Our family is new to owning chickens. We inherited 24 from a friend who needed to get rid of hers due to someone squawking to the city about them. We inherited the chickens, coop and all! It was a wonderful gift to our family.
We have always been interested in owning chickens and other small livestock, but never lived in an area where we could have them until now (HOA wouldn't allow them). We are resting our feet on acreage in the Rocky Mountains in Colorado, so we hope to gather lots of different livestock around us as time goes on.
We currently have 2 Black Langshans, 9 Ameracuanas (although 3 are very different looking almost hawk like), 6 Buff Orphingtons, 4 Leghorns, 1 Rhode Island Red, 1 Plymouth Rock (Barred).
We were fortunate enough to move them in their original coop so they still layed well for us right away. We hope to add some chicks this Spring since we have a couple of broody hens who have already given the previous family chicks. We will try to find fertilized eggs for this first go around and then hang on to a rooster, assuming we get one.
We've learned a lot by poking around this forum as we have needed first aid and predator information already, so we decided to join in.
As to the predators, we have been having them poke and try to dig under the fence, but so far to no avail. We created a large pen for them to roam, we buried the fence almost 2 feet and filled in with large rocks before we returned the soil to cover it all.
I hope in the Spring to have a couple that we can rotate the girls around in - wish we could free range them, but it would be too hard where we are (We back to Rocky Mountain National Park with almost no other neighbors so we see lots of wildlife).
Coyotes and Fox is what we have seen so far although, most of our chicken owning neighbors tell us it's Bobcat we have the most to worry about, haven't seen them or evidence yet, but winter is coming and we covered the top of the pen so we'll have to see what happens.
Excited to be here, we LOVE our chickens so much already, the children are learning so much and have their favorites.
Looking forward to learning lots from all of you.
We have always been interested in owning chickens and other small livestock, but never lived in an area where we could have them until now (HOA wouldn't allow them). We are resting our feet on acreage in the Rocky Mountains in Colorado, so we hope to gather lots of different livestock around us as time goes on.
We currently have 2 Black Langshans, 9 Ameracuanas (although 3 are very different looking almost hawk like), 6 Buff Orphingtons, 4 Leghorns, 1 Rhode Island Red, 1 Plymouth Rock (Barred).
We were fortunate enough to move them in their original coop so they still layed well for us right away. We hope to add some chicks this Spring since we have a couple of broody hens who have already given the previous family chicks. We will try to find fertilized eggs for this first go around and then hang on to a rooster, assuming we get one.
We've learned a lot by poking around this forum as we have needed first aid and predator information already, so we decided to join in.
As to the predators, we have been having them poke and try to dig under the fence, but so far to no avail. We created a large pen for them to roam, we buried the fence almost 2 feet and filled in with large rocks before we returned the soil to cover it all.
I hope in the Spring to have a couple that we can rotate the girls around in - wish we could free range them, but it would be too hard where we are (We back to Rocky Mountain National Park with almost no other neighbors so we see lots of wildlife).
Coyotes and Fox is what we have seen so far although, most of our chicken owning neighbors tell us it's Bobcat we have the most to worry about, haven't seen them or evidence yet, but winter is coming and we covered the top of the pen so we'll have to see what happens.
Excited to be here, we LOVE our chickens so much already, the children are learning so much and have their favorites.
Looking forward to learning lots from all of you.
