs. 

Newsletter: 

This week's events led to another newsletter about grass and cover crops, but I guess you have to start from the ground up! 

With the good weather still hanging around, I fenced off half of the backyard this week, that has grass, and seeded a Pasture mix and wheat among the existing grass. In a few weeks, the wheat will start to grow, and from then on, it will grow rapidly (roughly 60 days to get to 18 inches tall). The pasture mix, on the other hand, takes a bit longer to sprout, but when it gets going, it grows relatively fast. Another plus to having wheat (an annual grass) among the pasture mix (perennial grasses) is that it will compete with the pasture grasses for light. Since wheat is an annual, it grows extremely fast because it only has a certain amount of time to live and produce seed (if allowed to go that far). Perennial grasses (ryegrass, orchardgrass, ect...) takes more time to get established, but as a result, they become resilient in ways that annuals aren't (foot traffic, extended grazing periods, drought, ect...), and they come back every year!

Last year, I found out by experimenting with mixing perennials and annuals in the same stand (plot), was that the annual caused the perennial's to grow faster than if the perennial was by itself. Annuals, such as wheat, have wider leaves, thus shading everything that is below it. Well, the perennial grasses don't like that, and since they have some "fight" in them, they compete for light by growing taller. 

As I experienced last year, as soon as the chickens were allowed onto the section of yard with the annual/perennial mix, they immediately picked out the barley grass (because it tasted really good to them; it isn't the best tasting grass for people, as it has a very "green" taste, but I guess if you are interested in juicing or juice-cleansing, add barley or wheat grass onto your juicing list. They are high in protein, as well as some vitamins and minerals). I am going to let the wheat grow quite a bit taller this year (which will also get the ryegrass and orchardgrass mostly mature) and will see how it will respond to the chickens. 

Another benefit to having a mix of grasses is that the chickens can pick and choose what they like, as well as having differing protein levels in the grasses. Nice dark green grass leads to dark orange egg yolks! 

As always, any questions or comments are always welcome! 

Thank you!