Lynchburg Grows

This is the chicken tiller that Micha built the first week of Jan. 2010. Photo by Kim Raff.

We’ve still got lettuce growing in Greenhouse #1 but some of it was getting a bit too big, so Micha gathered some scrap wood and fencing and built a “chicken tiller.” Basically, its a cage about 3×6 feet that fits snug into the raised beds. Micha put chickens inside the cage and they went to town on the lettuce. When they finished eating the greens in one spot we moved the cage to the next spot. This serves three purposes: 1) we didn’t have to pull the lettuce up 2) the chickens, in search of bugs, turned up the soil (which we would have to do with a rake 3) It flat out looks funny and is cool thing to show people who’ve been by the farm in the last couple of days. (Plus, the stuff coming out the back ends makes good fertilizer.)  Although, the “tiller” wasn’t bust-out proof and a couple of the more-clever chickens figured out a way to get out during the night for two days straight. We think we’ve got the problem fixed. – Aaron Lee