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| Chickens 101 Want to raise a few chickens??? Enjoy the benefits of farm fresh eggs?? Here are a few tips and information that I have learned in raising chickens. We are a small time operation and not real fancy. I don’t like to spend a whole lot of money trying to do everything in just the right way. So some of my ideas are the frugal method of chicken raising! Now, lets get started raising those chickens! Buying Baby Chicks and Preparing For Them First you need to find a source for chickens. I have always been able to get them from feed stores. There are mail order companies as well. You can do an on-line search for this. Before I bring my chickens home I set up a cardboard box (pretty good size because these little chicks grow quick) and I line it with newspaper. I use a clamp on type desk lamp to warm the box and a lid over the top (but make sure you leave plenty of space open for air circulation). I purchase a chick feeder and a water container and a bag of chick starter. Now it is time to bring the chicks home. They can be real messy and need to have the water and newspaper changed daily at first and maybe more often as they grow. Keep the feeder full for them and make sure to keep them warm. The simplest way for me to tell if my chicks are warm enough or too cold or just right is to look in and see where they are. If the all huddle under the light then it is to cool (you may need 2 lamps or a warmer location). If they are at the edge of box and not coming near the lamp they are too hot, give more circulation of air by moving the lid to a different spot or off the box (careful though because eventually they will want to fly out of the box!). If they are pretty evenly spaced around, then they are just right. You will need to care for them and keep them inside until they have their proper chicken feathers and all the fuzzy stuff is gone and it is warm enough outside for them to survive. Some people will put a heat lamp in the chicken coop to help them make the transfer. Usually it is 8 to 12 weeks (I get tired of cleaning up after them and try and get them out sooner). Moving Them To the Chicken Coop The main thing chickens need is a coop to live in and lay their eggs. It can be simple or fancy, the chickens don’t really care :) It must be kept clean and the chickens need fresh water and food daily. They need a fenced area to contain them and it should be covered on the top because the chickens will want to fly out. We built our chicken yard by putting wood posts on the corners and by the gate and the metal fence posts in-between these. Then we put up chicken wire all around and ran small wire (like electric fence wire) back and forth across the top of the chicken yard, grid style, to keep them from flying out. In the coop they need places to lay eggs. They like dark areas and boxed areas. You can put wood boxes or even a piece of plywood against the wall will allow them to go behind and find a nice place to lay. We have boxes and this works well. Chickens also like to have roosts. These are bars to sit on. I use an old wood ladder set at an angle in my coop. Eggs Our chickens eat "egg layer" which I buy from our local feed store. Chickens will begin laying eggs around 4 months. They lay the heaviest in the spring and summer and their laying slows way down by fall and winter. It can help to have a light in the chicken coop for these darker months because it is the light that causes the chickens to want to lay. The light can be put on a timer to come on ealier than daybreak in the morning and stay on a little later at night. Web sites with plans for chicken coops and links to other information. You may need to copy and paste these sites to your browser. I reccomend that you do an internest search on Raising Chickens if you would like more detail on the "how-to's". http://www.geocities.com/chickenfarmerjoyce/index.html http://www.backyardchickens.com/coop.html (lots of chicken coop plans and photos!) Check out McMurry Hatchery, the are a very well know hatchery where you can mail order your baby chicks One last thing.... before you think that you can not have chickens because you live in the city, I would suggest that you check with your city ordinances. In the city we use to live in we could have up to 3 chickens (no roosters :). I wish I had known that then.... I would have had 3 little hens in my backyard!! |
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