Que Lawrence

Hello Rion,

Do you have ducks or chickens? I ask because this winter we let our ducks and chickens into the front yard for 3 entire months (Nov, Dec & Jan). That is where all my raised beds are. The beds are all filled with wood and covered with compost & hay. Why do I bring this up? There is NOT a bug in sight. Seriously. There isn't any grass left either and the chickens have scratched all through our wood chip mulch but that is ok.

In comparison, we have a small area in the backyard with three raised beds. Same type of setup. There is a noticeable difference in the bug population.

I am planting now so I will see how different things will be this spring & summer but for now, it really is incredible. We don't mind the bugs too much but like you, we don't want them eating everything

We raise rabbits for our family and to feed our dogs. We also raise chickens and goat but don't really butcher them often. When we do though, the dogs get some of it too. Since we don't have the room for pigs or cows, once a year we do buy 1/2 a pig or 1/2 a cow from a local farmer and use it for us and the dogs.

We have a rat terrier and a dachshund. They readily eat raw meat. Both dogs came to us with skin problems and the raw meat diet has completely clear up all problems.

Table scraps are given either to the dogs or the chickens.

Just catching up on some old topics.

We have duckweed in our aquaponics system (in the sump tank, not with the fish).  When it gets to be too much, we feed it to our ducks and quail.  They love it!  We don't really keep track of how fast it grows but we do know that during the summer, the birds get duckweed about once every two weeks.  During the winter, we leave it alone (in our greenhouse).

Oh, one more thing.  We raise the regular "pet-sized" guinea pigs.

Hello,

I  haven't been on this forum in awhile and missed this topic.  We raise guinea pigs for meat in our backyard in Portland Oregon.  Very easy livestock.  The vitamin C issue really isn't an issue for us.  We get lots of free scraps from the local produce market each day and there is plenty of green veggies loaded with vitamin C.

Like Silverseeds mentioned, no need to freeze.  Easy fresh meat. Any questions, I will be happy to respond.

We raise bantam chickens and coturnix quail.  The quail are in a 7'x12' chain link/wood frame enclosure.  We lined all the chain link with hardward cloth so that the quail can't get through the chain link.

Both chickens and quail are easy.  Our quail don't lay in the winter but we still get eggs from our bantys.  We eat quail throughout the winter and by the time spring gets here, we stop eating them and they start laying like crazy and having babies.

We like having both because we don't want to provide artificial light in the winter for the quail eggs and during the spring and summer the quail have a great turnaround cycle for meat production.  The chickens are just fun birds to us that lay also. The banty chickens also do the incubation of the quail eggs.

Right now we have the entire enclosure wrapped with plastic and tarps due to the amount of wind and rain we get in the winter.  There is a chain link roof and a wood roof but my husband likes to be sure that they stay dry.

We do have two rabbits in this enclosure with the quail.  We just noticed three days ago that we now have four baby bunnies!  So cute!  The baby bunnies run around with the quail and everyone seems to be just fine. 

Sorry it took so long for the pics everyone.  Since I was pretty new to this forum, I actually forgot which forum that I promised the pictures.  ops:

Yep, definitley less finished compost but that is ok.  I love the whole process.

We have an abundance of BSF also.  Tons of them. During the spring, summer and part of the fall, I love to feed them everything because it disappears so fast. They are in our very large compost pile.  I also started adding food scraps to our raised beds and the BSF found their way there also.  I was so happy. 

During the winter, we don't see them but they always come back in the spring.  I think they go dormant.  The worms come back first though - in abundance!  The worms love the BSF poo.