Hey.... Lets keep Chickens..!

GAILEY

I have 31 girls, 16 of which came as casts off from an intensive farm.
The surplus eggs pay for their food, I always have eggs, and I boil the left over veg, peelings etc for them too.
They are good for the soul
They are good for the purse
No need to boil them....let them retire...they've earned it

GAILEY

About the rat situation...sod the council...just borrow a terrier

123xyz

This may sound naive, but do you need a cockrel to make them lay eggs? Or are they happy to lay unfertilised ones? And how do you keep Foxy Loxy away?

Magentasue

No,you don't need a cockeral, they lay from about six months old. Foxes are more of a problem in some areas than others. You need a secure shed to lock them in at night, foxes will attack during the day but it's less common. They are less likely to attack if there are people or a dog around. If there are foxes around, the hens enclosure needs to be fenced in and the fencing buried in the ground, needs to be 5' high too.

Mine free range in the garden, so does our dog and it is escape proof (for them), we've never seen or heard of foxes in the area. As soon as it's getting dark, the hens go into their house, hop on to their perch and settle for the night. We just have to shut their door (pop hole) until morning. In the summer they're out chatting until 10pm,these days it's about 4.45pm.

pilgjo

Beent hinking about getting a couple of chickens as would love the kids to have a pet but don't like the idea of a caged animal. My main concern is cats, r the chickens safe in the garden during the day? Also, which breed of chicken is best?

Magentasue

Cats are no problem but I'd watch their first meeting - cat is likely to get a pecking. Our chickens are in the garden all day but it is fully enclosed - they will scratch and dig up so you might not want them to have access to the whole garden. Most people fence the chickens into a run, we've gone the other way and fenced the veg off.

I would suggest three rather than two just in case the worst happens to one... I don't know enough to recommend breeds but we have ex-batteries and Black Rocks. Black Rocks are a hybrid suited to free ranging and laying for a long period. The ex-batteries are good layers and it has been brilliant watching them become proper chickens instead of bald, scared, immobile wrecks. They cost about 50p each, Black Rocks were £6.50. Thoroughly recommend both!

suzetim

Hi Iagree, we got 2 chickens in sept....they are great. We looked at the omlet , and thought it was to expensive and tiny! So we converted and old rabbit and guinea pig shelter, which my husband had made. We have a small garden, and they love wandering around. However they do poo loads, so I needed to do poo scooping a couple of times a day when the kids were in the garden.

Bue they have now started really scraping away at the grass border and making a mess, so we have made a run round the coup, not a bad size and they are aloud out for 2-3 hrs a day to go round the garden.

We all love them every time you open the back door or go out they come running up to you and have such funny characters, so yes make great pets.

I was told they lay for up 18 months and live for maybe a year after that.

And yes the yolks are so yellow, I was told that was from eating grass, which most chickens never have access to.

Do they stop laying in winter??

Also beware they do eat loads of plants in your garden, but we are use to that as we have 2 guineas pigs and one rabbit who are freerange in the garden, but ht echucks have now finished off some other plants!!!

They make no noise so don't bother the neighbours.

They are great pets, they like being picked up and also the benefit of eggs every day. It's great......Give it a try I say.

Magentasue

suzetim wrote:

I was told they lay for up 18 months and live for maybe a year after that.

Do they stop laying in winter??

I think they live much longer than that, more like 5-10 years although ex-batteries often fail to make five.

Ours laid all though last winter but we're down to two a day from five hens now. Some stop completely,especially pure breeds I think. They lay less as they get older.

snowball2

I started keeping chickens this spring - started out with 8 black rocks, then had 2 RIR for my birthday in September and we hatched 5 chicks as one black rock had gone broody.

The black rocks are confined to their run at the moment as they started going into my neighbours garden abnd they werent too pleased sreaming bird flu!

Anyway they are still laying strong 6 - 8 eggs a day at the moment, we were hitting 10 reg during the summer!

This site is a wealth of info for anyone interested in chicken keeping covering all possible subjects!

Practical Poultry

Have fun!

bootman

I have two chickens and an Eglu which is fantastic. :j It is all plastic so very easy to clean. My girls have run of the garden all day and I get 2 lovely eggs every morning from them. I went to an agricultural show recently in Malvern where Omlet the company that make the Eglu were exhibiting. Also the people who do the wooden arks.

The arks were more expensive than the Eglu's and were so ugly. I don't get any beasties because it is plastic(bright yellow) which looks fab in my garden. :j

I would love a pink one as well for bunnies