25 Chickens - 25 Cents a day (and they make TONS of compost!)

[@jessicalandi6750]

Two minutes into this video and I'm so inspired that I had to stop and share it with my chicken raising friend (who will soon be giving me my first three chickens) who said she barely breaks even for feeding the chickens in return for the eggs. Can't wait to finish the video now. Canadian Permaculture Legacy sent me here! Love it.

[@danielrus7117]

Those must be the most happy chickens in the world! They look so tranquil and peaceful! Keep it up!

[@hermannschmitt4031]

and really healthy. Almost fat, LOL.

[@trudymatteson5439]

I've been using this method in my chicken run for the past three years....the chickens love it, I love it, and my garden loves it! Thank you for the tips.

[@camperspecial9666]

Excited? I'm beyond excited! You've just revolutionized my chicken set up. I can't wait till next fall now.

[@edibleacres]

You can get started on it any day you want... Thats the fun of it!

[@rwatts2155]

Go ahead! Pamper your chickens! They deserve a bit of pampering for everything they do for you. : ) I am putting some of the ideas I've gotten from you into practice in my garden. I have 13 Black Australorp chickens in my garden and get a great deal of pleasure watching them do their thing. They aren't laying yet but they should be laying in a couple months. They free range in my back yard ( and today they found a break in my gate and free ranged in my neighbors' yard!! ) Fortunately I have good neighbors who shoo'd them back into my garden. Thanks for making and sharing your videos. I'm learning a lot from you !

[@fredivory4304]

Oh you are so polite to your chickens!

[@KimberlyBarkdoll]

When we let our chickens out they literally RUN to the compost area. lol And to our creek bed that runs to our pond. We also use their pine shavings from under their night roosting area for compost. We have a separate container for onions, garlic, coffee grounds and egg shells on the countertop to bury in the compost. Everything else gets shared between the chickens and the compost. We're in Florida so I save the ends of the melons and freeze them in the summer. They LOVE it. And we treat them to black sunflower seeds in the afternoon. Another thing that has helped bulk up our compost is ask the tree trimmers that chip on site out here in the county to dump a couple of loads for us. They make quick work of digging through that for bugs, and then we put the leaves in their run and compost.

[@TheMiccoliGroup]

I have lived in Florida, my concern would be termites from the wood chipping.

[@gardenboots7464]

I keep rewatching your chicken videos. It just makes me happy :) Thank you.

[@edibleacres]

Very glad to have them available for folks!

[@Sarah-zg5qs]

There's nothing wrong with pampering your animals. The better you treat them the more work they will want to do for you. It goes both ways.

[@edibleacres]

I agree!

[@graywoodhomestead845]

I am so excited about this!! we are looking at as many ways possible to reduce/get ride of our feed costs and providing opportunities for our birds to eat in the most natural way possible. we started up a compost system this winter for them and this concept of adding the grain to sprout/ferment is the perfect addition! I'm inspired! Thank you!

[@cindyritchie5521]

Your chickens are so lucky to have you! Great work! Keep making videos! I just found your channel today and I am binge watching! I am loving every minute!

[@edibleacres]

Welcome to our community, we're glad to have you!

[@maryedmo7798]

this is genius! I saw a post on Vermont's system, and really love it. I love seeing this on a smaller scale

[@edibleacres]

Yeah, it was mind blowing the first time I learned of that system and it really inspired this work in a major way.

[@praisethelord4222]

very nice. thank you for this. 5 years after posting it. Bless you.

[@sharonweir5570]

I add chickens to my garden three years ago. They are my low wage workers.

[@nareshlaxamanpatil2050]

Really you are doing very good work

[@hermannschmitt4031]

You're running a sweat shop. :) LOL One of the best ones though. Your employees are working for food. The best food they could get. They love worms or most insects, you might have to crush some beetles for them to eat them, but when crushed they even love Japanese beetles. Every larva is a delicacy for a chicken.

[@rmar127]

Hermann Schmitt solar powered bug zappers can add dead bugs to their diet as well

[@bryonlako7377]

I love how you really let nature take over and do the work for you. I’ve had a similar thought process and you’re giving me so many good ideas. I’d love to see more videos of the “mini ecosystems” you create and what purpose they serve.

[@MsZenova]

They are so Healthy. I sprout grains and seeds for my chickens. This is awesome.

[@petramacdougall]

I got to tell you I'm totally excited about doing this and because of first watching you a couple of months back we are now creating over a yard or so compost / month with the help of our chickens and free resources like tree chips and boxes of discarded veggie greens from the market. So thank you! and the grains look amazing...i think I would have a hard time giving them to the girls and not eating them myself. G

[@grants169]

All this time I've been fencing off the compost from chickens. Time to rethink that.

[@hermannschmitt4031]

never do that. When I was a kid looking for worms to fish it was in the chicken area. One dig and I had plenty of worms to fish with. At the time I didn't know that worms make the end product for perfect compost.

[@hermannschmitt4031]

You might laugh about me but I started a worm bucked with about 9 worms. As long as they don't crawl out they're maybe happy. I'll check with them when the first one wants to escape. It's an experiment. I think worms try to crawl out when they're getting o much for the food source. I have an open top container without a lid. But i'm watching it. If one tries to crawl out I'll set him free and might find out why he tries to escape.

[@grants169]

@@hermannschmitt4031 I've had a red wiggler worm bin for years. I abuse them badly, go months at a time without checking them and they continue to thrive somehow. If you can pony up a few bucks, grab 100 or so red wigglers off ebay and you can maintain them with little work for life. I add handfuls to the compost and to my flower/vegetable beds that are mainly all compost... and let the chickens nibble on them too sometimes.

[@hermannschmitt4031]

@@grants169 I don't have to buy them only catch 'em. Later i can say I did it all by myself, LOL. To me worms are the most amazing creatures of all beings. We (humankind) will be gone and these motherfuckers are still here.

[@ytvladnoob24]

I lived my first 16 years of my life in the mountains of grid in the middle of a bunch of trees and I remember how I hated when I was making piles of leafs and the chickens right behind me making a mess with them, now I just think it's funny

[@leacutter4648]

e are beginning to create a permaculture inspired semi-sustainable homestead in rural Maine. We have been so inspired by this idea and so many others. Thanks for sharing your knowledge and ideas. -Brian @WaystoneFarm

[@chickenlaynehomestead94]

This has been very helpful in cutting cost and making my chickens happier. Thank you

[@edibleacres]

Great to hear!

[@christiebetts4970]

Loved the video and I subscribed.I have started supplementing my"first" 5 hens with a compost pile.Happy,happy chickens and beautiful compost for my little garden. My 5yr old granddaughter loves to help them look for worms.Now I just need a larger compost pile!

[@PermacultureHomestead]

great stuff, cant wait to have this many birds. its fun to watch my 3 chickens turn my compost throughout the year, nature is great

[@teakey]

Permaculture Homestead nice, I have three also.

[@ShieldBJ]

Hello out there. This is so very helpful. Starting immediately because it looks like you have happy chickens and it is exciting to learn how to use what we have. Thank you. I'll be back and certainly will be watching more of your videos. Also, love the green house. Perfect.

[@tiffanyjernigan5754]

Most healthy and happy chickens ever!

[@libbyjensen1858]

I just found your videos and I am addicted! I just LOVE watching what you do! This chicken video is fascinating!

[@collaboratingbackstage1156]

Genius. I learnt so much from you. Thank you and keep exploring!!!

[@johnnielawson]

Very inspiring, thank you for taking the time to make this. Johnnie Lawson

[@edibleacres]

My pleasure!

[@piercespencer9876]

you probably dont give a shit but if you are bored like me during the covid times then you can watch all the latest movies and series on instaflixxer. Been streaming with my girlfriend for the last few days xD

[@Rollwithit699]

Great work! Very natural, love the way your chickens are so comfortable in your presence. They look so healthy.

[@meganh109]

This is amazing! I love how you care for your chickens!

[@chantaltulliez8066]

I really enjoy that you are pampering your animals...they have a good life and its a win win situation for you as well...

[@edibleacres]

It can be seen as pampering, but in the same stroke it could be seen as simply providing a healthy work space for valued workers. Since it is a simplified food and much lower cost and waste than buying bags of prepared stuff, it's actually less pamper in that way. But they end up having a really nice life while they work hard and help us make compost. Win win for sure :)

[@kasdfg776]

That's a happy bunch of chick chicks. Such a contrast to factory farms.

[@sowhat3430]

Very calm to watch these chickens

[@MelaniePhoenix]

This is absolutely brilliant! Thanks for posting!

[@hermannschmitt4031]

I'm very impressed with how you think. Thanks for sharing.

[@edibleacres]

My pleasure to share

[@SuperRedhat123]

I love this video. You achieve such amazing symmetry in your practices. If chickens could smile, they would be doing it right now.

[@rebeccasuzannerustigian1257]

I have done very little but watch your videos for the last few days. Boy am I excited! The information you share is priceless, as is the culture you've created. I do hope you written a book and will provide the name so I can order a copy, and I also hope you'll continue to make videos on a regular basis. I've got to finish catching up on the videos, but I'll be back. Thank you for doing your thing! I love it!

[@edibleacres]

Our pleasure. No books in the plan, but we plan to definitely continue to grow the content on the channel. Thanks for joining us!

[@stephaniebrior3881]

Oh cool you guys are in the Ithica area. We live in the Northern Catskills and have 30 chickens and 4 ducks. Love the idea of using the leaves.

[@farmtractor1690]

these chickens seem very happy

[@mascatrails661]

I love what your doing with your chickens. This is my first winter with a flock and I have them on a moving system with portable electric fence and mobile hen house. My system was working well while the grasses were growing, but now that growth has slowed, I'm afraid my chickens are doing more damage than healing to my landscape. They are raking all my fallen leaves downhill and leaving behind bare soils. I think I will plan something similar to this for next winter.

[@ColonelKlink100]

I love your idea of putting grain to sprout in the compost piles! It must be like little treats for them, (along with the worms and bugs too). Keep on spoiling those chickens!

[@thunderingkitty]

nice yeah that compost helps keep them warm-ish to actually warm. I seen and been working using compost to heat my passive greenhouse just put up before this winter

[@emmavik-fredriksson640]

great content! happy to see you upload often now, you have so much good things to show us! thank you.

[@edibleacres]

Thanks, I wasn't sure if we're starting to push too much content out, but I figured people can watch it or not!

[@bluesalamander8351]

[@GoldShawFarm]

Great system. I want to try something like this on my farm one day soon.

[@snafu918]

Wow what a beautiful rooster!!

[@ZombiesCometh]

Great video as always, perfect length and quantity of information. I'm surely going to emulate this!

[@AdvancedHarmonics]

LOVE this! Very unique! Thanks for sharing and all the great info!

[@samcbk]

I love your chicken. They look so healthy and well treated.

[@edibleacres]

I'm glad you think so.

[@markpieklik8246]

Greetings from Clay New York. I have 9 hens and let them play with the leaves in the fall. Other than that I have a big compost pile in the back yard and use it in my garden.

[@chattychatotchannel]

I learnt at my animal rescue course about birds that birds should not be given anything rotten and not dairy since they cannot digest it as they do not have the enzymes needed (makes sense since birds do not drink milk) and it gives them diarrhoea and then they lose moisture from the diarrhoea so the rotten milk concerns me

[@manfredziegerer9110]

thank you sir! you the best. We need mooohr people like You

[@marieschieler1914]

You have beautiful healthy chickens!

[@LaurelHolliday]

Gorgeous birds! Great job keeping them happy and warm while you save money and enjoy super nutritious eggs! 🥚

[@LaurelHolliday]

If anyone tells you disapprovingly that you're "pampering your chickens," please tell them, with pride, "YES! Yes I am!" 😁 "The problem is...??"

[@edibleacres]

Right... It's one thing to spend a ton of money on them and have energy intensive or fossil fuel dependent things to 'pamper' them but in this system they are working incredibly hard and moving our bigger goals forward greatly. It's equivalent to having a really healthy work environment where employees are treated with great respect. Its the intersection of functionality and a good quality of life for the beings involved. I think its what every system with animals and plants and people should have!

[@SuperRedhat123]

One of my favourite videos on you tube right now. Harmonious.

[@edibleacres]

Thanks kindly for that! I'm excited to see how many folks have been responding to it. I need to do an update.

[@allenpost3616]

Beautiful Australorp's! You good Sir are brilliant. Thank you for sharing your wisdom.

[@utubemouse]

Thank you. Great ideas!. Western NY is such a lovely place to live.

[@jeffboothe2102]

That is ingenious, and inspiring. Now I want chickens again.

[@Marlynnamm]

Beautiful Australorps. My favorite Chickens and Of Course Jersey Giants

[@watchingitallhere]

Those are nice healthy chickens they look content.

[@homesteadinglife1017]

Great video. Thank you.

[@kaamranmohammad1584]

Great video...love the way you use hand gestures to drive home the point...very interesting and educative.....thanks a lot.

[@cassityart7001]

Lovely. Really exciting to see a method that is purposefully going into the direction of zeroing out bagged feed cost. Ithaca is a unique place where bartering is normal. The rest of the country seems locked into treasury IOUs. Best wishes!

[@edibleacres]

I bet barter and exchange is possible way more than you might think.... I'd explore it and see whats possible where you live.

[@cybertones942]

So chill they must be full already

[@jandoolin6215]

EXCELLENT video!! Thanks for sharing.

[@johnnyh4891]

Wow, just too cool!! I just moved to the country and would love to develop a system like yours! I'll keep watching I'm from upstate N.Y. thanks, again

[@stephanievanorden1765]

My husband is from Trumansberg!

[@murchlk]

What a great setup, +1 sub I can't wait too catch up on old videos.

[@SJLamb-te3dt]

That is fantastically clever! Good on you!

[@clauderodrigue6461]

Those birds look super healthy!

[@edibleacres]

I believe they are

[@fellowshipofthegreen4697]

They look great too...awesome job👍

[@rosehavenfarm2969]

Brilliant. Watching your series on the chicken composers...we want to implement, this year. Thank you.

[@edibleacres]

Good luck, I'm sure it will work wonders for you! If you have the time, you may want to watch all our chicken videos since the system is evolving over time and there are lots of positive and not so amazing parts of the experiment I share with folks.

[@blindjohn2969]

Awesome. Definitely a great system for larger scale organic gardening. It's one thing to add leaf mulch to your beds, but this way it should be high in nitrogen/nutrients from the chicken manure while they're scratching in it all day.

[@edibleacres]

It's nice to have the chickens 'shredding' the leaves over the whole winter so the nutrients and especially the minerals are ready to enter the soil in the garden come spring when we need it.

[@StaceySsch]

Your doing a great job , thanks for sharing.

[@Kindafu]

This is a great system. Very adaptable.

[@kheventplanner]

Pretty genius and an easy system to understand!

[@MrChickadee]

Do you feed anything for calcium? What about their water freezing?

[@edibleacres]

We offer oyster shells and grit as a free choice sometimes, and also give them back all their egg shells to rebuild, and it seems like it works. Water freezing... kzbin.info/www/bejne/omrHhJeqf6h6sK8 I explain what we do in our scenario here.

[@VaughnMalecki]

So many awesome ideas. Thanks for sharing.

[@lisan1819]

Wow! This is an amazing set up.

[@jamesgames4280]

Wow. Outstanding system. Thanks for sharing. God Bless

[@el.leonblanco]

Do you wait a certain amount of time before using this compost in a garden as it will have fresh chicken manure on it?

[@carlacowling1789]

That rooster at the beginning is freaking gorgeous!!

[@growerprepper2610]

Would you ever consider doing a video where you really go deep into how and what you barter. Your thoughts and techniques.

[@ImLisaMoore]

Thankyou

[@thomasreto2997]

Nice. I have noticed sprouts like that in my compost heap. Chicks look 😃

[@shean7890]

Fantastic, I love ❤️ your ideas. Thank you 🙏 for great information

[@jefdby]

This is so great. I needed this!

[@nercoG]

this is awesome. Thank you for making this

[@josewsantos7327]

Excellent Job!

[@yuz6884]

Interesting! How do you prevent the critters, rats and voles from feasting on the grains in the compost pile?

[@k8k8vt]

Curious regarding rats/mice as well.

[@garethpeterthobosi2945]

Wow....this is great ,i cannot wait to do it.

[@margaritagittens1951]

i have recently subscribed, you have ssoooo many useful, clear, wonderful ideas !! thank you !!

[@edibleacres]

Welcome to the channel! :)

[@farmerdell9991]

Logs are a great idea!

[@pfdcaw]

Great ideas you have there.

[@filougreendog]

years ago we had a few back garden chickens, at the same time our young son had one of those yellow plastic slides. so every august time it was chicken playtime as they as stood around waiting for the pollen beetles to fly onto the yellow surface and slide down to them ... they also used to like to go up the street to eat the flying ants coming out of the pavement🙂

[@edibleacres]

Sounds like a fun scene!

[@spir5102]

Fascinating! You have a true organic ecosystem here. Very impressive. Do you have a video about how you built the cattle panel greenhouse? I looked and didn’t see one. Keep up the good work

[@edibleacres]

Glad you appreciate these videos... Here is a playlist on greenhouses and high tunnels, the videos you want are in the list... kzbin.info/aero/PLihFHKqj6JeqFfSnu90neOyq9eS7oSYLS

[@turkeycreekhomestead]

just found your channel.. excellent knowledge and information here!

[@stonehillridge2619]

My concern in collecting bags for leaves from random neighbors is I am unsure of what they may have used on their lawn in terms of herbicides/chemicals. Are you concerned with this or how to do avoid this problem?

[@edibleacres]

Yes, worth thinking about... I look at the lawns of where I collect from. If they are weed free and 'immaculate' and OCD kept, I avoid it! I also look into the bags and mainly try to take only bags filled with leaves from trees... Seems VERY unlikely they are sprayed... So far, so good I think!

[@SecretWeaponShow]

God bless you

[@MegaStrumpfhose]

Lovely, I‘d love to be a chicken there!