Chickens hear Kansas City, anyone?

[KSRose]

I live near Kansas City, KS, and found Backyard Chickens from a Gist article. The idea that I could keep a few chickens just occurred to me. I'm 78 now, but I remember as a little kid living in the country in PA my mom and dad kept chickens. It may not be as easy to keep them here in hot Kansas as it was back then.

I was wondering if there are others in here who could offer some good advice on keeping chickens in this area. What breed of chickens would be best? And where do I get the chickens? I did have a few guina hes years ago, they preferred roosting in the trees. lol I'll be ordering the "dummies" book.

I have a barn and there's a shed that I could turn into a chicken coop. There's even a small fenced yard that I could run chicken wire around on the inside of the fence. We tried to grow veggies in that space and fenced it to keep deer out. I do have a local hawk that I'd like to shoot, but my daughter says it's a protected bird in KS.
thanks for your help
Rose

 

[HEChicken]

from Kansas! Please come join us on the Consolidated Kansas thread - I know of several others not far from you. You can find the link in my signature below. We'll do our best to answer any questions you have about keeping them in our Kansas climate!

 

[cubbysan]

I live in the Kansas City area but on the Missouri side. I just got my first baby chicks last month from Town & Country, a farm store in Harrisonville. They had chick days, somebody came and had hundreds of chicks, many breeds and ducks. Many of the tractor stores have chick days in the early spring.

I also got my first 6 ducklings from efowl.com, and they shipped them to me through the mail.

 

[maidenwolfx80]

Welcome I live south of harrisonville, nice to see people close to me on here. I bought mine from a local guy but the family center in harrisonville is doing a chick days on the 22nd I believe (gonna look it up for sure because I want to go ). I have a mixed breed flock so alittle of everything and all did great this summer and it was a scorcher. EE's are very hardy and my RIR's and new hampshires well really everybody did good, I kept a fan on them to move air around and placed frozen 2 liter's in the coop for them to lay against and we made it thru with zero casualties..

 

[cubbysan]

I am actually in SW Lees Summit. Just moved here three years ago from a Boston, MA suburb, so this country life is very new to us.

Good to here that they are having chick days again. We wanted Silkies, but he was sold out last time.

 

[maidenwolfx80]

I really want to add some more,,, just not sure what they will have at family center this time.

 

[KSRose]

Wow, thank you all for the fast responses and the info. I don't feel so "out there" now wanting chickens. It sounds like Harrisonville will be the place to get them, but I'm wondering if I should wait for spring to get baby chicks? won't they need warmers or something? There will no electric in the coop. maybe they'll come with their mama to keep them warm? LOL. How long before they're big chickens. oh boy, I feel so dumb. I'm ordering the dummies book today. Nevertheless, I'd like to get to that store on the 22nd and check it out. I don't believe there's a farmer store around here. To get the guineas many years ago, had to go to Lees Summit.

 

[maidenwolfx80]

Wow, thank you all for the fast responses and the info. I don't feel so "out there" now wanting chickens. It sounds like Harrisonville will be the place to get them, but I'm wondering if I should wait for spring to get baby chicks? won't they need warmers or something? There will no electric in the coop. maybe they'll come with their mama to keep them warm? LOL. How long before they're big chickens. oh boy, I feel so dumb. I'm ordering the dummies book today. Nevertheless, I'd like to get to that store on the 22nd and check it out. I don't believe there's a farmer store around here. To get the guineas many years ago, had to go to Lees Summit.

They will need a heat source. I use my bathroom as a brooder, childproofed so no chick gets injured and I cut up cardborad to make a fenced area for them. Set up my heat lamp with 50 watt bulb to hang in the fenced area, I use the metal hooded type for lizards. They will not come with a mom you will have to be mom. They grow so quickly, depends on the breed but it takes a few weeks after you get them for them to start feathering out, mine were 6 wkswks when they could be kept in the coop but I got my babies in summer. Just have to make sure they are mostly feathered before they can live outdoors wen it is colder. Dont feel like a dummy we all have to start somewhere and this is a great forum to start in. There are also many local people who raise and sell chickens.

 

[HEChicken]

Wow, thank you all for the fast responses and the info. I don't feel so "out there" now wanting chickens. It sounds like Harrisonville will be the place to get them, but I'm wondering if I should wait for spring to get baby chicks? won't they need warmers or something? There will no electric in the coop. maybe they'll come with their mama to keep them warm? LOL. How long before they're big chickens. oh boy, I feel so dumb. I'm ordering the dummies book today. Nevertheless, I'd like to get to that store on the 22nd and check it out. I don't believe there's a farmer store around here. To get the guineas many years ago, had to go to Lees Summit.

If you are brooding them yourself they will need a heat lamp at first whether it is Fall or Spring. The general rule is they don't need heat once they are "fully feathered". In reality, I am always able to get mine outside full time by the time they are 4 weeks old. In spring the nights are still cold so they tend to be inside in the brooder for 3-4 weeks, but the batch I hatched 4 weeks ago, were outside full-time by the time they were 2 1/2 weeks old because the nights have been so mild until the last day or two (and by now they're so acclimatized they took the cool change in their stride).

They take about 5 months until they are old enough to lay (the boys sometimes crow before that) and will but totally full grown by 12 months, although you won't notice much difference in size from 6 months on. Really, pretty amazing that they can come out of an egg and five months later be old enough to lay that same egg!

While I do have electric in my coop, I brood them in my house because with all the straw or shavings in the coop, I don't like the fire risk of having a heat lamp running. Also, they are just darned cute and I like being able to play with them and socialize them on and off all day, by keeping them in the house.

 

[KSRose]

to HCchildren, don't know I'm doing this right. thank you so much.
I won't be brooding anything. at least not for a long while. But great! I could get some chicks on the 22nd in Harrisonville and keep them in the kitchen until they're get some feathers and are large enough to out. ha, that'd give my dog (Corgi) time and opportunity to adjust to seeing chickens. He's not fond of birds. Our fall is usually pretty mild here, so that shouldn't be a problem. In the meantime, with chicks, that will give me time to get the coop and stuff in order. I just ordered the Dummies book That IS amazing - in 5 months they could lay an egg? it's an amazing animal. That first egg will be the best I ever tasted, I'm sure. I am so tired of the awful eggs in the store.