Have you ever thought about owning chickens? Wondered what went in to keeping chickens, and what it was like having them? I know I haven’t shared a whole lot about our chickens here on the blog, but I’ve been receiving a lot of questions lately so I wanted to answer those questions, and maybe in the process answer a questions you’ve had as well. Full Disclaimer – I am no chicken expert, which is probably why I haven’t shared much in the past, but we have had our chickens now for four years, and have definitely learned a lot!
Come and meet our flock ~
Ok, first off, YES they all have names! Honestly one of the most exciting things about having chickens is getting baby chicks! You can hold them (which makes them friendlier as adults), and they are so tiny and fluffy, my kids have totally named them ALL!
We do not slaughter our chickens, we only keep them for their eggs (gotta make sure they are pulling their weight – no freeloaders, lol :p). So yes, they act more as “outdoor” pets, and we are totally ok with that. Which leads me too, what happens if they die? We have lost some along the way, due to natural causes (which I will explain in a minute), and it just allows us the chance to explain to our kids that it’s a natural part of life. Thankfully because they are not indoor pets, like our dog and cat, the kids aren’t quite as attached, but keeping chickens has given us easier opportunities to explain the circle of life in the animal kingdom to our kids, which makes it easier for them to cope when one dies.
Q: Are they high maintainence?
I always tell people, keeping chickens is like having goldfish. Once you have their living quarters established, there really isn’t a whole lot you need to do. Make sure they have fresh water, and food – which we have large containers for that only need to be refilled 1x a week – and that is pretty much it for the basic needs.
Q: Do they smell?
We have our coop about 25′ away from our house, off to one side of our yard. We don’t smell them from the house, or even from the porch or the yard. Chickens don’t have a farmyard smell like other livestock, in fact you know the coop needs to be cleaned if you start to smell it. You do however, smell their run if it gets seriously wet. It’s mostly in the spring after lots of rain, and you can smell them when sitting at our fire pit area – which is the closest outdoor space we have to them. It’s typically only when the wind blows, and they do smell ripe, lol. One trick I have found when the ground is very wet inside their run, is to put hay down over it, and that tends to block the smell from blowing around in the wind.
Q : What about predators?
We chose to place their coop on the side of our yard, vs. further in the back of our yard, or behind our barn, in hopes that with them being more visible it would deter predators from wanting to attack. We do have woods surrounding us, and after 4 years, we have been successful in keeping them safe. The first year we did have a large rodent try to dig in underneath the coop to gain access, but we built their run with chicken wire attached to the bottom as well, knowing that could potentially happen. Once their run was in place and attached to the coop, we filled it in with dirt.
We have not had an increase in rodents since adding the chickens.
Q: Do you let them out of their pen.
Yes! We let our chickens roam, but I keep them on a time schedule. Allow me to explain. The first year we had chickens, we had 6. And we would let them roam all day long. It amazed us to see that they wouldn’t ever go to far, even when exploring the woods around our yard, and that they instinctively “tucked” themselves in at the end of the day. Meaning once the sun began to set, they all just filed back into the coop one by one, without any prompting. It was fine letting them roam all day when we had just 6, but with adding baby chicks over the years, we found the more chickens the bigger the mess. Meaning their poops are quite big for a bird their size, and when they are roaming, where the poop lands is where it stays. I found myself needing to hose off our porch almost everyday – yuck! And they are particularly fond of bathing in my mulch beds, which leaves big holes, and my garden beds would get ruined.
And while they egg laying production is dictated by the amount of sunlight they get, I have also noticed that if they get to roam a little bit, they tend to lay more. So everyday around 4:30-5, we let them out. Their run that is attached to their coop is quite large – it holds up to 30 chickens, and we currently have 14. In waiting to let them out towards the end of the day, they get forage for grubs – bugs, ticks, mosquitos – which is an added bonus for us – and this gives them just enough time to wonder around, before they instinctively go back inside as the sun sets, without bathing in my mulch beds or pooping everywhere. It’s a win win for both of us, and just something I’ve found to be a good compromise 😉 Plus they are hysterical to watch wondering around, especially when they start to run.
Q: How often do you need to clean the coop?
In case you missed my post about our chicken coop, shared HERE, we built our coop. I drew out a rough sketch of what I wanted it to look like, and my hubby took that sketch and built the coop we have. We did do some researching online about chicken coops for features about their nesting boxes, the ramp and doors, and creating a slide out tray for the floor of the coop, that makes cleaning it so much easier! The floor in the coop is made up of 1×3 slats, leaving enough room for their poop to fall below onto a tray, that slides out from the bottom, and can be hosed down. Their coop gets cleaned about 6x a year, and that helps greatly with the smell as well!
They do stay in their coop all year round. In the winter we run an extension cord out to their coop with a heat lamp for when are temps drop down into the teens and below zero. You do need a minimum of 4 chickens to make it through the winter, as each chicken radiates heat, so they all huddle together and keep each other warm.
I have so much more I could share, so feel free to ask me more questions, as I will be working on a Chicken Keeping post 2.0, and a post just on the landscaping I’ve done around our coop, including the crushed stone, and can address any questions or things I didn’t cover in this post!
I’d love to know, if you have chickens, or have ever thought about getting some? Tell me in the comments below ~
I’m so glad you finally made a blog about this! My husband and daughter are wanting to get chickens so I keep researching everything I can to build the best coop and things they will need. This has been very informative, so thanks again!