How Long Have You Been Raising Chickens? - OLD

[Tashi]

About two years now. We found hatching them out was addicting, so we had to move from Oxford to a Welsh mountainside. Now we've managed to acquire ducks and alpacas too

 

[justbugged]

For us it's been on again off again ownership of chickens for the past 20 years. It's had to depend on where we are living at the time.

 

[jprinc44]

8 Years on and off- 6 years continuously this time.

 

[ajyetzer]

I've been raising chickens for two years. Our first two were purchased at a local farm event back in 2009. Now we have eight hens of a variety of breeds and one obnoxious, but amusing, rooster.

 

[jodiwilliams]

this is my first year with chickens,this will be our first winter,and i love my chickens sooo much.this also my first year with ducks so hopefully everything goes good.

 

[Amimad]

I have just had my chickens for a year now and this is the first time I have seen them molt. I thought that something was wrong with them

until I got the news letter from BYC and realized it was perfectly normal! What a relief.

 

[devin0]

Literally all my life. 17 years. I've only started liking it 3 years ago though.

 

[chickens? not yet]

I grew up with chickens-eggs & meat- married my husband 41 yrs. ago his family had 20,000 hens. They were all cooped up in little cages it was sad. When his dad passed we got out of that. Just 4 months ago I bought 7 eggs and 5 hatched, we are really enjoying them!! I love this site so much info.!!

 

[Sarah54341]

7 years. We adopted two from a farm and two from a caged hen rescue program, unfortunately we only have two of the original four.

 

[HenalayLady]

Four 2-day old chicks arrived April 28 of this year; 2 weeks later 5 more joined in. I tried to keep them apart at first, but they integrated anyway. The flock of nine consists of one each of the following: Dominique, Speckled Sussex, New Hampshire Red, Golden Star (sex-link golden), Barred Rock, Black Australorp, and 3 Easter Eggers (sold to me as Ameraucana). As of 3 weeks ago every one had laid at least one egg; as of last week all 9 were laying almost daily. The Golden laid her first egg at 14 weeks, and has not missed a day! The rest started gradually a month later.
They're wonderful--a complete hoot! I love their funny ways, squabbles, "the sky is falling" alarms, prospecting habits, etc. They have made a mess of the vegetable garden and I didn't care. My 6-yr old golden doodle, Matti, (70 lbs of inquisitiveness) thought the chicks were the best squeaky toys she ever saw--managed to get one in her mouth on Day1 after up-ending the temporary brooder box! She now is their sometime guardian and other times she's trying to sniff their fluffy bustles, hoping for some "candy" to pop out. I try to curtail that nasty habit, but there must be something in that stuff that tastes good--the wild ducks come up from the river and scoop it up from the driveway and garden areas every day! So far, here in Carmel Valley, CA, there are no signs of molting, although the temp was in the 30's for the past 2 nights--and the eggs keep coming. We've had 3 stray dog scares with loss of feathers only and one hawk scare. I keep them in their coop until 10am daily, to lessen the hawks' chances, then they happily free-range. Matti is always on the alert, me too! So far, feeling lucky!