Backyard Chickens?
- Thread starter Dragonborn
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One other thought on the negative side - 24 hour chicken feeders DO attract rodents. There is a treader feeder that takes the weight of a chicken to open it, but other than that, you have to A. Deal with rodents, B. be up at dawn to open/put out the feeder and out at dusk to close/put away the feeder. I deal with the rodents. I have snap traps and water traps because I don't do poison. But the most important thing is for chickens to eat as soon as they wake up (dawn) and before they go to roost (dusk). I was faithful for a year or two, but it got old 7 days a week.
You have good space and good plans. I can't recommend a rooster. Long story I'll save for another time - or maybe I posted in the novel you're reading on this thread, I don't know. But for sure, 8 hens will be tortured by one Roo. Plus, mean as snakes, man-killers, non-trainable creatures. I sh!t you not. The one I have now is fine, but again, a long story for another day. Short story is I love them but I don't ever want/need another.
I agree with the zin thing on watching animals. Chickens are absolutely mesmerizing. I could sit and watch them for hours. I'll bet if they did a study with all the wires hooked up to you, they'd prove that watching chickens in the yard drops blood pressure within 5 minutes.
Rits
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I have 4 hens and one rooster. Not advisable as far as rooster to hen ratio but I seriously down sized to only my favorite chickens once we started showing Ripley. Its been so much easier than the close to 30 we had. Just enough eggs for us to get a dozen or two a week and the poop cleanup is manageable plus we can leave feeders out for them while gone and water and they are fine. Fortunately, my rooster doesn't beat them up. He does his breeding in the morning and at dusk and is good. Young roosters will be horndogs... mine is about 2-3 yo.
I would advise getting pretty chickens and enjoy them. Don't worry about egg producers unless you are wanting to sell for profit. Buff Orpingtons are nice and docile, so are my Ameraucanas (read, Ameraucana and NOT Americana or easter egger). Basically purebred breed bred to a standard
. My Ameraucanas have all been basically lap dogs with feathers. My rooster is an Ameraucana and he NEVER has looked at us funny. He will keep his distance but isn't mean. I also have a buff Orpington hen and blue laced red wyandottes that are big girls and also docile, not lap dogs but not afraid of us or mean either.
I would recommend finding a breeder (you read that right) if you are going to purchase Ameraucana chicks, over going to the box store. If you are going to go with hatchery stock, skip the box store and order directly from the hatchery and have them shipped directly to you. McMurray and Meyer Hatchery are two big names that sell quality hatchery stock.
Build your coop larger than you think you need. Chicken math is real and it doesn't hurt to have more room than not enough. If you ever can't let them out due to vacation or bad weather, you won't feel bad leaving them in if they have plenty of space. Too little space causes pecking, fighting and injuries. But... 12x12 you have more than enough space for 8 chickens lol! You theoretically have 18 chickens and leave them inside with that much space (or more if you let out every day). Obviously fresh air and grass is better but being locked in occasionally will not hurt them. They say 4 sq ft of coop space per bird (if you are letting them out daily) and 8-9 sq ft/bird for run space, but the more the better. Also if you don't want to be early to rise or might come back late, they do sell automatic coop doors that open and close dawn/dusk.
Mine free range with no aerial cover so I wouldn't free range mine without a rooster among them. He is their first line of defense. He will be the first to alert them to run for cover and will be the one to sacrifice his life over losing one or all. Mean roosters do their job very very well but horrible for management. Think boots, pants and a good stick to be able to access anything, and never turning your back. Many don't tolerate mean roosters and dispatch them while others want them for heavy predator protection. Just know, every one has predators. It's just a matter of time of them finding your chickens so when you build, build with that in mind and fort Knox your coop and run.
I leave my auto feeder and waters inside so I know they always have access even when I can't let them out. Some people don't like that due to rodents but again... fort Knox. Never had a rodent in the coop.
Speaking of mean roosters, are you willing to dispatch any or cull a sick hen? Yes, try to save one with supportive care however there aren't many vets that will see a chicken, so be ready to cull to end any suffering before it goes on for too long. It's sad when people aren't willing to end their suffering and let their sick chicken slowly die after all options have been exhausted...
Woo sorry for the book ... as with anything I don't own an animal without extensive research and diving in absorbing everything I can about them. I'm happy to talk chicken, maybe too much...but no surprise there
I would advise getting pretty chickens and enjoy them. Don't worry about egg producers unless you are wanting to sell for profit. Buff Orpingtons are nice and docile, so are my Ameraucanas (read, Ameraucana and NOT Americana or easter egger). Basically purebred breed bred to a standard
. My Ameraucanas have all been basically lap dogs with feathers. My rooster is an Ameraucana and he NEVER has looked at us funny. He will keep his distance but isn't mean. I also have a buff Orpington hen and blue laced red wyandottes that are big girls and also docile, not lap dogs but not afraid of us or mean either.I would recommend finding a breeder (you read that right) if you are going to purchase Ameraucana chicks, over going to the box store. If you are going to go with hatchery stock, skip the box store and order directly from the hatchery and have them shipped directly to you. McMurray and Meyer Hatchery are two big names that sell quality hatchery stock.
Build your coop larger than you think you need. Chicken math is real and it doesn't hurt to have more room than not enough. If you ever can't let them out due to vacation or bad weather, you won't feel bad leaving them in if they have plenty of space. Too little space causes pecking, fighting and injuries. But... 12x12 you have more than enough space for 8 chickens lol! You theoretically have 18 chickens and leave them inside with that much space (or more if you let out every day). Obviously fresh air and grass is better but being locked in occasionally will not hurt them. They say 4 sq ft of coop space per bird (if you are letting them out daily) and 8-9 sq ft/bird for run space, but the more the better. Also if you don't want to be early to rise or might come back late, they do sell automatic coop doors that open and close dawn/dusk.
Mine free range with no aerial cover so I wouldn't free range mine without a rooster among them. He is their first line of defense. He will be the first to alert them to run for cover and will be the one to sacrifice his life over losing one or all. Mean roosters do their job very very well but horrible for management. Think boots, pants and a good stick to be able to access anything, and never turning your back. Many don't tolerate mean roosters and dispatch them while others want them for heavy predator protection. Just know, every one has predators. It's just a matter of time of them finding your chickens so when you build, build with that in mind and fort Knox your coop and run.
I leave my auto feeder and waters inside so I know they always have access even when I can't let them out. Some people don't like that due to rodents but again... fort Knox. Never had a rodent in the coop.
Speaking of mean roosters, are you willing to dispatch any or cull a sick hen? Yes, try to save one with supportive care however there aren't many vets that will see a chicken, so be ready to cull to end any suffering before it goes on for too long. It's sad when people aren't willing to end their suffering and let their sick chicken slowly die after all options have been exhausted...
Woo sorry for the book ... as with anything I don't own an animal without extensive research and diving in absorbing everything I can about them. I'm happy to talk chicken, maybe too much...but no surprise there
Thank y'all for the info...I will need to nail down the size and location of the coop/run and also start looking at the different breeds.
I also joined the chicken forum....ugggg, that site is inundated with ads all over the place. Definitely not as clean and streamlined as Dchat. Thanks @JanS
I also joined the chicken forum....ugggg, that site is inundated with ads all over the place. Definitely not as clean and streamlined as Dchat. Thanks @JanS
Think about chicken security while you are doing your planning.
I thought at first that I had no chicken eating predator animals around here last time but slowly learned that yeah, we do. I just didn't 'know' what sort of stuff was out there lurking because I didn't have chickens out there yet for those potential predators to be looking at.
Yes, my friend had a rooster that she finally had to get rid of. He was pecking at the hens and they were losing feathers. He was really mean. What the heck is wrong with
! 
LOLAnd @Rits wow I didn't know you downsized from 30 to 4! I'm sure you found homes but it must have been hard to part with them.
Our first rooster was mounting them constantly and they lost all the feathers on their backs. We had one rooster and 16 hens and they had free range of 7 acres. Over half the hens were completely bald on their backs. I had to get them chicken jackets to protect them from his claws and prevent sunburn. It was AWFUL. The roosters are worse when they are younger, and we were hoping he'd calm down, but he was also the human aggressive one and he took one swipe too many at J, so into the pot he went. The rooster we have now is his son and he's the nicest rooster you could ever hope to have. He doesn't ever look at humans with an evil eye, and he's wonderful to the hens, although he had a couple of favorites that he raked the feathers off their backs. Now he's 6 years old and doesn't over-mate the hens, but still coos to them, shows them tidbits to eat and overall just what you'd want a rooster to be.
It's true. @Ddski5 - in urban areas the #1 predator of chickens is dogs, not wildlife. Fort Knox for sure. I think since you have dog proofed your yard for your own dogs this won't be a problem for you. If you joined Backyard Chickens, it's a huge huge forum with a handful of knowledgable people. There are so many threads that sometimes you can ask a question and get zero answers or comments. I still check it out occasionally but the first couple of years I had chickens I learned a lot from that group.
Little Bastards!
I don't know why but I laughed out loud at that!
Rits
Hot Topics Subscriber
Yes, they were rehomed and made many people happy! One woman took all my Australorps (my original/first set of chickens). They are her first chickens and at 4 years old they were still laying. They are very hardy and she just loves how much personality they have. She was telling me how they follow her everywhere, I had to chuckle because yep...they see humans, they know theres treats coming! The rest of the chickens I rehomed were younger and I split them off in smaller groups to various families. They sold last year, VERY fast. Can't beat buying a grown hen already laying! Skip the 6 months or so of feeding and raising a chick, waiting for it to lay.
I was going to sell them all and get out completely but there were a few that were very special to me and I couldn't part with them. So I have 5 now... 3 of them we purchased and picked up from the hatchery on the way to visit his mother in the hospital when we first learned she had stage 4 pancreatic cancer. She is no longer with us so those girls hold a special place in our heart (AC and DC, the Blue Laced Red Wyandottes, and Slayer the Buff Orpington
). One Ameraucana hen, Plum, that is a lap dog and then one Ameraucana rooster, Nacho, who is also a good fella. I did have 6 but sadly during that really cold snap back in Jan? Cornbread (one of my original/first chickens) didn't go back in the coop. My husband couldn't see that she didn't when he closed the coop up that evening before work because she was roosting under the coop... He found her as soon as he returned home from work the next morning. I bawled my ever-loving heart and eyes out... so now he always goes in the coop to do a headcount. He usually does, but that day he didn't for some reason. He felt awful.Our coop. It sits on running gear and we can move it around the property. We built it like this because at the time, we were staying at my parents place while we looked for property/home to buy. We wanted to build a really nice coop but also be able to bring it with us. Now that we're settled, we're thinking about taking it off the running gear and putting it in a permanent place near the garden and closer to the house. Then during the warmer season, having a much smaller mobile coop that would be easy to move around all by hand. The chickens would stay in the Chicken Mansion when we go on vacation and during the colder months. Oh and @Ddski5 when designing your coop, ventilation is KEY when it comes to chickens.
Before
Inside. We use coffee grounds instead of sand for the poop board under the roosts now. Smells AMAZING and lasts forever. Keeps moisture down. I also don't use those cut pipes to feed anymore and instead use a 30lb gravity feeder on each side. I used to ferment their feed but that required religious feeding every morning and night plus the work to set up a rotation of buckets for fermenting feed.
Plum, our sweet Ameraucana hen. She coos at you, comes running when she sees us, and loves to jump up from the ground to your shoulder and hitchhike!
Sorry, I edited in some pics later after walking away from this post
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Rits
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Sorry for double post. It's been a while since I posted pics of the girls.
Slayer the buff Orpington I kept. Australorps on either side.
Queso an Ameraucana rooster I rehomed. I was keeping him for breeding but when I majorly downsized I didn't have room for two roosters.
Nacho, keeper Ameraucana rooster. He already was the main man for our flock and he had better breed type so we kept him over Queso.
Cornbread (Plymouth Rock), DC (BLRW - Blue variety), Slayer (Buff Orp), AC (BLRW - Splash variety). Nacho the black one in the back (Ameraucana). Another Ameraucana on right that I rehomed.
The girls and their man this winter. Looks like this was right before more bedding was added. With the roost trays it's nice since most of their poop happens when roosting so it saves the bedding below for much longer.
and Plum being Plum! (look on Derek's shoulder) This was right when we moved in. New construction and an old corn field, so excuse the lack of grass lol.
Slayer the buff Orpington I kept. Australorps on either side.
Queso an Ameraucana rooster I rehomed. I was keeping him for breeding but when I majorly downsized I didn't have room for two roosters.
Nacho, keeper Ameraucana rooster. He already was the main man for our flock and he had better breed type so we kept him over Queso.
Cornbread (Plymouth Rock), DC (BLRW - Blue variety), Slayer (Buff Orp), AC (BLRW - Splash variety). Nacho the black one in the back (Ameraucana). Another Ameraucana on right that I rehomed.
The girls and their man this winter.
Looks like this was right before more bedding was added. With the roost trays it's nice since most of their poop happens when roosting so it saves the bedding below for much longer.and Plum being Plum! (look on Derek's shoulder) This was right when we moved in. New construction and an old corn field, so excuse the lack of grass lol.
Kswoodssue
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I gave my friend a rooster, as I had a spare. Her husband put him in a pot because he did not do his duty with the hens. A platonic rooster was not what they wanted
Poor guy…darned if you do and darned if you don’t.
Poor guy…darned if you do and darned if you don’t.
Never heard of that problem before!
Yea, I'll bet!!
Oh, man, I'm so sorry to hear that! I remember Cornbread. RIP
I've always admired your coup! So well done!!
Interesting! I assume fresh grounds not used?
Adorable!
Are you kidding!? I need more chick pics!
They are so beautiful!
Rits
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No as I believe those are toxic due to the potential leftover caffeine? These are dried and bagged and sold in our box farm store.
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