How do you vacation when you have chickens?

[BarefootMom]

you either have family look in after them or you don't. lol

My sister has 10 laying hens and they wanted to go camping for 2 weeks. So my BIL made a little portable coop that fit onto a little bumper trailer. They pulled it behind their camper and took the chickens with them!! Plus they made a lot of new friends at the campground and was able to sell a ton of eggs!

I think if we were to go camping I would take some of my chickens too.

 

[DelcoChix]

Quote:
What a creative, great idea--just imagine how easy it would be to meet your campground neighbors (usually kids and dogs are the icebreakers)...and just think, those hens really did know why the chicken crossed the road (to get to the campground)...and they really did have a "chicken coupe," wheel and all. Great idea.

 

[henbliss]

What to do with my 3 hens while on vacation? Is it a bad idea for them to go live with a friend who already hens and a big pen?? I would love some thoughts!!

 

[barefootfarmers]

We are actually on vacation right now. It has been a rough week. Our oldest barred rock just started laying the night before we left. I was soooo worried. Our solution was to ask two sets of neighbors to watch the girls. One who has chickens so he was collecting the eggs and the other to do the scratch. And yet i still worried. They are my only daughters, so far so good though. I get updates through out the week. We also set up the food and double water that lasts a week now (food in a 5 gallon bucket with screws to elevate it from a galvanized pan) the water was in a five gallon bucket with a 5 gallon cooler jug in each. We made sure it was functional before we left. We also have another neighbor to watch the dogs and cats. It is truly a project for us to leave. But the way it works is I have watched all their animals in the past and I only ask for twice a year. So I think it is a great give and take.
Good luck and hope you find great neighbors.

 

[DawnCols]

Quote:
Oooh, sounds like the beginning of a sad story. I fear the visiting hens would get beat up by the home team. In my small experience (and from reading this forum), chickens don't take kindly to newcomers.

But maybe your friend would be willing to stop by to tend your chickens while you're gone.

We have had a friend's teenage daughter from down the street take care of our hens when we were gone for a couple of days. But we worry that for longer trips it would be asking a lot. I browsed the petsitter web site someone else mentioned and it seems that it might be possible to go that route. Most focus on dogs and cats of course, but a few include "farm animals" in their listings. Looks like standard rates are $15-$17 for a 30 minute visit for feeding, litterbox scooping, dog walk and medications, $5-$10 for a 15-minute potty break.

How they would charge for chickens, I don't know.

 

[chi-rn]

Oh... interesting post. Thanks for asking the question... We just figured we gave up vacations forever when we got chickens. Recently told our daughter -- who's thinking about getting married (2nd marriage though) to just come & visit us after the wedding! (Wouldn't have done this for first time, but just not sure what I'd do!)

 

[barbaraj]

I was wondering if it is a good idea to take my six hens (between three and four months old) to a friends home who also had chickens? Or will her hens/rooster mess with our girls? For our hens, they're kind of divided in two groups of three. Just wondering if it's feasible to take ours to our friend's home/chicken coop for the two weeks we'll be gone. Thanks!

 

[keesmom]

What to do with my 3 hens while on vacation? Is it a bad idea for them to go live with a friend who already hens and a big pen?? I would love some thoughts!!

Yes, it is a very bad idea to bring your hens to a friends' home while you are on vacation, for more than one reason. Disease exposure is one, the other is flock dynamics. Can your friend check in on your hens? Or a local teen?

 

[keesmom]

I was wondering if it is a good idea to take my six hens (between three and four months old) to a friends home who also had chickens? Or will her hens/rooster mess with our girls? For our hens, they're kind of divided in two groups of three. Just wondering if it's feasible to take ours to our friend's home/chicken coop for the two weeks we'll be gone. Thanks!

Yes, it is a very bad idea for the reasons I stated in my above post. Her hens and rooster will definitely run yours off, and there is the possibility of exposure to illnesses. Can your friend check in on your hens while you are gone? Or a local teen/petsitter?

 

[Fred's Hens]

I was wondering if it is a good idea to take my six hens (between three and four months old) to a friends home who also had chickens? Or will her hens/rooster mess with our girls? For our hens, they're kind of divided in two groups of three. Just wondering if it's feasible to take ours to our friend's home/chicken coop for the two weeks we'll be gone. Thanks!

Well, if you had a large, flat bed trailer and took over a tractor, appropriate in size, it would likely be fine. It's just awful hard to go through all this for a vacation. Easier to just bring a caretaker in and do the chores with them for a few days as a training period before you take off.