people with house chickens

[RoxyAnny]

Hi! New to the forums & happy to find fellow house chicken folks. My grown kids think I'm nuts but they have no answer to how is this different from pet parrots? Chickens are better! Much quieter & they won't outlive you.

Claudette's mom was an Old English Banty mix, the rooster a Full sized Polish mix. She's just a bit smaller than an Orpington. She has a lovely poof of feathers on top of her head. I decided she needed a sister, so I got a silkie, Babette. Unfortunately, Claudette is a scrapper & is too often naughty to Babette. It works, but not as happy a family I hoped for.

The reason I'm posting is to share my in-house housing solution. I happened to already have a 2nd hand tv armoire that was not in use. I didn'y want to modify the basic structure just in case I want to revert it back to its intended use. And I needed only a screw driver & scissors. If interested, here's how I did it:

I removed the doors and lined the inside all around with clear contact paper. Then cut a box to fit the bottom to contain the bedding. I bought some window screening, cut to fit the front opening but longer than the height to allow for making top & bottom rod pockets. Two tension rods through the pockets hold it in place behind the doors. Except I can't find where I put the darned hinges so I've been draping a throw blanket over it at night.

I could do a cutout in the doors & cover that with screening & I wouldn't need the screen curtain & rods. I will be adding a shelf to make it a double-decker; a level for each chicken. The cabinet has a couple of drawers that are handy for their supplies.

I've ditched the bedding & replaced it with a nice artificial turf which is awesome! Loose food & wet suff settles down in the pile, poop sits on top & is easy to remove. Super easy to clean. I shake it off outside & give it the occasional bath in the tub. I could probably put it in the washer too. No litter mess to deal with makes me so happy

This cabinet has worked out really well. Once I find the #%&# hinges, it's going to fit in really well with the decor.

 

[Anansi]

Thank you for the suggestion of vitamin E, we'll start using that. Gurtrude lays mostly pastel greens, but occasionally we get one that is more pastel blue. As far as taming her, she was people oriented to begin with. Some of the pics were taken within a few minutes of us getting her in the house to dry her off.

 

[Calichicken2015]

Congrats on your indoor girl!

 

[Calichicken2015]

I have some Silkies free-ranging in the kitchen, as we were worried it would be too cold for them and I didn't feel safe letting them stay out after we recently got them. They are super sweet and my little flock of a hen and roo is gonna expand soon with the hen going broody.

She is a real character, very outgoing and readily takes treats from your hand and even runs over to you, while the rooster is more wary. Also being super broody she refuses to budge off her 14 related eggs and 3 adopted quail eggs (In the yellow dummy ones) as so I have to be a nanny to her, bringing her food and water as well as taking her off the nest for toilet breaks... Oh boy, can she scream the house down! This morning she was in a very bad mood and so she was mock-charging at me in order to try and scare me away from her nest, as I refused to let her back on until she pooped. She always stopped at the last second as she knew I wouldn't move. She does peck at me at times when I check to see if all eggs are fitting under her properly, but I hardly feel them.

The most amusing part of today was... She stopped her tantrum for a minute, just drinking from the water bowl peacefully... Before then starting up again with the tantrum.

Hen: "MY EGGS! LET ME BACK ON- oh, one second, lemme get a drink... Gulp, gulp, gulp Ah... Oh. MY EGGS! LET ME BACK ON THE NEST! NOW!"

The rooster is also quite the character, very sweet yet also a little skittish, he dislikes being picked up, but if you set him down on your lap and give him some sunflower seeds, he pretty much turns into a lap-cat.

He is more wary than the hen, hesitant to take treats from you unless they are something he REALLY likes or if the hen is gobbling them all up before he feels he can get some, he also rarely jumps at me, being very docile. The only times when he does jump is when I am dealing with the hen throwing a tantrum, or when I was herding them back inside when it started raining and the roo didn't like me herding his hen. He is also very sweet and docile towards his mate, letting her crawl under him when it is time to sleep and so until the hen went broody and stuck to the nest, he spent pretty much every night sleeping while standing.

With him not really having any hens to mate with at the moment though, with the only hen being broody, he can be a little pushy with her when she is off the nest with his mating dances around her and getting in her way, but isn't aggressive towards her and I doubt he'd be aggressive towards the chicks. I still pick him up and hold him when she is off the nest though so she can eat and drink in peace without him running around her while showing off how pretty his wing feathers are.

If he does attack the chicks when they hatch, he'll be put in the chicken jail. A large dog crate we got for future implementation in the coop we are gonna build outside.

He is quite the handsome roo also. This is him when he was outside dealing with the pesky slugs and snails that attack our strawberry plants. ^^

Good luck with your hatch!!!

Sounds like momma hen is doing a great job!

 

[Calichicken2015]

I am a new chicken mommy. I have one isa brown chick. I was looking for and tips or advice to help pamper my poultry princess

lol I quickly discovered that there is a lot of negativity towards indoor chickens. I plan to keep her fully indoors and thought this would be a better thread to discuss it. I look forward to hearing from experienced owners

Congrats on your new baby! I used a converted dog kennel for my indoor girls house when she was out of the brooder. We took her outside several times a day to forage, sunbathe and dust

Otherwise she was a happy girl hanging around the house with us! House Chickens are very lovable pets

 

[Calichicken2015]

Hi! New to the forums & happy to find fellow house chicken folks. My grown kids think I'm nuts but they have no answer to how is this different from pet parrots? Chickens are better! Much quieter & they won't outlive you.

Claudette's mom was an Old English Banty mix, the rooster a Full sized Polish mix. She's just a bit smaller than an Orpington. She has a lovely poof of feathers on top of her head. I decided she needed a sister, so I got a silkie, Babette. Unfortunately, Claudette is a scrapper & is too often naughty to Babette. It works, but not as happy a family I hoped for.

The reason I'm posting is to share my in-house housing solution. I happened to already have a 2nd hand tv armoire that was not in use. I didn'y want to modify the basic structure just in case I want to revert it back to its intended use. And I needed only a screw driver & scissors. If interested, here's how I did it:

I removed the doors and lined the inside all around with clear contact paper. Then cut a box to fit the bottom to contain the bedding. I bought some window screening, cut to fit the front opening but longer than the height to allow for making top & bottom rod pockets. Two tension rods through the pockets hold it in place behind the doors. Except I can't find where I put the darned hinges so I've been draping a throw blanket over it at night.

I could do a cutout in the doors & cover that with screening & I wouldn't need the screen curtain & rods. I will be adding a shelf to make it a double-decker; a level for each chicken. The cabinet has a couple of drawers that are handy for their supplies.

I've ditched the bedding & replaced it with a nice artificial turf which is awesome! Loose food & wet suff settles down in the pile, poop sits on top & is easy to remove. Super easy to clean. I shake it off outside & give it the occasional bath in the tub. I could probably put it in the washer too. No litter mess to deal with makes me so happy

This cabinet has worked out really well. Once I find the #%&# hinges, it's going to fit in really well with the decor.

Hello!

Can you post a pic?

 

[MageofMist]

Good luck with your hatch!!!

Sounds like momma hen is doing a great job!

It should be soon when the eggs hatch, which is super exiting! And mama hen has been doing an amazing job looking after her brood so far, with my assistance as she refuses to budge off the nest otherwise.

the 2 weeks flew by so fast I thought I still had 2 extra, but nope, it is around a week now til the fuzzballs enter the world. XD I already crushed up a bunch of feed for them and have an emergency brooder for if something happens, so I am prepared.

 

[Sylvester017]

Thank you for the suggestion of vitamin E, we'll start using that. Gurtrude lays mostly pastel greens, but occasionally we get one that is more pastel blue. As far as taming her, she was people oriented to begin with. Some of the pics were taken within a few minutes of us getting her in the house to dry her off.

That is so stinkin' cute! -- the colored eggs and that she was so tame to begin with! You lucked out

If you happen to get a reliable pic of her egg color that would be nice to see. Sometimes cameras are hard to get the color right.

 

[Calichicken2015]

It should be soon when the eggs hatch, which is super exiting! And mama hen has been doing an amazing job looking after her brood so far, with my assistance as she refuses to budge off the nest otherwise.

the 2 weeks flew by so fast I thought I still had 2 extra, but nope, it is around a week now til the fuzzballs enter the world. XD I already crushed up a bunch of feed for them and have an emergency brooder for if something happens, so I am prepared.

They will be here before you know it!!!! Post pics when they hatch and you are able to sneak a picture without upsetting momma hen

 

[MageofMist]

They will be here before you know it!!!! Post pics when they hatch and you are able to sneak a picture without upsetting momma hen

Yup, and until then, I am gonna continue feeding and watering the hen.

She is drinking out of a large rabbit waterer. We would hang it in there for her, but it leaks, so I hold it for her so she can drink from it when I do my checkups. Last thing we want is mold in the nest!

She did have a bowl of food in there too, but she knocked it over... No need to clean out the seeds anyways as she'll eat it when she is ready and if any is still there after today, I'll take it out during her toilet break that also doubles as a nest-egg check.