Pete, I think this video was exceptional. Very well presented, informative, rational. You always present your information in a clear, concise form. I enjoy your videos and seeing daily farm activities, as I am an old farm boy who no longer is physically able to do things that I used to do! Blessings to you and yours always, from Ohio!

Highlight of my day. Seeing your videos. Thanks Pete.

Pete keep doing what your doing. I had to sell my farm in January 2021 to get my wife closer to good health care. Your farm videos fill a void that I have since moving to town. Thank you for letting me tag along.

I enjoy your Small Farm Sundays. My "small farm" is 2500 sq ft - my backyard - with no livestock allowed. But watching your videos still gets my brain going - I ponder things, questions pop into my head, I fine-tune my mental meanderings, and then I start to research. I just got started growing food last year, and I'm hoping in a couple of years I can supplement my income with sales of saved seeds, plant starts, fresh produce, and preserved foods...and in the meantime will also provide myself, my family, and my friends with nutritious & delicious LOCAL food. Thanks Pete.

Atta boy, Pete!! I'm "addicted" to your wunnerful channel!!! Everyday, when I bring up KZfaq, I check YOUR channel first in hopes that you've posted another gentle adventure there on your farm. No wonder your channel is growing so exponentially!! All 248,000 of us are cheering for ya buddy!!! ;o)

You are a wealth of information on several subjects for the small farm thanks for taking the time to share your knowledge

Well done Pete. I had 3 questions when this started, you answered them all.

I find your view on a lot of things extremely thought provoking, no matter what our trade is. Your comment " All bets are off the table" is so true. I am a 63 year old carpenter and I can't even understand or explain the daily issues we keep facing. Thanks for your videos, I love watching your mechanical intuition on the tractor repair videos. I will share with some of my younger family boys,, and girls, to watch even if its not tractors they want to rebuild.

Hi Pete! Thank you for another great video. The meat birds we get here in Nova Scotia, I’m sure they’re the same as you get, they grow so fast that the roosters go off their feet. They eat like there’s no tomorrow. We always kept them in a pin. So they got lazy fast. And for a week or two before they’d be butchered we’d feed them cracked corn. The corn kinda turned the fat yellow but it give the meat a bit better flavour.

Appreciate this Pete! My gf and I are starting the process to start our small farm. We won't have the luxury of inheriting but are working on our transition with my father-in-law who had run this farm as a small dairy here in Canada for 40 years. The farm needs to be completely renovated but we will be bootstrapping

Thanks for that info Pete! I have been wondering why everyone isn’t hatching their own meat chickens…..very interesting! G’day from Australia 🦘🇦🇺🌞

Hi Pete, its been nice to get know you through your vlogs and you take me back to my school days back in England in WW2 when my 2 best buddies were Farmers sons. We lived in an area where a lot of farms were pure dairy farms so they grew hay ,some crops of Cow Cabbage and Mangolds and the rest was grazing. Farms were relatively small about 150 acres. So I was familiar with driving cows to the barn to be milked ,mucking out the stalls and picking eggs which were found all over the farm yard as chickens ,ducks and geese ran free although they had a shed for night time and that's where they got fed then locked in for the night because of marauding foxes.Fun time was hay making as we got to drink farm made cider. the farms usually had just one tractor a David Brown or a Fordson usually but also had a Shire horse or two who were genle giants and used for hauling a big cart or a plough or harrow. I loved that rural lifes o much I ran away to sea following a family tradition and that led me to come to Canada in 1967. You know Pete I think besides being a farmer youre a rural "Philosopher" ,you havea very engaging way of putting across your thoughts and ideas I just love each vlog .Thankyou so much you've got a new fan.

We hatched our own Cobbs which I believe are Britains answer to the Cornish cross! But they were about 2.50 per egg so rather pricey compared with the USA. But I do think many many less people want to grow eggs and meat her than the USA so prices reflect that. Was an awesome experience!

Great comparison of needs vs time. Also glad you pointed out that the commercial breeds are consistently getting the genetics tweeked by breeders. I know the Cornish cross I remember as a kid in the 1980s were a lot different from the current genetics.

My husband and I are clients, and though we are seniors who aren't going to be raising chicks, we enjoy these videos, too. They are so informative! Thanks, Pete!

As a guy trying to expand our small farm operation, I love videos like this that discuss farm business ideas! Keep em coming!

Great Job! The dream must be tempered with the business end of farming. Not to discourage but to foreworn the new and those just dreaming about homesteading. Love your channel.

Excellent discussion of the three types of chickens and why you would raise them. Thanks Pete!

Great to see you again, even among the snowflakes I was in yesterday. Mom is really got a knack of finding the broody hens that hatches her own. We like leghorns and Australorps.

Generally speaking, it’s fun, but you’ll get 50% roosters on average. However, given the bird flu, it’s probably not a bad idea if you’re looking to replace or add to your flock

A lot of great information to digest in this video. It seems the specter of efficiency is hiding in every corner of all of our daily endeavors.

Wow, I never thought that raising chickens was such a.........research, background, investigative kind of thing. I'm surprised. Nice job

Thank you Pete! Your videos are great. I am a dark chicken meat lover as is everyone in my family. If you come across any 3 or 4 legged chicken breeds, I would definitely be a weekly buyer! Ha! Happy Sunday to you and your family. --Chuck in Jensen Beach Florida

It's sad that so many companies are using the "shortage" excuse for their mistakes.

This was timely for me because we have been thinking about closing the loop on our meat bird production. I'm not feeling 100% confident about it. We provide for our personal use~~we're not selling commercially. Thanks for giving me some insight. :)

Indeed, Pete. And, yes, hatcheries seem to be overwhelmed this year and KZfaq may have the answer. A quick search on the Tube yields a large number of videos of people raising meat chickens in their backyards since Covid. While a bad thing for small commercial growers like yourself, I think that people becoming more responsible abut sourcing their food is a positive thing. Hope your second weekend at the market went well. Seems like farmer's market's season is off to a good start nationwide. Blessings.

We like the dual Purpose breeds for our own hatching since we can grow out the extra cockerels for meat. But we still order in Cornish Rocks as well to make sure we have enough chicken for the year. Some may not know that a Cornish hen in the store is just a Cornish Rock that didn't make it to the final harvest weight. Can do the same at home as long as you regularly check on them and process them out right away.

Thats a ton of great information and you explained so well thank you Pete, Your videos are my number one go toos I just love your farm life

Can’t wait for the auction video Pete. I saw you there!

Just found your channel a couple weeks ago, and I'm really enjoying it so far! I like the way you explain not only what you're doing, but what the other options are, and why you choose the options that you do. Enjoy that NY Spring snow! I just drove across NY on the I-90 this past week...budding trees and snow patches...gotta love it!

My husband and I are retired from professional careers at pretty typical retirement ages. We started raising chickens and Dexter cows more than ten years before retiring. I agree that with your market you need consistency and that is best managed with hatcheries. We raise Appleyard ducks, Pilgrim Geese, and chickens. Our personal favorite meat bird is a Bielefelder x Buff Brahma F1 Cross. It is a big colourful bird and also a decent layer. We think they are very tasty and like the texture. We raise four breeds with distinctive appearance in bird and eggs. Sometimes hatching your own is for the sheer joy of it. We sell multicolour eggs on the honor system and haven't been short changed yet. Knock on wood.

Thank you,as we have been discussing this at home. We only produce eggs and decided yesterday to add to our hens with some new chicks. We also started the “raising broilers” discussion. We round tabled this last night and your timely explanation just answered all of our questions. I have been following you for some time and I have appreciated all of your well thought out thoughts and explanations. Thank you again.

As always Pete, you are a great teacher...Our best to you and your family.. JR

Great information Pete. Thank you. Hope to come visit the market sometime this summer. We live in NYC, recently retired, need a weekend activity and a trip to the market sounds just right. Take care. Hope you get your chicks soon.

Hi Pete! My Grandad always said “for every problem there’s a solution”. So I searched Amazon and ordered one chicken and one egg. …I’ll let you know! During these unsettling times, I always seem to find some comfort visiting your channel. Thank you! …tugg

My small farm is 40k Sq ft. Chickens quail ducks pheasant as well as insane amounts of fruits and vegetables and I wish I had more. You guys have a dream for a lot of people. Keep it up great stuff

Great video on explaining how to blend commercialism with small farming and the balance to be successful. Excellent follow up on a previous video on idealistic farming.

my husband a I love every show you do. We will see you some day at the farmers market.

Thanks so much for the video. Perfectly explained about the chickens. I wish I could try yours. Enjoy your weather it's 93 degrees here in Arizona. Keep up the great videos. 👍❤❤❤

Pete, I think you hit the nail on the head with this Small Farm Sunday Episode. Maybe another Episode you can hit on the Consistancy of your product, the consumer likes a small range of choice, within the same parameters each time. IE, consumers like a big breasted chicken, but they want to have the choice between 4 and 6lbs. per bird. Same thing with Pork, a lot of people like the 3/4-1inch cut porkchops, but they want the size of the pork chops relatively the same, people don't want huge pork chops ( In my experience) and they dont' want tiny chops either. Middle size chops sell like lemonade on a hot day, nearly everyday,

Thank you Pete for your great follow-up of your last video. Points well taken. I myself , have not been able to cross-breed my chickens successfully. Thank you for your time, and energy sharing your videos with us. 🇺🇸

Pete, thanks for another great Sunday video. Your videos are chocked full of valuable and useful information. We are glad you were able to receive your chicks so your production cycle won't be 'discombobulated'.

I'm a young beginning chicken breeder. Right now working with Columbian Wyandottes. God gifted me with an "accidental" cockerel in my sexed "pullets" last year. Anyhow, last fall I hatched 10 chicks in a small, Nurture Right 360 incubator. I hatched 3 Columbian Wyandottes (got 2 pullets and 1 cockerel), 1 Columbian Wyandotte/Welsummer mix (cockerel), and 6 Easter Egger/Columbian Wyandotte mixes (3 pullets, 3 cockerels). I kept the Columbian Wyandotte cockerel for breeding, sold one of the Easter Egger cross cockerels for $15 on craigslist, of course kept all of the pullets (the Easter Egger cross pullets all lay a bluish egg), and butchered the remaining cockerels at about 22 weeks. They were a decent size- at least 3 lbs a piece. I've only cooked one so far (8 hours on low in a crockpot with potatoes, carrots, and onion. Was good and nice and tender.) I hatched another batch already this year, and it looks like 7 out of 10 are cockerels, lol. Oh, well, at least they taste good. I have 11 Columbian Wyandotte eggs in the incubator as well on day 15.

Hello my friend, you are the treasure of the farmer who strives to improve livestock, as long as you are safe in the house of you and his generous family

Pete I think you underestimate how very interesting this "chicken talk" is! I only have a 1/4 acre but in my heart I am a homesteader. I could scale a chicken tractor for my small place and mow no more!

Thanx 4 sharing ur production strategy. Thats very doable and not that complicated. Ur chicken structures also affordable for start-up small farmers 🚜

This is getting crazy, sure glad things working out for you, love watching your videos on tractor and animals,will be growing my chickens flock this year went from 9 to 50 chicken 🐓🐓🐓 this year, thank again for all your information

You were done a favor, I got my cornish x "on time" it's too wet and too cold for them to be outdoors yet so it's become a lot of labor to keep them clean enough to be healthy. Right now would be a perfect time to start.

Great info, prefer grass fed, moving the pens is the BEST. I love your videos!

You do just an excellent job explaining your rationale for why you do what you do. While I am not a farmer I just like listening to you provide insight from a farmer's perspective. Keep up the good work!

I knew your oldest was ready to get the heck out of their. I hope she finds happenest in here life. Your two other kids love learning and didn't mind working. You tube income is a lifesavers for just a few acres farm. Lol. I can't wait to see you and your son use the truck you have or buying a project together. That will be a treasure he'll rember that time together. Still shocks me how awesome you are with rebuilding machines. Neal Apollo Beach Florida

Fantastic video Pete. Thank you so much for going over what's best when it comes to chickens. I learn so much from you and it is deeply appreciated.

Couldn't agree more with all you said. I used to hatch rare breed and ( what I called ) ornamental chickens and did a killer business. I couldn't imagine hatching production breeds for profit. I moved to a bigger farm and once I get all the other projects caught up I will be firing up the incubators and getting back to it...

Another great informative video Pete. even as a consumer I come away learning how to be a more productive, saving individual from all your information Thank your for taking the time to share all that knowledge with Us. God Speed. ECF

Coolest thumbnail yet. You look like the Fonz in your black jacket leaning back on the jukebok, with chickens. A lot of great points in there.

My family has hatched chicks and ducks for years....thank you Pete for your accurate knowledge.

Oh I miss raising chickens. That was fun over the years, at least we knew what went in the chicken to plump them up. Very tasty.....

Thanks Pete, very sensible. Glad you guys got your chicks.!

great job Pete cleaning barns here in MN snow in the weather for Thursdays come MN warm up lol

I've been told my Grandmother allowed here hens to hatch Rhode Island reds. She passed away while I was a infant. Our broiler chickens went on pasture also. Periodically we would skid the Hutch to a different location. No where near as often as you do. I'm thinking 4 months although we did butcher a large rooster for the house earlier. On the mortality I had to bury them. I think 5% sounds about right. I come from a large family. The folks would raise 100 broilers per year. My elder sisters would come home to assist with butchering, and take a share. I enjoy your videos because you take me to a time when the world made sense. Thanks Pete.

Thank you Peter for your constantly entertaining and informative videos. You really do have a large and variant knowledge on many different subjects, which I find surprising and I acknowledge your talent. Cheers mate from Australia.

Just watched this video again and noticed the "halo" that appears over your head as you are walking along! (at about 10 minutes into the video) Apparently, it's just a drop of snow on your lens. But how appropriate! I just started incubating my first batch of 12 American Bresse eggs. We'll see how they grow! Did the Cornish Cross, but prefer to breed on my own. Love your videos!

First. Thanks for the video keep them coming

So interesting, surprisingly. Its just a pleasure to hear someone explain something so clearly. Great work.

I'm looking at breeding my own now (not commercially) just as food security for my family. That is where it makes the most sense to me.

Amazing we were just talking with local hatchery. I stated i am keeping with our normal hatchery their stock is the best layers. We never have issues with them!! Funny you speak of and we were just going through this!!. Great stuff !! Small farm Sundays

Recently purchased 60+ acres farm land and trying to figure out what it takes to start (small) and maybe grow in a few years. I don’t even own a tractor. My wife and I are both retired. My wife is ok with the purchase, but not so into planting or raising critters. Your channel has been an excellent mentor. Pls keep up the great work. Enjoying the channel. Tks for sharing.

We grew Cornish commercially for years when we were younger. They are definitely the "race horse" of the industry and superb for that system. Now that we homestead only we've been producing Rangers for about 5 years now. We only do 100 birds a year vs the thousands we once did. 8-9 weeks, on grass with high protein plant based feed and our average carcass weight is 5.5 lbs with a feed conversion of 3:1.(We only grow out roosters and keep meticulous records like yourself) While we obviously order those we have started crossing Delaware Roos over Speckled Sussex hens for a trial run of fryer chicks. If I were growing commercially like yourself I'd be doing just what you are with the Cornish. Now we have the freedom to experiment and it's so much fun! Great video Pete.

My new incubator is being delivered tomorrow. When Tractor Supply is sold out in the first part of April, it is time for me to start hatching my own egg layers. They had ducks and pullets but no chicks and if something that big can have a problem getting chicks, you just know it has to be bad.

Well, now I know. Thanks Pete. I was very young when I last raised chickens in 1954.

As usual Peter Larson very nice Sunday video.

You by far have the best videos out there

I can hear the wisdom in your voice. I subbed.

Very informative! Thanks for explaining in a way that a novice can understand! Bev in Maine

I just discovered your channel. What a great source of insights! We have chickens, eggers and meat birds and are in the process of adding Dexters and Icelandic sheep to our small homestead farm. Many infrastructure projects will still need to be completed. Thank you for sharing your experience!

Funny, that was my question from your last video.

I raise a dual breed called Chantecler, bred in Quebec for very cold environments. They are somewhat smaller than a Buff Orpington. I've had them both in Maine and in the northern Adirondacks where their very small combs helped them survive temps down to -40° with no ill effects. Now in PA, I keep them for the eggs and they are very good producers. They also dress out to a decent size for home use. (Not sure of the weight as I never weighed one. Old ones usually leave here alive as I don't eat meat.) Very friendly variety and never had an aggressive rooster. I have the Buff Chantecler variety , primarily because they are such a pretty bird to have running around the place. I read a write-up by a small farmer that described them as "like golden rays of sunlight in any season." Not one to wax poetic but that describes them perfectly.

we are in our 3 time with meat birds in big city we can do spring and fall.we have learned some every rotation.but bring in big city no rooster allowed so no raising our next chickens but have good connection in country that do the hatching if I need new layers.thanks for bringing back sun lessons.our friends are amazed it only takes 8 weeks.take care

Two of the largest fundamental flaws in smaller operations is not precisely tracking the cost of inputs and rationally pricing owner/operator labor. Your recurring emphasis on these points hopefully will save others. Too often the dividing lines between self sufficiency (homesteading), hobby farming and farming as the main source of income get blurred. I’m more or less a hobby farmer. It isn’t my main source of income, nor am I trying to be self sufficient. I can and do make uneconomic decisions because I want a given outcome even if it isn’t the most economic course. As a primary business you can’t do a lot of that. My hat is off to you for making it work. Hopefully you didn’t go too far in the hole redoing the MD. That is the type of thing I do full well knowing the end product’s monetary value doesn’t justify the expenditure of time and money.

Hey Pete, I see you're getting the snow we got yesterday. I'll send you 60 degrees and sunshine tomorrow bud!! I'm setting up my solar power supply for my electric fence today. Great day to be outside.

Thank you for talking about the chickens - very interesting!

Thank you for all the information about raising your own chickens for meat to sell. Until I had to move to drier air for health reasons, I kept a backyard flock. I bred, raised and slaughtered them for my own use. The excess Barred Rock roosters made delicious tasting chicken and dumplings! I kept golden comets for eggs. They can lay eggs, even during molting , 365 days per year. So, for a while I supplied my whole neighborhood with free eggs!

Good stuff. we raise about 20 Cornish cross a year for our family and that keeps us in chicken for the whole year. Good meat and you know where it's been raised.

Hey Pete, thanks for sharing. Hope you folks are having a nice weekend. Take care

P I cannot tell you how much I enjoyed your information on raising Given those vital information on farming as well as us to talk about the various breeds of chickens. Thank you for taking the time to explain to us about commercial breeding in your growing your chickens.

Again, you educated me. Thanks! My grandparents sold eggs and raised chickens.

I clicked on the thumbs up on a few comments from ppl. Your videos are informative.

Justification of progress foreword to success is the best discussion, keep up the information. Have a great day.

Information well shared 👍👍🔥... Big congratulations Sir....!

Well done as usual Pete.

Green video Pete. I don’t know much about chickens except for the KFC kind. Once again I’m learning a lot from you.

Pete, as always another great video. It was great to get to meet you and talk for a few minutes at the market yesterday.

Very good and well-informed video. Thanks Pete.

Chicken Sociology 101. This was very interesting. Understanding the fundamentals of producing eggs and meat from chickens provides information that is helpful even to city folk. A little knowledge is always good. Except where sausage is concerned.

Great video Pete, I'm glad you got your supply of Cornish X chicks worked out. I sell eggs as a sideline from my small layer flock and I've found that buying ready to lay pullets is my most efficient means of replacing old hens. I buy them from Moyer's Hatchery in PA. via a local dealer in Delaware. I'm supposed to be getting some next week, I hope I don't get any last minute surprises like you did with the broiler chicks. I really enjoy small farm Sundays. Thanks for sharing so much great info, it's very generous of you.

We hatch our mongrels for our own use, but you are right about the lenght and quality of the meat!

Yeah!! Love and missed Small Farm Sunday. Well done!

Love your videos Pete. I raised cornish crosses last year and had great luck with them. I agree about using a hatchery versus on farm hatching. I really liked what you said about time allocation on a farm. We raise Dexters and sell by the whole/half beef due to lack of time to sell by the pound at local farmers markets. Great honest information , keep up the good work

You do such a good job at explaining things in an interesting way.

Thanks for great information, we raised up a few layer chicks on our property in Idaho, they are doing well , giving us fresh eggs, not really sure how well they will handle the Idaho winter but time will tell