• Wednesday, April 8, 2009 - Raising chickens.
When we were just thinking about chickens, here is what we ultimately did.
We decided that raising chicks one summer was a great HS project, and we found someone who lives in the country and raises chickens for eggs, and that person agreed to take our chickens off our hands after we raised them from chicks. Having that safety net instead of jumping into a years-long commitment was a huge help.
We spent the winter reading up on chicks, and learning about chickens, etc.
(We got an egg and an incubator and that is a long, sad chapter in our chicken raising experience.)
Anyway, just before spring, we prepared ourselves by getting the light, feed, feeder and waterer, etc. Then, when spring arrived, we went to the feed store and picked out 4 chickens - one per child.
For a couple of weeks they lived in the house. First, we kept them in an old washtub. Why? Because that's how my granny did it, dadgum it. 
When they outgrew that, we kept them in a grid cage that houses our Guinea pigs. We kept them really warm and then began to harden them off when they fledged, as well as giving them some supervised outdoor play time. We did have to put an old window screen on the top at one point because they began to jump out. We put little twigs in for them to practice roosting on. Yes, this is in our family room, by the way.
When the weather was warm, we lifted the grid and set it on the grass, put the birds in it, covered it with a screen and an old rug on part of the top for shade. This was kind of like 'hardening them off.'
When the time was approaching for them to move outside, I got ready. I got an old doghouse off Craigslist, put a door and a latch on it, drilled a couple of ventilation holes at the top and painted it to match our house. Then I built a small run. It was 10 feet long, 4 feet tall and 4 feet wide. This was an easy project that anyone can do. Here it is with my daughter helping.
I built the panels using small pvc tubing and connectors that I got from the plumbing supply at the hardware. I used a hacksaw to cut them to length. Basically, there were three sides that connected. No top, bottom or end. I wrapped chicken wire around the three sides and attached it with zip ties.
Then I built a panel for the top, and one for the end. I wired them in a similar manner and then hinged them to the run with zip ties. The end panel was a chicken entrance; the top was for my convenience.
This was our temporary chicken tractor. I attached a sheet to one end for shade, and put a light tree branch inside. I kept the feed and water in there. We moved it around the yard, moving it 2x per week. My kids spend lots of time with the birds, reading to them, drawing them, etc.
Here are some photos of that...
(by the way, this run was in no way predator proof)
At night, I put the birds in the doghouse and shut the door, and let them out again in the morning.
We named the birds, became very involved with them because we were outside in the back yard all the time. Even our baby was involved in caring for the chickens!
Once we were caught unawares and a summer storm drenched the birds early one evening. We wanted to make sure they were dry before we locked them in the doghouse for the night...
When the weather turned cold, Joseph came to pick them up as agreed upon, and we were chickenless all winter.
Guess what happened? We missed chickens!
We ordered more chicks. We planned to build a chicken tractor right away, but then we moved, so we kept them in the same set up as before, and then as the weather turned cold, DH built a lovely coop. We made some modifications to materials for our climate and budget.
We have had some issues, such as one of the hens being a rooster and having to be rehomed, and regular predator visitors (fox, hawk...).
Here is a photo of a juvenile Cooper's hawk that discovered our run last summer.
He landed on the top of it and jumped up and down on it, trying to get our hens. He was not in the least intimidated by me. You can see where he caved in the top of the run; the chicken wire is all bent. If I hadn't been home, we would have lost Ethyl and maybe the others.
We love having chickens; it's so much fun and very rewarding. |
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