What One Chicken Can Do

Considerations When Buying Your First Chickens/Chicks

Black Austerlops

I always recommend to people wanting to get chickens that they first and foremost read a good book on home chicken raising first! These are living breathing feeling animals and have a right to be raised in such a way that make their little chicken lives enjoyable. Almost every library in our nation has at least one book on chicken raising so you don't even need to spend money to learn if you really want to embark on a chicken adventure. One of the most complete books on chickens that I have read is Story's Guide to Raising Chickens 

with a close second being The Encyclopedia of Country Living

 Both are full in information on the realities of chicken rearing.  And here are some good kindle editions  as well









That being said you don't have to do much to make chickens happy. Food water and a clean shelter is what they most desire with occasional scraps thrown in to make life interesting. Because we live in town our chickens are not let out to roam (chickens don't understand property lines and like to explore) but have an enclosed run. When we lived in Wyoming our chickens free ranged at will and we only lost one chicken to unknown causes. Chickens are the easiest farm animal to raise in our opinion.

Barred Rock Hen

OK so here is what we have learned from keeping chickens in town.  Part one is going to be about what you should consider before you even get your chicks.

The most important consideration is if you can have chickens legally in your town.  Surprisingly many cities and towns are now making it legal to have chickens .  Many times up to 10 hens although roosters are often banned due to their joy in crowing.  Or you might live in a town that doesn't have a law either way. That is true in our case.  Our town only stipulates that you get the city councils permission to have chickens.  My daughter (who does chickens in 4-H)  wrote a presentation on her chickens, got written approval letters from all our neighbors, took pictures of what we were going to use as a chicken coop, and also outlined how many chickens/what breed/fly control/waste disposal that would occur.  The city council loved her presentation and approved us on the spot.




So after you figure that you can have chickens what else should you consider?

First off what do you want out of your chickens?

Do you want exotic beautiful birds just to look at and enjoy?  Lots of eggs? Occasional meat? A little of everything?

These are important thoughts because many of the best egg layers are rather ugly and have skinny frames for eating when they are past egg laying prime.  And the more exotic chickens don't lay as well as a commercial egg laying breeds.

Buff Orphington Hens

For us we want both egg laying, pretty birds, and a decent rack for when the hen gets old.  Plus I wanted to get heirloom breeds to help keep them from going extinct.  The breeds we enjoy most are Buff Orphingtons, Rhode Island Reds, Black Austerlops, and Barred Rocks.  All of these birds are very attractive and lay eggs like crazy.  They are also gentle and non aggressive for the most part.

From our 9 laying hens we get about 7 eggs a day in summer, a few less in winter.  We do not keep a rooster because they are very noisy.  Hens do make noise when they lay an egg.  They let out a cluck cluck squawk call for a few minutes, but that is much quieter than a rooster.  Our neighbors don't mind our chickens at all, especially since I give them periodic gifts of eggs.  Bribery works!

There are hundreds of chicken breeds so you are bound to find a breed that suits your taste in color, size, feathering, laying capacity, egg color, and temperament.  If you are looking at getting banties then also consider that they lay small eggs and not as well as the larger breeds, but as an upside they are very broody and make excellent mothers.  We once had a little black banty hen that was the best setter and mother we have seen.  So if you want to raise chicks (you need a rooster here to get fertile eggs) then having a banty or two will be a good choice.

Also I have to say that there is nothing like really fresh eggs for cooking and it is so exciting when you go out and gather your first eggs!

The Secret To Hatching Hens Not Roosters!

I found this great post at fresheggsdaily and had to pass it on.  By the way fresheggsdaily is a great resource for people with chickens or thinking about getting chickens. The information is interesting and proven to a degree.  The way you do it is by temperature control.  I have seen this on nature shows when it comes to crocodiles.  If their nests are a certain temperature more males than females will hatch.  I am definitely trying this out! Click on the pic below to go to the post. Also check out some of the incubators available from my amazon affiliate partner.  If you buy one I get a small commission that goes to support this blog. Enjoy!

Respect the Chicken!

 

What an amazing animal the chicken is.  It was one of the first creatures that humans appreciated enough to domesticate.    And if you ever have the chance to own a few you will understand why with their many sterling qualities. Low maintenance and small enough to not cause life threatening injury if they get mad at you.

 They raise their own young with ease and are extremely prolific.  They can scramble for food in the wild and yet happily devour all possible forms of kitchen waste.  They can be penned easily or trusted to stay close to home while roaming.  They don't require allot of love or attention from humans to find meaning in life,  all though a few will follow you around and take an interest in whatever you happen to be doing. They can be entertaining, beautiful, and most of all useful!



What other animal not only can give us a tasty meal itself but also give us a perfect little protein rich package every day of their life?  I greatly respect any animal who gives us food to eat but the chicken has got to be one of the best.  The best being of course the family milk cow (number 1 on fantasy list).

Our chickens are 4 and a half years old and laying up to 8 eggs a day.  That is a whopping 56  eggs a week from 9 chickens!  Our chickens hardly eat any store bought food and take care of all our kitchen scraps and garden waste including grass clippings since we don't treat our grass with chemicals.  They are quiet (we don't have a rooster) and generally speaking they don't smell. They are the ultimate survival livestock.  I love to just sit and watch them as they are very pretty and funny too.  When people ask me what is the easiest farm animal to raise and care for I always say chickens!

Baby Chicks, Dealing withChick Deaths, and Helping Chilled Chicks

We recently got some new chicks and a new chicken coop.  We bought nine which is a few more than what we needed due to the fact that you often loose a few.  Our old chickens are almost 4 years old and are getting to the end of their laying lives.  Surprisingly they are still laying very well.  We have 7 chickens and get 7 eggs a day almost every day (except when they succeed in getting out to hide their eggs).

 

 

We got a mixed bag of hen chicks

 

 

 

This one will either be a white hen or a golden

 

 

And then disaster!  This morning I went out early to check on the chicks and saw immediately that the heat lamp was out!  This was very bad news especially since last night was extremely cold.  I rushed and opened the door and saw the dead chick below.  The heat lamp above had somehow shattered in the night.  We got lucky that it didn't start a fire that could have spread to our house!

 

 

Another one that was under the pile of surviving chicks.  It was most likely crushed to death.

 

 

I immediately brought the survivors in who were severely chilled and put a heater fan above them.  They are doing fine now but it just goes to show you how fast you can loose chicks due to the heat lamp going out.

 

 

Here is Bremmer who thus far has had little exposure to them.  He has been fascinated all morning.  He has been laying next to the box in herding guard dog position.  He won't let the cats get near the chick box.  Samson our golden retriever is totally uninterested.  He came over for an inquisitive sniff and then went and laid down.  He has never had more than a polite interest in our rabbits or chickens.  I just watched Bremmer watch Samson go over and sniff above the chicks and chase him away.  He is a great protective herding dog.

 

 

He did this same thing when my daughter brought home a newborn kitten that had been abandoned on a road. I have never seen anything like it because we have never had a herding dog.  He literally never left the kittens side and protected her from our other dog, and our parents in law dog.  He groomed her and licked her bottom and followed her around the house.

 

 

This morning its a trip to the feed store for a new heat lamp and two new chicks.  The kids are very sad and today we are going to bury their chicks, the thought of just throwing them away shocked them so we have to hold a memorial service.

Bringing Chickens Back Into Lay

We were having a problem with our chickens.  Namely they all stopped laying.  I was getting one measly egg a day from 9 chickens!  This was highly annoying since they still ate as much as usual.  So what I essentially had was some smelly ornamental pets.  I was seriously considering putting them all into the pot rather than keep feeding them.  But first I tried some different ways to bring them back into lay.

First is to put a light in their coop as winter has come.  Chickens lay based on the hours of sunlight they get so by supplement their light in winter you get more eggs.  However this went on for two weeks and nothin.  No change.

I also increased their scratch and scraps in the hopes the extra food would help.  Generally the more food a chicken eats the more it lays.  Still nothing, nada, zip.

That pot was looking better and better.

In a last ditch effort I did something I had read about but never tried.  I gave them Cod Liver Oil in their water.  Fish oil is rich in Vitamin D.  Which is what our bodies make from sunlight.

The next day I had 4 lovely eggs in the box, and every day after that too.  Now we are up to 6 to 8 eggs a day, which is very decent for how old our chickens are and the time of year. 

So lesson learned.  Fish oil works!  Logically it makes sense.  If chickens lay based on the hours of sunlight they get then that could be based on how much vitamin D they are producing sending signals to their brain that it is time to start or stop laying.



The Chickens Are Coming! The Chickens Are Coming!

Its hard to explain why I love chickens to people who have never owned them.  It's not that they have complex personalities.  Frankly a chicken is pretty disappointing if your looking for companionship.  But there is something fascinating about watching them.  They are always busy with something and they do have an endearing way of following people around to see what they are up to.  This can be intimidating to people who haven't had allot of experience with chickens.  Most people think they are going to get pecked or something.  But really the chickens are just hoping that you are about to either throw some sort of edible item to them or uncover some sort of edible item.  They're kinda single minded like that.

We just did our order to Murray Mcmurray Hatchery.  After trying several hatcheries out it's the only place I will order my chicks from.  They are of the best quality and have a huge selection.  We should be getting them by March 5th.  Horray!


So what did we order?  Well you have to do a minimum order of 25 so everyone got to pick a variety.

Daddy's pick

Colombian Wyandotte

Mommy's Picks

Black Australorps

Cuckoo Maran (chocolate colored egg layer)

White Orphingtons

Captain Submarines Pick

Black Giants

Eldest Daughters Pick

White Cochin's

Princess In Waiting Pick

Golden Polish

Viking Boy Pick

Araucana

 (easter egg layer)

Next Door Neighbor Girl Pick

Silver Spangled Hamburgs

With all these chickens we should have plenty of eggs. I cant wait to get them!

Creepy Weird Eggs Our Chickens Have Layed

As of late we've been getting some weird eggs including a shell less egg.  I've seen them before but usually they are burst in the laying box from the chickens sitting them.  It was really creepy! lol  But believe it or not this is normal to find once in a while.

EEWWWW!

The White Egg is store bought and then you can see how big the average eggs are and then we had one really small one.

only two inches long

The nesting box I built

We have been needing a new nesting box for our chickens for awhile.  Husband threw together one a year ago but it had many faults.  The chickens pooped in it.  It was too big for the need and it just didn't work.

So today I decided to re purpose a piece of broken furniture to make a better box.  We recently had to remove an old dresser that was falling apart.  The drawers however were still in good shape and I thought "Hey!  If I put a piece of wood across the front it would make a perfect nesting box. 

Nothing like fresh eggs!

So out the garage I go and about a half an hour later BAM! I have a new nesting box.



The chickens seem to like it too!

Keeping Chickens in Town Part Two: Housing

Housing is an interesting thing when keeping chickens.  Chickens are really not picky on where they lay their heads at night, but having a nice chicken house with roosts, feeders, and a laying box will make your life much easier.  Making it attractive on the outside will also keep your neighbors from complaining.

We once lived up the street from a couple that had free range chickens.  Now this was a town of less than 300 people and was very rural.  But still these chickens roosted in the trees, on fences, wherever! There were huge piles of poop under where they roosted.  The smell was gross and it looked terrible.  All I can say is I'm glad that I didn't live right next door because chickens don't understand property lines and made frequent neighborly visits.  Granted these people were in their 80's and couldn't keep up with the cleaning needed for free range chickens.

There are thousands of different chicken coops.  From the ornate palaces to converted dog houses.  All have their good points and bad points.  It just depends on how much money you want to spend and the kind of setup that makes you happy


Our first chicken coop was made of straw bales stacked up in a square with a plywood top.  We even put in a little window.  Not the most pretty thing you would see but it worked fine for the chickens and kept predators out at night.

Now that we live in town and cant free range our birds we are using a small plywood building.  We built a run for the chickens to go outside and exercise/dust themselves/get sun in.  It works great and is easy to clean and take care of.


So things to consider if you want chickens in your backyard.

Security


Chickens are tempting to many animals (and people) you will find in town.  Especially dogs and raccoons!  So having a secure place for them to sleep and roam is a good idea.  A fenced run keeps them within safe bounds and keeps unwanted visitors at bay. One small dog can kill all your chickens in less than an hour.  We use chain link for our run and buried chicken wire around the perimeter of the run after we found signs of digging under the fence.  The way that works is the dog/raccoon/skunk starts digging at the fence line and then hits the wire hurting it claws.  Suddenly chicken doesn't look so good!  Some people use barbed wire in places with lots of roaming dogs and raccoons.

 Also chickens are not what you call potty trained.  They poop everywhere they go.  So unless you are OK with finding chicken poop all over your yard, driveway, and walkways I suggest you have a run for them.
 

A cheaper way to make a nice looking chain link chicken run is to buy a used large chain link  outside dog kennel on craigslist.  You can find them for $100.00 and sometimes even free.  Get the six foot high ones and then cover them with plywood or more chain link. It's cheaper than buying the materials from the hardware store and is easy to set up.  Our plan is to get one soon, the run we made was just temporary.

Ease of Cleaning and Maintenance

If you are going to have a run that is not movable and a permanent building for your chickens make sure you can stand up in it.  Otherwise when you have to clean it out or go into it for any reason your going to have to stoop over the whole time.  Dirt floored or concrete are personal preferences.  We've had both and while you can bleach concrete I don't care either way for the small amount of chickens I have. I would never do wood though because it absorbs smells, moisture, and will eventually rot.

Litter

There are lots of different options here.  We use wood shavings because they absorb the poop better and smells nicer.   Straw is cheaper but it is much messier.  Cost is also an issue here so you have to go with whats cheap in your area.  We use a deep litter system where we clean the coop twice a year.  Then we put a couple of inches to start with wood shavings and add more as needed to keep it clean and smells down.  This works great for us.

Food and Water

You have to feed your chickens, even if your allowing them to free range.  You also must at all times provide water.  If they have no or little water they will lay less eggs.  You can buy feeders and waterers for your chickens.  I recommend the automatic feeder and waterer myself.  They keep the feed and water clean and prevent the chickens from wasting them.  We have a 5 gallon waterer and a large automatic feeder that hangs from the roof.  We only have to fill the water once a week and the feeder once every two weeks.  This cuts way down on your labor every day.  I just check them every day or so while collecting eggs (I have to fight with the children for this privilege) to make sure they aren't empty.

    
  Waterer                     Feeder


Scraps

I cant imagine how much food I would end up throwing away if we didnt' have chickens.  With 4 children there are many scraps everyday that go to the chickens.  Old milk from sippy cups, fruit and veggie peelings, bread crusts, rejected meals, food that sat out too long.  It all goes to those voracious bottomless pits.  I NEVER throw out food. Everything from the kitchen that goes to the chickens except poultry products ( possible cross contamination here) that go to our dog.  Chickens are like an amazing recycling program.  The more food a chicken eats the more eggs it will lay.  They also get grass clippings from our yard (we do NOT spray or treat our grass so be careful doing this), weeds from the garden, and any garden waste.  They love it!

Egg Laying Box



It's a good idea to have a nesting box for your chickens.  Otherwise they will lay on the ground or wherever they decide looks good.   This will lead to you not knowing if an egg is "fresh" or "old", eggs too dirty for use, lost eggs, and possibly even to the chickens eating them which is a hard habit to break.  You don't need anything fancy and can build it yourself or use a covered cat litter box picked  up at a yard sale.

Shade, Dirt, and Sun

This would also be under shelter but is kind of special in its own way.  All chickens like to sun themselves.  This allows them to get vitamins they need.  But they also need shade in the hottest times of year.  Our chickens always go back into the chicken house during the hottest part of the day because there is no shade in the run (yet, working on that) at midday.  If we had shade for them outside they would sit out in the shade.  Chickens also need dirt to dust themselves with.  It helps protect them from nasty bugs.  So make sure to provide your chickens with somewhere to dust themselves.

Warmth and Light

In the winter if you have really cold winters, you will need to either make sure your chickens have shelter that will keep them from cold wind and weather or resign yourself to no eggs.  The more energy a  chicken expends on keeping warm the less eggs it will lay.  If you use a small building/shelter and keep enough chickens in it they will huddle together and keep each other warm.  Also sealing any drafts and having glass windows will help.

Light is another issue.  Chickens need 12 hours of daylight or they slow or stop laying eggs.  Every winter we put a heat lamp in our coop to provide the extra light and a little extra warmth for our chickens.  That way we still get eggs even in the coldest winters. This winter was in the teens and under zero almost all season which is unheard of for around here!

Fly control

Your going to want to control flies no matter what.  Nothing is worse than ruining your outside time with flies everywhere.  Not to mention your neighbors will really hate it.  We use flytapes and also fly trap bags.  These work very well.  Some people lime the soil of their run and this keeps down smell and flies.  I can't seem to find lime anywhere so go figure.

The Chickens Are Coming!

I love January.  It's when I get all my gardening and other fun magazines.  I page through them fantasizing about all the things I would like to do or grow in the next year. This week I got my Murray McMurray Hatchery Magazine for 2011.  This is in my opinion the finest Chicken Hatchery in the United States. 

The first year we raised chickens I ordered 50 chicks from them and raised the most beautiful, healthy birds we have ever done.  Not one chick died and we won all blue ribbons and best of show at fair that year!

This last year I bought my chicks from a feed store that used a local hatchery.  They are ok, but many of the chicks turned out to be a mislabeled variety called The Red Star and not the Rhode Island Reds like we wanted.  Red stars are excellent layers but just not very pretty to look at.

So even though we don't have to we are going to order 25 chicks from the hatchery so we can get what we really want.  We always get the heritage (meaning old varieties) multipurpose birds.  Not only are they generally more attractive than the commercial layer, but they also dress out nice and plump when they stop laying. 

So far the list includes:

Black Australorps: lovely big coal black birds that are unique because they also have black eyes.  Excellent layers of big brown eggs and will lay deep into winter.  White skinned which I prefer.

Buff Orpingtons:  Golden big birds that are excellent layers and gentle.  Very pretty and white skinned.



Rhode Island Reds:  I'm not fond of red chickens because when they first feather out the other chicks tend to pick them.  However my son loves them for some reason and you can stop picking by using red lights in the brooder.  They are also one of the best layers of big brown eggs.



Barred Rocks:  Excellent layers and setters (if only we could have roosters!) and they lay well. Very pretty with the black and white barring.  Developed in the united states these are a true American chicken.

Eldest daughter and Princess in Waiting have yet to pick what they want so I can expect more varieties than these.  I wish we could do ducks just because they are so fun but I think we would be pushing the city a bit far.  Right now I am getting 7 eggs a day from my 9 chickens.  Pretty good with it being the dead of winter and unseasonably cold this year.