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Junior112

Junior112

In the Brooder
5 Years
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Jul 13, 2014
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Bend, OR
Hi I'm Jeff and my wife's name is Becca. We are new to owning and she is new to being around chickens, I'm familiar but never owned any chickens as my own pets! We actually dont even have our chickens yet! I will be bilding our coop myself then getting it ready and then we will get chickens.

If anyone has any advice they'd like to give on raising and caring for or better brands or what kind of hens to get please let me know!
 
Welcome to BYC, Jeff and Becca! BYC has a very good Learning Center which is certainly worth spending your time perusing. As far as breeds are concerned, it depends on what you want in a chicken. My personal favorite chickens are Black Sex Links (Black Stars), which are hardy, friendly, egg laying machines. However, although readily available, they are hybrids and will not breed true. My favorite standard breed is the Black Australorp, which is very hardy, calm and gentle, and an excellent layer of large brown eggs. My advice is to research the different breeds and see which one appeals to you. A good place to start is the "Breeds" icon at the top of the page. There are also excellent quick reference charts at http://www.mypetchicken.com/chicken-breeds/breed-list.aspx and http://www.sagehenfarmlodi.com/chooks/chooks.html, and Murray McMurray has an excellent "chick selector" to help you find the best breed for you. You will find it at http://www.mcmurrayhatchery.com/chick_selector.html Just be sure to click on "show more characteristics. Whatever breed you eventually get, good luck with your flock.
 
Hi Jeff and Becca! Welcome to BYC. Michael gave some good tips on finding information about the various breeds. Our first group of chicks were Barred Rocks, Rhode Island Reds and Easter Eggers...we think they're all great. This year we've added Black Australorps, Speckled Sussex, Red Sex Link and more Barred Rocks.

When getting your chicks, be picky about where you get them. Our first girls were from a listing on Craigslist and that was a lot of heartache (out of the 7 we got, only 3 lived longer than 2 weeks). I know other people have had luck finding chicks that way but from then on, we made the decision to only go through a reputable hatchery to get more birds. Some people get wonderful chicks from their local feed store or directly from breeders too. Just be careful that you are dealing with a store or hatchery or individual you can trust. You want to know that you are getting healthy birds so your first experience gets off to a good start.
 
Alright
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great to have you joining the BYC flock
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BYC has a very useful learning center
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Hello there and welcome to BYC!
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You have been given some great advice and links to follow. You might also stop by our learning center for lots of good articles on all the aspects of keeping poultry....

https://www.backyardchickens.com/atype/1/Learning_Center

Enjoy this new adventure you are on and welcome to our flock!
 
If you definitely DO NOT want males, don't buy anything called "straight run," and with day old chicks you are likely to get plenty of males. If it is important to you buy sex links (color determines sex at birth) or older POA (point of lay pullets) these will be females.

Some breeds are very hard to sex until a few months old or till they crow or lay eggs. There will always be someone trying to sell guaranteed sex birds of these breeds only to badly disappoint buyers. So yes, buyer beware.
 

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