A GUIDE TO RAISING CHICKENS

View from the side of the new coop

This is intended to be a very basic guide to raising your own small flock of chickens for eggs and meat. I will go into details on subjects like how to build the coop, roosting, types and breeds of chickens , types of commercial food, how to grow some of your own chicken food, how to attract bugs for the flock, dealing with summer and winter and keeping the flock happy, healthy and productive, and just plain enjoying them and having fun. I will also tell you how to kill a chicken for meat in the most humane way possible.

The photo above is of my new coop attached to my back porch. There are several key points to understand about coop designs. I have put an enormous amount of research into this, and there are many good websites just on coop designs. Gauging from the hens reaction to their new coop, they have no idea I am a terrible carpenter. The basic idea is to have air flow so the chickens don't get sick from being damp. Air should be able to come in the bottom nearest the roosting bars and be able to exit on a side farthest from the chickens.

This will keep them warm and dry. Winter or summer. Chickens, no matter the breed, are much more comfortable in the spring and fall. They do better in winter than in summer. With layers of feathers to keep them warm they get very overheated in summer and need a cool shaded place to get out of the sun.





On my new coop , not quite finished yet, I built an overhang to help them stay out of the sun
and to have a snow free place to walk in winter. I still have to do some shoveling to give them enough room to walk around when the snow falls.

I attached the coop to the back porch to make my life easier. I can feed them and give them fresh water without going down the hill where the old coop is in the snow and ice.

Front door showing ramp and bungee cord .

Raspberry bush surrounded by flax and clover pants used for feed supplement

A small portion of the garden where we grow food for us and the chickens.

2 of the 3 kids holding Rhode Island Red cross breeds.

I used a lot of scrap lumber I had around and got some from building sites that would normally need to pay to dispose of the scrap they had. They were glad to let me have what ever was left over. It was less expensive than to have them throw it away. Everyone wins here. Why pay for lumber if you can find a contractor building a structure that has wood  he doesn't need? Being frugal is the name of the game here. As I said, the chickens don't know the difference. I know folks who made coops out of old trailers and one had a small school bus that worked or even an outhouse. As long as it gives them some protection from the elements and from predators and allows them to roost as well as a place to lay eggs, you have it made. 


Sunflower plants can be used to attract bees for pollinating and the seeds are great to eat or use as chicken feed.



I put 2" thick rigid insulation in between the studs on the walls and ceiling and then used more scrap plywood or T-111 to cover the insulation. If exposed, the hens will peck away at it and get sick, so insulation needs to be covered.

I put branches inside as roosting bars. They should be thick enough so when the hen sits on it her feet are covered by her feathers. The roosting bars allow the hens to fulfill their natural desire to be safe , by being as high up and away from predators as possible. Also, obviously heat rises and the higher they roost the warmer they will be. The more chickens you have in the coop, the warmer it will be. 



Inside the new coop you can see the roosting bars, a ceramic heater on the left. The nesting boxes are to the right.

 

      I spaced the branches about a foot apart and a foot above the previous branch for 2 reasons.  1.) They can easily hop from branch to branch until they get as high as they can, within the pecking order. Usually the older birds get the top spots.

Also they don't poop on each other as they would do if I didn't stagger the branches. To give them easy access to the outside, I built a simple ramp under the front door. I have the door attached to a bungee cord with a string going onto the back porch. This allows me to unlatch the door and it swings open all by itself. At night, when they all come back inside to roost , I pull on the string until the door is shut then I latch it. All without leaving the back porch.  The nesting boxes, where they lay the eggs are external and have a lift up lid , again on the porch so it's easy to get to in bad weather.  Hens ( Female chickens) will gladly share nesting boxes. There is no need to build 1 box for each bird. We have about 16 chickens and they all share 2 nesting boxes with no problems. They do like their privacy though and don't like being disturbed while laying an egg.  the winter



  In winter and  summer you need to give them extra food and water and don't forget to bring the eggs in before they freeze in the winter. Fresh , unwashed eggs have a very thin , invisible coating on them that is like Gore Tex. It breathes and does not allow bacteria to enter the shell.When you wash the egg, you wash away this membrane. An unwashed egg will last very well for weeks if not longer, but once you wash it , it needs to be refrigerated and used within a week or two.

Australorps




Phillip and his huge cabbage, most of which was used for chicken feed.

 There are many different breeds of chickens. Each has their own characteristics. So you need to do some research into which type suits your needs and climate. Some breeds do better in colder weather than others, some better in hot weather. Some will produce more eggs , some will give you more meat. Some smaller chickens are called " Bantams" and are mostly for showing at your county fair. Roosters (males) are more colorful to attract predators to themselves rather than to the hens ( female) . A rooster can be very loud and aggressive. If you want to raise chicks , you will either need a rooster or buy day old chicks from a farm and have them shipped overnight via USPS or pick them up locally. You will also need other equipment like a brooder with a heat lamp. This you need to research from a poultry store or  on line . It's too big of a topic to get into in  a blog. Some hens can be a "duel purpose" chicken. It can be good for laying eggs and can be slaughtered for a good amount of meat as well. The Australorps and Rhode Island Reds fall into this category.  The White Leghorn, below are great     for laying eggs but skimpy in the meat department. They do not tolerate cold winters well and the combs ( the red fleshy part on the head) can get frostbite easily. If it does get frostbite, the tip of the comb will fall off and re grow in the spring with apparently little or no pain involved. But you should strive to keep the flock healthy and comfortable in all seasons.  You can apply Vaseline to the comb to help prevent freezing.  The Black Australorps ( two photos above)  are very beautiful but timid. They are a bit larger and meatier than the Leghorns and tolerate the cold better. They average about 5 eggs a week per hen in warmer weather. Their name comes from being a cross of Australian and European breeds. When the sun shines on them their feathers reflect a greenish tint. The leghorns give you white eggs ( about one a day each) and the Australorps give you brown eggs, ( again about one a day, depending on weather ) There is absolutely no difference between white or brown eggs, except for the color. Same taste and nutrition. Some people used to commercial white eggs find the brown eggs more "exotic".

White leghorn in old coop next to hanging waterer and feeder.





True love

Hanging waterers and feeders.....  First off to prevent a lot of waste, it is better to hang an inexpensive feeder, which you can get at  most farm or feed stores for about 10 to 15 dollars. Hang it about the level of the chickens backs so they don't poop into it or spill it. This is more important for waterers. Chickens , like humans, need lots of water so they can regulate their body temperatures, but they don't always remember to go back to the waterer, so if they run around all day outside the coop, you should have more than one  even if it's just a bowl. I have a few kinds of electric waterers for the winter. One holds about 2 gallons and hangs from a hook in the coop. An extension cord connects to the base keeping the water just above freezing.    The other is a bowl and the cord is protected with a coil of wire, like a long spring so the hens don't peck at it and either get electrocuted or start a fire. No matter which kind you use, you need to be very careful about the a/c cords. The chickens might peck at them or try to perch on them,either one can lead to a fire or dead chickens. The same thing applies to heaters. I have a ceramic flat panel heater in the coop and I try to keep the cord out of the way of the chickens. Having the coop attached to the porch , I don't have the problem of long extension cords to bring power to the coop, like the way I did with the old coop, which was 50 feet down hill from our house.   I use both all winter long . The  bowl is easier to fill and will work well unless you put it inside the coop on top of the bedding. There , the hens will scratch the bedding and get it into the water in about 3 minutes. So I use the hanging waterer inside the coop and the electric bowl outside. The chickens are attracted to the color red, which is why the bottoms of the feeders and waterers are red.  FEED ... Many people think that chickens are vegetarians, but nothing could be farther from the truth. I dice up some leftover ham or beef ( poultry seems to cannibalistic  to feed them)

The kids near the old coop.

They devour any meat (protein) they can get. Like worms from the compost pile or other bugs and insects from the area. I also give them whole corn (cracked can scratch their throats) as well as black oil sunflower seeds, which they love. You should  also add oyster shell  pieces to help give them the calcium they need to make the egg shells strong enough not to crack easily. I just mix the oyster shell crumbles in the food  and have never had a problem.  we also grow our  own sprouts   I grow them in open weave hemp or flax draw string pouches. I soak and rinse them 2 times a day and after 4-5 days the seeds start to grow. I use alfalfa, flax, buckwheat, clover and many other varieties of seeds. I make sure I grow enough so I can give the chickens some to help them get the nutrients they need during the winter.

Inside the old coop

 The humans in our family also need the same nutrients , and growing your own is always better than buying sprouts at the supermarket. Fresh sprouts have many times the nutrients of the mature plant. Commercially grown sprouts  always have anti-fungal chemicals sprayed on them, which is why they grow so large and nice looking. But we don't want to eat chemicals and would rather grow our own food. It also teaches the kids where their food comes from and lets them participate in the process.  RAISING CHICKENS FOR MEAT....  We bought about a dozen "broilers" last summer to be raised for meat only. They were all very young males ( cockerels)  and are bred to grow very fast and gain a lot of weight in a short amount of time.  2 months is all they should live for. I know this might be a sore subject for many of you, but most of us eat chicken on a regular basis and it is best to give them a healthy and happy life at your home rather than buy them at Shoprite    Commercial chicken processing plants are very cruel and unsanitary. The chickens  are hung from their feet on hooks and beheaded by either machine or by hand. They suffer quite a lot before they die and they get to watch the chicken in front of them get killed , which adds to the suffering. Raising them in your back yard is much more humane. They live a happy and healthy life. They get to fulfill their instincts for roosting and taking dust baths in the dirt ( to rid themselves of parasites)  They get to scratch the dirt for worms and seeds as well. In a commercial processing plant, even a "cage free" or "organic" plant , they are severely limited in the space they have. Also they have little or no  access  to sunshine or grass. In most cases they don't have the room to even learn how to walk or roost. They are put in plastic "battery cages" and all feeding and watering as well as egg collection is automated. They have no life or happiness at all.  So letting them live in your yard is both a kindness for them as well as for you. They will eat most of the insects in the yard. Just don't let them roam the garden at will or they will devour every plant they see.  To help supplement their feed, I hang a low wattage drop light in the coop, being careful not to get it too close to the bedding as to prevent a fire. Insects will be attracted to the light,  and the chickens will have a feeding frenzy on the insects.  After it's dark, the chickens cannot see so they will not move until it's light out. Some folks turn on a light at about 4 am or so to encourage more egg production. The hens need about 15 hours of light shining in their eyes to produce the most eggs that they can lay. I don't do this much though. I like to let their natural cycles kick in and have them take a rest and use the nutrients in the food to help them survive the winter.  Every year they also "molt". They shed feathers like a snake sheds it's skin. The feathers will re-grow, but it takes a lot of energy to do this. Egg production will fall off as they use their nutrients and energy to make more feathers rather than to lay eggs. They need to do this to survive the winter, so let them. I keep the lights off after dark and give them black oil sunflower seed as well as whole corn and even cooked meat or oatmeal in the winter. Cracked corn can scratch their throats, whole corn has a lot of carbohydrates and will help keep them stay warm without injuring them.  KILLING CHICKENS FOR MEAT. To humanely kill a chicken I use a metal "Kill cone". It is basically a funnel that I nailed to a tree. I have the kids tossing small pieces of bread to the other chickens so no one needs to watch while I do this. I gently hold the chicken then put her head first into the cone and let her relax for a couple of minutes, until her head sticks out from the bottom of the cone. Then I quickly take a small paring knife and cut her jugular vein in the neck . The chicken will bleed out in a couple of minutes. Quick and almost painless. I have read articles on how  some people kill chickens and it can be violent and messy, like chopping off the head with a hatchet.  They will run around squirting blood and scaring the chickens and kids. But you can research ways to do this if you want. The Navajo Indians have a saying , "if you have live stock, you are rich". Sounds about right to me. You can e-mail me with any questions at wscheps@hvc.rr.com