Anybody here keep chickens?

DEL 707

DEL 707

DEL 707

Soldato
Joined
20 Mar 2004
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Having moved out of london and finally having a garden not made out of concrete, I've been thinking about getting a couple of chickens, more as pets then egg production, maybe a bantam breed?

Just want to see if there's any1 here who keeps thing, so I can get some feedback. :)
 
my mum has some, they like to roam.. you'll usually get about 1 egg per chicken per day, sometimes less.. (ie 4 from 5)

how big is the area?

also, you'll need to get it fenced off, badgers and foxes (and wild dogs/cats) will own them, we do live on a farm though, so the amount of badgers is probably higher here than other places
 
my sister does. She's got 3, they're each laying an egg a day and cost about £1 each a wee to feed. so 21 eggs for £3. But it is laying season apparently, after that it drops down a bit.
 
We had some on our farm. They were annoying. Can't imagine why anyone would want to have them as 'pets'. World must be going mad. All they do is make a mess leaving feathers and crap everywhere.
 
as far as food goes, just buy a bin and fill it with corn from a farmer, they only need about a small cup full a day (i think)
 
I have 4 chickens.

They are in a well-dug-in run (we have foxes) it's a reasonable size, but we let them out once a day for a couple of hours to run about and so that the kids can pick them up, etc...

Get about an egg a day per chicken - it's lovely in the morning to go down, pick up a (warm) egg and have a pancake!
 
Ahh cool, a few people about with some chicken knowhow ;)

I don't live on a farm, I'm only semi-detached, so my main concern is noise as I don't want the neighbours complaining, obviously I'm not planning on buying a rooster.

Here's a picture of the garden to give you an idea, that's all the grass I have out the back, everything behind me is paving.

garden1.jpg


I "hope" to let them have free riegn of the back garden, the walls/fences are pretty high. I'm not worried about foxes/badgers getting in, but there are a lot of cats in the area, I have 3 myself.
How destructive are chickens? Do I have to worry about them tearing flowers to pieces?
Is the pond going to be a danger spot, do I have to worry about them suddenly taking a dip?

Housing wise I was thinking of converting the old shed down at the bottom of the garden, was left there by the previous owner.

garden2.jpg


It needs a bit of work done to it, but there's plenty of room inside, all I'm using it for at the moment is storing rubish.
 
they'd be fine with water, they'd float / walk out

if that's all the grass you have, i'd say 3-4 max...

there's about 14 wild cats on our farm, they don't care about the chickens though.. was just a warning as some might, put perches & ladders in the shed (my mum's shed is about 1/6 the size of that and has 6 hens in it

they lay their eggs in sawdust, make a trapdoor at the bottom that you open with a piece of string, and close them in at night
 
We got 4 hens about 2 months ago and they are now happily in residence in a coop/run which I built at the end of our garden which is much bigger and less than half the price of an eglu (although not as 'cool'). You will definately need to make sure that their housing is fox-proof otherwise don't expect to have them very long. Hens make very little noise, so they certainly shouldn't cause a problem for the neighbours.

Ours don't have free roam of the garden as they will tend to trash any plants which they like the taste of, however we do put them out on the grass in a large run (which they share with the rabbits - although not at the same time...) every day or two.

We get 3-4 eggs per day from them, although has dropped to 1 or 2 on occasion, particularly in hot weather. It's definately nice to have really fresh eggs, especially on on the days you get a massive double-yolker :D .

If I'm being honest the economics of it does not really stack up once you factor in the cost of everything (i.e. housing, feed, various powders to dust them with to avoid mites etc, cleaning stuff for the coop), but then most ´townies´like us who get hens don't do it based on cost. We got them partly for the eggs, partly as pets (they have a real character...) and partly to do our bit for a more 'back to earth' approach to our eating (in conjunction with a new veg patch).

Go for it :D
 
Geese, that's what you want. Not only do they give a superior egg, but they also double as the best guard 'dogs' around.
 
DEL 707 said:
Having moved out of london and finally having a garden not made out of concrete, I've been thinking about getting a couple of chickens, more as pets then egg production, maybe a bantam breed?

Just want to see if there's any1 here who keeps thing, so I can get some feedback. :)
Click to expand...
Marans or Aracanas are pretty good, we have six, they're easy to look after.
 
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