Okay so does anyone do this for eggs?
If so, where do you buy the hens from etc......
It is something I have been thinking about lately.....

Nothin' as good as a fresh farm egg. You can get your baby chicks from a hatchery, the local farm store, neighbors, local swap meet and keep an eye on your local paper. Spread the word, you may find someone wanting to get rid of theirs. Do your research on housing and feed. Don't forget preditors either, racoons killed every one of my first batch of hens. Also coyotes, hawks and snakes do their dirty deeds too. Housing has to be very secure. The little banty's are really cute and there are chickens that lay colored eggs. Enjoy.

We had six chickens when I was little, was great to have fresh eggs. But they got killed by foxes eventually.

Then my Mom decided to get some again when I was a teenager. From what I remember it cost quite a bit for a good quality secure hen house. And the enclosure needs to have the chicken wire walls dug down and buried into the ground otherwise the foxes can pull it up if not secure enough. Despite all this the foxes got all of them one night when they were not shut away in the main hen house at night.

Don't let that put you off! I think it would be a great thing to do, depsite the initial cost of the hens and the equiptment and food etc, in the long run it will save you on buying eggs, and you can always sell the eggs too! And the sound of hens is so friendly and warm as they cluck at you in the morning. And you cal tell when they are laying an egg....squaaaaaaaaaaaaawwwwkkkkk!!!!

Henry, I had hens for eggs. I kept 6 and they were like pets. I would still keep them, but we built a house on the land where we used to keep them and no room now. As others mentioned, you need a secure hen house to house them at night. My hens were loose during the day to free range in the huge garden we used to have. I purchased my chicks at a feed store and they were not fully fledged. They had to stay in large box with a light on to keep warm. You feed them chicken feed which you can purcase at the feed store as well. They need to eat gravel too and fresh water too. And straw to roost on. Be prepared to muck their stalls - they poop a lot! It's all good though because it's an excellent fertilizer and be added to compost for the garden. I think they were about 4-5 months old when they started to lay. You don't need a rooster for eggs, only if you want baby chicks. Roosters can be mean!

Also, if they do not free range, they will quickly remove every blade of grass from their enclosure. It can get rather nasty and muddy.

Can't really add anything to the above - only add my vote for chicken keeping! I have six girls and they keep my family of four in eggs, my mum and dad mostly as well and some over for friends and family who visit. Last year for a while I was without chickens and the supermarket eggs - even the free-range farm fresh ones were tasteless in comparison. We do shut ours up every night in a little stone barn, though or the foxes would get them. We feed them layers pellets but I also cook up all scraps, veggy peelings etc on the back of the woodburner overnight - they love that!
In winter they free range the garden and eat lots of pests. From spring onwards, they're confined to a large run off the side of their house cos they eat the flowers otherwise! It is a very large run though, so I would still class them as free range.
K x

You can order them on line. Our local Tractor Supply store sell them and usually the feed stores. I can remember my dad picking them up at the PO :D

Wow you can order them online? Nothing ever ceases to amaze me.

I used to raise a flock of about 50 chickens, mainly for eggs. I would use what I needed and sell the excess. Cindy covered a lot so I won't repeat any of it. Here are some of the things I learned in addition to what Cindy covered. You want to either feed them back their shells or get oyster shell bits to throw on the ground for them. The calcium strengthens the shells - And YES, you can get the shells too strong. :P I always kept a rooster simply because fertilized eggs are higher in several nutrients. And despite what many people believe, if you get an egg with a blood spot inside, it is NOT because it is a fertilized egg. It is because the hen strained too hard to lay the egg, thus causing the blood spot. Poor hen! Depending on the breed of chicken, your hen can lay 1 egg every day or 1 egg every 1-3 days. Do NOT wash the eggs as you collect them. Each egg has a protective coating on it that is natural from the hen. This protection keeps bacteria and other nasties from getting through the membrane and making the egg bad.

Interesting facts...My aunt used to sell eggs to Albertsons. You can bury eggs in cool sand and they will remain good for up to a year. What a thought! :? Of course our society consumes eggs so rapidly that such methods are no longer needed and the eggs you get in the store are usually only 1-3 months old.

If you do not have anyone local who raises chickens to talk to, check out your local 4-H. They should have someone who will be able to give you all sorts of insight into raising chickens and will be able to point you in the right direction for where to buy the best chickens and equipment/feed for your area.

One thing to consider when buying feed. If the corn inside the feed has been genetically modified (which over 80% of the corn in America is now), you should realize that tests have shown that the modifications can be passed down into the egg. It is unknown how it affects the human body but I would be cautious feeding it to small children and infants. JMO.

Golden Comets are my favorite. I just ordered 3 dozen day old chicks through the hardware store. They come from a hatchery in Ohio. They will come in the mail on May 1st. I paid the extra for pullets rather than straight run (sexed females vs whatevers in the box). The college I work at is all about Creation Care and going green. I've been selling my extra eggs here at work for a couple of years now. Check your state Ag & Markets for regulations.

My new birds will start laying late August. Extension Office is a great resourse. You can even find online chat rooms about raising chickens. Chick starter to begin with, layer mash closer to laying time. With a good feed you shouldn't need to add extra grit (crushed oyster shell) to their diet. Layer boxes, a good perch, dry bedding, free choice their feed. My hen house is 12' x 12'. I do not let them out because of the dogs. We also have a bald eagle nesting near us and lots of hawks.

I bought 20 chicks two years ago and still have them all. They weren't happy with our long cold winter. Their egg production is coming back, about 14 eggs a day now. They'll be soup this fall.

We have one banty that came from the farm store. She's 3 and is just fun to have around.

Good luck,

Thanks everybody. You have been very helpful :)

Wow! 50! I am not wanting to raise that many but all of your information is something to think about. Thanks!

So whats a good chicken to get when you live in a small town and have a small backyard, so therefore would need to build a small coop and run????

I like the colored breeds. They tend to be a quieter bird and easier to handle. Here's a link http://www.ridgwayhatchery.com/chickens.htm

Thanks for the link! :)

My DD has a rooster, and I'm asking for another for my son. I have also been wanting to get a few chickens, but we will have to expand our lot. I want to get some banty chickens, the small ones that lay really small eggs. My Aunt is also going to bring me a Rhode Island Red! :D
Farm fresh eggs are the best!
Do you have a local feed store? At ours, they have a yearly "chick day", when you buy a sack of feed and get so many biddies for free. Or you can order whatever kinds of chickens and roosters you want from there.
I can hear DD's new rooster crowing right now. He's white with feathers on his feet. The other one I'm going to ask if my son can have is red. They're just going to butcher them, I think, so I may save his life!

One thing I would caution against bantams, cute and lovely as they are - mine were always going broody, which is great if you want to hatch more chicks (obviously you must have a rooster!) but NOT if you want them for eggs. I don't keep bantams anymore for this reason.

K x

a regular rooster and a banty/bantum hen would....be the same?

My brother-in-law has a couple of chickens just for the eggs. He was telling me the other day about live chicks for sale at Rural King.

I used to be a free range chicken farmer and agree 100% on Comets - huge brown eggs, not too broody, and such sweet dispositions! Purple Wyandottes are another favorite of mine, but they are sneaky and can escape pens and end up in crazy places (mine were nicknamed the Houdini sisters).

You are in Wake County, right? There used to be some big hatcheries near Pittsford, I believe. The Raleigh fairgrounds flea market may have som, too. The County Home extension office can get you in touch with local hatcheries. You may want to get some older chicks rather than invest in lights and chick waterers. Put an ad in your local Craigslist for poultry supplies. I used the hanging feeders that could not be tipped over. on one wall of the henhouse, I kept a small feeder full of oyster shell in case they wanted some - one bag lasted years.

You want to make sure you can secure them at night - raccoons will see a henhouse as a KFC!

I dont know if we have a local feed store or not and I dont have a yellow pages so I am going to look it up online and see.

I talked to my grandma. She used to keep chickens, she told me to get the Rhode Island Red or to get the Banty chickens cause they are small and lay small eggs if space is a concern for me.

I hadn't heard about Comets. I do need one that is of a sweet disposition...LOL I dont want to be pecked to death for trying to get their eggs...LOL
Yes I am in Wake County. Ill try the fairgrounds flea market and Ill call the county home extension as well.

Henry,

Check out the Eglu!
http://www.mypetchicken.com/Chicken_...ens_-P127.aspx

Talking about the chickens has brought back so many fond memories! All 6 of my girls had names and would you believe one was named Henrietta, LOL. They were Buff Orpingtons, very sweet disposition. It was so funny to watch them pecking in the garden. If one found a bug or scratched up a worm, they'd all come running. Chicken fight! Well, squabble really. My Corgi dog would herd them into their coop each evening, and believe me she could count. Now I am longing for hens again. The Eglu might just do the trick.

Hmmm interesting.....this might be an option.

Orpingtons:
http://www.backyardchickens.com/breeds/orpingtons.html

They get my vote for the gentleman/woman farmer :D

Edited to correct my link

That looks like a good breed, thanks for the link.

The spot I want to build the coop and put them in.

Well we have had chickens now for about 10 years and have learned a few things about chickens that might help you even though we live in Australia.
Ours got mites. little black things on parts of the chickens body that isnt covered by fur..we got told we had to by this insecticide and hold the chickens by their legs (poor chickens) and dunk them in a bucket full of insecticide which they didnt like and we didnt like doing. We finally found another method which works just as well. You get vaseline (petroleum jelly which you use on your lips etc)and smear liberally all over the mites and it suffocates them. The way to avoid mites is to have a coop off the ground and with a floor as since we built the new coop we have had no problems. When building your coop think of ease of getting in there and cleaning it out, ours opens up on one side and we have a little door for the chickens to get in and out with a ramp so they can get up there as our coop is about a metre off the ground. Also they eventually eat and scratch there way to a coop that is all sand and no grass etc so we built our coop with a run on each side so when one side is exhausted we put them in the other side to let the other side recover. I usually throw out wheat and let it grow and let them in there when it is about knee high and they love it. We also have a problem with crows stealing eggs as our coop is not covered so if you have crows you should maybe think about covering your coop. We also had foxes kill our chickens but again had no problems now that we have dug in tin to about 1/2 a metre deep all around but wire would do the same thing. I love my chickens and enjoy sitting outside just watching them scratching away just something that makes me feel so relaxed...our chickens are like a pet and live out their days as i could never ever kill one..wish you all the best with your chickens and if you have any other questions dont hesitate to ask.
Helen

We raised chickens for meat & for eggs both. There is a difference so be sure you get the right kind. Broilers are for meat only. We used to order chickens online all the time and we also got eggs and hatched our own.

Murray McMurray Hatchery in Webster City, Iowa. They will come through the mail. Our post office would call and ask us to pick them up because they were so noisy.

My DH raised exotics. We had pink, blue, green, brown and occasionally even white eggs.

If you have a fireplace or woodstove, wood ashes kill mites- just throw them in a place where they like to take dust baths, like under a bush. I've never really had a problem with them.

thanks for the advice :)

Hey thanks for that tip - will definitely try that on my girls!

K x

PS Evil thought - better make sure the ashes are cool first otherwise might end up with roast chicken! :lol:

LOL :)

Henry,

We always had RI Reds when I was a kid, nice sized brown eggs (we got a premium price for brown eggs) Roosters were meaner than mean, but my mom wasn't afraid of them at all!! They usually ended in the soup pot, although one particularily mean one (he attacked a grandkid) just ended up in a hole out back :shock: :shock: (moral of the story..don't tick off mom!!) The locals around your place can probably give the best advice as far as coops and predators, and they don't mind your asking!! Seems to me they molted every year and didn't lay very often at that time. My memory could be wrong though :lol: Have fun and learn lots!!

Thanks :)

UPDATE:

Was telling my neighbor about my idea and she said she thinks the town has to approve of me having chickens and that I can have no more than 4 chickens on my land. I thought we were not within the town limits so I am going to have to go check tomorrow or friday.

Oh, good luck Henry, hope you can get some. There are places in the UK where you can't keep chickens. Where I live in France, every second house has them!

K x

I have really enjoyed reading this thread! I have learned so much about chickens. :wink:

Couldnt talk to the person that knows anything cause they are on vacation til next week.