It’s a brand new year, and we thought we’d give you some more information about us and how we look after our livestock.
We are a family built and run farm. We bought the land back in 2013. Since then we’ve developed the land and now house over 200 chickens. We have a brick barn and a mobile home for me to live in as the agricultural worker on the farm.
This is me (and Juno). I graduated with a degree in fashion design and worked as a designer for 2 years before joining my dad full time on the farm. I’ve always loved animals and being outside in the fresh air, it seemed like a no-brainer when dad asked me to join full time.
Here at Higher Oak Farm, we dedicate our time to ensure that our hens and cockerels are well looked after, well fed and most importantly have a good life. One of the biggest issues with industrial farming of chickens for eggs or meat is that the methods used on the birds do not honour many of their natural habits or needs. For example, overcrowding the hens and de-beaking them to ensure they don’t inflict harm on one another.
As well as having plenty of space our hens are moved around to different runs and moved onto fresh pasture on a monthly basis, rotating the hens around and moving the coops allows the soil and grass to re-generate and gives the chickens fresh pasture to scratch in. Moving then hens is also the perfect opportunity for us to clean out the houses and re-sawdust the floor.
If you’ve read our blog previously, you’ll know that at the back end of last year, we planted our own Orchard and had a local bee-keeper come and put 5 hives up on the farm. We also seeded a wild flower meadow and are working on an area where people can drive onto the farm and collect eggs from a vending machine to collect eggs as and when they want too. This allows us to have as much time as possible to collect eggs, feed, clean and look after the hens.
If owning Chickens is something you’re thinking about for this year but you want some more information on what it actual entails, please contact us at kirk@higheroakfarm.co.uk and we’d be happy to help!