tell us how you got into chicken raising

[the simple life]

Hi everyone,
Just curious how everyone else got into keeping chickens in their backyards.I got to thinking after I realized how I just kind of stumbled on it and wondered about everyone else.
I will tell you my story first. A little while back I got an e-mail from the farm co-op list I belong to advertising all the goings on in the area, opening day at the farmer's market and some pullets for sale at a local farm.
I started to think about visiting the farm and checking out the pullets.I had never before considered chickens, it never, ever even crossed my mind.For some reason those pullets for sale kept popping back up in my mind and the date to which they would be available.I started wondering if this would be good for my son who has some learning and social disabilities, a hobby that we could do together and hopefully interest him.But then I had to think about that if he wasn't in to it, I better be since I would be taking care of them.So I called the farm and the woman said someone from New York had called and wanted all 50 of them even before they were on sale.I was surprised that I was so disappointed.I decided to look on line for hatcheries.Once I did that I was really hooked, I just kept finding more and more information and all these different websites and the more I learned the more interested I became.After I found this group I started getting more excited about it, I think because now I had the knowledge I needed to be successful at this and it could really work out.This whole time my husband had never said anything about me deciding to keep chickens. I mean when I told him he said okay and that was it,he was fine with it.Everyone else I know thought I was out of my mind, there really are not too many people in my town that have chickens.
Yesterday we had my son's birthday at a farm and they had several different coops and hen houses there, my husband was walking around checking them all out to get ideas for our own.Then he said I am getting really excited about this.They had white silkies there and he thought they were really cool, they are on my list to get but I guess I better get cracking on that. He can't wait to get some. If I had not found this group I never would have considered incubating eggs either and now I have 41 eggs in the bator and more coming!!
Anyway,I now have 9 baby chicks and the 41 eggs in my bator so I guess I am going to be knee deep in chickens
Well thats my story, tell me yours.

 

[Cats Critters]

I fall in love with random animals and research them and ether a:decided I don't what them or B: try to convince my mom in to them

So that's how I got in to chickens!

 

[Crunchie]

I got my first chickens as one of many steps towards more self-sufficiency. My first chickens were 4 laying hens that we bought as a friend who had extras from a big McMurray order. They supplied us with eggs, bug control, and entertainment! They suprised me, they were such a rewarding experience. When I was far along in my pregnancy and my husband was taking care of most of the outside chores for me, he forgot to close the coop door a couple nights in a row and some lucky fox got away with 2 of my girls. I was upset, but my husband (not "into" the chickens at all, as he puts it) was equally as upset for me--so much that he promised to immediately buy me any chickens that I wanted.

Silly man. It all snowballed from there!! A couple of weeks later I convinced him to drive me across 3 states, 7 1/2 hours each way, to buy one trio of Cuckoo Marans from a breeder.

After the Marans came the Polish. After the Polish came the incubator(s). The rest, as they say, is history!!

I have over 50 birds now. Mostly Polish and Marans, a few Ameraucanas...and I still have the 2 remaining hens from my initial little laying flock, Tellulah and Ellie Mae. They're part of the family now!

 

[Southernbelle]

I can't remember a time when I didn't want chickens. When I was little, my favorite thing to do on my grandparent's farm was collecting the chicken eggs. Last year we moved to this house with 6+ acres and for the first time (since I was 7) I'm living in a non-residential community and I finally said - why not chickens?

Last spring my husband freaked out over chickens and begged me to wait a year - I said "just 2 chickens - we can do just 2, right?" No. So, to be sensative to his feelings/needs, I opted to wait one more year. That's what marriage is about, right?

So, this spring I got my McMurray catalog in the mail and started researching the breeds I wanted. I didn't really talk to dh about it, it was a done deal, right? He freaked out again when he realized what I was researching, but I didn't even consider waiting any more and he ultimately decided that he "loves me more than he hates chickens" with the stipulation that he never wants to smell them. **Note there was no discussion on the # of chickens**

Within a month I had 40 chickens - silly man, last year I just wanted 2. This year I discovered BYC - all you enablers can sleep well tonight, your mission was successful.

 

[BaronRenfrew]

I grew up on a hobby farm in Eastern Canada. I was interested in hunting and can recall skipping school in the spring to spend the day in the woods. It was a combination of riding a motorbike and listening for drumming grouse. I even tried to catch them with a fish net. When old enough to hunt I went hunting every day after school untill dark. After 4 months in the woods I was proud of my first "partridge" (ruffed grouse). My brother left behind a bunch of Field and Stream magazines as he was an avid fisherman. The hunting stories drew me in. Bobwhite quail, pheasants, grouse, partridge and the dogs that went with them.

My brother came home from a summer working as a cook in a hotel that catered to hunters and fisherman.

He literally stopped on the driveway into the farm, reached behind the seat for his .22 rifle, and shot a grouse on the driveway. This was November.

I was so disgusted with the monumental effort that went into my bird compared to his.

While unloading his truck, I unpacked a big cardboard box that was frozen solid. "What's in it?" " A few birds I shot on my days off." "Huh? How many did you get?" "I only went out a couple of days. I donno maybe 70." (In Northern Ontario in peak years the birds can be outrageously plentiful. The legal limit in possession is only 15 birds.)

I gave up hunting.

I started raising birds. I also attended my first bird auction and was hooked on the range of birds available to keep. I've kept ducks, geese, bantam and standard chickens, coturnix and bobwhite quail, Hungarian and Chukar Partridges, and ringneck pheasants.

Today I have quail, ringnecks, and some bantams. I have birds on the brain.

So what's your story?

 

[BaronRenfrew]

Oh: add pigeons and guineas to the list.

 

[ChickenladyinMN]

When I was a kid my mom hatched eggs for farmers that we knew. Over the years there was always something that ended up staying, and we lived in the city and eventually they banned people from having chickens in thier yards. When my daughter was in preschool her teacher brought in her baby chicks the kids thought they were neat we went to the farm supply store and picked a yellow chick, red chick and black chick. We were only going to keep them until they got big enough to send to a farm, then they started to lay eggs. That's when we decided to keep them for eggs only. One of the hens laid a bunch of eggs in the garage and we were going out of town so we put them in the incubater and 21 days later had our next generation. We ordered our next chickens, our Aracaunas we have 8 left out of 10. We have a rescue chicken - a little Banty that fell from the clutches of a hawk. Soon we hope to hatch some of our Aracauna's eggs.

 

[KingsCalls]

My wife and I decided to raise some chickens for the eggs. Started with Buff Orpingtons(about 12). We fell in love with them and bought 10 Barred Rocks. Once we had learned from our mistakes we decided to try bantams. Bought Seabrights (gold and silver), didn't much like them. We then bought Japs. in black tailed white, black tailed buff, blacks and gray's. Had good luck with these but, they were hard to sell and didn't lay a lot of eggs. Then we bought BB Red OEG bantams, kept these for about a year and then got some lemon blue OEG bantams. Kept these until just recently. The roo's were too aggresive!
We now have gone back to the beginning........Orpingtons. Standards in blue, black and buff...............bantams in blue, black and buff. Should have white's in both standard and bantams by fall. Orpingtons to us are the best all around bird. Personality, lay well, males are hardly ever aggressive and very friendly. We have also gotten fairly big into call ducks(gray and white) and have just gotten into "fainting goats". Now I'm wondering, what's next?

 

[Davaroo]

I read an article in Hobby Farms. I then got an incubator and ordered some eggs off ebay. The rest is history.

 

[Katy]

I was raised with chickens and when I got married 35 years ago I started my own laying flock.