Recent content by yorick

I had to put my project to petition the city on hold but plan to take it up again now that things have opened up for me. I'll post an update once I have it in place.

So... after more research (all worthwhile hours, I might add, since it is educational and useful to others), I discovered that Hayward does have documented ordinances explicitly stating that chickens are not allowed with an "administrative use permit". The relevant language can be found in the...

I recently received a letter from the city of Hayward noting that our chickens are in violation of a city ordinance which requires a permit to have "livestock". After some research, I decided to respond with a letter. I'd like to get some feedback from BYCers on their take on my letter...

I'm new to this and have 4 hens that are only 12 weeks old. I built the coop next to my newly-built and raised vegetable garden which are about 2 feet from the ground. I am considering ways to keep the girls out of my new vegetable garden. I've read posts about using fencing around the...

Uh... sorry for such a simple question from an amateur... but, what is "worming"?

WEEK 12 UPDATE: Mission Accomplished! I am now able to trust the dogs with the birds without supervision. The birds free-range for about 8-10 hours during the day. The dogs are indoors most of the time but are let out a few times a day and more on weekends. The last few times, I was able to...

I LOVE the "Leave it!" command. We use that on both of our dogs and is actually how we communicate to them when they are out with the chicks and getting "frisky". It has really helped in our training process. For others reading this, I highly recommend teaching your dog the "Leave it!"...

WEEK 8 UPDATE: So far so good... (I plan to upload a video showing week 8 soon.) Our pullets are now regularly in the yard with us as I'm doing some landscaping. Our older dog (Sasha) is out with us most of the time I'm there and she just hangs out with them for a few minutes then goes about...

I've seen a lot of discussions about different kinds of ways to cover the ground of the coop run but not a single topic asking to choose what is best. I'm in the process of building my coop (5'x5' coop with a 5'x10' enclosed run) and would like to hear from you guys what you think is the best...

WEEK 4 UPDATE: PROGRESS!!! (I think) Because we've been putting the chicks out in the yard earlier than expected, I decided to jump ahead to the plan for Week 6 even though we are only in Week 4. We put the chicks out for about 20 minutes then let the dogs out one by one. Below is the video...

That's awesome! Seeing that makes me think that my efforts won't be in vain if I have the right kind of dogs and follow the prescribed plan. It gives me hope. Quote:

So, we are now in week 3 and so far so good but I'm still very careful and watchful. I hope this will work out but understand that you can't always break a dog out of its natural instinct. We encountered a very interesting relationship building between one of our chicks and our pitbull. Below...

I've read a lot of posts that talk about the bottom of the coop but not a post dedicated to the question: Is it better to have wood chips (i.e. fine pine chips) or linoleum floor in the coop? I hear the arguments about the linoleum being easy to clean and wipe but it seems like it would smell...

Love the idea. How high should a chicken fence be to be effective in keeping the chickens out of the veggie garden? Quote: