BY DANI TIETZ
dani@sjodaily.com
What came first, the chicken or the egg?
Well, in the case of Coopers Backyard Farms, owned and operated by Andy Wilsey-Cooper and Randy Cooper, a dozen chickens came first.
Over two years of their operation, the egg layers have been the catalyst for a change in lifestyle for the Coopers.
“I rarely have to go to the store,” Andy said.
Coopers Backyard Farm, which includes a lush garden with beans, peas, squash, cabbages, carrots, zucchini, tomatoes, asparagus, berries, garlic and potatoes, egg layers and chickens and turkey for meat, has also grown to include bees, a fruit orchard and grape vines.
Randy also has his sights set on bringing in pigs, sheep and breeding the chickens instead of purchasing chicks each year.
“Everything is reliant on each other for its growth,” Andy said.
Andy said she became more aware of what she was putting in her body and it became of the utmost importance when her daughter and sister were diagnosed with cancer.
“I started looking into all the nutrition,” she said. “I got a hold of Suzanne Somers’ book. And boy, she hit the nail on the head. She talked about, you know, how we’re under environmental attack. And we really are.”
The Coopers are careful not to use chemicals on their plants and they don’t feed their chickens hormones or fillers. Andy spends her evenings tending to the garden, pulling weeds, giving the plants Epsom salt baths or spraying them with tea tree oil.
“If you go to the store to buy organic, it’s only 35-percent less, and that’s not good enough for me,” Andy said.
“In the summer (the chickens) eat the bugs and keep my garden really healthy.”
During the fall and winter months, the chickens eat non-GMO without antibiotics or hormones feed or barley from Triptych Brewing.
And although some of the chickens are Easter-eggers, the best part about them is that they follow Andy and Randy all over the farm. The Coopers have become part of their brood, and the chickens watch over them.
Andy knew that she was part of the team when she tripped and fell in the yard.
“Red (a rooster) freaked out and he ran over to me,” Andy recalls. “He was so upset.”
Having healthy food isn’t all that concerns the Coopers, though. They also want their animals to have healthy lives, too.
Andy said she is always taken when she watches documentaries on how food, particularly meat, is produced. The standard may be for chickens to have a little light every day, but they may also be on confinement with nowhere to move on large farms.
Cooper’s chickens have moved from a small coop Randy built to a barn where they can come outside when their owners are home and have wood and beams to climb on inside the barn.
They get new bedding about every 10 days and take baths in the dirt. The Coopers even leave the radio on for them during the day, mostly to scare away predators, but also to keep the chickens company.
The dark orange egg yolk is packed with protein and can be left on the counter unwashed for use over a month’s time.
“That’s just how they were supposed to be,” Andy said. “Back in the old days, they didn’t have refrigerators, so they just ate the chicken eggs as they came and let them know until they needed them.”
The Coopers keep their egg layers separated from the chickens and turkeys used for meat, although those birds also get a steady diet of pasture and bugs.
The growth of the farm has been trial and error, though. The Coopers rely on the expertise of others, mostly through YouTube videos, to troubleshoot the issues they come across.
Currently, the Coopers are learning about how to take care of bees. With a couple hives near the orchard on their property, the plan is to plant red clover nearby so the bees have an organic food source to create their honey.
Andy not only believes in the nutritional value of honey, but also its medicinal qualities.
“I had surgery and one of my wounds was healing and we were getting ready to go on this big trip to Mexico,” she said. “
“I went to the doctor and he’s like, ‘No, you’re not gonna be able to go in the ocean.’ I decided I’ve got to get this healed. So I got online did some research. I found that in burn centers, they use Manuka honey from Australia, really high grade, and they slather it on the skin to prevent, you know, infections.
“So three days later, my wound started closing up. I went back to the doctors two weeks later and it healed up, and I had no scars.”
The farm is not a solo operation, though. While the Coopers do the majority of the day-to-day work, they enjoy when their children and grandchildren visit, helping to gather eggs or harvest beans or potatoes.
Andy said the kids run and the dogs play while the adults will sit in the garden to talk.
The Coopers hope that at some point, they may be able to open their land to children for a camp so that they, too can learn about organic farming and taking care of food products.
Until then, the Coopers offer products for consumption.
Every now and then, Andy will post about farm-fresh eggs for sale at 109 N Main St., in St Joseph. The eggs sit in a wooden box near the entrance and can be paid for by the honor system.
The Coopers also sell their chicken meat and will sell their turkey meat in a few weeks. The price may be more than a customer might pay at a grocery store, but the Coopers are just recouping expenses incurred from raising the chickens, not making money.
Fresh fruits and vegetables will be canned throughout the fall months. Andy said that the produce grown last year was enough to sustain the family.
To learn more about the Coopers Backyard Farm follow them on Facebook.
