Hey y´all! I am just wondering how you take care of your chickens because I am getting chickens soon. Are there any recommendations on maintaining these wonder-foul creatures?
Some great posts above. We are all unique, we have different goals and reasons for having chickens, different climates, different amounts or room, different experiences, different flock make-ups, different risk tolerances, and a lot else. The details are going to vary a lot.
To me the basic needs are food, water, predator protection, climate protection, and certain things for health. You can get a lot of different opinions on these on this forum.
They need appropriate food. What is appropriate for yours will depend on age, sex, purpose. and your management techniques. You can get some really widely varying opinions on what is appropriate. I'd need to know details before I could make any specific recommendations.
They need plenty of water and it needs to be clean. There are many different kinds of waterers so details will vary as to how you maintain that. If you are watering with an open bowl they can poop in is one situation. If you are using a closed system, say with nipples, then the maintenance requirements change. What does not change is the requirement for clean water.
A lot of different things like to eat chicken. Again, different people have different perspectives on this. Some people that free range may accept an occasional loss due to their perceived benefits of free ranging. Others will be devastated at the loss of one chicken. It is your responsibility to protect them according to your risk tolerances.
Your specific climate will affect what you need to do for climate protection. In most of Texas your winters should not be that brutal and chickens can handle cold much better than many people realize. They do need to be able to avoid cold winds. Snow can be an issue if they are not used to it, not because of immediate danger but because it is strange and they don't trust it. Your summer might be pretty brutal, again depending on exactly where you are. In high heat they need shade and plenty of water as a minimum. Some of us need to go to extraordinary measures to keep them cool enough.
Health is a wide topic. As always, there are lots of different opinions on what is the best way to go.
A constantly wet coop or run is a health threat. When the weather sets in wet you may be challenged in keeping things dry. They need dry places to go to get out of the wet. Try to set things up so water drains away instead of flows to your facilities and stands.
Chickens can get a lot of diseases or parasites. I try to limit their contact with other chickens and use certain biosecurity measures to try to not bring something home to them. Others are a lot more relaxed in this.
I'll put space in this health category. I find the tighter I pack them the more behavioral problems I have to deal with, the harder I have to work, and the less flexibility I have it deal with issues as they come up. If you follow the link in my signature below you'll see some of my thoughts on space. Lack of sufficient space can cause you a lot of misery and aggravation.
Poop management. Dry poop isn't usually that big of a deal. It just isn't. But if it gets wet and especially stays wet it is. If it gets wet it can stink and be very unhealthy. It can make a mess if you step in it or they do. They can track it onto their eggs. That wet may come from water, that's why you need to keep things dry. If the poop builds up to a thickness it can stay wet and never dry out. Lots of different ways to manage poop. Some deal with it daily, some of us use different schedules and different techniques.
Above all, be flexible as you can. Many things do not work out as you expect. That's just the way life is. If something is not working, change it. If you can give us the details of what you are working with and what you want to accomplish we can often help with that. But there are so many different ways you can do practically any of these things I'm not going to try to give you a point-by-point list.
Welcome to the forum and welcome to your chicken journey. It should be interesting and may even be a lot of fun.
