Does anyone keep chickens in East Belfast?!

SuperMum2010

LOL!!! Caught on!

Orange_King

Last time I was at Mckee's farm shop (located on the road to Ards from Craigantlet crossroads) they were doing a completed pakage with coop and hens etc.

Now would be a good time to get them I think.

SuperMum2010

Fantastic - thankyou! I thought they had chickens last time I was up there (drooling at the stuff no true MSE fan could afford!!), but didnt realise they were for sale.

Orange_King

There are others down the Ards Peninsula who sell hens - there's a guy who sells eggs (and hanging baskets) at Ards Car Boot on Sundays and I'm sure he would be able to sort you out!

thetope

I keep chickens but I don't live in the city. They are very easy to look after indeed and keep me entertained for hours watching - and of course the eggs are great.

I would recommend if you are in a built up area just getting hens and no cockerels - we have two cockerels and they are pretty damn noisy, and not just in the morning! The hens by and large are not, but when they are in the process of laying their eggs they can shout a bit. But, if you have a decent chicken house they will be laying their eggs in the nesting boxes which should muffle the sound down and therefore shouldn't bother the neighbours unduly.

We have a large garden and let the chickens roam about freely. They do scratch at the ground and can make bare patches in your lawns, damage plants and dig up stuff, so if you are precious about your garden i would recommend having some sort of secure chicken run to confine their activities a bit. Because our garden is big the damage isn't too bad but I can imagine the smaller the garden the greater the effect! You can always let them out of the run for shorter periods to enjoy the benefits of free ranging for part of the day whilst protecting your garden. The other bonus of a decent and secure run attached to the hen house is that you if you are away overnight you can leave them (with a good supply of water and food) and not have to organise someone to close them in. We don't have a run and we have to ask a neighbour to shut in the hens if we are away when night falls so that mister fox doesn't have a buffet banquet. (you can also get light sensitive automatic open/closers whcih are pretty good, your chickens should put themselves to bed when night falls so that is also a solution)

Do realise that chickens are not necessarily a cheap way to get eggs. I would recommend feeding a good layers pellet and supplementing it with treats like raw veg peelings, corn on the cob, grain etc (note it's actually illegal to feed your chickens kitchen waste though i don't think the chicken police will ever actually catch you). You will also need to worm them (I recommend flubenvet as there is no egg withdrawal period) a few times a year and generally keep on top of their health. They do make a bit of a mess of the coop (I think i read somewhere that 80% of their poo is done when roosting at night) so when you are building/purchasing your hen house do think carefully about how easy it is to clean. A "droppings tray" beneath the roosting perches definitely helps to keep the bedding cleaner but the coop must still be regularly cleaned (whether it "needs" it or not) to make sure you don't get a build up of things you can't see, like mites

well this post has gone on a bit longer than i intended! i'm by no means a chicken expert but the above advice is just a few things i've picked up along the way that i wish i'd known at the beginning

SuperMum2010

Wow thanks -thats really helpful. I have been thinking about this for over a year now, and have read loads of stuff in books, but its good to hear it straight from the chicken owners mouth so to speak!!

NAR

There's no-one here but us chickens!

arkonite_babe

SuperMum2010 wrote: »

Just wondered if anyone was a chicken keeper in the city? Im in east belfast, and am considering (i.e. trying to convince oh that it is a good idea!!!) keeping chickens, just maybe 3 or 4, as I love baking and would love a small supply of REAL eggs, and also for the children to see them for real! Does anyone else keep chooks in the garden and do you have any hints/tips? Where did you get your chooks from and is it hard work?!

Thankyou :-)

Some links for you from other boards which might help a bit:

Hen house corner

Hey, lets keep chickens

Ex Battery hen and chicken advice please

Hope these are of some use to you, oh and some chicken homes to drool over as well.......

Omlet

Chic-Hens


Oh and I'll add this to the other thread from last year

seatzie

theres a guy in the Cregagh in East Belfast keeps them in his back garden in an old red telephone box, no complaints that I've ever heard of he's had them a few years

BatCat

Hi,
My neighbours (their back garden backs on to our back garden) kept chickens for a year. We didn't see much of them, but they didn't keep an eye on the food and so we soon had a lovely rat problem much to the joy of my cats.
I complained to the council but apparently there's little the council can do unless you try to sell the eggs.
So if you're keeping chickens please please keep an eye on them!
Cheers,
BatCat