We went on our first Master Gardener field trip. Usually we are attending the farmers market at Tractor Supply on the very same Saturdays that there are scheduled field trips. We had a very special blessing of visiting Mrs. Sara Doherty yesterday.
Mrs. Sara is the "Tomato Lady!" She lives at Doherty's Tomato Patch at 1980 Hwy 394 in DeRidder. There are signs on the road leading you to her house and farm where she sells all kinds of tomato plants! Evan and I got there a few minutes early and got to visit with Sara on her porch with fresh squeezed lemonaid and cookies.
Mrs. Sara has 6 vegetable stands all around the local area. I know of one on Pine Street (Hwy 171) in DeRidder and also on Nelson Road in Lake Charles. She explained about the different kinds of tomato plants. I knew there were basically 2 kinds : Determinate and Indeterminate but I never knew that they took different care. She covered many of the different varieties of tomatoes. Dream Girl, BHN 444, Creole, Mountain Fresh, and much more! We learned how she cares for her seedlings and grows her 12,000 tomato plants that she will raise this season! We feel like our 70 are a lot!
Sara was at the Burton Coliseum for the Gardening Festival last weekend where she sold lots of seedlings. She sells Tomatoes, Cucumbers, Squash, Eggplant, Blueberries, Watermelons, Muskmelons, Jellies, Jams, Pickles and Georgia Peaches when in season.
It was fun to meet another woman who likes to garden as much as Evan. I pray my children are entrepreneurs like Mrs. Sara and her husband!
This is another Local Farmer that would love your business and prides herself on the quality of her produce!
Sunday, March 30, 2014
Saturday, March 22, 2014
Rhode Island Red Chicks Coming!
We also wanted to tell our customers that we have Rhode Island Red Chicks for Sale. This is a Straight Run (male and female) because they are too small to tell gender. This is one of the most famous and all time popular breeds of truly American chickens. Developed in the early 1900's in the state of the same name, they have maintained their reputation as a dual purpose fowl through the years. No other heavy breed lays more eggs than the Rhode Island Reds.
One Week Old: $ 4/ per chick
One Month Old: $6/ per chick
I split them into this time frame because that is usually the gap of time between their hatching and our trip to the Farmers Market.
We also have Fertilized Rhode Island Eggs available for your incubator for $ 8/dozen.
At the next Farmers Market on April 19th we should have Ducklings also. Ducks are easy to raise, naturally free from disease, and once started, require little commercial feed. Although most ducks are raised for their meat, they do lay well and can provide lots of eggs for baking! High end bakeries will pay money for duck eggs for their rich flavor! They are a joy to watch and of course water to play in is appreciated. Do not release ducklings directly to a pond. They are an easy meal for most predators from turtles to bass. We prefer to keep our ducks in a moving cage for a length of time until they are not such easy prey.
Mallard Ducklings: $ 5/duckling
Muscovy Ducklings: $ 4/duckling
Blue Swedish Ducklings: $ 4/duckling
Black Swedish Ducklings: $ 4/duckling
We should be bringing Toulouse Goslings and African Goslings to the Market also. Geese are fun to raise. They have been pictured in pyramids! I'd say they are pretty old. Geese can be expected to breed past 30 yrs and a 40 yr. old is not uncommon. Geese are raised primarily for meat today but many customers use their eggs for baking and the shells for decorative arts. Goose down goes into everything from an old fashioned feather bed to a modern lightweight jacket. Geese are easy and inexpensive to raise, quick to grow, and a delight to behold. They are wonderful watchdogs also! We have had no problems with aggression from geese on our farm.
Goslings: $ 10/gosling
At the next Market we hope to bring Guineas also. Guineas are natural bug exterminators- they are excellent in controlling ticks and fleas. As such- they roam in search of a fresh supply of bugs. When you buy your Guineas, please be very aware of their tendency to roam. If you keep them confined for 3-4 weeks with food and water, they will associate that location as hone base and even though they roam, they will tend to roost at home base. All guineas originally came from Africa and have always been prized for their all-dark, gamey tasting meat. Guineas are easy to raise. Once you get them started they live and grow on bugs, insects, and weed seeds. The newly hatched young are called keats and are very active from the start. Once guineas are grown they will range throughout your farmstead foraging for food and serving as your personal watchdogs. To help guineas get off to a good start, put marbles in their water to keep them from drowning. ( I didn't say they were the smartest of the fowl family!)
One Week Old Guinea: $5/guinea
One Month Old Guinea: $ 10/guinea
We hope you have a Blessed Day! Thank You for visiting the Scoggins Family Farm Blog!
One Week Old: $ 4/ per chick
One Month Old: $6/ per chick
I split them into this time frame because that is usually the gap of time between their hatching and our trip to the Farmers Market.
We also have Fertilized Rhode Island Eggs available for your incubator for $ 8/dozen.
At the next Farmers Market on April 19th we should have Ducklings also. Ducks are easy to raise, naturally free from disease, and once started, require little commercial feed. Although most ducks are raised for their meat, they do lay well and can provide lots of eggs for baking! High end bakeries will pay money for duck eggs for their rich flavor! They are a joy to watch and of course water to play in is appreciated. Do not release ducklings directly to a pond. They are an easy meal for most predators from turtles to bass. We prefer to keep our ducks in a moving cage for a length of time until they are not such easy prey.
Mallard Ducklings: $ 5/duckling
Muscovy Ducklings: $ 4/duckling
Blue Swedish Ducklings: $ 4/duckling
Black Swedish Ducklings: $ 4/duckling
We should be bringing Toulouse Goslings and African Goslings to the Market also. Geese are fun to raise. They have been pictured in pyramids! I'd say they are pretty old. Geese can be expected to breed past 30 yrs and a 40 yr. old is not uncommon. Geese are raised primarily for meat today but many customers use their eggs for baking and the shells for decorative arts. Goose down goes into everything from an old fashioned feather bed to a modern lightweight jacket. Geese are easy and inexpensive to raise, quick to grow, and a delight to behold. They are wonderful watchdogs also! We have had no problems with aggression from geese on our farm.
Goslings: $ 10/gosling
At the next Market we hope to bring Guineas also. Guineas are natural bug exterminators- they are excellent in controlling ticks and fleas. As such- they roam in search of a fresh supply of bugs. When you buy your Guineas, please be very aware of their tendency to roam. If you keep them confined for 3-4 weeks with food and water, they will associate that location as hone base and even though they roam, they will tend to roost at home base. All guineas originally came from Africa and have always been prized for their all-dark, gamey tasting meat. Guineas are easy to raise. Once you get them started they live and grow on bugs, insects, and weed seeds. The newly hatched young are called keats and are very active from the start. Once guineas are grown they will range throughout your farmstead foraging for food and serving as your personal watchdogs. To help guineas get off to a good start, put marbles in their water to keep them from drowning. ( I didn't say they were the smartest of the fowl family!)
One Week Old Guinea: $5/guinea
One Month Old Guinea: $ 10/guinea
We hope you have a Blessed Day! Thank You for visiting the Scoggins Family Farm Blog!
Tuesday, March 18, 2014
Closed for April 5th Market!
We are sorry to announce that we will be closed for the April 5th Market. Our daughter's wedding reception will be on that day. We will miss all of our regular customers but we will be back on April 19th! Thank you for your understanding while we celebrate with our new son -in-law and daughter! God Bless You!
The Scoggins Family Farm
You may contact us at 337-725-6364 or 337-526-6760 to ordered Pastured Poultry or Rabbits! We have a limited amount of each so it will be 1st call/1st serve. Thank you so much!
The Scoggins Family Farm
You may contact us at 337-725-6364 or 337-526-6760 to ordered Pastured Poultry or Rabbits! We have a limited amount of each so it will be 1st call/1st serve. Thank you so much!
Wednesday, March 12, 2014
March 15th Farmers Market
We are excited to add a new item to our market this week! We have Pastured Poultry! This poultry is Non-Medicated, Preservative Free, Pastured on grass and natural chicken feed! It is amazing after seeing the commercial poultry market videos of literally thousands of birds in these houses with horrible conditions and unhealthy birds that we can provide a safe, healthy alternative!
We will be taking sign ups for our Pastured Poultry at the market! We cannot sell the poultry out of the farmers market due to state regulations but we can sell them out of our farm. I will take sign ups and deliver the birds on a specific date and time or customers can come out to the Scoggins Family Farm and pick up their birds!
We will also have Fresh Dressed Rabbits to offer!
Saturday we will have Fresh Baked Breads, Fresh Milk from Hill Crest Creamery, Fresh Pastured Poultry Eggs, Canned Goods, 100% Pure Honey and more! We hope you stop by and visit us!
We will also have live Rabbits, Ducklings, Chicks and Fertilized Rhode Island Red Eggs! Coming soon we will be hatching Geese!
We will be taking sign ups for our Pastured Poultry at the market! We cannot sell the poultry out of the farmers market due to state regulations but we can sell them out of our farm. I will take sign ups and deliver the birds on a specific date and time or customers can come out to the Scoggins Family Farm and pick up their birds!
We will also have Fresh Dressed Rabbits to offer!
Saturday we will have Fresh Baked Breads, Fresh Milk from Hill Crest Creamery, Fresh Pastured Poultry Eggs, Canned Goods, 100% Pure Honey and more! We hope you stop by and visit us!
We will also have live Rabbits, Ducklings, Chicks and Fertilized Rhode Island Red Eggs! Coming soon we will be hatching Geese!
Sunday, March 9, 2014
It's Pastured Poultry for Supper!
Our family has butchered chickens several times but recently we went into the Pastured Poultry business. After careful consideration and much concern from our children (who are usually the poultry pluckers) we decided to dive in.
We purchased 2 chicken tractors that are 10 x 12. These tractors can hold lots of grass fed, happy chickens! We also received 44 plump, ready to butcher Cornish rocks from the purchase. During the freezing rain last week we lost one chicken, so we had 43 to butcher. The icing on the cake was that the deal included a chicken plucker! This wonderful invention can pluck clean 3 chickens in 15 seconds. People who have never plucked a chicken cannot appreciate these numbers but those of us who have spent 30 minutes pulling the feathers and down out of a chicken can applaud it! People, the chicken plucker ranks up there with space travel in my book!
The children and I started the day with several set backs but by 10:30 am we had the butchering in progress. It is important that people realize it is not traumatic for children to butcher animals for consumption. They realize that every cute yellow chick and fuzzy rabbit is for their consumption and they can appreciate that. No one in our family likes the butchering end of things but it is a means to an end and must be done. (Your chicken mcnugget producers have to do it too) . Back to the work at hand, we were completely finished with our chore in 3 hours! This is amazing to us, since it usually takes us 3 hours to pluck the chickens. Our beautiful chickens were then placed in shrink wrap bags and carefully dipped into 180 degree water for about 3 seconds and amazingly the chicken looked like a Wal-Mart processed bird!
The Scoggins Family Farm has decided to provide these Non-Medicated, Preservative Free birds to their customers with our standard vegetables, dressed rabbits, canned goods and honey. The State of Louisiana does not allow individuals to sell a home processed animal at the farmers market. We are allowed to sell 999 of them out of our farm though. Strange rules and regulations but that is how it is. I'm sure the USDA could explain it to everyone but at this point I'm a little confused at their legal jargon.
Pastured Poultry will be offered to our customers for $3.25 a pound. The birds range from small 2.5 lb ones to large 7.5 lb roasters. We try to butcher so everyone can have 4 1/2 to 5 lb birds. You may set up a time to pick them up at our farm or I can meet you if I am in town that day. Realize that we live 1 hour from Lake Charles so my trips to town are once every 1-2 weeks. I hope that you enjoy the chicken as much as we do! Have a Blessed Day!
We purchased 2 chicken tractors that are 10 x 12. These tractors can hold lots of grass fed, happy chickens! We also received 44 plump, ready to butcher Cornish rocks from the purchase. During the freezing rain last week we lost one chicken, so we had 43 to butcher. The icing on the cake was that the deal included a chicken plucker! This wonderful invention can pluck clean 3 chickens in 15 seconds. People who have never plucked a chicken cannot appreciate these numbers but those of us who have spent 30 minutes pulling the feathers and down out of a chicken can applaud it! People, the chicken plucker ranks up there with space travel in my book!
The children and I started the day with several set backs but by 10:30 am we had the butchering in progress. It is important that people realize it is not traumatic for children to butcher animals for consumption. They realize that every cute yellow chick and fuzzy rabbit is for their consumption and they can appreciate that. No one in our family likes the butchering end of things but it is a means to an end and must be done. (Your chicken mcnugget producers have to do it too) . Back to the work at hand, we were completely finished with our chore in 3 hours! This is amazing to us, since it usually takes us 3 hours to pluck the chickens. Our beautiful chickens were then placed in shrink wrap bags and carefully dipped into 180 degree water for about 3 seconds and amazingly the chicken looked like a Wal-Mart processed bird!
The Scoggins Family Farm has decided to provide these Non-Medicated, Preservative Free birds to their customers with our standard vegetables, dressed rabbits, canned goods and honey. The State of Louisiana does not allow individuals to sell a home processed animal at the farmers market. We are allowed to sell 999 of them out of our farm though. Strange rules and regulations but that is how it is. I'm sure the USDA could explain it to everyone but at this point I'm a little confused at their legal jargon.
Pastured Poultry will be offered to our customers for $3.25 a pound. The birds range from small 2.5 lb ones to large 7.5 lb roasters. We try to butcher so everyone can have 4 1/2 to 5 lb birds. You may set up a time to pick them up at our farm or I can meet you if I am in town that day. Realize that we live 1 hour from Lake Charles so my trips to town are once every 1-2 weeks. I hope that you enjoy the chicken as much as we do! Have a Blessed Day!
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