Locking up our little friends

[Doopy]

We have free-ranged our chickens for years. Our flock has ranged in size from 20 to 30 chickens and we only have layers. We sell organic free range eggs at farmer's market as well as to two mom-n-pop hole-in-the-wall restaurants. Last year the flock managed to migrate out to the road many times and a few stragglers made it into our corn/bean field across the street. Our road is about 1,200 ft. from the house. It's not a busy little road but do have hot-rodders and it's not unusual to see blood and guts on the road from time to time. This year the group wants to hang out near the road and have become more of a nuisance to drivers. We have lost three chickens so far this spring in the road.

Also the chickens have been more destructive in the vegetable gardens and flower gardens since last year. We have had very good success with chickens in the gardens over the years (I actually plant extras to compensate for the chickens) and they do a very good job of ridding us of unwanted bugs and voles in the garden. But the young sprouts have been decimated this spring.

So I fixed the big gate to the chicken run and patched several holes in the fencing and the chickens are penned up for the first time in their lives. Obviously they don't like it a bit. They are used to a protene rich diet of bugs, weeds, voles, mice, etc. How do you guys suggest we supplement their diet to keep them healthy. I know this change is going to cost more in chicken feed as we almost never had to but feed in the past. Penned up chickens is something new to us.

 

[Egghead_Jr]

You'll certainly be going through the feed now. You may want to check your area for a bulk feed supplier. Lately (actually since late fall) have had to keep our birds penned excepting a hour or two before dawn. With 6 birds that meant a 50# bag of layer pellets every month so that means every week for you. Yeah, I'd be looking into a bulk supplier especially if you plan on buying organic feed to keep your status as organic egg supplier.

 

[Doopy]

They have easily paid their own way until now. We may change our mind on the lock-up situation. But I don't know how to train them to stay away from the road and gardens. We cannot afford fencing for the gardens.

 

[brandislee]

I didn't think we could either, but fencing your garden is going to cost you less than feed for your chickens for the summer. My garden is 50x60 and I fenced it with 5 foot fencing for about $350. 4 foot would work, you could always clip the wings of anyone who feels the need to fly over the fence.

You could also create barriers to the road. I've noticed as my chickens free range that they aren't terribly pernicious about going through barriers when ranging our 3 acre property (and I'm assuming yours is at least as big, if not larger). I have close neighbors on one side and a road on the other two. So far I haven't had issues with the road (but it's a highway, so if I ever do have issues the whole free ranging thing is OFF, I'm not going to be the cause of an accident!), but I do have issues with them going into the neighbor's yard. I put up that cheap, crappy garden fence (like 32'' I think, they could totally jump it if they wanted) along the side of my property with neighbors. It ends at the garden, forming an L, and they almost never go around the garden fence. They have never hopped the short fencing. The only problem I still have is when they go into the woods on the back of the property, they sometimes will wander around the fence. I'm also working on planting a thick hedge, probably with some thorny things planted throughout, because I've noticed they won't go through where the blackberries are thick on the edge of the woods. It might be worth at least trying some of these methods to deter their wandering where you don't want them before you shut them up full time. I do still monitor mine mostly because I worry about them getting into the neighbor's garden and destroying it, and if they get around the fence I lure them back into the yard with some scratch. But I'm home mostly all day and can do this (and I do shut them in the run usually when I leave).

If you do end up having to keep them locked up you can up their protein for free a few ways, albeit it some of them a little unconventional. I don't do any of these things (yet), but I learned them in Harvey Ussery's book The Small Scale Poultry Flock. He supplements his flock's protein in the winter with worms from his worm bins, soldier flies (there is a contraption for attracting them, then they lay their eggs and the chickens eat the larvae), and (this is the grossest one) with maggots- for this he uses fresh game or road kill in a 5 gallon bucket, filled in around the carcass with leaves to keep the smell at bay. There are large holes drilled in the bottom of the bucket, and he hangs it somewhere his chickens can get at the maggots as they fall out the bottom. This sounds gross, but really is the ultimate recycling. For the remainder of the diet you could obviously use some of the grains it already sounds like you grow. These would at least help offset the cost of feeding.

 

[Doopy]

Thank you for the great reply, Brandi. I really like the bucket idea. I have a small farm here and our animals are animals and not pets (except for the dogs and cats) so locking up the chickens shouldn't bother me. But it does. They come running up to the fence every time someone walks by or when I drive by on the tractor. They're playing with my heart.