Official BYC Poll: Are Chickens Easier or Harder To Raise Than Dogs/Cats?

[Mother-Hen-Michele]

I was about to vote chickens are easier than both, then I looked up at the dog asleep on the floor.

The chickens are much more numerous so it isn't a fair comparison. You can have just one dog, and they live more or less on the floor of an existing house. Building coops and runs is constant work. Chickens are forever hungry, dogs are forever stealing my lunch one bite at a time. I don't have so much fear of the dog getting hurt or eaten by a predator, but she does not learn to leave porcupines in peace (3 times now ).

I guess they all create the effort/ work you decide to invest in them. Lots of people do more for their dog than I do for my old girl, and lots of chickens live with less fussing than I do for mine.

 

[Ursuline Chick]

Just MHO. However after having 4 cats (that I loved) at once time. I would say chickens and cats are about the same. Both train easily with treat food rewards and a little time.
I have 20 chickens right now.

 

[lv9777]

I think chickens and cats are pretty close. Because I do not have to build a separate house for the cats and they bury their own feces, my cats are easier to care for than my chickens. I was going to give points to the chickens for the eggs I enjoy, but if I enjoyed small rodents, this might be tie.

 

[NinjaGamer2022]

Less than dogs, more than cats.

My votes exactly. My family has two puppies that I find much more work that chickens. Cat for me are close but chickens more for a few reasons:
1. They are basically guaranteed to get something in their life, coccidiosis, bumblefoot, parasites, etc. But for a fully house cat it wouldn't be shocking if it didn't get anything in it's life (I'm not counting things with age like cancer and whatnot because in the end of any animals life they will most likely have health issues.
2. Doing a chicken's litter definitely takes longer than a cats (even counting scooping a cat's litter daily because that only takes about a minute).

I may add more reasons later why a chicken takes a bit more work than a cat. I personally think there's no doubt a dog is more work for these reasons:

1. Need to be walked or put on a tie out multiple times a day
2. Needs to be took out to go to the bathroom.
3. Needs a lot of training and socailizing (a chicken only needs to be trained to go to a coop at night and I find socailizing a chicken easy)
4. Needs a caretaker if going out for a few days, a chicken could be kept in a coop with enough food and water.

 

[NinjaGamer2022]

sooooo worth it tho!!!
when people ask "are you a dog person or a cat person?" i say "im a chicken person"

I personally like chickens better than cats and dogs overall. The one MAJOR thing cats and dogs have over chickens is that it isn't uncommon for their to be murdered chickens. But if they are well cared for and you get known to be friendly breeds that were raised together you should have no problem. I would rather have a pet chicken over a cat or dog (not that cat or dogs are bad animals I love them).

 

[Chicken poppy]

For me, their SO much harder then cats. Keep this in mind: Mine are spoiled rotten, i don’t eat eggs or meat, im vegan. Their for pets only and get a very warm well heated insulated coop with a big winter run. The coop is the size of a shed. (Which, was made from scratch! No reference, scratch. Many insulation layers.) That alone to put together is a lot of work, not even mentioning putting them up for the night, cleaning, etc.

For a non related story, i still felt like i should share it though:
I was in the coop and Gabby (a japanese bantam, super small) started tugging on everyones butts. As you would expect they got annoyed, but she would run off and do it to another one. Eventually, she tugged super hard on the meanest chickens feather, then she ran behind me. Well, she thought i tugged her butt, so she puffed up like a turkey and stood on her tiptoes growling. Lets just say that did not end well for me and i have battlescars to prove it.

 

[Anime2lover]

Many of us keep dogs, or cats and many have kept one or both before we took the plunge and started keeping chickens. Some say that chickens are more work to raise than other pets and vice versa. So, we're curious to hear how you all think chicken keeping compares to keeping dogs or cats.

Try your best to keep this an "apples to apples" comparison. For example, keeping 5 chickens will be different from keeping 20 cats as keeping 10 chickens will be from keeping 10 dogs.

This isn't about the direct "costs" of raising the animals, but about the amount of time, worry and effort. Consider:

• Getting everything set up for the animal(s)
• Frequency of health problems
• General care (feeding, housing, exercise, protection, etc.)

Place your votes above, and please share your thoughts in reply to this thread.

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I do think chickens are more work then dogs because not only do they need to be let out, and it, fed and watered every day but you also have clean out their pens when ever they get to muddy (wich happens often where I live during the summer), as well as maintain and mend their pens when things break, file down roo spurs when they get long,do them up if you have meat birds, search the penn each night to make sure they all go in, and in my area, treat bubbles often (not fun....). As with our cats, all we have to do is feed, water, change litter boxes, get vaccinated now and then, and treate for fleas and ticks. And for dogs all we really have to do is walk them a few times a day, bathe now and then, feed and water, give attention, and occasional vet visits.

 

[FrostRanger]

Once all the infrastructure is taken care of, they're less work than my dog or my cat. When I was sick and couldn't do much, I still had to let my dog out, feed my cat and tend to the chicks that were being brooded inside but I knew the adult hens would be just fine for a few days as I always give them at least a week's worth of food and water

 

[The Welch Chickens]

More work than cats, because the chickens have more health issues than my cat. Perhaps the answer would be different if I had a sickly cat, etc.

 

[Bawkbok]

Definitely more work. could be that we've incurred one problem after another in only three months after purchasing our pullets. We lost one to a mystery something very rapidly shortly after acquiring her, with the others we've experienced coccidia, bouts of diarrhea, a respiratory ailment - all quickly resolved since we monitor them constantly and catch things early and now one has bumblefoot! Ugh. That one is proving to be much more challenging. Hubby says it's all practice for the much larger flock I hope to have some day. yikes.
Had dogs all my life - from puppies mostly - dogs are much easier.