I have had chickens for 2 years, and a still on the steep side of the learning curve. Last year we put 4 wood eggs in coop to help the girls figure out the preferred place to lay eggs. We had no snakes last year and also didn’t have any chickens die. This year we found one of our girls dead...
We are new to everything related to backyard chickens... but, decided to give it a try. Actually, we went to local feed store last week planning to get 4 chicks - and ended up with 15. We are now in the process of building a coop - to attach to a 10x10 chain link dog run. Thankful for this...