Chicken free ranging? (Calm me down)

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ChickenCanoe said:
You can feed the starter even after they are laying as long as you're providing oyster shell in a separate container.

I keep a dish of oyster shell with each flock, either by the feeder or by the nests. When most are laying, I will usually mix grower and layer 50:50 because I have roosters with each flock too.

Don't you have any feed stores nearby? Shipping must be expensive for that.
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Maybe I'll keep them on it until it runs out then!!

Should I put it out now or when they start laying?

And we do, 2 actually, but nobody could drive me and I wanted it immediately.

Shipping actually wasn't bad though!

This was the total

400
 
It won't hurt to put the OS out now. As they mature, they start to store up extra in their medullary bones.

The warm winter makes me worry about excessive heat this summer.

If you can avoid worrying, the chickens will make their way back into the coop by dusk without having to round them up. It's just what they do.
 
Okay awesome! So when it gets here I'll put that out too!!

Yeah, I sure hope its not :(

Anyhow, I'm starting to trust that. Usually I end up rounding them up but they've been in and out of the run numerous times and even when flying away, always come back to near the baby pines, so clearly they know where home is so I think I may give them the benefit of the doubt tonight and also let them out every day. Makes me nervous but they can only get better at it I suppose
 
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The bigger threat than not returning home is the threat from predators. Especially hawks and dogs during the day.

However, as Simon Barnes wrote in How to be a Bad Birdwatcher - "I'd sooner be a small bird in a hawk-filled wood than a caged chicken on a factory farm."
 
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