Planning your Chicken Flock for Year-Round Eggs

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Chickens are animals, not egg laying machines. They don't lay year round and they don't lay forever, but there are ways to plan out the life cycle of your backyard chicken flock to give you better chances of getting eggs year round.

The egg laying cycle of a chicken goes something like this:
0-6 months: no eggs
6 months- 2 or 3 years- 3-6 eggs per week
Exceptions:
Molting- 4-6 weeks during the fall (usually October-November)
Winter- once the days get shorter, usually they don't lay again after molting until February. The only exception is with chickens that have just started laying- they will usually lay through the winter months during that first year.
Broody- depends on the chicken. Some will never be broody, some are broody constantly. Basically they sit in an empty nest box thinking they are hatching eggs...

There are unnatural ways to encourage laying in chickens during the winter months, like keeping a light on in the coop, but I prefer to give the ladies a break when they need one during the winter. After all, chickens have these cycles of rest for a reason. However, with careful flock management and planning, you can raise your chances of getting eggs year-round.

Older chickens will lay fewer and fewer eggs as time passes, and feeding chickens without getting fed as a result is not a good use of resources. And since new chicks will usually lay through their first winter, that is the key! We are putting a three-year plan into effect with our backyard flock, and it looks something like this...

For the sake of conversation, let's say that you have a flock of 10 backyard laying hens.

Year 1:
Buy five chicks in April of the same breed (actually probably get 6-7 because they hardly ever all make it to adulthood). These chicks will begin laying in October, lay through the winter, really ramp up egg production in the spring and then take their first rest in the fall of the second year.

Year 2:
Buy five chicks in April of a second breed, preferably that lay a different color egg than the first. These chicks will begin laying in October of the second year, just as the first group begins to take their rest for the winter.

Year 3:
Buy five chicks in April of either a third breed or the same as the first breed, once again that preferably lay yet a different color egg. These chicks will begin to lay in October as the first group finishes their second year of laying and the second group takes their first rest. As this group of chicks begins to lay in October, it will mark two years of laying for the first group, which means their egg production will have significantly slowed down. The first group of chickens will be retired (to the pot or freezer if you want to make the most of your investment).

Year 4 and forward:
Continue the cycle of buying new chicks each spring and retiring the oldest group of layers each fall to keep up optimum egg production in older hens, year-round egg production from the youngest hens, and a little meat every fall for chicken noodle soup or gumbo!

Many people start a flock of backyard chickens without considering that the group will go through its best production, as well as breaks, and finally slow down and stop laying all at the same time. Staggering the ages of your chickens will help even out the overall production of the flock over time. Also, using groups of chickens with different colored eggs will help you keep track of the production of each individual age group of chickens within your flock. I hope this helps you plan your long-term chicken flock!

Top Ten Gardening and Homesteading Hacks

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Here are my top ten all time favorite gardening and homesteading hacks! These simple tricks are too good not to share :) For more detailed info on any of these ideas, click on the links provided.

1. Add a goldfish to your rain barrel to keep mosquitoes from breeding. For ten cents it will eat all of the mosquito larvae and you never have to feed your goldfish!


2. When buying wood for homesteading projects, check the damaged and returned wood at Lowe's and Home Depot to get up to 90% off the sticker price.

3. Lay down decorative metal garden edging or cucumber trellises to keep cats and other animals from digging up seeds in freshly planted soil.


4. Put cardboard down in the bottom of raised beds to kill weeds and grass and then add the dirt on top. The cardboard will decompose allowing plants to root deep in the ground, but only after it has suffocated all of the weeds and grass beneath it.


5. Put a layer of heavy duty chicken wire a few inches off the ground as the base of a chicken run floor to allow chickens to "free range" without pecking the ground bare.


6. Take a 2 liter bottle with a small hole in the top and flip it upside down into the dirt to water plant roots directly and avoid losing water through evaporation in the heat of the summer.

7. Use a spray bottle filled with water to train chickens to BE QUIET!


8. Use a spray bottle with a mixture of skim milk and water to naturally get rid of powdery mildew on plant leaves.

9. For carrots and other small seeds that need to stay consistently moist for germination, plant the seeds, water them in, and then lay a wooden board over the area to keep the moisture from evaporating. Check under the board each day and remove once the seedlings sprout.

10. Use oatmeal, cayenne pepper, and garlic as a natural chicken dewormer.


I hope you enjoy these tips and tricks! Feel free to add your own in the comments!

How to "Free Range" Chickens in an Enclosed Run

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We all know the benefits of free ranging chickens- higher egg nutrition, better chicken health, and lower feed costs just to name a few. However, there are also many reasons that people choose NOT to free range their chickens- protection from predators, city by-laws, or just trying to contain the mess or keep them out of the gardens. Is there a way to have the best of both worlds? Can you "free range" chickens in an enclosed run?

While this solution technically would not be considered free ranging, it does allow chickens to have access to dirt (where they can dig and dust bathe) as well as a limited, but constant supply of fresh greens to peck at. As you can see, this was a store bought coop and run (seen all the way on the back side. And built on to it is a large run. Normally just a few chickens would peck all of the grass from this run completely bare within days, not allowing any greens to grow back. 

In order to keep the greens growing, simply set up base of 2x4's around the bottom edge and lengthwise every few feet inside and put a layer of small square chicken wire across the entire bottom. I suggest a 1/4” or 1/2” hardware cloth. This allows the grass to grow up through the holes to be eaten by the chickens without pecking it bare. 

The poop falls through the grate to fertilize the grass, and rain also falls through to naturally water it. Make sure to leave the floor of part of the coop ungrated so that the chickens can also have an area to dig in the dirt and dust bathe.

Voila! Happy, healthy chickens in an enclosed coop with plenty of access to natural greens!

 
 

How to Train Chickens to BE QUIET!

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Most backyard chickens will spend their days quietly pecking away at grass and bugs, sleeping under a shady bush, and quietly incorporating themselves seamlessly into the regular routine in even a highly suburban area. But every now and then you get a chicken that will NOT be quiet. Some can even be considered SCREAMERS! The white chicken in the picture above, Snow, was definitely a screamer.

If you have one of these, you know what I'm talking about. What is that ungodly creature yelling at the top of its lungs outside my window so early in the morning???? Forget fresh eggs for breakfast- I'll just eat the chicken!

And I know that if she is driving me crazy, then the neighbors must be thinking of ways to murder me in my sleep! You must decide- deal with the noise or get rid of the chicken. Thankfully, before I decided to send away the culprit, I found a simple solution that worked beautifully...train the chicken to be quiet. 

If you have ever trained a dog, it is very similar, and all you need for quiet, well-behaved backyard chickens is water! Fill a spray bottle with water and every time the chicken starts to scream, tell it to stop and spray it with the water. It will quickly learn which behavior is causing the undesired spraying, and stop! 

I know, there are some chickens who are bent on disobedience. They are strong willed, and a spray bottle won't even ruffle their feathers. Don't be discouraged- you are stronger than the chicken. All you need with a strong willed chicken is a couple of hours and a garden hose! Every time the yelling starts, spray the hose at the chicken (resist the urge to put it on the jet setting, this is for instructional purposes only). This has worked with even my most rambunctious chickens. When I am out watering the garden anyway, it is a great time for training. An hour at the most is all you will need. Now chickens do have a short term memory, so you may have to have a refresher course every now and then, but you don't have to live with a SCREAMER!

Do you have any screamers? If so, how do you deal with them?

 

Common Ways Backyard Chickens Die and How to Avoid Them

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When I first got backyard chickens I was told by many sources to get more chicks than we planned on having because not all of the chicks would live to be laying hens. While I took them seriously, I had no idea just how many chicken deaths I would have to deal with in the first year. In all honesty, chickens are really dumb. I mean really, really dumb. Our chickens free range, which means that they have a lot of room to be creative and unique in their stupidity. Even if you do everything right, they will still find a way to die, but here are some of the most common ways that backyard chickens meet their maker and how to avoid them if possible.

1. Dogs

We have lost countless chickens to dogs. Literally, countless. I don't care how nice your neighbor's dog is, even if they coexist happily with the chickens while separated by a fence, the moment that barrier is gone, they will snap the neck of every chicken in your flock and fling feathers across the whole yard. We have had our chickens fly yards with dogs, and we have had dogs dig into our yard, but the outcome is always the same. Feathers everywhere and dead chickens. Sometimes there is no good solution. For us, we couldn't rest easy until one neighbor moved away! If you want to have backyard chickens, it's just a risk you have to take.

2. Chicken Hawks

Chicken hawks are mean. They are large birds that will circle over your yard, studying your beautiful hens, and then nose dive down and snatch them right from in front of you! I have read a lot of diy ways to keep away chicken hawks (from plastic owls to shiny metallic things hanging all over) and tried most of them. The only way to really stop them is to make sure your chickens have a place to hide where they can relax- a coop, some bushes, tree cover, etc. The smart chickens will learn to take cover when the hawks are around, but like I said, smart chickens are few and far between. Once chickens get full-grown, especially if you have the heavier dual purpose breeds, they will be too big for the chicken hawks. If you have chicks or bantams, I would suggest keeping them in a coop or run that has an enclosed top until they are big enough to hold their own.

3. Eggs

Chickens can become egg bound, which means that an egg that they should be laying instead gets stuck inside of them. It cannot stay there long without the chicken dying. If you notice a chicken trying to lay but unable to, give it a warm bath as soon as possible. I know it sounds funny, but it will almost always relax the muscles enough for the egg to dislodge. If that doesn't work, you may have to go in there after it, but that gets tricky because you don't want the egg to break inside of the hen in the process.

4. Raccoons

Raccoons will be attracted by the chicken food, but will then go after the chickens. Even chickens inside of a coop will not be safe from these destructive beasts. Raccoons will reach their tiny hands through the holes in the cage and literally tear your flock limb from limb. Chickens are VERY heavy sleepers, and probably won't even wake up through this process, believe it or not! To keep the raccoons from getting to the chickens, make sure they sleep in an enclosed area that has solid walls. If your chickens like to sleep on a roosting stick next to the chicken wire, put a board over that part of the wall so that the raccoons can't reach in. Also, consider setting a trap to catch the raccoons so that you can relocate them away from your property. The price of the chickens you may lose to raccoons more than covers the cost of the trap!

 

5. Worms

Chickens can get worms, and particularly gape worms, which could kill a chicken if left unchecked. Learn the signs and treatments HERE to avoid losing a chicken due to this very treatable problem.

6. Water

You probably think I'm talking about dehydration, which would kill a chicken, but that isn't actually what I meant. When you have small chicks, they will often fall into their water bowl and drown, even if it is only an inch deep. Make sure to fill the water bowl with rocks so that they can sip the water from between them without falling in.

7. Gender

Even if you specifically order all hens, every now and then you may end up with a rooster or two...or eight, like we did. Roosters don't generally mix well with suburban neighbors, so this means they will not make it to adulthood. Instead of waiting until our neighbor to murder it for sanity's sake at 3 in the morning, we decided to take the initiative and turn the roosters into gumbo. If you end up with some males, it will change the number of chickens in your flock.

8. Crossing the Road

No I'm just kidding, although if my chickens got out of the back yard, they probably would cross the road and get hit by a car. However, there are many, many other random things that can kill a chicken. For example, if a chicken looks up when it rains, it will drown. Also, they tend to try to eat things that are too big for them to swallow and choke to death. Or if one chicken is injured, the other chickens will try to peck at the wound until the chicken dies. Why, chickens? Why?

To sum it up, plan on starting with more chicks that you would like to have chickens, and don't get discouraged if you have to start all over at some point. Eventually, the smarter chickens will survive and the majority of dumb ones will find creative ways to move on. If you never lose a chicken in your flock, you should get an award! A really shiny one!

Backyard Chickens, Part 1: The Basics

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Backyard chickens are gaining popularity, and for lots of good reasons- fresh eggs daily! Are you interested in backyard chickens but not sure where to start? Perfect! Let's chat about chickens :)

Getting Started- What you Need

Before you get chickens, you need to have the stuff. Part 1 of chickens basics will cover all of the necessary gear to have a happy, healthy chicken flock.

Feeders

You will want to get a chicken feeder. The most common is a stand up feeder. These work well, but sometimes the chickens knock them over, in which case you may want to look into a hanging feeder. There are even fancy PVC pipe feeders if want to go all DIY on the project.

Waterers

Once again, there is the basic waterer that sits on the ground, but water can get easily contaminated when chickens kick dirt or hay in there. Also, get a large waterer because chickens drink more than you think. What we ended up using was a 5 gallon dog waterer, and our chickens love it!

Feed

When chicks are little, which is 6 weeks old or less, they eat starter feed, which is small granules. Once they are over six weeks old, chicks can eat regular pellet feed. And then around 5 months old, you want to start giving them laying feed, which has added protein for healthy egg production.

Kaytee Laying Hen Diet, 25 Pound
Central Avian and Small Animal (Kaytee)
Buy on Amazon

Chicken Coop

The coop can look like anything, I mean anything! You can buy one prefabricated that you assemble, build one yourself, or even contract it out. Your coop will depend on what you plan on doing with your chickens. If you are keeping your chickens enclosed, you will need about 4 square feet of coop space per chicken, plus 10 square feet of run space. The coop is the covered part of the chicken home, while the run is the area exposed to fresh air and sunlight but still fenced in. The one below is fully enclosed and would hold two full-sized chickens.

If you plan on free ranging the chickens, then the coop can be much smaller. Free ranging means that the chickens are free to roam your yard. If the back yard is fenced in, then you can have a coop that they enter and exit freely and roam the yard as they please. This is the set up that we have, and we love it. For a free range coop, you only need to make sure that you have one foot of roosting space per chicken. A roosting stick is a wooden stick (like a broom handle) for the chickens to sit on while they sleep.

Another option is a chicken tractor. With a chicken tractor, you keep a few chickens in a movable coop/run that you move from place to place in your yard each day so that the chickens can eat grass and bugs without having free range of the yard. Lots of options to think about!

Roosting Stick

We already discussed this, but you need one foot of roosting space per chicken in the coop. Any stick can be used, but wood is best for the chickens to be able to hold onto. Make sure you have a roosting stick low enough for the young chickens to reach as well as a few higher ones for when they get older. Different chickens will prefer different heights. They like to perch and sleep on these.

Other

Other needs depend on how young you get your chickens. You can begin with laying hens, in which case you would need nesting boxes. If you start with eggs, you would need an incubator. If you begin with day old chicks, you will need a box with a heat lamp until they grow their feathers.

Chickens

I almost forgot! You will also need chickens! There are lots of different kinds of chickens, but that is a post for another day. There are different breeds for different things- good layers, dual purpose that can also be used for meat, cold hardy, heat hardy, different colors (chickens and eggs), loud, friendly, flighty, etc. Do some research to find the breed that is right for you.

That's the basics of what you need for chickens- it's pretty basic! But really, the best way to get started and learn is to just get some chickens and go for it!

 

How to Build and Maintain Rich Garden Soil Naturally

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As a gardener, I get really excited about dirt. I love playing in the dirt, and I really love seeing rich dirt, full of little composted pieces of nutrient filled particles. There is just nothing as wonderful as tilling up loose rich soil to plant in the spring. I have always heard stories of people who started growing vegetables on land with terrible soil and were able to slowly build it up over time to become very rich, well composted soil. I always wondered, how is that possible? Wouldn't growing vegetables further deplete the soil of nutrients? Is it really possible to build bad soil back up to awesome, rich soil without just pumping it full of synthetic fertilizers? 

After doing a lot of experimenting with self-sustaining backyard homesteading, I have discovered how simple it is to build up the soil and keep a highly productive garden while not stripping the soil of necessary nutrients in a natural way. Here's how it works!

Think of your yard like a bank account. Everything that you do either counts as a deposit or a withdrawal in terms of nutrients. In nature, all of the deposits and withdrawals balance at the end. A tree grows leaves in spring using the nutrients in the soil, then drops its leaves in the fall which decompose back into the soil, replacing the nutrients that then go back into growing new leaves. God created a beautiful system! In your yard and garden, there is a lot of human intervention which can sway the balance to your advantage or disadvantage, depending on how you interact with the nutrients you have.

Let's look at some withdrawals that we make on our yards and think of ways to limit those withdrawals or not make them at all.

Nutrient Withdrawals
1. Mowing the grass
Grass grows using the nutrients in the soil. If you have a lawnmower that spits the grass back out, then those nutrients go back into the soil and you're fine. If you have a mower that bags the grass and then you leave it at the street to be picked up, you are gathering up your nutrients and throwing them away! Bagging the grass is still fine (we bag our grass) but don't let it go to waste! Use it as mulch around garden plants or put it in your compost pile to be used in the garden later.

2.  Bagging leaves
This is the same idea as the last one. When you rake up leaves, don't bag them and leave them at the street- use them as mulch around plants or compost them. If you don't care what your yard looks like, you could always leave them on the ground and let them decompose right where they are. Consider mowing the leaves to mulch them into little pieces so that they decompose even faster.

3. Growing vegetables
When you grow vegetables in the garden and then eat them, you are making a withdrawal. Since this particular withdrawal is the reason we even care about nutrients in the first place, it is the most necessary one we make. By all means, eat all the vegetables! There are other nutrient-consuming parts of growing vegetables that we don't eat, though. What about all of the plants that you pull up at the end of each season?


4. Prunings, Branches, and Sticks
At the end of each season when cutting back bushes, trees, and perennials, chop up all of that stuff and put it in your compost rather than putting it out at the street. If you trim trees or end up with a lot of sticks and branches, the easiest way to keep some of the nutrients is to have a bonfire and add the ashes to your compost. If you want to keep even more of the organic matter in your yard, buy a mulcher and run all of your branches through it (leaves and all!) to add to your compost pile. The mulcher we bought on craigslist gets a surprising amount of use at our house.

Basically anything that grows in your yard and then goes somewhere else is a withdrawal, including the fruits and vegetables that you eat. Now let's look at ways to make deposits back into the yard.

Nutrient Deposits
1. Composting
Instead of throwing away organic matter, keep a small compost pail by the trash can to collect your kitchen waste- fruit peelings, vegetable ends, and egg shells- and put them into your compost pile. There are nutrients all around you that other people are throwing away that can be yours, too! When your neighbor puts out their grass clippings or leaves, drag it to your compost pile and dump it in there! My neighbor, after seeing us do this several times, now puts his bags over the fence into our back yard instead of at the street. After we have dumped them in the compost, we put the empty bags back over the fence until next time. If my neighbor wants to make a withdrawal from his yard and put a deposit into mine, I won't stop him :) You can also get compostable material from stores. Most coffee shops collect and save their coffee grinds for individuals to pick up for free. Some grocery stores throw away old produce, but will keep some aside if you ask them. All of this is great to toss into your compost pile. Check around your area- you will be surprised how much organic matter is thrown away that can be yours!

2.  Mulch
Many places have free mulch available through the city. The city picks up all of the branches, leaves, and grass clippings, mulches them into huge compost mountains, and then offer free truckloads of mulch to anyone living within the city limits. We have gotten LOTS of free mulch over the last few years to build up our soil. So if you got excited about taking your neighbor's leaves, you should be thrilled to know that you can now have a helping of the whole city's leftovers!

3. Store bought dirt
I rarely buy bags of dirt. If you compost a lot then it may not ever be necessary, but every now and then the garden expands faster than the compost pile can support and we have to buy a few bags of dirt. Store bought dirt doesn't have a high content of organic matter in it, but adding it is still better than nothing.


4. Manure
Animal poop is great for the garden! Why? Think about it- they eat up all the organic matter and then spit it back out into a compact form of nutrients that are already broken down! If you have a friend with a horse, cow, goats, etc. see if they will give you their manure. Most people with large animals have more than they know what to do with, and will give it to you free if you offer to get it yourself. Just remember to compost new manure for around six months before using it in the garden. This natural fertilizer is so hot it will burn your plants!

5. Fertilizer
I try to avoid this at all costs! As long as you know and understand the deposit/withdrawal cycle and make good use of what's around you, you may avoid this altogether. If the soil is so depleted that you must bring in fertilizers to give it a jump start on the road to recovery while your compost matures, look into organic fertilizers. I like my dirt as natural as possible.

Creating a Self-Sufficient and 
Highly Productive Nutrient System

Now that you know which things are withdrawals and deposits, let's look at creating a cycle that can repurpose as many nutrients as possible to get the most out of them and wasting as little as possible. There are ways to introduce other components into your yard that will create systems of nutrient self-sufficiency!

1. Chickens
A great way to give nutrients back to your lawn naturally is to free range chickens. Chickens will eat the weeds and some of the grass, as well as bugs and insects, and in turn deposit those nutrients (in the form of poop) all over your yard. While free range chickens eat a lot less feed, it is still important to buy some high protein laying feed for eggs or regular feed for meat chickens. The feed you buy and add into the system counts as the deposit that will balance out the withdrawal of you eating the eggs or meat. You will also buy some hay to put in the bottom of the coop, and when you clean that out it all goes in the compost for another deposit. Chickens play a role in transferring matter efficiently while also producing more food for you!

Withdrawals- eating grass, eating bugs, laying eggs for you to eat, becoming meat for you to eat
Deposits-  feed that you buy for them, poop in the yard, hay bought to put in the coop


2. Rabbits
Rabbits are amazing little composting machines! And an added bonus is that rabbits are one of the few animals whose manure you can put into the garden immediately- no composting or waiting necessary. While you can put your green plants in the compost to break down, a much faster way is to feed it to a rabbit. When I pull up old plants in the garden (broccoli, tomatoes, beans, you name it!) I feed it to my rabbits. Then I scoop out that manure from under the cage the next day and till it back into the garden where I pulled up the plants. That's a one day turnaround of green plant to nutrients in the soil for the next season of planting! On top of that you will buy rabbit feed as another deposit into the system. We grow our rabbits for meat (an added level of productivity), but if you don't want to go that far rabbits make great pets and will do the same job.

Withdrawals- Meat that you eat, eating garden greens
Deposits- Best poop for gardens, rabbit feed


3. Aquaponics
I won't go into all the details of aquaponics here, but aquaponics is a system of using container raised fish (more specifically their poop) to fertilize plants growing in water rather than dirt. The plants clean the water which cycles back to the fish in a completely self-sustaining system that grows fish and vegetables with the only input of fish food! If you have never heard of it, do a little research- it's awesome!

Withdrawal- Fish to eat, vegetables
Deposits- fish food

4. Bees
Bees are sneaky little nutrient ninjas! They fly around and take all of your neighbor's pollen (I don't think they will miss it- besides, they do them a favor by pollinating everything) and then bring all of the bounty back to your house where they turn it into honey and beeswax. This system creates a lot of output for a little input while increasing the productivity of all of your plants by pollinating them.

Withdrawal- honey, beeswax
Deposit- your neighbor's pollen

5. Goats
Backyard dairy goats can also play a role in nutrient making. They will be a fats composter for leaves and tree branches in the same way that rabbits are for all things green. The food you buy is a deposit for the manure they create as well as the milk and/or meat that you will get out of the system.

Withdrawals- Making milk, meat, eating leaves
Deposits- Feed, poop

Each time you add a new animal or system to your yard, the cycle becomes more complex, but also more complete. You will be amazed how adding just one animal to your yard will transform the way to use and recycle the organic matter to create even more output for the input while keeping your nutrient balance stable.

Do you have any other ideas to add to the list of deposits and withdrawals? What creative ways do you use to build up your soil?


Reasons to NOT refrigerate fresh eggs

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Did that title just say to NOT refrigerate eggs? Isn't that unsanitary??? I'm also going to tell you not to wash them. Don't leave just yet- I'm not crazy, and have very good reasons for this advice!

Guess what? When I got back yard chickens, I learned something that I had literally never heard of before- NOT refrigerating eggs! For anyone living in the United States, this idea is shocking, but for the rest of the world, it is old news.

First, let me tell you why Americans DO refrigerate eggs. Eggs can carry salmonella, and storing eggs at room temperature is the best environment for it to multiply. But storing them at room temperature is not the source of the salmonella, just the growing environment. Where does it come from?
Salmonella is significantly more likely (as in, off the charts) to appear in eggs from: 
1. Large flocks of hens (thousands of them)
2. Unsanitary conditions (such as cages stacked on top of each other)
3. Close quarters (usually about 1 square foot of space per chicken)


As it turns out, most of the eggs produced in the United States meet all three of those conditions. Because the eggs are produced in such an unsanitary environment, the eggs go through a thorough washing and bleaching process before showing up at the grocery store. This seems like a good idea considering where the eggs came from...

The only problem is that chickens lay eggs with a natural protective coating that keeps bacteria out. When eggs are washed, this protective coating is removed, making the eggs more susceptible to entering pathogens. The solution? Store the eggs in a refrigerator where the bacteria is less likely to exist. 
It seems like every solution along this track only causes another problem. If we take things back to a simpler time, the problems solve themselves, which allows me to keep my eggs out on the counter with no worries.


The Alternative
If you are raising backyard chickens and are producing your own eggs, then you probably don't have thousands of chickens. My flock is currently ten chickens, and that is way more that enough for us. As a result of a small flock, they most likely have plenty of space to peck around without sitting in each others' poop and growing diseases all day. When they do lay eggs, you are able to pick them while they are nice and clean, still having the chickens protective coating on them. If they don't need to be washed, then they can be safely stored out on the counter for a MINIMUM of 21 days.


Why 21 days? When chickens lay eggs, they lay a large clutch and then sit on them to warm them in order to hatch them. From the first egg of the clutch being laid to the last before being sat on is usually around 21 days, which means eggs were designed to last at least that long in original condition. Eggs can last longer than that, but 21 days is the minimum. 


So why are eggs on the counter better than eggs in fridge? For me, fridge space is always a precious commodity, so having a little extra is great (especially if you are getting a couple hundred eggs each month), but there is more to it than that.

You may have seen baking recipes that call for room temperature eggs. Eggs at room temperature (and especially ones that have never been refrigerated) bond with the ingredients differently and form air pockets that expand during baking which make lighter and fluffier baked goods, especially breads. This also makes a big difference when whipping egg yolks to make a meringue- definitely fluffier with room temp eggs.


If for some reason you get a few eggs that are really gross (sometimes chickens are just not careful about where they poop) then I would definitely recommend washing them and putting them in the fridge. But other than that, fight the urge to do what you've been told to do all your life, and let those natural eggs stay natural!

So what do you think? Are you willing to take the challenge with your backyard eggs?

My First Year of Homesteading

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So this week marks the end of what I would consider my first year of homesteading. While I had a small vegetable garden and got my first few chickens last year, the chickens didn't really start laying until this year, and we have expanded a lot in the last 12 months, so I would consider 2014 our first year of true urban homesteading.

I know what you may be thinking- I wish I could have a "homestead"! I wish I could have some land and grow some food and get some animals and be self-sufficient! Let me clarify our situation to encourage you. We do not have land (well, unless you count the 0.2 acre lot our house is on), and we do not live in the country (the exact opposite- we are smack dab in the middle of a city), and we are not self-sufficient (although more so than we were last year!). You can be a homesteader no matter what your living situation is. Don't wait until you buy a farm, start where you are with what you have.

To give you a little inspiration and celebrate how far we've come, I would like to share a little of our journey this year with you- how we started small and grew little by little, and how we can't wait to continue growing next year.

Our progression into homesteading has been slow but steady. Some of the things that we are doing are things I never thought I would consider a part of my daily life. Here is how it happened...

Vegetable Gardening
First I started a small raised vegetable garden a few years ago just to grow a few tomatoes, cucumbers, and peppers- it's just sort of something you do in the south. It was 5' x 10', and later I expanded it to 5' x 15'. It was small, but manageable. I bought plants at Lowe's or Home Depot for $3 each. Some years we harvested a lot and other years we didn't get much at all. Monetarily speaking we usually broke even or ended up a little ahead.


Starting Seeds
I then decided to branch out and try a few plants from seeds- I was pretty intimidated by starting my own seeds! Carrots worked out, and beans and peas were so easy and produced a ton! I started experimenting with more and more plants from seeds until almost every plant in my garden was started by seed. Now the gains were much higher, because seeds produce many plants for a fraction of the cost of plants from the nursery. Plus, I now had a much wider range of plants to choose from! Click here for a handy vegetable starting guide.


 Composting
One of the most expensive parts of gardening is the dirt! We starting composting all of our kitchen scraps and yard waste to make our own compost, and haven't bought any dirt since! I wish I could tell you how many pounds of nutrient rich "waste" I have composted instead of put in a landfill this year, but I know how much dirt we have made and used, and it has been significant! Composting is too beneficial and too easy not to do :)


Laying Chickens
I had been reading a lot about backyard chickens, and we decided to get a few to experiment. We talked about getting 3-4, but knew they wouldn't all make it so decided to get 5, and then somehow came home with 7 :) We built a coop ourselves from pieces leftover from other projects for pretty cheap. The chickens free ranged in our fenced in backyard which cut on feeding costs and make for a happy flock.


 Fruit trees 
In the fall of 2013 we put in several fruit trees around the edges of the backyard. There was a mulberry tree there when we moved in, but we have added a satsuma, kumquat, lemon, grapefruit, pomegranate, grapevine, 5 blueberry bushes, 2 apples, and 2 pears over the last year. While this sounds like a lot of trees, placing them strategically around the edge of the yard or as a part of existing gardens and landscaping has made up hardly notice them at all! The price of fruit in the store is crazy, and we are loving the addition of fruit in our yard!


Raised Beds and Square Foot Gardening
Around this time, we discovered something terrible. All of the vegetables that were our favorites, were also the chickens favorites, and the garden was the perfect place for them to dust bathe. Suddenly almost any gardening became impossible, and we rigged up some netting to keep them out.
This system worked for the rest of the season, but I wanted to make a significant expansion to the vegetable garden, and fence it in to keep out the chickens. We worked all fall of 2013 and were able to put in the first plants in March 2014. We made the new garden all raised beds and planted using the Square Foot Method.


Meat Chickens
After an unfortunate accident involving our flock of chickens and the neighbor's dog, we had to start a new flock. As it turned out, some of our hens in this bunch turned out to be roosters. We knew that crowing in the suburban neighborhood wouldn't go over well, and needed to get rid of the offenders quickly. That is how we happened upon our first meat chicken. Of our 12 chickens, 5 turned out to be roosters, and we quickly learned how to deal with the queasiness and process our own chickens. They turned out to be really delicious! At the same time, we began researching the inhumane treatment of chickens in meat processing plants. We decided not to buy anymore chicken from the grocery store and added meat chickens to our flock. While many people we know consider us raising our own meat to be mean, anyone who eats meat gets it from an animal somewhere! At least this way, we know that our animals had a happy, free ranging life before they had a second purpose of becoming nourishment.


Canning, Drying, and Preserving
With the expansion of our garden, we started really getting a lot of fresh produce. In some cases there was more than we could eat or give away, so I started learning how to preserve food for later. Drying herbs, canning, pickling, and freezing vegetables, and making jams and jellies quickly became normal, and our pantry was well stocked. You can read the review of our harvest from the spring season.



DIY Household Items
As soon as you figure out you can make your own food, you begin to look at everything differently. When I run out of something around the house, before I put it on the shopping list I ask myself, is this something we can make ourselves? We experimented with a lot of diy household items this year. Some have turned out great, like laundry detergent, and others not so much, like shaving cream. But slowly, we are buying less household products and making more of our own.


Rabbits
My husband had been researching other meat options, and started looking into raising meat rabbits. I dragged my feet for months before starting this project, because rabbits are so cute! It seemed strange to raise them to eat, but they were a lot more practical than starting a new flock of meat chickens every few months. We got two rabbits, and by the time they had grown to mating age, mated, gave birth, and raised the babies to eating age, I was ready to give the rabbits a try. Best decision on the homestead yet! We have now replaced all of the chicken in our diet with rabbit, and gone back to only laying hens.



Selling the Extras
At the end of 2014, I was a part of a few craft shows, and decided to sell some of the extras that I had from our gardening adventures. These were things that I knew we would never get around to eating because we already had so much. I sold dried herbs, pickles, pepper jelly, etc. I was surprised how much people jumped all over locally grown food items that hadn't been grown with any pesticides or fertilizers! I made $63 in profit from just those few extras, and then I realized- now we are homesteaders for real! I already have people asking for more of certain items, so I will be ready with some more farm fresh products next year!


 The Year in Review
While we still aren't self-sufficient, and are a long way from it, here are some things that were staples on our grocery shopping list last year, that we haven't bought at all this year!
- eggs
- chicken
- chicken broth
- laundry detergent
- most herbs (there is the random one or two that I don't grow)
- green onions, green beans, cucumbers, pickles (all of the other vegetables I still had to supplement throughout the year)
- bread (that's right, all homemade for one year now- woo hoo!)

This year we produced...
- 22lbs. meat (valued at $88)
- 87 dozen eggs (valued at $348)
- 12 lbs. fruit (not bad for the first year on our trees) (valued at $33)
- 85lbs. vegetables (valued at $226)

That's a total of $695 worth of food that we grew in our own yard with minimal effort and experience! (I'm basing these prices on regular grocery store prices, NOT what you would pay at a local farmer's market, which would be much more expensive.) Plus, add in the $63 we made from selling finished products and our total comes to $758. We spent $225 on feed, so our final profit value was $533.

Our average grocery bill last year was $50/week. So this adds up to almost 3 MONTHS of free groceries! We used what we had to make more of what we needed- that's homesteading!



What next?
We are looking forward to continuing to grow our homestead next year with new projects already in mind.
- We want to build an aquaponics system in the greenhouse to grow fish and vegetables in a coexistent relationship
- We are thinking about expanding from one female breeding rabbit to two for double the meat production
- I am getting a dehydrator to begin learning how to preserve fresh foods in a new way
- Not sure if this will happen this year, but our area recently made it legal to have bees within the city limits, so that is on the list for the future as well!

What about your homestead?
So what steps are you going to take this year to be a little more self-sustaining? Think about what you have and what you can do with it- you will be surprised at how much can come from just a little!


Egg Hunting: How to Tell the Age of an Egg

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Every now and then our free range chickens will decide to lay eggs in places other than their nesting boxes, and the only way to find their new nest is to either have a full-blown egg hunt or to do a little spying on the hens. 

Recently our egg production has taken a drop since the days are getting shorter, one of our hens is broody, and a few others are molting. But when I only gathered one egg over three days with three hen still laying, I had a feeling that the ladies had new hiding place. My egg hunt turned up empty, but the spying did the trick when a hen emerged from the garden singing the egg song. Sure enough, deep in the bushes, I found the mother load!

Not only a few, but nine eggs all in a neat little pile!


I was glad to have the eggs, but now on to the real problem. How long had the eggs been there? Were these laid over the last few days or had it been building up over weeks? Fortunately there is a neat little trick to figure out the general age of the eggs and if they are still good.

The Water Test
This is a pretty simple test. Simply submerge the egg in about 6 inches of water in a clear container.
1 week old or less- the egg will lay on the bottom on its side
2 weeks old- the egg will lay on the bottom with the fat end beginning to stick up
3 weeks old- the egg will rest on the bottom standing with the fat end up
4 weeks old- the egg will float on the top of the water


Thankfully for us, it turned out that all of our eggs were less than a week old. Any egg that floats is a bad egg and definitely should not be eaten, but beyond that eating the eggs is up to your own judgment. Personally, one week outside is enough for me. Anything beyond that goes to the compost, but I know plenty of other people who will eat any egg that isn't floating.


If your hens are being mischievous, I hope you have a successful egg hunt!

Natural Chicken Dewormer

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Earlier this summer we lost a laying hen to gape worm. By the time we figured out what was wrong with her based on the symptoms, it was to late to treat her. 

About Gape Worm- How to Recognize the Signs
Gape worm is a worm that most chickens carry at any given time. Occasionally it will take over a weaker chicken and can cause death, as it sis in the case of our hen. Gape worms lodge themselves in the throat of the chicken and cause them to walk around with gaping mouths as they gasp for air. (hence the name) The gaping mouth of the chicken is the first sign, following by making hoarse rasping noises, stopping egg laying, lethargy, stretching out the neck and shaking the head back and forth in an attempt to dislodge the worms, and finally heaving the body forward to literally attempt a self-Heimlich maneuver. The chicken eventually dies of asphyxiation as the worms multiply and block the breathing passage.

You can see Meg "panting" in this picture with a gaping mouth, the first sign of gape worms lodged in the throat.

What to do about it
After doing more research we realized that other hens in or flock were showing early symptoms of gape worm as well, and we needed to act to keep from losing more hens. As it turns out, the gape worm can be easily treated with antibiotics. We didn't want to use antibiotics unless absolutely necessary for two reasons: 1) you can't eat any of the eggs for two weeks while they have the antibiotics in their system and 2) the whole reason we have our own chickens is to avoid unwanted and unnatural substances such as antibiotics and growth hormones in our food. On the other hand, we didn't want to lose our whole flock to the worms. We started looking for a natural remedy to use to deworm the chickens. After reading about a few different natural dewormers for chickens online, we decided to put our own concoction to the test. The recipe is simple and uses ingredients that you probably already have around the kitchen. 
Our Natural Chicken Dewormer Recipe
We made a single serving of grits (I know this is a southern thing, but you can substitute oatmeal as well. This part is just to give them a base of something they like to eat so they will gobble it down). Then we mixed in a teaspoon of Cayenne pepper and a tablespoon of minced garlic. We fed this mix to our chickens once a week until the threat had passed, and we continue to give it to them about once a month to avoid problems in the future. Not only did all of the symptoms disappear immediately, but they have shown no signs of infection since!


 I thought at first that the chickens wouldn't eat the awful smelling concoction, but I set the bowl out and ran back in to grab my phone to take a picture. By the time I got back outside, they had pecked it clean! Cayenne pepper and garlic goes in, and gape worms come out :)


Natural Chicken Dewormer Recipe
1 serving oatmeal or grits
1 tsp. cayenne pepper
1 tbsp. minced garlic

Serve once weekly or as needed.

So simple! I hope that you will be able to combat gape worm (and types of other worms) in your flock naturally!

10 Reasons to Get Backyard Chickens (and 4 reasons not to)

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10 Reasons to Get Backyard Chickens

1. Eggs!

The most obvious reason to get backyard chickens is that you get delicious eggs! There is nothing like country eggs (although ours are in the middle of the city...) and your own free range eggs that you know are pure and healthy are a huge incentive for having chickens. The eggs are the reason that we started some backyard chickens to begin with, but we had no idea how many other great reasons to have chickens we would discover along the way.

2. Chickens are low maintenance.

If you are interested in exploring self-sufficient living, chickens are an easy "gateway" animal. You build them a coop, give them some food and water, and let them run around and lay eggs. Pretty simple!

3. You can have chickens almost anywhere.

Even in the middle of the city, there is room for a small coop with a few laying hens. They do not take up much space, and most cities allow them. We allow our chickens to free range in our fenced in backyard, so they literally take up no extra space than we already had. 

Okay, so I don't recommend you keep them in the house, but they will sneak in if you leave the back door open on a nice spring day!

4. Chickens have a great personality!

I had no idea how much I would fall in love with our chickens! They each have names, come when they are called, are super sweet (love to be petted and held) and are more like pets than farm animals. They each have their own quirky traits, and we love to go in the backyard to just hang out with them in the evenings, laughing at their crazy antics.

The chickens were very curious about our new bunnies, and when the rabbit would hop, all the chickens would jump in the air, flap their wings, and squawk!

5. Chickens will replace your bug man.

If your chickens free range, they will keep your yard free of many unwanted pests. My chickens eat all kinds of bugs, and I have even seen them eating small garden snakes on several occasions. The chickens know to wait outside of the vegetable garden gate when I am in there because I will bring them all of the caterpillars I find on my plants. Less mosquitoes, love bugs, june bugs, caterpillars, and snakes? Fine with me!

Brandy Jr, my "gardening chicken", waiting outside the gate to the vegetable garden for me to bring her some caterpillars.

Brandy Jr. eating a big grub!

6. Chickens are natural weed and feed for your lawn.

You will not have to mow the grass as often. Living in Louisiana, our mowing season is usually from March through October (sometimes longer), and it is an every week thing unless you want your yard to look like a jungle. But now that we have chickens free ranging in the back yard, we cut that area half as often as the front! And for some reason, they like the weeds the best, so they go around eating the weeds first and naturally fertilizing the grass as they go. Now if only I could find an animal that does laundry and dishes!

7. Chickens are inexpensive.

So far this year we have spent $70 on chicken feed for our flock of seven laying hens, and we have gathered 68 dozen eggs! That is just about $1 for every dozen of fresh, free range chicken eggs. Anyone who has bought these at a farmer's market knows that $6/doz is a common price, so it is definitely worth it on the financial side! I'm not including the price of the coop or the chickens in this but even if I did include all of the start up costs (that we will benefit from for years to come), it still comes out to less that $4/doz.

Our first egg! What a day!

8. Chickens make a great garbage disposal.

I hate wasting food, but sometimes the leftovers just don't get eaten in time or the produce from your garden is half eaten by a caterpillar. I used to cringe as I threw away food, but now I smile as I toss it to the chickens, knowing that it will soon become eggs! My chickens eat anything and everything- bread, rice, vegetables, meat, yogurt, oatmeal, scraps that I throw in the compost pile- you name it! We have gotten into the habit of scraping our plates into a bowl to set out for the chickens, and they love it. Never waste food again!

9. Chickens can also be a source of home grown meat.

I understand that it is a big step to go from having laying hens to raising meat chickens, but once you get started, you may find it easier that you think. We stumbled upon this stage of backyard farming on accident when we ended up with five roosters in what was supposed to be a flock of hens. We obviously couldn't keep roosters in the city so we figured out how to turn them into gumbo. We were not disappointed :) Besides, organic chicken meat in the grocery store is expensive!

Did you say MEAT?!

10. Chickens are a stress reliever.

I'm not sure how to explain it, but there is something so calming and pastoral about sitting on the swing in the backyard watching the chickens peck around in the grass after a long day at work. Computer screens, emails, board meetings, and to do lists melt away as you reconnect with something REAL, something tangible. It lets your mind go back to something simple- life creating food that sustains life. Every now and then it helps to put the technology down and remember how the world works.

4 Reasons NOT to Get Backyard Chickens

1. They ruin gardens.

They like to dig, fling dirt and mulch everywhere, and uproot plants for fun. For people who love to garden like me, chickens and gardening do not mix. I finally solved this problem by fencing in the area of my yard that was for me (the gardens and patio) and the area that was for the chickens. Every now and then a chicken will get into the people part of the yard and trample down all of my tulips and I have to threaten to have chicken for dinner, but it works out well for the most part.

2. They can be loud.

There are lots of variables here- certain varieties are louder than others, some chickens simply have a loud personality, and sometimes chickens are loud in certain circumstances, such as when they are hungry, bored, annoyed at the neighbor's cat, etc. Also, they like to sing the egg song every time they lay an egg, or anytime any of them lay an egg. But you know, as long as it means eggs, I let it slide.

3. Chickens die, and that is very sad.

We have lost many chickens to neighbor's dogs, chicken hawks, and gape worm. You will become attached to certain chickens, and when you lose one of your favorites, it is very hard. The atmosphere of the whole flock can change. Be prepared to lose a few.

This was one of our favorites, Oreo, keeping my husband company while he had the flu. Our neighbor's dog got into our yard a few weeks later, and we lost her.

4. You have to find someone to feed them if you go on vacation.

Like most animals, they need someone to check in on them. While most people will dog sit, which is a pretty big responsibility, they feel a little strange about chicken sitting, even though it only requires filling up a feeder once a day and gathering the eggs.

Needless to say, for us the pros far outweigh the cons, and we love having chickens. I can't imagine our yard without them! Do you have any other reasons to add?

EGG DAY!

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We have been counting down for months...
We knew that the day was getting close...
The anticipation has almost been too much to bear...
But finally, EGG DAY IS HERE!!!!

As first time chicken owners, we have had our share of struggles getting started. From a total of 25 chicks that we began with, we now have 12 that have made it to adulthood. 

Meet Brandy Jr., our super lovable, very friendly, cuddly, and beautiful Buff Orpington. 


She has a pretty tragic story. She was one of our original flock of 7 Buff Orpingtons. Three of her sisters disappeared, some escaped under the fence to become snacks for predators and some were taken straight from the yard by birds of prey. She and three sisters survived the tough world or urban free ranging and had made it to their three month old birthday when a neighbor's dog dug under our fence and killed all of Brandy's sisters. There were feathers everywhere and it was such a devastating day to see our pets lifeless on the ground. We thought that the entire flock had been lost, but we soon discovered Brandy playing dead in the bushes! We had one baby left!


We have since started two new flocks of chickens, Americaunas and more Buff Orpingtons, and they have all flocked together but left out poor Brandy. She didn't really fit in with her new sisters. While they were skittish, she loved to sit with us and be petted. Far ahead of our other chicks, we counted down to Brandy's egg day for months! We had read about the signs, and she had them all- her comb and wattles were turning red, her hips were widening, and she was getting more vocal. Then we saw the tell-tale "egg squat" where she squatted down, lifted her tail and slightly spread her wings when petted. 

We made her a beautiful new nesting box and put in a ceramic egg. Six days after the first egg squat and at 22 weeks old, Brandy decided to plop down in the nesting box and get down to business. 
Right on time, you good girl!



Of course when it came time for her to choose a nesting box, she picked the disgusting plastic makeshift one we had put in there until the real ones were finished...


But who could complain when lo and behold, the first egg appears!!!!!


There is no feeling like a first egg! I hope Brandy feels accomplished, but not too overwhelmed- we have to do this again day after tomorrow!

So what did we do with the egg? Ate it that very day, that's what! I hear that the eggs get larger and more regular with time, but here is a comparison of a regular store bought egg to Brandy's handiwork.


I couldn't wait to see what the inside looked like. As you can see, the yolk is much darker in color that the pale yellow of store bought eggs. (That's where all the free ranging in my garden pays off). 


So you want to know...how did it taste??? Well, it tasted just as amazing as everything I could have hoped and dreamed :) Definitely worth the wait!



And then there were eleven!

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We had originally wanted only 4-5 chickens in our backyard, but everyone said to buy more than we want in a flock because not all the chicks will make it to adulthood and it is difficult to introduce a single new chick to an established flock. That is how we ended up with seven chicks about 5 weeks ago, and I have loved having the bigger than intended flock. Click here to read about their beginning weeks.

About three weeks ago when we came home from work there were only six. There was no sign of feathers or a struggle, and the other chickens were not disturbed or skittish in the least. We looked around the neighborhood and waited, but the whereabouts of our lost chicken will remain a mystery. And then there six.


My flock has grown quickly in the last few weeks and are almost full-grown. The fear of losing another chicken had passed, but last Friday one of them found a hole under the fence and went to play with the dog next door. Dogs play a little rough with chickens. And then there were five.


Even though we now had the number that we had wanted in the first place, five just wasn't enough for us anymore. Somehow this weekend we found ourselves coming home from the feed store with 6 new week-old Americauna chicks to add to our little flock of Buff Orpingtons. And then there were eleven! 
(I couldn't be more excited!)


They are so cute, but definitely more skittish than our first groups of chicks. I'm interested to see how well this group mixes with our flock that has grown up together. So far the Orpingtons are being polite, but don't want much to do with them. Does anyone have experience with mixing flocks of different ages? I hope they all get along!


How to Chicken Proof a Vegetable Garden

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I love my vegetable garden, but unfortunately, so do the backyard chickens. After discovering that several of my favorite plants were also my chickens' favorites, I knew something had to give.

They ate all the leaves off of the soybeans and squished my squash plants....

took a good chunk out of my lettuce and kale...

and ate all the leaves off of my bush beans.

Not okay.

For a temporary fix I used all of the fencing and metal edging that I could find to keep them out. It worked for a while, but is definitely not a look I want to continue.

After looking into several options, i decided to go with this deer netting from Home Depot. I was able to order it online and they delivered it to my local store with no additional S&H. A $20 fix? Yes, please!

 

I cut some fence boards in half to make three foot long posts. Then I nailed them into the inside of the raised bed to create a frame.

The netting is 7 feet high so I doubled it over before connecting it to the frame. I wanted to still be able to access the garden, so I decided to make a separate section of removable netting between each of the framing posts. To do this I put a nail on each side of each piece of framing at the top, leaving the head sticking out about a quarter of an inch. I attached loops to the edge of the netting and hooked it over the head of the nails.

I repeated the same thing at the bottom of each piece of framing to keep the base taut. I made sure to overlap the edges by a few inches to leave no openings.

Now when I want to have access to the garden, I simply unhook the loops for that section and pull back the netting. And I can easily replace it when I am done.

I need to watch how close the plants are to the edge, though. This hen is giving me her innocent eyes after eating a few leaves of a bush bean plant growing too close to the netting. "Who me?" she asks.

 The finished product turned out a lot better than I thought. It doesn't block sunlight from the plants, can be easily removed for garden access, it keeps out any critters, and it is hardly even noticeable!

And now the chickens and I are back to a happy co-existence :)

In the beginning...

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I love starting projects, and I seem to always be in the middle of creating something new, especially in the yard. All of these projects start with LOTS of internet research, and after getting a lot of good tips from bloggers and forums, I can't help but begin my own! Maybe someone can gather a bit of helpful information from it, or I can at least look back to learn from my own mistakes along the way :)

One of my newest endeavors is backyard chickens!


Here is our little flock of seven Buff Orpingtons. This is their first day with us, and they are about two weeks old. They are so soft and sweet!


The chickens have to stay indoors for a few weeks or until the weather gets warm enough for them to handle it. They are supposed to stay in their box, but we have several who are much too social for that!


Having smelly chickens in the house was a great motivator for us to finish the coop as soon as possible. But once we moved the chickens out, they missed being inside with us. Our parrot, however, was very happy to have the house back to himself.


Now that the chickens are out of the house, they love to free range in the backyard, especially the mulched gardens.

A few observations as a new chicken owner:
1. They are SO low maintenance! I open the chicken coop door in the morning, let them free range in the yard all day, and then at dusk they go back into the coop on their own. I count their fuzzy heads and close the door for the night. I check to make sure their food and water containers are filled, and that's it!

2. They have personalities. My chickens are very social, have distinct characteristics, and are always up to the funniest antics. They follow my husband and I around the yard, and come when called (unless distracted). I was not expecting such fun from a bunch of chickens!

3. They like to eat garden plants. This was a disappointing discovery. I love to garden and spend a lot of time working with my flowers and vegetables, so I was horrified to see that they had eaten every green leaf off of my kiwi vines and strawberry plants, not to mention eating portions of my lettuce, kale, dahlias, jasmine, and others. They also like to take dust baths in the mulch, which means mulch gets flung everywhere! This also causes a problem with direct sown seeds as they get dug up and flung out of the beds as well. I would fuss at them, but they are just too cute! I have a feeling I will be a terrible mother one day...

4. They eat like pigs! They eat everything in sight! Bugs, plants, leftover food, you name it. They are constantly pecking, tasting, devouring. Maybe they will slow down once they have finished growing, but at this rate they are eating us out of house and home!

To read more about this flock, click here.