Hello from Minnesota!

[halfwayfarming]

Hi! My name is Mya, I live in southern MN and don't have any chickens yet. I live in town and I am under 18, so I still live at home. I am trying to convince my parent to start up a chicken coop in town but they are kinda hesitant. My dad has always wanted to get chickens but he thinks we would look "wierd" if we did it in town. To me I think it would just look like we have a rabbit hutch. Let me know what you think about this. Also what do you do with your chickens when they stop laying? I wouldn't have the heart to kill them so do you just keep then for pets? We also own land in the country and we were thinking of putting a coop out there but we don't live out there so that probably wouldn't work. Thanks for reading!

 

[Yorkshire Coop]

Hi Mya

Glad you could join the flock! There are many people who keep their chickens in town some even have house chickens. As long as they are allowed in your area you may want to check this out before getting any chickens. Some people certainly do cull there hens once they have stopped laying especially if eggs are most important to them. You can keep them as pets nothing wrong with that. Having them out on land where you are not present would be an issue, they need feeding watering etc and they need to be safe from predators too and checked on regular.

The learning centre is a super place to start here is the link for getting started https://www.backyardchickens.com/a/getting-started-raising-chickens

Good luck and enjoy BYC

 

[Kelsie2290]

Hello and Welcome To BYC! X2 what Yorkshire coop said. Check with your local town or city hall to see if chickens are legal in your area. Many people are keeping small flocks in town now, check out the small coops in the Coops section for ideas on lovely little coops https://www.backyardchickens.com/a/small-chicken-coop-designs-pictures-of-chicken-coops.
What you do with your older hens is up to you, if you do not want to cull them when they are past their prime laying age, you might want to consider getting some of the more heritage breeds, they don't lay as well as the commercial layers like the sex links, but they generally will keep laying for a lot more years.
X2, Keeping chickens away from home is difficult if you can not be there once a day or so. If you have neighbors there, you might consider seeing if they would want to go in a flock with you.

 

[BantamFan4Life]

Welcome to BYC! I'm glad you joined us!

 

[drumstick diva]

Keeping chickens at another location didn't work out for my neighbor. He had them at a friend's place several miles away - the friend said one morning - he found all were killed by predators.

 

[rainbowhatchery]

hello

 

[halfwayfarming]

Thanks for the replys! I have a list of some chickens I want to get, I think a couple are heritage breeds. I want to get a couple silkie bantam, couple Ancona, Easter egger, Sussex, and a Wyandotte. That is a few more than the six we can have in town but I would choose so we would have 6 or less. Whoever has some of these breeds let me know if you like them. The silkie bantams are more for pets than egg chickens btw. It might be possible to have chickens at "the farm" because its only 20 minutes away, and it would definently be possible to get out there daily the only problem would be in the winter. We would end up having to walk down the really long drive way sorta thing if there was too much snow. It seems like that would be the most possible option for chickens now. It would only be one winter out there before we move into the land and can be there all the time. We would have to build a very predetpr proof coop though.