So did you jump in with both feet or?

[hobbyfarmrookie]

Move to the country, where you don't have to have city permission to have what you want.

 

[NancyP]

That's my plan hobbyfarmrookie

 

[kidd42]

Since I was a kid I wanted hens. Finally last summer my wife and I started talking about raising them. Between her and I, we read everything we could find about it, including beng on BYC on a daily basis. Finally we placed our order this Jan. and recieved 23 chicks via mail order first part of March. We are first timers at this, but have done a pretty good job so far building the coop and raising the chicks, with a lot of help and advice from people on this site.

 

[Chicky Tocks]

I think you could say that I worked myself up to this. As a kid, we always had chickens, horses and pet rabbits.

Then I married DH 13 years ago and we've had 4-6 hens for all those years. If we ever found a roo in the flock, we rehomed it. DH had a bad experience with a roo.

Then in December of 08, my 15 y/o son was in a serious car accident. He acquired a tramatic brain injury. Throughout all of the healing and months at the hospital, I absorbed myself in this forum. I found the homemade incubator thread and buried myself in the fact that I was going to do it! I needed something to keep me from smothering my son and to let him heal without me over-doting him. His therapist are very pleased with his progress and I now have 18 chickens. (11 of them 2 weeks old). I'm holding out for more eggs and expect I'll end up with at least 30 chickens before it's all said and done.

It's a very self-satisfying hobby.

 

[ChickBond 007]

I got started like this:
To darling husband:
"Honey, I just order 25 chickens from Murray McMurray Hatchery. They will arrive in 4 weeks. I'm planning on keeping them in your garage.
It's amazing how fast he started plans for a coop.

 

[mullers3acers]

:

Quote:

 

[Jennie5193]

My parents bought out someone that wanted to get *out* of the chicken business (why anyone would do that is beyond me!) when I was about 3 or 4. I have great memories of going to the hen house and gathering the eggs. The flock was mostly EE's so it was always fun to see what color the eggs were. My husband grew up much the same way.

We wanted chickens for so many reasons, food, self-sufficiency, and for the children to learn a little bit about how the food chain works. I would absolutly feel like a failure as a parent if my kids thought for one second that food came from a grocery store! I am also teaching them the importance and responsibility of taking care of their 'food'.

My DH and I have been married for almost 9 years. He is the one in the family that says "NO!" to whatever scheme I come up with so in Januaray when I up and said "Hey, let's get chickens." He said 'Okay'. I must've stared at him for a full 2 minutes wondering who this guy was and where my DH went! We decided what breeds we wanted and started plans for the coop. The next week we were the proud owners of 20 baby chickies!

After that, whenever I found a chicken or two that I wanted the answer was "go ahead, get it"! We love having a little chicken farm in the backyard of our suburban home.
I guess you could say it is *our* hobby... yes, I think it is safe to say that chickens have helped our marriage!

 

[Remudamom]

The first time we got chicks was pre Y2K. We built a huge chicken house, and bought 250 BOs. They free ranged all over the ranch for a while, then we built them a big yard.

After about three years we got rid of them, and dh didn't want anymore. A friend had to move and I ended up caring for her hens at her farm, got tired of going there every day and brought them home.

Now I have 14 at our farmhouse down the road, RIRs, California Whites and Silver Laced Wyandottes. They will stay there, but can't free range because of a neighbor's little dog. Definite chicken killer.

I also have some banties in various stages, some at the farmhouse and some here at our house, and two guineas that were raised with the banties. When my babies are big enough all the banties are coming home.

When I bought the big chicks we did not have a renter in the farmhouse, and didn't know about the neighbor's dog. Now with the dog and the renters it doesn't look like such a good idea to have chickens there. I don't mind going over every day because it's just a mile, but I hate bothering the renters by walking through their yard everyday to get to the chicken house. But I don't want that many chickens here at my house either, my garden suffers.

 

[old mill poultry]

I first ordered some hatchery chicks. Before they came we bought 6 chicks at the feed store. That was five years ago and we now breed full blooded chicks locally to our feed stores and 4h clubs. I only wanted fresh eggs back then, but really fell in love with chickens and just love being a chick mama.

 

[Mourningdove]

Well I had been around chickens every year of my growing up years.
I was raised up north in the city and my grandparents had an 86 acers farm in the south. They had chickens and every farm animal you can think of

They had to farm and raise animals just to keep 16 kids fed

Anyway last year a friend gave me 4 laying hens from her sons chicken house, these are white rock types! Then a week later I bought 4 young hens and 3 of those turned out to be roosters

how the learning process can throw you a curve

So I then get me an incubator and on the hatch day my 25 surprise pullet chicks arrived from Ideal...hubby saw the chicks and asked me where they came from

I said hey I told you I was gonna order some

I went from 4 hens to having 67+ chicks and chickens in less than 10 months!!!! I plan on getting more!