Where do you retire chickens if you don't want them killed? - Page 2

Mine retire to Florida.




Oh, wait, I am in Florida. The 43 degrees on the thermometer threw me off.... sorry...

Give them to a rescue group, they seem to defy the logical traditional choices.

Mine will get a retirement coop,just for those special little workers.Old folk chickens.They done their job,now onto retirement.If they lay an egg or two,I still will collect them,but otherwise they can relax out their golden years stress free.

No, chances are if you give away or sell an old hen, it will eventually be eaten by someone. If you want your hens to have a goood forever home, keep them yourself. You can add new pullets every few years to keep up egg production.

my mom had one hen that lived to be 12- so like with all animals we have, we intend on keeping them, integrating new ones occassionally- its been wonderful for us, hubby retired from the Navy and we became hobby farmers... 

Same here, except they will still be in the main coop. 

They will still eat bugs, they will still provide fertilizer, and they will still make me smile with their antics.  This is their Forever Home.

forever home for mine. I would add onto my coop and run too. by the way I had a hen that laid eggs several times a week until she was 7 years old. She did quit for a long time each winter but started up again.

I might keep em in the main coop as well.I have:

Jecky - Cokoo Miran hen - going on 3 years
Noseeher-Partridge Rock Hen-boss going on 3 years
Flame Jr - American Game Hen going on 3 years
Oddball - American Game hen going on 3 years


Thats it for my seniors.

Everyone is free to do as they choose when the laying is done, and I respect your choice.
But let me get this straight. Let's say you have an urban/suburban backyard, would like to keep say 7 birds and you eat eggs. You build a retirement coop for when their laying slows significantly. And let's say you have some production breed like stars that may be nearly done after 2 years of laying. So you get new birds and retire them in 2 or 3 years. You get more and retire them, et.al.
Theoretically you could have 5 coops full of non-layers that you are buying what is now a significant amount of feed for. When does it end?
I thought one of the purposes of this local food/sustainable living concept was to get closer to and learn more about where one's food comes from - that includes meat(chicken).
If one has chickens, feeds them for optimum nutrition, carefully nurtures them so they are as comfortable as possible, refuses to eat said bird, yet eats chicken mcnuggets, chicken strips or grocery birds, that lived a horrid life, ate a diet that I wouldn't dare feed my chickens - I just don't get it.

I don't have a problem with the concept of a retirement home for chickens, especially since the meat isn't that tender but
If you don't want the birds to be killed and you found someone to maintain a retirement home for them, would you be willing to buy their food and pay for the maintenance of the facility for the rest of their lives?

restraint is required.Im not getting any more 'pet" birds.I have production reds,dark cornish bulldogs,and amber links.So you see where I am going.

but the first batch were for hobby purposes,so they are staying,but the others are for sale/eating/egg laying.