malvin

At 89, I think it's time to move on. Always wanted to raise chickens and sell chicken eggs, and here is where I'm moving to. Stay tuned, malvin

Manglesphoto Loc: 70 miles south of St.Louis

Canisdirus

GREAT!!

raymondh Loc: Walker, MI

Appears to be a quaint little homelet

sourdough58 Loc: Maine

When covid came I remember going to the store and finding that amongst many other things empty shelves and NO eggs, I can lots of things but I cannot make eggs, I eat eggs several times a week and I need them for baking so I bought 20 chickens, when they reached egg laying age we had more eggs than we could sell or eat, like all of a sudden everyone had chickens/eggs, so I pickeled eggs and gave them away, I took some with me when I went too the auto repair I gave eggs to everyone just to get rid of them, and also the food pantry, then we had a new neighbor move in down the street I never met them but one day when we were away their dog came over to visit and killed 10 of my chickens and next thing I knew they moved away. but now my egg problem went away.

bobmcculloch Loc: NYC, NY

bobmcculloch Loc: NYC, NY

Go for it.

malvin

Hello sourdough58, Sorry to here about that dog killing your chickens. Because of being aware of the chance
of a predator getting to my free range chickens, I'm going to get a mean kick ass rooster to protect my chickens,
maybe two! malvin

DirtFarmer Loc: Escaped from the NYC area, back to MA

In case anyone else gets the urge to keep chickens:

We moved to a nice suburban town a few years ago. I went to Tractor Supply one time to get some tools and when I got home I made the mistake of telling my wife they were selling chicks (they do that every spring). She decided she wanted 20 chickens. We compromised on 12 and got some pullets. It cost us probably $40 for the chicks, feed, heat lamps (they were probably 1 week old) and a small pen. It then cost around $1200 to build a coop with 1" wire fencing around it, about 5' x 8'. It then took me a couple months to put the coop together, including burying the fence to prevent animals burrowing into the coop and digging holes for the 4x4s in the CT soil (which is what the locals call the upper layer of rocks).

After about a month, it was evident that 2 of the 12 pullets had evolved into roosters (spontaneous misidentification). The town had an ordnance prohibiting roosters from disturbing neighbors. We ignored it for a while but eventually got a call from the Board of Health. They were quite reasonable about it. The important part was that the roosters not disturb the neighbors. Of course, roosters like to make noise. And roosters do not crow at dawn and dusk. They crow any damn time they want to. 24 hours. So we looked online and discovered that by making a collar for the rooster you could reduce the noise. Got some velcro and made a collar. Put it on the roosters and it worked. They still crow, but it sounds like they have laryngitis and the sound is significantly reduced. They have to expand their neck to make noise and if it is restricted they can't disturb the neighbors. You basically put it on but leave enough room to get your little finger in between the neck and the collar and that seems to be enough that they can breathe and eat but can't make a lot of noise.

Occasionally we would let the chickens out to roam. They liked that but the first few times we had to chase them back into the coop at night. Eventually they got the idea and they would go back in on their own. They liked to dig up the lawn in search of bugs. When they got a few bugs to eat they would run under a bush so the local hawks wouldn't see them. We would feed them table scraps. They love meat. When we put a dish out on the lawn they would all gather around and start eating. The roosters would stand around watching the sky. When the hens were done, the roosters would eat. More than once I saw a rooster fight off a redtail hawk. But when the fox came around the rooster was not faring well in the fight until I came out and the fox ran off.

Having roosters ensures that your flock will increase. We had one chicken who would occasionally gather some eggs and sit on them. She hatched a couple broods so we had more chicks. We got up to about 16 (after losing a few chickens to successful hawks or fox, or coyotes), but several of them were roosters so at one point we had 5 roosters. That became a problem once the roosters got sexually active. The hens were getting beat up regularly. We had to dispatch 4 of the roosters. We left the old gentle rooster and had no problems after that.

We lost a couple chickens to Vent Gleet (otherwise known as 'nasty butt'). It's a fungal disease that acts on the chickens digestive system. It may be caused by infected water, so it's good to change the water regularly.

We had a hanging waterer, but we had to empty that in the winter. We put out a heated dog water bowl, but it would get full of chicken poop so we got a stainless compost bucket that held about 2 quarts. We would put water in the dog bowl, then put the compost bucket in the dog bowl and it would stay liquid most of the time. The bucket was tall enough to avoid getting pooped on.

At the peak we were getting around 2 dozen eggs a week. They got distributed to local family and neighbors (which helped to mitigate the noise problem). Fresh eggs are not the same as the fresh eggs you get from the supermarket. They have firmer yolks and taste better. If you add up all the costs (infrastructure, feed, other supplies) they probably cost around $15/dozen.

Many people eat their chickens when they become nonproductive (around 3-4 years age). But my wife considered them pets and they all have distinct personalities. They can be nice or nasty. Since our chickens had a lot of out-coop time, we lost them occasionally to local dogs, fox, coyotes, hawks.

In good weather we could load up the food dish and waterer and just leave them in the coop for a week. The coop got an internet-activated door that we could open to let them out into a fenced area. Once trained they would go back into the coop at night and we would close the door (wherever we were, in once case we were in Paris). The last time we did that we had a flight home with a change in Atlanta. It was early morning and we decided while we were waiting in Atlanta we would let them out so we opened the door. The connecting flight was delayed. When we got home at noon, all the chickens were dead. It looked like a couple coyotes (or local dogs) got in and just ran them all down. About an hour later we heard one and got her back into the coop. Then there was another about 15' up in a tree so we had two left. A few months after that we moved to an apartment so we had to give them away. Fortunately there are a lot of people who keep chickens, so there were choices as to where to send them.

Next batch of chickens will have a fully enclosed run.

kpmac Loc: Ragley, La

Good luck.

sourdough58 Loc: Maine

I had that Rooster he was a handsome guy, he took wonderful care of his girls, I am sure he died protecting them. Predators normally only kill what they eat, to have them free range in the daytime and locked up in the coop at night I was willing to lose one here and there, I could work with that, dogs are not predators they kill because they think its fun running chasing and catching them.

malvin

Hello DirtFarmer, Found your chicken story very interesting, and enjoyable. Thank you, malvin

StanMac Loc: Tennessee

I think the COVID era chicken keeping trend has lost some of the wind in its sails. The enthusiasm of everyone I know who got into it seems to have waned. The expense and time to keep a small flock must be more than the benefits derived.

Stan

sourdough58 Loc: Maine

You got that right its not cheep but we have grown fond of our chickens and eggs.

raymondh Loc: Walker, MI

Thanks for this very interesting experience.