Beginner Chicken Keeper Seeking Knowledge! HELP!

[SandraK]

From the sound of it, chickens can be as naughty as some of little hook-beaked heathens can ...

 

[Ziggymon]

From the sound of it, chickens can be as naughty as some of little hook-beaked heathens can ...

Oh, yes, and they're a lot smarter than most people give them credit for.

 

[KimKimWilliamson]

Awesome Pics, your Duck House is awesome. It looks just like the dogs house here, which was originally a Chicken House when the house was bilt in 1926.

Im nervous of the heat lamps as well, as Ive read a few websites that say the Hens sit around the light and get warm, then think they can wander outside without thier feathers fluffed up, and catch hypthermia or freeze to death. Does anyone ever have that problem??
Everything I read said no lamp, just a bulb to lengthen light hours in winter, which will provide a small amount of heat, and then well insulated nonn drafty walls would be enough to keep them warm and comfy. Plus some straw bedding......

Im beginning to wonder if I should just BUY a coop, LOL My husbands gonna kill me when he hears how elaborate this thing has evolved into, LOL

 

[Ziggymon]

The duck house is the small house, the one with the interior pic. The periwinkle one is the chicken house.

The heat lamps in the chicken house are about five feet from the floor, in the part of the house that doesn't have roosts in it, so 4+ feet away from any part of any chicken. They're placed to heat the house, not the chickens. My guys don't like to go out when it's really cold, so the temp difference has never been an issue.

The duck house has a much smaller cubic foot interior, is really well insulated with its double walls, but a water bucket freezes solid in there with just a lightbulb. I suspect it gets considerably colder where you live than it does here.

I use compressed pine bedding. I think it's more absorbant than straw or hay. In the chickenhouse, I add fresh bedding on top of the old throughout the winter (adds to the insulation), and then muck out in the spring. I muck out the duck house periodically throughout the winter - ducks get everything soaking wet.

 

[GG.]

I had no idea about duck poop until we got our muscovies - it's really wet and a lot of it

 

[Ziggymon]

Yes, very different from chicken poop. Also they always go for one last swim before going to bed (even when most of the pond is frozen over desite the aerator), so they carry a lot of water in that way. And they need access to water through the night, and they splash that around vigorously.

 

[GG.]

I was surprised at first to see ours bathe at night, but they do as well as in the daytime

it doesn't get nearly as cold here though - occasionally we will see a couple of nights in the 20's but most often it is mid to high 30's and only a few nights at a time and only for a couple of months each year

 

[KimKimWilliamson]

Yes, it is quite cold here in winters. As cold as Minus 30 celcius sometimes. Our coop would be only about 5 Feet High max, I think. I will have to look more into a heat lamp....but we found a styrafoam sheeting for insulation so I feel a little better about keeping it warm in there.

We used to have a muscovie duck back when we lived on a farm in BC. We had geese too, and they were awful, but the Duck was so awesome. He and my Husky who was a puppy at the time were the best of friends. But he became a little trouble maker after we got too friendly with him....he'd try to get in the house, eat the garbage, and mount the geese, LOL I miss him though.....we called him Ducky Duck, LOL Id think about getting ducks again, but our pond is farther from the house than it was there, and I couldnt mess around with the water source through winter, it'd drive me nuts!

 

[KimKimWilliamson]

Question, my husband was telling a friend at work about our chicken plans, and the friend said that he grew up on a farm with 10 chickens. The friend complained that the odor the coops emit was unbearable, and caused them to get rid of the chickens. Is this true? I never even thought so few chickens in a clean coop could create an UNBEARABLE odor, but this man was adament, and now Hubby is freaking about it......do you notice it?

 

[merlinsmom13]

Chipper roosted in a chair in my sisters room. She came in at night & free ranged during the day. I don't remember a terrible smell but its was a long time ago. We just changed the papers under her chair every day. The other chickens roosted in the barn, we kept things pretty tidy, so I dont remember it being bad.

 

[KimKimWilliamson]

Those were my thoughts exactly, if the coop is kept clean they shouldnt have too much of an odor. Just like any animal, LOL I thought so.

 

[Ziggymon]

I think chickens are remarkably odor free. As I said, I don't muck out all winter, just add fresh bedding on top of the old. (There's actually a name for this (other than "lazy", LOL!!!) because it helps keep the coop insulated in the winter. If odor starts to develop with this method, you sprinkle food grade DE over the bedding, and that takes care of it.

 

[Holiday]

Yeah, a chicken coop is what you make of it. A lot of people overcrowd the birds and let things get filthy, and then, yeah, it reeks. But, it doesn't have to. Of course, chickens are like any other creature, and they sometimes have their off days. A big broody hen dropping, for instance, can smell pretty foul

I had chickens for years, sometimes quite a few, and they can be a fair amount of work, but they're also enjoyable in many ways. I miss having them sometimes.

 

[GG.]

like Holiday says, it is just a matter of keeping the area clean and not overcrowding


we police our yard daily and you wouldn't know we had animals unless we had invited you into the back to see them

 

[KatherinesBirds]

Ours were all free range out in Texas but the predators were a problem there too. We had Reds and a bunch of Old English which I loved. They are smaller than most chickens, lay small eggs but get to be so darned tame that you can pick them up and they love to cuddle. The hens are darling!! We had five acres so the chickens had lots to eat and it was all thick grass so the droppings kept it green and the geese kept it cut down pretty much. No odor with all that space and 24 chickens. Tons of eggs! I trained them to come into an open front barn at night so they were safe. Electric fence on all the time kept most of the critters away except for an occasional Fox or Bobcat. Chickens are fun!!

 

[Gen120]

We've had chickens for 11 years and my dad had them as a teenager too. We have 25 chickens and are going to get some more chicks this spring. We have a BIG pen we just built about 2 weeks ago to keep all the chickens contained and safe, before that their pen was too small for all of them comfortably. The pen we have now has the coop inside it and then fence surrounding the whole coop, it has a 8ft tall fence all the way around and a hatch door on the inside. I will take pictures of our coop and fence soon.

We have various breeds, including a leghorn hen, 1 black sex link hen, golden seabright/japanese bantam cross rooster (that we hatched), 3 americaua hens (they lay blue/green eggs), a RIR rooster, 2 buff orpington hens, 2 deleware hens, 2 silver laced Wyandottes, 4 Phoenix chickens (1 rooster, 3 hens), 1 RIR hen, and some other breeds that I can't remember now. We have a total of 5 roosters, 3 of them being bantams and really they honestly act like hens in the way they behave (not getting into fights etc, they all crow and strut, lol!). 1 other rooster is our Phoenix rooster and the main big rooster that's the haed of the flock is the RIR rooster.

All of our chickens are friendly for the most part and have different personalities. The friendliest ones we have by breed are, the Deleware and RIR rooster and phoenix hens/rooster. All of our chickens are friendly because we handle them a LOT when they're chicks and keep them inside until they're old enough to not be picked on by our larger chickens. We also have 2 guineas, and they keep things in order so to speak in the pen (along with the RIR rooster). We feed our chickens a scratch grain mix and laying pellets, plus we have an ice cream bucket (both with lids) under our kitchen sink for table scraps and such for the chickens (as well as a compost bucket) (there are some foods that are bad for chickens, mushrooms and such, there is a website about that but of course, I can't find it now.. will have to look for it later).

We give ours crushed oyster shells about 1x a week and we get probably about 6 to 8 eggs a day, sometimes 12. Our chickens eggs taste so good I literally can't eat eggs from the store anymore, the ones from our chickens almost have an orange yolk compared to a pale yellow yolk from the store. Also, free range/your own chicken's eggs keep a LOT longer than store bought eggs. We have eggs in our refrigerator from several months ago and they're still perfectly fine. They also last a lot longer if you don't wash the eggs when you put them in a carton (obviously you'll wash them when you use them). I think it has something to do with the eggs being porus or something.

Chickens are a LOT of fun and we love ours so much, they're all named and all come to you when you call them, love to be carried and petted.. We also have 3 ducks that live in the chicken pen with the chickens and we always put them all up at night at dusk or a little before. If we have somewhere to go where we'll be gone from 4 until after dark, we'll put our chickens up before we leave. Tractor supply store also sells these feeding blocks of grains and molasses, that we get for our chickens in the winter for extra nutrition and we buy them for them when we go on vacation too (as a special treat, hehe), they're usually about $12- 13 dollars here. (and last about a week or so with our chickens).

 

[birdlover82]

Also, free range/your own chicken's eggs keep a LOT longer than store bought eggs. We have eggs in our refrigerator from several months ago and they're still perfectly fine. They also last a lot longer if you don't wash the eggs when you put them in a carton (obviously you'll wash them when you use them). I think it has something to do with the eggs being porus or something.

The eggs have a natural bloom on them that prevent bacteria from entering them. I've also read that when you do wash them to wash them in room temp water because cold water will cause the pores to open which will then let the bacteria enter the egg. Another thing to do before cracking them is the float test. If it floats it's bad if it stays at the bottom it's good.

 

[KimKimWilliamson]

Wow thanks Victoria! Thats alot of really great information! I love this forum, there are people who know something about everything
All of you have been helpful! I am just so eager to get them here now, but coop building is on hold during the work week Hopefully we will get it dont this coming weekend, and then I can get the pullets here that week. I found a place close to my home called Ty's Exotics and its a huge ranch/farm where the family breeds and sells all kinds of Chickens, Livestock etc that are for Hobby farms.....like Alpacas, mini pigs, fainting goats, etc. Im taking a trip up there on Friday to see if he is a well run farm and treats the animals good. He has some beautiful Chickens, and some amazing Egyptian Ducks!

Here is his website

Ty's Exotics - Home


Does anyone know where we can buy premade coops? Just curious on pricing, but I cant seem to find anyplace that sells them.

 

[birdlover82]

Are you getting chicks or grown chickens? If you're getting chicks figure you have a few weeks of them being inside to get your coop all built. I was hoping to get all my chicks this week but that's not happening since I'm getting specific breeds this year. So looks like I'll be getting chicks 3 different times. Last year it was only 2 different times so wasn't too bad.

 

[KimKimWilliamson]

I was hoping to get pullets, because Im not sure I want the chicks in the house with my parrots.......and I was hoping to have eggs for easter, LOL
But Im having trouble, so I may only be able to get chicks since no one has pulletts in the breed I want.

My husband was just super motivated at first but he spoke to a friend (same one who said chickens stink) and that guy said its hard to build a non drafty, insulated coop properly and he should just buy one. I thought Id entertain him, and look, but I cant find them anywhere.

Wow, three different stints raising chicks? You will be a busy lady!!! LOL PICTURES!!!!! Please....LOL