Chickens in the Spring

[Laura]

I think I am ready to pull the trigger.

I am ready to take the plunge and get some chicks this spring.

What would you recommend I do leading up to the day I buy the chicks?
What books to read, what chicken coop's to build?

I'd love to have a 'chicken tractor' type thing. One I can move around the yard.....

Thanks for your input!!

Laura

[momma_to_seven_chi]

I think I am ready to pull the trigger.

I am ready to take the plunge and get some chicks this spring.

What would you recommend I do leading up to the day I buy the chicks?
What books to read, what chicken coop's to build?

I'd love to have a 'chicken tractor' type thing. One I can move around the yard.....

Thanks for your input!!

Laura


Hi Laura,
You should start looking at catalogs early. Have the chicks ordered by Feb to be sure you get them. They sell out early. Right now, I would start looking at hatchery websites to learn about breeds and their uses. Order catalogs for next spring. And order chicks early.

You need to decide if you want chickens for eggs, for brooding more chicks, for meat, or multi-purpose. Different types of chickens provide different resources. If you want broodiness and meat, youwouldn't buy white leghorns as a first choice. You just need to learn about breeds and each of their fortes.

Here is a link to chicken hatchery websites. I would try to order from a hatchery close to where you live. You want the chicks to travel as few days as possible.

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=chicken+hatchery&btnG=Search

Other people will help you with henhouse plans. My husband does the building here, so I can't help you much with that. My only suggestion is that you use a concrete floor in the chicken house. It prevents a lot of rodent issues. Just throw straw on it for a warmer floor in winter.

[Anon001]

Laura,

Before deciding on the type of chicken house, you need to determine how many chickens you'll need.

I would go ahead and decide if you want enough for just a couple eggs per day or if you want a dozen a day. Do you plan to sell excess eggs or give any away to family and friends on occasion? Do you want enough to put also dress each year?.... and how many.

After you determine your purpose, you will know how many hens you need. Then based on the number of hens, you can determine the size of chicken house.

I keep more than I should in one small chicken house, but they are turned out every morning to free range and they only go back in at night to roost. I let them out no matter what the weather is. Being animals, they know when they need to go out and not.

Also, do you plan to let them free range or do you plan to build a chicken yard with your chicken house?

Do you have any neighbors or friends with chickens that can help you starting out?

I will say that having chickens is probably the easiest and least time consuming of all the farm animals.

Good luck.

Paul

[Laura]

If I buy my chicks at the local Tractor Supply, I have to buy 6. State law.

I would like to build a house to hold 10 chickens.
It has to be a house that can withstand some pretty wicked wind in the winter.
It has to have some insulation. It's dern cold out there right now.
I do want something I can move around the yard. My neighbor has a house with a tall fence.....but once they have scratched the soil bare......it's toast.
I really want to be able to drag mine all over the property.

I would like to gather 3-5 eggs per day.
I would like to start out with just laying hens, get used to them and their routine, then graduate to meat birds.
It's cold, so I need a hardy bird that can handle some low temps.

I do have one neighbor that just started keeping chickens May 09. She told me the hardest thing about chickens is keeping them alive :-)

I will swing by the tractor supply today and grab a couple of chicken magazines and see what's up! I checked out a couple of chicken books at the library.....one is a Storey book, and the others are good informational books.

[momma_to_seven_chi]

I do have one neighbor that just started keeping chickens May 09. She told me the hardest thing about chickens is keeping them alive :-)


Chickens are hardy. They don't die easily IMO. If you only want six of them, buy eight chicks to start just in case you loose a couple in the brooder or end up with a roo. And if you just want eggs, then get leghorns. They won't brood, and are skinny things, but they lay well.

[homemade_mamma]

Hi Laura, you are going to love having chickens! I have been raising meat chickens for 2 years and this was my first year with laying chickens.

I see you are in the same zone as I am. Right now our temp. is -14 and my chickens are doing fine. I have 3 different types of layers. Production Red, Black sex link, and Buff Orpington. I LOVE my Buffs and they are fluffier than the others so I can only imagine they must be warmer.

I have 11 chickens left out of 13 I started with this spring. The other 2 weren't sick, they just met my dog before she was trained properly to leave them alone. I have 8 cats and they have never bothered them. Once they get a certain size they can kinda hold there own. So really i am having good luck keeping them alive! They started laying some time in Aug. One time this summer I did gather 11 eggs in one day, but usually I had around 8 a day. I am sure that spring will bring MANY eggs as they will be full grown by then. They still give me around 3-4 a day and I am surprised I thought they would have quit by now for the winter.

I don't know what kind of yard you have (town or country). I really think a permanent structure would serve you better. Yes, their run will be bare by the end of summer but a chicken tractor is better for warmer climates. (my opionion of course) Once I got my dog trained, I let them run free around our property. They never went far and were soooo happy!! No problem with hawks, owls or any other animals... yet ;) You really will need an insulated coop with a solid floor of some type for the winter. The fence doesn't have to be that high, just clip wings. Chicken tractors usually use the grass as a floor. I can't imagine having one of them right now in this 13 inches of snow we just got.

Now for meat chickens. If you are worried about your yard, DONT get fast growers like cornish cross. They are eating/ pooping machines!!! Find a layer that is a good dual purpose bird. I would think any larger layer would be OK. (Black feathers leave black speckles on the skin, not pretty, but just fine to eat of course). Layers will lay good for about 3 years and then you will need to do something with them, they can live for a long time after that. The optimal set up would be that you get chicks each spring. Within 3 years you will have a set to cull each year for meat. I am very attatched to my chickens and am dreading the 3 year mark! I really don't know what I will do...

Hope this bit of info may have helped, I am no expert but I have learned alot these past 2 years. Have fun!

Debbie

[Anon001]

If I buy my chicks at the local Tractor Supply, I have to buy 6. State law.

I would like to build a house to hold 10 chickens.
It has to be a house that can withstand some pretty wicked wind in the winter.
It has to have some insulation. It's dern cold out there right now.
I do want something I can move around the yard. My neighbor has a house with a tall fence.....but once they have scratched the soil bare......it's toast.
I really want to be able to drag mine all over the property.

I would like to gather 3-5 eggs per day.
I would like to start out with just laying hens, get used to them and their routine, then graduate to meat birds.
It's cold, so I need a hardy bird that can handle some low temps.

I do have one neighbor that just started keeping chickens May 09. She told me the hardest thing about chickens is keeping them alive :-)

I will swing by the tractor supply today and grab a couple of chicken magazines and see what's up! I checked out a couple of chicken books at the library.....one is a Storey book, and the others are good informational books.

Laura,
The Storey book is a good one. I have to disagree with the comment about keeping them alive. They are probably the easiest of all farm animals to raise and keep alive. That is why it is usually recommended to start with chickens first.

As far as insulation in a chicken house, it is best if you don't unless you live somewhere that the temps are always way below zero. You can actually do more harm than good by trying to take care of the temps with adult chickens. If the chicken house is small and you insulate it, you can actually cause respiratory problems. I've never had a chicken house insulated and I've always kept at least one window with just wire. There are many times in the winter when our temps drop below zero and I've never lost a chicken to the cold.

There are so many breeds out there these days. If money is an issue, I would start with one breed that is a good "dual" (meat and layer) breed. One of my favorites is the Buff Orpington. They are heave meat birds and also good layers. They used to be good setters but a lot of that has been bred out of some strains. I'm thinking my next ones will be Black Australorps.

Usually, I keep back enough eggs to set hens when they go broody. I think you get a much higher percentage of hatches and the mama hen raises the young. When you raise chicks, they go through a lot of feed. Twenty chicks today could easily go through $50 to $75 in feed before they are adult. But if the birds free range and the mama hen raises them, you don't have much in feed expense. My free range birds eat very little grain and feed.

If you have a big enough yard and just a dozen birds or so, they won't make the ground bare... usually.

If you want 3 to 5 eggs per day, I would suggest starting off with 10 to 12 chicks at least. If you get "straight run", about half will be roosters so you would need more. But if you get just pullets, then 10 to 12 would be good. You may lose one or two as chicks but that would give you 8 to 10 eggs in the summer and maybe 3 to 5 eggs in the winter. Someone correct me if I'm wrong. It also has to do with what breed.

Good luck
Paul

[cinok]

I agree kkeeping chickens alive is easy although you may lose 1 or 2 early on, no matter what you do every time we buy a dozen chicks we always loose 1 or 2. If you keep them in a tractor and leave it sit in one place too long espasilly if the ground is wet the can scratch it clean in a week or so. We have 10 now and lately we have been getting 8 eggs every day and some times 11. somebody must be laying twice a day. Feed is cheap the only reason we use feed now is with the cold weather I want to keep them laying.

[AlchemyAcres]

I'm thinking my next ones will be Black Australorps.


I've had Black Australorps for many years. They're great birds!

But, I've decided to go back to RIRs because there's a HUGE market around here for good started organic RIR chicks....and that'll sure outpace what's possible from just consumable eggs.


~Martin

[Andy Jones]

From my experience,you can't go wrong with Rhode Island Reds,Buff Orpingtons or Barred Rocks for eggs.White Leghorns are great for eggs,but I personally don't like all the white feathers everywhere.My place is located in a heavily wooded area and I've had terrible trouble with hawks and raccoons.The hawks were fairly easy to deal with.I had to put wire over the pens to stop them.The coons are another story.They will wipe you out very quickly.They will tear through the wire,dig under,and in my case,top out from nearby trees and come down trees in my pen to get in.I stopped this by wrapping the trees with thin aluminum to keep them from climbing up and down.I put a fence charger on two strands of wire 6" and 12" above the ground around the perimeter of the pen.I haven't had any more coon problems since I did this.

Andy