I can’t come close to guessing what your start-up costs will be. It depends on what you have on hand, what you can do for yourself, and how high your standards are. Craigslist can be a great source for materials. Chickens don’t care if it is cute or painted or fancy but in some neighborhoods the neighbors do care. If you are going to be buying all their feed it is really going to be hard for a small operation like yours or mine to save money by raising chickens even if your start-up costs are zero. If predator pressure will allow you to free range them enough where they find a lot of their own food you can do much better. But don’t look at it as saving money. Look at it as knowing where your food comes from. Those feed costs are really hard to pay out. On a half-acre, there is probably not a lot of free ranging available.
I’ll put in another pitch for something that could raise your costs. With your weather and your health, I strongly suggest building the coop big compared to the number of chickens you think you’ll want. They may spend quite a bit of time in the coop section. Plus, if you try it and like it, you may want to expand. If you have 9 hens and eat a couple, you have significantly reduced your flock size. I think you should plan on how to continually add new chickens.
My basic flock is one rooster and maybe 7 hens, though I seldom have that few. My goal is mainly meat with eggs being a side benefit. I’ll put some eggs in the incubator at the end of this month to start the annual cycle, then do the same in another few months. If a hen goes broody she’ll always get some eggs to hatch and raise. Last summer my flock peaked at 41. I still have 9 from a late broody hatch to butcher whenever I’m over this flu and I get a good weather day.
I built my brooder in the coop, right under the roosts so the top is a droppings board to collect the adult’s poop for the compost. That way it does not get mixed with shavings but goes on as pure poop. My chicks are never in the house after I take then out of the incubator. Neither my wife not me would accept the noise, dust, and smell. It’s totally not necessary if you have electricity to your coop.
My typical day involves going to the coop to feed, water, and open the pop door to let them out somewhere between sunrise and 9:00 a.m. My coop is oversized so I don’t have to be in a hurry to get down there. My coop is on the end of a storage shed so I store feed down there and I have running water there, though I carry water in the winter when it is freezing outside. Then after dark, I go down to gather eggs, close up, and top off the feed and water in the summer. That’s not really typical. I’m retired so I go down several times during the day to see who’s laying which eggs and make sure things are OK. But haven’t have to go back down there again until after dark. That’s the point.
In winter when it is freezing weather, I do the same in the morning but have to carry water. I also go down a couple of times to break ice out of the water dishes (I use the black rubber dishes so I can just turn them over and stomp the ice out of them or use a stick to break the ice.) Keeping water thawed in your winter may be enough of a reason to run electricity to your coop, which increases your start-up costs.
I clean the droppings board once every one to three weeks, depending on how many chickens I have and how bad it gets. I recently cleaned the bedding out of my coop and put it on my garden for the first time in four years. Not that I had to but I wanted it on my garden. I have an oversized coop and mine can spend most of their time out of doors. I don’t have the snow you do.
I clean nests out after a broody hatches in it or if there is a mess in there usually from a broken egg or a chicken pooped in there. It may be years. I don’t clean them out or change them out just to stay busy or really tidy. (Just teasing Linda
) The chickens don’t seem to mind.
How much your start-up costs are and how much time you spend taking care of them depends on how you set it up. Having feed and water right there is a huge convenience. I really like having electricity so I can see to work in there at night and I can keep the brooder in there. We all do things different. There are a lot of things that many of us have that you don’t absolutely have to have, but some of them make it a lot more convenient.
Good luck!!!
I’ll put in another pitch for something that could raise your costs. With your weather and your health, I strongly suggest building the coop big compared to the number of chickens you think you’ll want. They may spend quite a bit of time in the coop section. Plus, if you try it and like it, you may want to expand. If you have 9 hens and eat a couple, you have significantly reduced your flock size. I think you should plan on how to continually add new chickens.
My basic flock is one rooster and maybe 7 hens, though I seldom have that few. My goal is mainly meat with eggs being a side benefit. I’ll put some eggs in the incubator at the end of this month to start the annual cycle, then do the same in another few months. If a hen goes broody she’ll always get some eggs to hatch and raise. Last summer my flock peaked at 41. I still have 9 from a late broody hatch to butcher whenever I’m over this flu and I get a good weather day.
I built my brooder in the coop, right under the roosts so the top is a droppings board to collect the adult’s poop for the compost. That way it does not get mixed with shavings but goes on as pure poop. My chicks are never in the house after I take then out of the incubator. Neither my wife not me would accept the noise, dust, and smell. It’s totally not necessary if you have electricity to your coop.
My typical day involves going to the coop to feed, water, and open the pop door to let them out somewhere between sunrise and 9:00 a.m. My coop is oversized so I don’t have to be in a hurry to get down there. My coop is on the end of a storage shed so I store feed down there and I have running water there, though I carry water in the winter when it is freezing outside. Then after dark, I go down to gather eggs, close up, and top off the feed and water in the summer. That’s not really typical. I’m retired so I go down several times during the day to see who’s laying which eggs and make sure things are OK. But haven’t have to go back down there again until after dark. That’s the point.
In winter when it is freezing weather, I do the same in the morning but have to carry water. I also go down a couple of times to break ice out of the water dishes (I use the black rubber dishes so I can just turn them over and stomp the ice out of them or use a stick to break the ice.) Keeping water thawed in your winter may be enough of a reason to run electricity to your coop, which increases your start-up costs.
I clean the droppings board once every one to three weeks, depending on how many chickens I have and how bad it gets. I recently cleaned the bedding out of my coop and put it on my garden for the first time in four years. Not that I had to but I wanted it on my garden. I have an oversized coop and mine can spend most of their time out of doors. I don’t have the snow you do.
I clean nests out after a broody hatches in it or if there is a mess in there usually from a broken egg or a chicken pooped in there. It may be years. I don’t clean them out or change them out just to stay busy or really tidy. (Just teasing Linda
) The chickens don’t seem to mind. How much your start-up costs are and how much time you spend taking care of them depends on how you set it up. Having feed and water right there is a huge convenience. I really like having electricity so I can see to work in there at night and I can keep the brooder in there. We all do things different. There are a lot of things that many of us have that you don’t absolutely have to have, but some of them make it a lot more convenient.
Good luck!!!
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