How to keep Chickens in a City...

rayb · Hot Air Balloon

How to keep Chickens in a City...

Roper · Senior Bucketkeeper

Many of the Hispanic families in our neighborhood have chickens in their yards. They seem to be able to hold thair own against the other urban critters, and they do an excellent job of controlling the bug population. I'm seriously considering getting a few.

bokbadok · Senior Bucketkeeper

I had chickens when I lived in San Jose, CA. I loved them. LOVED.

The only downside was that when allowed to roam in the yard, they left droppings everywhere, including all over the patio. So unless you've got a good fenced off area or orchard or something, it's really better to keep them contained. But then the bug control doesn't work quite so well. I would love to have chickens again, but it hasn't worked out just yet. Still hoping to figure out a way to do it.

Convert · Veteran Member

I was going to start raising a few but discovered that our local laws prohibit it. Dang!!!

For such a small Mormon community, they sure are into controlling other people's lives.

If you can do it more power to you, I wish you well. Check out portable pens, they look handy.

Cocobeem · Keeper of the Holy Grail

Yea! I found the chicken thread!

Okay, #1- Skip the rooster. Seriously. He's useless. And a pain in the butt. Hens don't need roosters to lay eggs and all he does is want to jump them all day long and pretty soon they have no feathers left on their backs. They just. don't. need it.

#2- We use two old wooden dog houses for their "coop". We put grass clippings in them when we mow the lawn. We have 3 hens and they'd probably only need one, but we had two of them, so there.

Note- we also have a rooster, but he's going bye-bye at the county fair in a few months.

We have ours secured away from the garden and also in good enough fencing that dogs can't get to them. Ours happen to be aggressive enough to take care of cats on their own.

Note- if you get a hen who's "broody" which means she won't get off the eggs and won't let you take them, you have to force her off the nest or she'll wait for them to hatch. If there's no rooster, she'll be waiting there forever and be quite disappointed in the end. One of our hens got broody and she raised 3 chicks - she sat on those eggs for DAYS without eating or drinking. Chicks were so fun, though.

rayb · Hot Air Balloon

how much space do you have for your chickens?

Cocobeem · Keeper of the Holy Grail

Well, not that much right now. I wish we had more, but it's a triangle shaped piece that's about 18' on one side and around 20-22' on the other two sides. That's just a guesstimate without going out there and eyeballing it. Once the garden is mature toward the fall and throughout the winter, they'll have about 100' by 50' or something...

We do give them all the kitchen scraps in addition to chicken feed from the feed store, so hopefully their diet during this gardening time makes up for their ability to forage as much for bugs, etc...

rayb · Hot Air Balloon

Are chickens loud?

arbilad · Head Chef

Yes, even without a rooster, chickens are loud. For instance, when laying an egg they are really loud.

bokbadok · Senior Bucketkeeper

Which happens once a day.

Yes, hens cackle, and it seems like one gets going and they'll all join in. But it's not like they do it constantly. They certainly cackle less often and loudly than the average dog.

PollyAnna · Senior Bucketkeeper

I grew up having chickens around, and I hated the rooster... I believe the feeling was mutual... I lived in many "Pensions" that had chickens on my mission... I always KNEW when we were having chicken for supper... weirdface

Cocobeem · Keeper of the Holy Grail

Our chickens are not loud. They do a little small-time clucking when it's feeding time, but really not much at all. And I've never "heard" them laying an egg. rolleyes

We've had several double-yokers, for the record. biggrin

Now that's something fun for the kids to see! They lay eggs according to hours of light, so you can almost "induce" some double-yoker eggs if you let them just have natural light until say Christmas, then suddenly give them a heatlamp for several extra hours in the evenings... whammo! When the kids go get the eggs and one is like... HUGE... it's just fun. wink

rayb · Hot Air Balloon

I'm feeling deprived... I'm chicken retarded... double-yolkers... sigh...

Cocobeem · Keeper of the Holy Grail

Hey, it's never too late, ray. What- you act like your life is over!! Come on!! Find the place with the best chicks, and jump right in!! This is something worth experiencing. All of a sudden all those sayings like "mad as a wet hen" or "pecking order" or "i feel so hen-pecked" or "i rule the roost" or "egg on your face" or "i feel cooped up" or "walking on eggshells" or "don't count your chickens before they're hatched" or "don't put all your eggs in one basket" or "you have to break eggs to make an omelet" or "running around like a chicken with its head cut off" or "ruffled your feathers" or "that's a bad egg" or "i'm going to wring his neck" or "soft as a downy chick" ... become really meaningful! Not just thoughtless sayings...You can actually *live* them!

Here's something for ya, too--

THE TOP TEN REASONS FOR
RAISING YOUR OWN CHICKENS

1. Taste & Freshness - Personal chickens are the ultimate source of truly fresh eggs, and nothing beats the flavor of home raised chickens

2. Educational - Your kids won't need a lot of diagrams about sex education if you have a rooster and hens

3. Health & Safety - There's virtually no risk of antibiotic resistant bacteria living in home raised meat or eggs, and if you whack 'em yourself, there's less chance of fecal bacterial contamination that's in a lot of store bought chicken

4. Great Pets - Safer than dogs, chickens make great pets that require little care, produce fertilizer, eat bugs, are very cute, and give eggs at almost no cost, plus, if you get tired of them, you can eat them

5. 4-H kids in the City - Since chickens are smaller than cows, urban 4-H kids can keep poultry to learn about responsibility

6. Outlaws - Urbanites with chickens are an elite vanguard that gets to ignore stupid laws

7. Cultural - You'll have something to talk about with ethnic groups that are used to raising their own fowl

8. Awakenings - If your flock has a rooster, nobody within a hundred yards will need an alarm clock (read response from a Roosters Neighbor)

9. Variety - Genetically diverse small flocks preserve rare breeds, like ethically run companies maintain honest CEO breeding stock

10. Fashionable - Keeping chickens is stylish no matter what else happens to you. Just ask Martha.

Euphrasie · Senior Bucketkeeper

#2

Just a note on the fertilizer...it's very high in nitrogen. If I used it on my garden, I'd burn it to a crisp. Not that I have chickens. Or fertilizer. Just, you know, hypothetically speaking.

salesortonscom · Wise and Revered Master

Mahonri wrote:

The neighborhood just to the south is full of chickens. They run all over the place, poop everywhere and wake us up crowing each morning. We don't get the advantage of the eggs that way...It's funny because the roads have "Chicken Crossing" signs all over.

Same here. Whenever there's a big wind storm animals wander into our place. We have picked up a turkey and a goose. We posted signs but they were never claimed. Didn't want to let them just run loose though for fear they would be run over.

arbilad · Head Chef

We need to get some more chickens. A skunk got the chickens roosting low to the ground, and some other animal tore the heads off the other chickens. Plus we need to fix our coop, but that's another story.
Anyway, my son likes white eggs. I have no problem with brown eggs, but I was thinking that, as long as we were getting new chickens maybe we could get a chicken that lays white eggs in addition to the brown egg layers. I really like blue andalusians, but I found on a website that they are not cold hardy. How serious of a problem would that be in winter? We don't heat our coop, but we do give them plenty of bedding and insulate it with bales of straw on the outside.
Does anyone have any experience with blue andalusians? I just don't want to buy a boring leghorn.

Cocobeem · Keeper of the Holy Grail

Hey, get those ones that lay easter eggs! What are they called? Aracauna or Americana or something... they have like blue pastel, green pastel, etc... our neighbor has some.

Basically I think if it gets below 10-15*F, give them a simple heat lamp aimed into the coop and they should be fine. We do nothing for ours, even when it's below 0*F and they're fine. We have brown egg-layers, though.

arbilad · Head Chef

Your neighbor probably has Americanas - we had a couple too. We only got green eggs out of them. We're probably going to get some more.
Araucanas are much, much rarer. They have no tail, in addition to laying easter eggs. We also had buff orpingtons, banded rocks, and black autralorps. We'll probably get roughly the same mix again.

rayb · Hot Air Balloon

Man, this group's chicken lore is amazing. Just for this reason alone do I keep checking out Bountiful... :)

--Ray

Cocobeem · Keeper of the Holy Grail

What do you mean they have no tail? Dang rooster's fault, I tell ya.

Mahonri · Senior Bucketkeeper

Tonight we are deciding if I am going on the hike up Picacho Peak or if I'm going to stay home and make a chicken coop. I really do want to buys some chickens for the back yard..

arbilad · Head Chef

You're probably not going to be able to get chicks until spring comes. Of course, having the coop ready beforehand always helps.

DaKnife · Senior Member

Put a chickenwire fence around the city? That will keep your chickens in the city.

PollyAnna · Senior Bucketkeeper

DaKnife... your post made me laugh uproariously cause a couple days ago the neighbor's rooster got out and was terrorizing our small dog in his own dog run, through the fence. (He is a REALLY mean bird, and the neighbor was almost unable to retrieve him...) Anyway, hubby's comment was, "where is a coyote when you need one???"

Their property looks like a "compound" for all the chicken wire... and the blasted rooster still gets out.