How much time do they take?

[Snickrrs]

I live in the suburbs and chickens are out of the question in my backyard... however, there are several local farms around, and I'm debating asking if they'd lease or lend a bit of their property for meat bird raising next summer.

I'm curious how much time raising 25-50 meat birds take each day? What other considerations should I have if the birds are not in my own backyard and within walking distance?

 

[TamTurkey]

it stinks that you can't have birds in your back yard. I live in a neighborhood and I have a 10x10 coop with additional space to run which holds the 25 chickens just fine. To get them to full eating size 6-8 weeks for Cornish Rock broilers. It depends on the breed and your feeding plan though. It would be pretty neat to be able to lease some land to put a "moveable" chicken house on. I hope you do it. Home grown Chicken has the best flavor!

 

[Snickrrs]

I try to buy local farm-raised chickens, but they're so expensive. We eat more chicken then beef so I was hoping to be able to source locally and still not spend too much. (A 3-4 lb whole pasture raised chicken cost me $25...)

How much time do you think it takes you each day for your 25 chickens? Is it just feeding/watering and checking on them? Or are there other major basics that I'm missing?

Thanks!

 

[TamTurkey]

$25??? wow I wish I could sell mine for that! Where are you??! We feed and change water every morning and night (takes 5-10 minutes depending on how much of a hurry we are in). We clean and put new shavings down once a week. (our birds are market show animals we keep them indoors in central air & heat except for when we clean the coop once a week which takes about 30 minutes). We also go stir them up about every hour when we are home. But understand again this is for show we are trying to get them as big as possible in a 6 week period. The more they are up and awake the more they eat the bigger the bird. We have alrm clocks all over the coop going off to wake them up. And a radio that the station gets changed daily to keep them up. This is a time crunch thing. You can do it with out all that much work but I would still feed them moring and night and make sure they have fresh water!!! If you want to fatten them quickly use show feed. Depending on the weather you'll need to make sure they don't freeze. Build a coop to give relief from the sun and safe from predators.