Here at Painted Hand Farm, we have a variety of fowl. For our layers, we prefer the Black Jersey Giant as our main bird. It is a dual purpose bird developed in the 1870's in New Jersey to provide both eggs and meat. Unfortunately, the breed is a slow grower and has been edged out of commercial production for faster growing birds. The birds are the largest breed of chicken in North America and are prolific layers of very large brown eggs.
In addition to the Black Jersey Giants we also have some Araucana pullets. These birds are native to South America and lay eggs with a blue-green colored shell. The eggs are the same color on the inside. Anyone for Green Eggs & Ham?
Our Pastured Heritage Turkeys are featured at LocalHarvest and SlowFoodUSA
LocalHarvest is a public nationwide directory of small farms, farmers markets, and other local food sources. Painted Hand Farm is their Featured Turkey Grower. Additionally, we also provided an article on cooking heritage turkeys and a recipe.
SlowFoodUSA is a branch of the Slow Food movement in Barolo, Italy. Their mission is to reach out to consumers and demonstrate to them that they have choices over fast food and supermarket homogenization. We are listed on their site under Heritage Turkey Growers.
Turkeys have always been a favorite of ours to raise. Turkeys raised on pasture get 40% of their diet from forage which makes a BIG difference in taste and juiciness. Over the years, we have raised a variety of breeds. Our favorite is the heritage Bronze Breasted and Bourbon Reds. 2004 will be our first year to raise a flock of birds on pasture. Pictured above are the three week old poults in the brooder before going out on pasture. Below is our portable pen Ralph constructed from two cattle panels.
For natural bug control, we employ a flock of Guineas. 90% of these birds' diet is bugs, especially ticks. Since acquiring our Guineas, we had noticed a significant reduction in ticks, garden pests and flies. They are also considered a delicacy although we have not had the opportunity to eat one yet. In Ojai, we ate Peacock which are closely related to Guineas. Although the all dark-meat meat Pea fowl was quite tasty, it was one of the chewiest things we had ever cooked. We'd rather have our Guineas in the grass than the stew pot.
