Glad to find this community! I received a small coop and run for Christmas, and have ordered 5 chicks for delivery in April. I chose Red Star for many reasons, mostly because I fell in love with a friends Buff Orps, but like the egg laying of the reds. I'm a little nervous, I want everything to be right for my new girlies! Glad to be here!
Hi Glad you could join the flock! Congrats on your great Christmas present and your impending chicks I'm sure you will enjoy this new venture very much, raising chicks is a fantastic experience that's lots of fun and very rewarding too. The learning centre is a fantastic place to check out, here is the link ~https://www.backyardchickens.com/atype/1/Learning_Center It has lots of great articles to help you get started. Wishing you the very best of luck and be sure to ask any questions that you may have. Everyone here to help and very friendly. Enjoy BYC and all the chicken chat
so glad you have joined us. Congrats on your upcoming new flock. But, have to comment - small coop and run does concern me. Many of the pre-fab ones are way to small to house a full size flock. Please do visit the learning center and coop/run forums to explore the amount of space full size chickens really need. Personally, I started with 3 BO's and 3 BR's - same size as the breeds you are getting. I built an all-in one coop/run 5 X 10 feet and by the time they were grown had to more than double their living space. Imagine each hen will be about the size of a 5 gallon bucket and the water fount and feeder space will equal 2 more hens in space used. Mark out the size of your coop/run and place 7 buckets in there and picture the space. If your coop/run have enough space, you will have happier, healthier chickens and avoid feather picking issues. Wishing you luck and fun in this great adventure. Feel free to post questions, we are here to help.
Welcome to BYC. Glad you decided to join our flock. Red Stars (Red Sex Links) are laying machines that will consistently churn out more than 300 large brown eggs per hen per year. You should get loads of eggs from those girls. ) Please feel free to ask any questions you may have. We are here to help in any way we can. Cheers.
Thanks all for the replies, the coop is 4 X 7, plus 3 nesting boxes, and the run is actually a large chain link fence that I intend to put hardware cloth buried out about 4 inches and up the sides of the link so the chooks won't get eaten by raccoons.. I have a few months to tinker with the coop and run,its used so it needs a good cleaning. I was looking at viruscides made for livestock...any favorites?
Good for you Metagirl, sounds like you have done your homework. Hardware cloth is the way to go. Welcome to Backyard chickens
The red sex link girls are great...I have 3 in my mixed flock and really enjoy them. Not only are they wonderful egg layers but they are very entertaining (sort of like busy little 3 year old kids). Have fun!
