Welcome!

We would like to welcome everyone to The Hicks Homestead blog. This blog will be used to document our journey as we explore sustainable living and minimizing our carbon footprint. We will share our successes and failures as they come with all of you. One of our first successes started last fall with the construction of our chicken coop.

Human door

Chicken door

This coop houses our six chickens (Buff Orpingtons crossed with Rhode Island Reds) and in turn they usually provide us with six eggs daily. This was one of our first steps in minimizing our dependency on large scale corporate farming. Our happy chickens produce eggs that are better tasting and nutritionally superior to eggs from the big box grocery stores. When you compare the nutrition facts on factory farmed chickens and eggs from pasture-roaming, bug-eating, dust-bathing, happy chickens you see the difference. Get ready:

• 1/3 less cholesterol 
• 1/4 less saturated fat 
• 2/3 more vitamin A 
• Two times more omega-3 fatty acids 
• Three times more vitamin E 
• Seven times more beta carotene
• Three-to-six times more vitamins

This initial step has been a complete success so far and we are considering getting additional hens in 2012. The demand for our natural, farm fresh eggs has been steady and is picking up as word spreads.

Chickens scratching around in the yard...

and in the woods!