The Backyard Homestead Book Review

This is an excellent book.  We’ve read a number of similar books, and this is our favorite. The Backyard Homestead has great overviews on gardening, raising animals, landscaping with plants, maintaining fruit trees, keeping bees, homebrewing, cheese making, and more.  While each of these topics is broad enough that you should have other guides or […]

Egg Nutrition

Fresh eggs have a variety of benefits over commercial eggs including flavor, eye appeal (yolk color, shell color, and consistency), and even nutritional content. According to an oft-cited 2007 study by Mother Earth News Magazine, eggs laid by hens raised on pasture, as compared with eggs laid by confined factory farm chickens have:

Bloodspots

Every now and then a little red dot will show up in a fresh egg.  This is a bloodspot.  Bloodspots are caused by abrasions or other irritation in the hen’s oviduct. Contrary to what most believe, a bloodspot does not indicate fertilization.  Fertilization can only occur when a male chicken has access to the laying […]