I hardly noticed when the price went to $7.70 for the cracked corn and I didn’t mind much when I paid $8.10 for a bag. I started to really get concerned, however, when they asked me to pay $8.70 for a bag. The next time was $9.10 and last week it was $9.50 for the sack! When is it going to stop? It seemed that the price for corn was pretty uniform all of last winter, but I am getting nervous this year. Our flock has increased and they are eating quite a bit of corn now.
I am sort of getting an idea to try to grow a field of corn to use to feed our own chickens. It seems that if we could even grow a few bags worth of corn it would help out. This might be a silly idea for us, because we have not been very successful growing corn for our own family in the past. We usually have some corn survive, but not enough to freeze for later use. Last year the raccoons ate almost all of our sweet corn right before we would try to havest the ears! We have also had trouble with the stalks staying up after hard rains. Our 2005 crop was pretty much ruined by a series of rain storms.
Our biggest problem will probably be that we are limited as to the places we could make a large corn field. We have many acres of land, but almost all of it is mountainside. Folks in eastern Kentucky used to raise corn right on the side of hills, but I do not see that around here anymore. I wonder how difficult it would be?
First we would have to clear a spot. Here is the first area I have my eye on. It is up past the schoolhouse on the right before you get to the barn:
We would have to clear out over 100 trees, but most of them are not very large. There are also a lot of rocks that we would run into. On the plus side, it is an area that is not straight up and down, but rather a gentle incline.
Has anyone out there ever tried to clear a field like this and plant crops in? I would appreciate any pointers.
I will likely not tackle this job for quite a while, as there are so many other things to do right now, and this is something that I think would take a long time. We probably won’t see a corn field here this spring, but maybe in future years?
If the price of corn does not drop back down, we will need to do something!
3 comments
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Nancy on December 13, 2006 at 5:22 pm
The feed prices here are going up also. First I was using an all grain…it went from $6.25 to over $7. Then I switched to a different brand of grain…same thing…price went up. Switched to sweet feed..started at $5.35 and is now $5.55. All in the last few months!!!
We have 2 horses, 2 beef calves, 4 goats and lots of chickens. The prices are driving me crazy.
I was told by an employee at the feed store that the price of the stuff they use for fertilizer for corn is going up, and they are raising the prices of all feed with corn in it for that reason. (Get this though, the price of the fertilizer is for NEXT YEAR, they are trying to get the money to buy it early I guess.LOL)
Hope it all works out for you, we might try to grow some corn for feed also. But we only have 7 acres total, that includes where the houses sit, and the woods, so we wouldn't be able to plant a whole lot.
Nancy
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1 on December 12, 2006 at 10:11 am
Have you thought about feeding oats or some other grains? I know the people around here who have chickens feed oats. You could try feeding a few different types of grain.
The price of corn is going up.
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CedarCityMom on December 12, 2006 at 8:27 am
I actually have no idea on the growing corn part. All of my growing experiance has been in a desert (Las Vegas) and I now live in a much differant climet. I have to learn to grow all over again and that'll happen this spring I hope. That's when I hope to have my garden up and going. I pray you get the needed answers or the price of corn comes down. You'll probably get the needed answers before prices ever come down though, Lol. Have a good one though.
Jessica
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