Some are born into chicken keeping. Some achieve chicken keeping. Some have chicken keeping thrust upon them.

Mar 12, 2021
13
88
56
Dallas Area / East Texas
[Northeast Texas]

(1) Are you new to chickens / when did you first get chickens?
At the end of January this year, my wife and I found 8 juvenile chickens in our back yard. We lured them into a temporary pen to enclose them while we drove around and asked the neighbors if any of them lost any chickens. No one claimed them, so we decided to keep them. We've always wanted chickens, but never attempted it. Since then, we have built a coop and a fenced in yard for them, done copious research into chicken keeping, and have generally descended into full-on chicken madness.

(2) How many chickens do you have right now?

Eight right now, but four of those are roosters and three of those need to get rehomed.
... Anyone want roosters?

(3) What breeds do you have?

I have been told by people who are higher level chickenmancers than myself that they are Black Australorps, or at least that's what might primarily be what is getting expressed in their lovely chicken mutt genetics.

(4) What are your favorite aspects of raising backyard chickens?

I love watching them investigate their surroundings and do what we call "Chicken Science" to determine if new items in their space are threats, things to stand on, or food. Sometimes they do Chicken Science on my shoelaces.

(5) What are some of your other hobbies?

When I'm not outside doing chicken stuff, I occupy my time writing short stories and designing games for tabletop play.

(6) Tell us about your family, your other pets, your occupation, or anything else you'd like to share.

Our family unit consists of myself, my wife, and my mom... as well as three cats & two dogs. My wife and I are relatively newlywedded and celebrated our 1-year anniversary a bit early by adopting a flock of small dinosaurs together. Mom was wary of becoming a chicken farmer but fell in love with them in record time. Oh, and I'm also a librarian.

(7) Bonus: How did you find BYC, how long have you known about BYC, and what made you finally join our awesome community? :D

My mother has chicken keeping coworkers who have all been very adamant about having her tell me to join BYC. The thing that finally made me click the new account button was that I am in the process of rehoming three of our birds who had the audacity to mature into gorgeous roosters (sarcasm, I love these little dudes, but we really can't keep four roosters) and I thought I should check here for tips on how to do that so I can ensure my birds go to someone who will not be cruel to them.
 
:welcome
Welcome to BYC! This is a great community of chicken lovers! Feel free to ask any questions you may have!
 
Hello, and welcome! Good luck with those chick's and the re-homing of those rooster's. If you are planning on keeping one of the rooster's, then he is going to be needing more girl's than just the 4 or he will quickly be over-mating them.
Thank you for the welcome and the well-wishes! We do have one rooster that we will be keeping (he was chosen because he's very calm, even to the point of letting me pick him up and move him around, and isn't doing the whole "puff up and square off" routine that the others are starting up).

We've heard about the potential for over-mating with this small of a group. We have connections with our local FFA chapter, which will be doing their auctions soon. Once we've rehomed the extra roos, we might try adding a few new ladies. They're still kind of in the awkward teenage chicken stage and none of them have started mating/laying yet, though I know it's only a matter of time. I have my eye on some chicken saddles/aprons too, in case they start getting randy before we can get the flock ratio sorted.
 

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