So I had been browsing this site for a few weeks and finally decided it was time to join. I am new to the world of Backyard chickens and have quickly become absolutely swept up in the day to day adventures of raising my own chickens. Well my story of chickens truly starts... almost ten years ago now (god thats hard to believe. it means I am getting old lol). I was in sixth grade at the time and I remember my french teacher telling us about how she grew up raising chickens on her family's local farm and that she and he husband had chickens of their own. I was utterly amazed and I remember running through the front door to tell my dad that I wanted to get chickens. Well suffice it to say the answer to that was a definite NO. (and with my father there was never any further discussion of a closed topic).
Well my desire to raise chickens never really disappeared, and over the years I have looked into it from time to time. And then it happened this summer. Someone I work with mentioned that he was going to be getting chickens, and I was reminded how raising chickens were re-legalized within city limits about two years ago now. Once again I came running home to my partner of three years telling him how badly I wanted chickens of my own. And what would you guess his response to this was? A big fat NO. Well I was absolutely determined and wasn't going to give up this time. I researched all the perfect breeds for raising chickens within the city, I researched our local laws and regulations when it came to raising chickens, coop designs, feed, etc etc etc. The next week I re-approached the topic with him (TH we will call him). Well my TH still said no. So again I diligently continued my research, found a local specialty hatchery I could order pullets from, and did some number crunching as we aren't made of money. Then it dawned on me. I already had the base of a chicken coop built! It was stored in our garage never finished. It was a huge garden planter that TH had started to build for me when we lived in a house with nothing but concrete and no grass, but then we moved and he never finished working on it as we now have a huge backyard. But with some alterations we would have a coop and we wouldn't have to spend a dime! So the next day I went to work on it and transformed it from the frame of a giant planter to a chicken coop, and showed it to TH when he got home from work. He gave me one look and said NO.
Well at this point I was a little distraught and decided to just leave it alone for awhile. And then we came across a listing on craigslist for a woman who wanted to get rid of her pullets and she lived just twenty minutes from us. It was fate, and finally he said fine. So that night I emailed her and began the process of getting my Urban chicken permit (we have to have a permit here in Cedar Rapids). within a week we brought our three girls home, and began our journey of raising our own backyard chickens.
Here are early pictures of the chicken coop. It was literally just the coop with some small area for the girls to use as a run under and in front of the coop itself.
And this is a picture of the chicken that TH picked out. He named her Oprah due to her obvious attitude and the large tuft of feathers that all Polish hens have on their heads.
So thats the beginning of our story with Backyard chickens. We have since done alot of updating in just the few weeks that we have had our wonderful girls, but that is for a different thread ^^
Well my desire to raise chickens never really disappeared, and over the years I have looked into it from time to time. And then it happened this summer. Someone I work with mentioned that he was going to be getting chickens, and I was reminded how raising chickens were re-legalized within city limits about two years ago now. Once again I came running home to my partner of three years telling him how badly I wanted chickens of my own. And what would you guess his response to this was? A big fat NO. Well I was absolutely determined and wasn't going to give up this time. I researched all the perfect breeds for raising chickens within the city, I researched our local laws and regulations when it came to raising chickens, coop designs, feed, etc etc etc. The next week I re-approached the topic with him (TH we will call him). Well my TH still said no. So again I diligently continued my research, found a local specialty hatchery I could order pullets from, and did some number crunching as we aren't made of money. Then it dawned on me. I already had the base of a chicken coop built! It was stored in our garage never finished. It was a huge garden planter that TH had started to build for me when we lived in a house with nothing but concrete and no grass, but then we moved and he never finished working on it as we now have a huge backyard. But with some alterations we would have a coop and we wouldn't have to spend a dime! So the next day I went to work on it and transformed it from the frame of a giant planter to a chicken coop, and showed it to TH when he got home from work. He gave me one look and said NO.
Well at this point I was a little distraught and decided to just leave it alone for awhile. And then we came across a listing on craigslist for a woman who wanted to get rid of her pullets and she lived just twenty minutes from us. It was fate, and finally he said fine. So that night I emailed her and began the process of getting my Urban chicken permit (we have to have a permit here in Cedar Rapids). within a week we brought our three girls home, and began our journey of raising our own backyard chickens.
Here are early pictures of the chicken coop. It was literally just the coop with some small area for the girls to use as a run under and in front of the coop itself.
And this is a picture of the chicken that TH picked out. He named her Oprah due to her obvious attitude and the large tuft of feathers that all Polish hens have on their heads.
So thats the beginning of our story with Backyard chickens. We have since done alot of updating in just the few weeks that we have had our wonderful girls, but that is for a different thread ^^
