Top Five Chicken Nuggets of Advice

[Babeof1957]

Greetings From Jordan, Minnesota!!! I am new to this site and new to the world of raising chickens. This coming Sunday I will be picking up about a dozen day-old chicks of various breeds (one will be a rooster). The brooder is ready, I've done a lot of homework, but please respond to this if you're so inclined: What would be your TOP FIVE pieces of advice for me? Ready...Set...Go!!! (And thanks in advance for a response!)

 

[donrae]

1. Give them lots of space. Twice what you'll think they need. Crowded birds are stressed birds. Stressed birds are more prone to illness, parasites, and behavioral issues. Read the link in Ridgerunner's sig line. Then read it again

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2. Don't get a rooster unless you're familiar with animal behavior, livestock in particular. Evaluate yourself and your personality. If you have a hard time getting your kiddos or your genial, people pleasing retriever to mind you, nix the rooster and start with an all hen flock. Keep those hens for a year or so, then if you decide you want a rooster get a young bird and let your hens teach him some manners and grow him up right. If you're familiar with livestock already, or have an assertive enough personality you can deal with a possibly aggressive animal, skip this advice.

3. Don't feed layer feed. Start them on starter (medicated or not, do your research and decide for yourself) then switch to grower or all-flock or something similar and keep them on that. Most back yard folks give treats that lower the protein of the feed, and layer already has the absolute bare minimum needed for most birds to produce. When they start laying, give them their own egg shells and/or oyster shell for calcium supplements.

4. Don't coddle your birds. Yes, folks like to treat them as pets, but they're historically livestock. They can tolerate a range of temperatures, especially cold (when they're adults). Chickens have been living outside without electricity for many years and have done just fine. Be sure they have a good shelter, out of the wind and rain, and don't worry about how cold they are. DO have enough air flow/ventilation in your coop. Folks tend to want to box the birds up and insulate them. Birds generate a lot of moisture at night with their poop and their breathing and all that moisture needs a way to escape the coop.

5. Don't be afraid to change things up. If you start with sand and don't like it, try deep litter. If you start with sex links and just don't like something about them, sell them and buy another breed. If you have one hen that's causing upheaval in the flock, sell her. If your birds aren't shiny and healthy looking and productive, change feeds. Folks tend to think keeping chickens is a "pick one thing and stick with it forever" kind of thing, it's not. It's much more fluid. I've changed so many things about my management, breeds, reasons for keeping birds, etc over the last 20+ years it's not even funny....and I'm still changing!

 

[aart]

Quote: WinnerWinnerChickenDinner!!!

 

[Sutremaine]

I don't have a top five, but I do have something that hasn't really come up.

Observe the birds. Go and sit in the run, or the coop, and just watch them passively. Get used to what is normal for them. Then, you can mull that information over and decide whether or not that normality is acceptable.

Here's a nugget I've just thought of: Do not underestimate the amount of damage a chicken can do to plant roots and shoots. Forget oysters -- to a chicken, the whole world is their pinata.

 

[Pork Pie]

Hi, and good luck with your impending new flock.

My nuggestsworth is to understand that there are very few hard and fast rules about keeping chickens, so if you get or read conflicting advice, do what you feel suits you best.

CT

 

[CroqueArizona]

1 organic apple cider vinegar added to the water 1 Tbs/gal
2 medicated chick starter feed
3 Temperature temperature temperature......
4 vented top to keep the adventuresome in ( hardware cloth)
5 Take pictures lol maybe streaming video

 

[Ridgerunner]

One – read this

Pat’s Big Ol' Ventilation Page
https://www.backyardchickens.com/web/viewblog.php?id=1642-VENTILATION

Two – read this

Pat’s Big Ol' Mud Page (fixing muddy runs):
https://www.backyardchickens.com/web/viewblog.php?id=1642-fix-a-muddy-run

Three – Follow the link in my signature to get my thoughts on room. Make everything bigger than you think you will need. This includes coop, run, nests, brooder, roosts, just everything. This makes life so much easier for you. Your comfort and convenience are very important. These things are more about you than the chickens.

Four – Be flexible. Things often do not turn out as planned so adjust.

Five - To repeat what CT said, take everything you read on here with two grains of salt and a dash of pepper. We keep them in so many different conditions, with so many different goals, and are unique in so many different ways that there is never any one way to do much of anything where that way is right and every other way is wrong. A quick example from above. If you have egg eaters a rollaway nest box is a great idea. If you want a broody hen to hatch eggs a rollaway nest box will not work.

 

[Mrs. K]

Some of the most respected posters posted, excellent advice above.

1. Draft free but well ventilated was the most confusing thing to me. What it means is that you need a great deal of fresh air in the coop, but shelter from the wind. My south side of the coop has large openings at the roof line to let out warm damp air. You want to keep chicken DRY not warm. Their dry feathers will keep them warm. Don't seal it up tight or add heat.
2. When people ask me, I say just do hens the first year or even two. Roosters take a little experience, a lot of space and a sharp knife. Many roosters do not work out, they can start out as darlings, and turn into nightmares. If you want a rooster, you need to make a plan on what you will do if he is aggressive. Some are, some are not. If you are sure you can't cull, don't get one.
3. Chicken math needs to go both ways, adding and subtracting.
4. Predators will find your weak spots in your set up, everything likes chicken. It sucks, but then you have space for new ones.
5. This is a great hobby that I have enjoyed for years, you don't have to do it all at once, get it perfect and never change. So far, I have never kept a long term plan! haha things and opportunities change.

Best of luck
MRs K

 

[Babeof1957]

I put organic apple cider vinegar in my dogs' water...it provides many good health properties such as pest protection, infection deterrent and fungus prevention.

 

[lazy gardener]

1. Realize that chickens are not long term pets (if you DO consider them to be pets.) Consider your flock as a "pet" with members that come and go. Unless you are going to open a poultry geriatric home, you will need to bring in new birds every year or two.

2. Build your coop bigger than you think you'll need it. Build it well, don't waste money on chicken wire for the coop. Chicken wire will NOT deter predators. Put plenty of ventilation in the coop.

3. Mama heating pad for brooding chicks.

4. Think multi-purpose: need a brooder? Use a box that can be turned into compost, or build a brooder that will also work as a tractor. Size it so it can go over a raised bed in the garden.

5. Deep litter in the coop and in the run if the run looses it's grass cover. The worst thing you can do is have your flock confined to a barren mud or dust bowl. This creates an unhealthy soil that is not capable of growing anything because of the nutrient overload. (It is also more prone to harboring parasites.) Chickens miss the benefit of having a healthy soil/ green vegetation / and insects to work on. Cover that run with a good thick layer of mixed materials (grass clippings, leaves, wood chips, spent litter from the coop, garden debris, even stable litter) and the chickens will happily turn that material into a rich black compost. The run will no longer have any odor! While you're at it, give your chickens some landscaping in their run: a swing, some logs, a pallet propped up on one end, or on cinder blocks, a couple of bales of hay or straw to play on, a frame to grow fodder in.