We have a varying number of chickens at Crooked Acres; as of September 2008, we have around fifty. Right now we have 24 eggs in the incubator due to hatch in a few weeks, so the population will be expanding as those hatch and contracting as we process chickens to eat.

We have several different kinds of chickens - Rhode Island Reds, Delawares, Americaunas, Black Jersey Giants, Buff Orpingtons, Barred Rocks, Golden Polish, a couple of White-Crested Black Polish, and a lot of “mutts”.

Our girls provide us with plenty of fresh eggs and we’ve found that fresh eggs from our own chickens are head and shoulders above anything you can buy in a grocery store. We eat our own chickens as well. We don’t enjoy processing our own chickens, but the meat we get from them is far superior than that we find in the stores. The fact that our chickens are treated like royalty until the moment of death is a big plus, as far as we’re concerned.

Our chickens get plenty of high quality chicken food and scratch, which is supplemented by food from the garden (they love corn on the cob and tomatoes!) and the kitchen (they adore rice and pasta).