Timing for starting a flock

[Skipcurt]

So I finished the foundation to the coop today. Thank god!! I need to buy some stock in an ibuprofen company. Other good news is that a local farm finally contacted me back and said they could get all the birds I'm looking for with the Marek's vaccine and a month earlier AND for almost half the cost that I was quoted from a shipping hatchery.
Winner, Winner, chicken dinner!

 

[belindaschicks]

I live in wisconsin and have gotten chicks from meyer in May. I also have hatched in May. I have had no problems with them laying their first eggs in fall and all have continued to lay through winter. I have a mixed flock consisting of bantams, an EE, barred rock, RIR, Wyandotte, and Austrolop.

 

[Abriana]

The best timing for starting a flock I personally think is around April/May. It’s just beginning to get warm and you can, if you’re a beginner, have all summer to adjust and prepare for the first winter with chickens, which can, if you have large combed breeds that get frostbite or it gets really cold where you live, be quite stressful. Also they can find lots of yummy treats and start their life strong and happy.
Good luck starting a flock!

 

[henaynei]

Timely info for flock building
https://www.backyardchickens.com/articles/adding-to-your-flock.47756/

 

[Discofan]

I started all my chicks outside in a wire pen in the run. Temps were in the 20s, sometimes dropping into the teens, with snow still falling. They did great. Strong, active, confident....and off all heat and completely integrated with the rest of the flock by 4 weeks old. My first-ever batch I raised indoors with a heat lamp, and by 5.5 weeks it was either them or me! I put them out into the coop. The first two nights I had a heat lamp in there for them. Temps dropped down to 18 and I worried all night long, getting up to check them. They weren’t anywhere near the lamp - they were snuggled all comfy in a ball of beaks and feathers over in front of the pop door. They thrived. The morning of the third day I took the lamp out and I’ve never touched one again.

I ordered those chicks too early for my area, I know that now. I didn’t understand the concept of ordering and scheduling delivery for later at a better time of year, and that was strictly my fault. The day they arrived from MPC - a full day and a half after P.O. tracking showed they already been delivered to me, by the way - it was 17 below zero and late February. I finally put them out on April 1st. If I had waited until the “appropriate time”, according to the conventional way of doing things, they’d have been close to laying in the brooder box because that year our last snowfall was on June 6th.

April is a good time to get chicks in my opinion. However, around here the “normal” spring chick season is still pretty cold, snowy, and blustery, so we almost have to get a head start on things. You can’t go too wrong raising chicks if you just take a page from a broody hen, and they raise their babies successfully in all kinds of weather.

Happy to find this post. I’m in Louisville, KY and the nights can still get below 60 degrees in June. It sounds like I could get chicks in late March/Early April, and put them out in May/June and still be just fine. But if young chickens can thrive in that kind of cold up North, they would be fine going out in May here. I would of course choose breeds that are cold-tolerant to begin with!

 

[Crooked Chicken]

I am building my own coop. Right now setting the foundation blocks for a level structure. It is kicking my butt...well back really! I can't wait to start working with wood instead of concrete blocks and moving dirt. It will be a 6'x 13' overall with a 4'x 6' elevated henhouse with a single pitch sloped roof. Pretty typical of many coops.
I have ordered 1 female each of Barred Rock, Speckled Sussex, Golden Laced Wyandotte, Welsummer and an Easter Egger all with the Mareks vaccine.

So I finished the foundation to the coop today. Thank god!! I need to buy some stock in an ibuprofen company. Other good news is that a local farm finally contacted me back and said they could get all the birds I'm looking for with the Marek's vaccine and a month earlier AND for almost half the cost that I was quoted from a shipping hatchery.
Winner, Winner, chicken dinner!

I got my chicks in May of 2017 and all of the pullets laid by September. At least half are still laying through winter.

Since you are currently building your coop, keep in mind what you might wish to do in the future. If you decide to increase your flock eventually, it would be nice to build an in-coop brooder, storage for feed and supplies, hospital cage (in case of an injured bird). I would recommend poop boards under the roosts as it really makes cleaning a breeze.