Category: Animal Husbandry

  • Snippets and Highlights

    Greetings, readers! As usual, the best laid plans of mice and men, when not backed up by good habits, gang aft agley. So to get back on track, I thought I would post some highlights of homesteading thing-a-ma-jigs we have accomplished over the last couple of years. Chicken infrastructure: For small numbers of chickens. I…

  • Kittens!

    Right, time to do something about this blog. I’m going to try for Saturday morning posts, to at least get into a routine. Anyway. It so happens that in the autumn of last year, we had holes cropping up left and right across our land. Rats. This is a farm, not a golf course. Besides,…

  • Our Waipu Goats

    Our Waipu Goats

    Hello Readers! It’s a beautiful day here on the Kiwi Homestead.  As we’ve almost finished settling into our new home I thought I might take this opportunity to share with you our new herd.  As part of our long term goals, we set out to find only rare breed or heritage animals for our farm. …

  • Raising Turkeys (and assorted birds)

    Raising Turkeys (and assorted birds)

    This week on KiwiHomesteading; The challenge of raising turkeys When the Mad Scientist and I decided to move to Canterbury we were very interested in finding a place where we could become self-sufficient and build a sustainable life.  We started small by raising chickens in the city and growing a veggie patch. We always knew…

  • Still alive.

    Winter is not an easy time of year for the Kiwi Homesteaders. The coughs and colds come out in force, with three kids in kindergarten. We’ve also been house-sitting for Starfish’s parents, and that has at times felt like a mission, with maintenance items coming out of the woodwork and a lot of floor space…

  • One Crazy Drive

    One Crazy Drive

    Hello, again my dear readers! At last, I bring to you our tale of the journey over the mountains to the West Coast of New Zealand.  We had bought two chicken coops on Trade Me, and they were for collection by the buyer. The Mad Scientist got up bright and early, and nipped down the…

  • Chicken Coops

    Chicken Coops

    One of the most difficult things for Starfish to do when we started renovating our old house was say goodbye to our six brown shavers and three chicks. They went to a good home with some friends of ours, but we missed their personalities and their eggs, which we used ourselves and sold surplus. Now…

  • Allow us to introduce…

    Allow us to introduce…

    Read along with this post to find out more!

  • Raising Chickens part 2

    Raising Chickens part 2

    Raising Chickens Part 2 Incubation

  • Raising Chickens in the City

    Raising Chickens in the City

    A guide to keeping Chickens for egg and chick production.