The Barn and Fields > Animals and Homesteading
Talk to Me About Chickens!
mooremama:
Let the fun begin :D I love my chickens.
We have had Rhode Island Reds, Buff Orpingtons, Barred Rocks, Dominiques, White Brahmas, and a mixed breed that comes when you have a rooster in the flock with different breeds of hens. ;) I have loved them all.
I would second the fact that they're social animals; they enjoy being in a flock with other hens and they also enjoy human company. I would recommend getting 4-6 hens. LIke Catherine said, once you taste and use fresh eggs, you will want more than a dozen a week. :D
I buy layer pellets at Tractor Supply (TSC). I find that we don't use as much food if I feed them pellets instead of crumbles. Since I don't confine my hens and they have free range of our 3 acres, I don't use grit or calcium. I feed them crumbled eggshells and I never have trouble with soft shells. Also I don't feed them chicken feed in the spring and summer. With free ranging they prefer the bugs, worms and grasses instead of feed. I will throw out scratch for them just to keep them use to coming to the coop.
Sam built a coop with an enclosed front portion and an open/fenced in back part. They will come to the coop to roost at night and to lay eggs. We have nest boxes in the front portion.
Aaron bought some Barred Rock pullets not too long ago for $5 apiece. They were about 3 months old. Most of our hens have been given to us or hatched out here by us or broody hens.
HTH,
Beth
Beth
greyhoundgirl:
Just adding that we absolutely love or have loved our Buff Orps, Rhode Island Reds, Salmon Faverolles, and Barred Rock as well. They just didn't lay quite as prolifically as the other breeds I mentioned.
luv2bmom:
We so enjoy our hens! Our first hens were Golden Comets, the sex-linked as spoken above. Very good layers!
Our next 3 hens we've had going on 2 years now, 1 buff orpington and 2 white brahma's, lovely brown egg layers and physically large! Living in Ohio the larger breeds are a bit more tolerant of the cold climate we have here.
We paid $2 each for our 3 day old buffs, when we got our pair of white brahmas they were 20 weeks old and cost us $30 for the pair. We were desperate as 1 of our buffs was taken by a predator. An awful mistake as I thought dh and closed the coop and he thought I did....:( Our buff was so agitated we had to find friends for her asap. Chickens are social as others have mentioned!
We started our girls on growing mash, then when we got the first eggs I switched to laying mash, our farmers equity grinds it all up with the oyster shell and grit in it so I don't supplement those.
I use the shaved bedding in the coop, our roost post was from our woods. we have 3 laying boxes but they only use 1. we use a red heat light inside during the winter but it's over the top of the waterer and gives the coop some heat.
We will always have chickens we enjoy them so much! Ours free range all day and go into their coop at night, unless i'm gone all day and we let them out in their confined area. Dh built a tractor which is lovely b/c it doesn't take long for 3 chickens do away with grass. Moving them every other day keeps your yard from getting tore up. Let us know when you get them!!
Cheryl:
I've been thinking more on this and I just wanted to add if you are primarily wanting good layers, then I would go with the Golden Comets or Red Stars. I'm not really sure of the differences. We have 2 Red Stars and they are the best layers. One is almost always on the nest at daybreak and both of them lay every day. I like all of our hens, but these two beat out the others for eggs. :)
Andrea G:
You will love having chickens. I would get a couple of red stars for sure and maybe two to four more of different breeds. Barred rocks, buff orps, australorps or ameraucanas are all good layers, though not quite as good as the red stars. But I like to have colourful chickens. :) You will get more than one or two eggs per day (except in the middle of winter probably) but you will find that your friends and family will happily take any extra eggs off your hands. If you like cute and fluffy, get a silkie. They are bantams but even though they are smaller they can all live peacefully together, especially if they were raised together. Chickens are so much fun to have around!
Navigation
[0] Message Index
[#] Next page
[*] Previous page
Go to full version