Our Red Ranger chicks are a few weeks old, and they absolutely love taking dust baths! Did you know that dust baths are super important? They prevent parasites such as mites and lice from finding a home in the chickens’ feathers! This video shows our awkward “teenaged” birds taking baths… Please forgive the loud goose honking that mostly covers my narration.
KW Homestead
Pasture Raised Poultry & Edible Landscaping Plants Since 2013
Author: Emma (page 12 of 36)
This is a short video of some of our layer ducks, searching for snacks and doing what ducks generally do… Explore and eat!
Semi-Dwarf Apple Trees are a good choice for your family and yard because they will grow to be 12-16 feet tall and will yield twice as much fruit as a dwarf-sized tree without taking up much more space! This size tree is great as a climbing tree for the kids and will yield plenty of apples for your family during apple season. Semi-dwarf fruit trees have well-anchored roots and a greater surface area to yield ratio than dwarf fruit trees. With appropriate care and pruning management, a semi-dwarf apple tree is the perfect fit for almost any yard or garden!
Semi-Dwarfs bear 4-10 bushels a year, and since there are an average of 125 apples per bushel, you’ll be harvesting 500-1,250 apples a year when the tree is mature! WHOA! Apple pie and applesauce, anyone?
This year we have 5 varieties available: Gala, Golden Delicious, Honeycrisp, Stayman, and Liberty. You’ll need at least 2 varieties to ensure cross-pollination, so talk to us to help determine what varieties work best for you.
Also, don’t forget that Jason offers planting services for your fruit trees or bushes, so you don’t have to worry about planting depth and method! He also offers on-site consultations to assess your land and help you determine the best place for your edible or fruit bearing plants. He can work with you to create an edible orchard that includes fruits and other goodies that your family will enjoy for the next decades. Contact us for more info!
We raise only the best, most nutrient dense meats here at KW Homestead! All of our birds are raised outside, on pasture, free ranging around the woods and grasses. They’re supplemented with non-GMO grain and are humanely harvested when they mature.
Because we only raise pastured birds, we don’t raise birds in winter, when there’s no green pasture for them to enjoy. For this reason, we are sometimes out of stock on our more popular cuts of meat in the early spring. But never fear, all of our Red Ranger chicken parts are now back in stock! Flavorful Boneless & Skinless Breast and rich and moist Thighs are ready for your dinner table!
- Swing by one of our Triad market locations to grab yours today, or reserve a pack for delivery via email.
At a few weeks old, the poults have finally begun to act like turkeys: jumping around, hanging out in the food dish, trying to fly… We would consider them to be at the “toddler” age in turkey years, when they’re just starting to get into everything! This video shows how they’ve changed since being little fluff balls!
If this video has gotten you thinking about Thanksgiving, and you want to ensure that your Heritage Thanksgiving Turkey can be reserved at $9/lb, reserve today! The price goes up as the holiday season approaches, so act fast!
This is always our busiest season, and there isn’t really a warm-up period… We have to hit the ground running to keep up with the many animals, plants, and the human baby in our lives!
While it’s the busiest season, it’s also the most fun for everyone. Each year there’s lots to do and lots to learn, not to mention the benefits of the lovely weather and of building up stronger bodies to make things happen around here.
You can always find us working on something, like:
- moving cows, ducks, turkeys, & chickens to greener pastures
- potting & pruning plants
- preparing brooders for arriving babies
- watering plants and feeding animals
- installing fencing or other infrastructural components
- processing chickens, ducks, & turkeys for sale
- and so much more!
So, next time you see us, be sure to ask us what we’ve been up to this week! Here’s a few pictures of what we’ve been up to since the beginning of May:
When it comes to cooking duck, as duck farmers it’s something that we should know something about. While we’re often roasting whole duck and getting crispy skin and moist meat, we don’t always branch out with our spice combination!
That’s why we we’re super excited to discover an amazing Asian 5-Spice Powder blend from our friend and fellow farmer, Stephen at Elam Gardens. It’s a blend of pepper (black and Sichuan), fennel, cloves, star anise, cinnamon, and allspice. You can sprinkle this delicious rub onto your duck and cook it the way you like best. Here’s what we’ve been into lately:
- Preheat your oven to 375.
- Score the skin of the bird everywhere except the legs. Be sure that your scores are deep enough to reach through the skin and into the fat but not so deep that you see the meat through your cut.
- Sprinkle salt and Asian 5-Spice Powder both both sides of the bird.
- Select a large and deep oven dish and either add a small metal rack or cut up veggies to lift the bird a half-inch or so off the bottom of the dish.
- Add a quarter-inch of water to the pan.
- Place the bird, breast side up, on the rack/veggies.
- Cook on 375 for 2-2.5 hours, depending on bird size. Note that it’s hard to overlook duck, so if you like really crispy skin, you can get that without sacrificing the meat! Go for it!
Our Red Ranger broiler chickens are truly pasture raised! They spend their days eating grass, bugs, and worms and ranging around through the greenery. Here’s a video of our newest batch of birds, taking time out in the heat of the day to relax.
When you have lots of huge, huge goose eggs, what do you do with them? Well, make a frittata, of course!
Each goose egg equates to 3 or 4 chicken or duck eggs, so unless you’re making omelets for the extended family, baking with goose eggs is one of your best options.
This recipe is simple, delicious, and fits into the Paleo or Weston A. Price diet ideology. Here it is:
Ingredients
- 6-8 goose eggs, broken and whisked together
- 1-2 pounds of sweet potatoes, cubed
- 1/2 pound of grass fed cheese, grated
- 2 onions, diced
- 2 green peppers, diced
- basil
- garlic powder
- salt
- red pepper flakes
- lard or duck fat
Materials
- large cast iron skillet or large sauté pan/pot
- large casserole dish
- whisk
- fork
- large mixing spoon
- mixing bowls
- sharp knife & cutting board
Directions
- Heat your cast iron skillet on medium and add your lard or duck fat.
- Begin sautéing the sweet potatoes and when they are about halfway cooked, add the diced onion and green pepper.
- Add salt, garlic, red pepper flakes, and liberal amounts of dried basil. Stir this mixture often and continue cooking until the sweet potatoes are tender when poked with a fork.
- In a large mixing bowl, crack the 6-8 goose eggs (the number your choose depends on the ratio of egg to other ingredients that you desire, and how much sweet potato you chose to use). Be sure that no shell ends up in the egg bowl… These shells are almost as think as a light ceramic dish, and could easily hurt you if you bit into one.
- Poke each yolk with a fork and begin stirring. Once the mixture can be blended with a whisk, switch to the whisk.
- Add the cooked sweet potato to the eggs and stir well with a large spoon.
- Add the grated cheese and stir well.
- Add more basil, garlic, and salt. The amount you add depends Up how much spice you like in your dish. I always add more than I expect will be needed, just to be sure the flavor is there, and it turns out great.
- Mix everything together thoroughly and pour this mixture into a large, greased casserole dish.
- Cook this dish in the oven on 375 until the top becomes a light golden color.
- Enjoy!
This video is a brief look at our nearly finished turkey brooder. It’s been outfitted to make it predator proof and easy to clean. The removable floor panels allows to easy access to install heat lamps and a pulley system will allow us to lower and raise these lights. Now, we await the cute (and often confused) turkey poults!
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