Who here has some backyard chickens flying around? I know Ted Cruz has a flock of female chickens.
They wouldn’t last long with me... They’re too tasty.
Not exactly the ideal Brooklyn pet.
chickens help keep down on ticks which carry lyme disease- guinne foul do too-
Reminds me of the cartoon from 1932: “A Chicken in Every Garage.”
Backyard chickens keep the coyotes from eating cats, Yorkies and Chihuahuas; until you run out of chickens.
I have 3 Ameruacana’s. They run free and I built them a nice safe coop that they have to fly up to enter. They make me laugh every day.
If you really don’t like your neighbors, buy a couple dozen guineas instead. Plus they are are more adept to avoid your dogs who love chicken.
In the 1950’s, one of my close friends grew up in a semi-rural area, and his family raised chickens in the back yard.
My friend came down with ocular histoplasmosis, which is a fungus that thrives in soil mixed with bird droppings.
He permanently lost half the vision in one eye.
The domestic chicken is a not-so-distant variant of east asian jungle foul. They are designed to survive on insects and various things in a humid bamboo thicket.
Chickens are a gateway animal
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LrTBSLesW7I
Back a few years ago Mr. PanDowdy and I attended a meeting at the home of Andy Schneider, better known as the Chicken Whisperer®. http://www.chickenwhisperer.com
He showed us his Alpharetta (upscale bedroom community of Atlanta) home with it’s backyard chicken coops and showed us how to raise backyard chickens. It was amazing!
We decided to hold off raising our own chickens till we get moved full-time to our mountain property.... soon, soon.
And in a SHTF world would be indispensable.
Deed restrictions are mostly uniform and universally applied. For every house I have owned, including the one I live in now, in the woods on six acres, farm animals of any type are forbidden.
Yes, some people get away with raising chickens or other farm type animals. But with the restrictions an angry neighbor can exercise the power of the state on you at any time.
Ah.., one our families “hobbies”.
OK...here is our chicken ranching experience for our last “batch”:
Fifth or sixth generation usually 2 1/2 years egg production.
Live in rural Southeast Alaska predators include (in order of destuction):
Black Bear
Migrating hawks, spring and fall
Neighborhood dogs
Mink and Marten
An occasional Bald Eagle
Our chickens are kept in an enclosed area approximately 200’ in circumference plus pen.
Started with 25 last spring down to six right now waiting for local feed store to get chicks from Murray McMurray will purchase another couple dozen.
Three massacres occurred this last 12 months the most recent being a neighborhood dog getting into pen and killing 9 hens. Before that had a mink massacre of five birds at two in the morning. Last fall before hibernation a black bear broke down fence and killed five.
Didn’t lose any to hawks eagles or ravens of this last batch.
Used to let then run free, at night returning to pen seems like we lost less birds but gardens and flowers were not safe.
My pecan, fruit trees, and flowers have really produced this year due to the advantages of chickens. Of course, there is the added extra of fresh eggs every day.
I just got five Pekin ducks a few weeks ago; had chickens and ducks growing up and have a “wild” pair of Pekins hanging around the stream and thought it would be fun to get some more. I just wanted the eggs basically, since Pekins don’t normally brood (and are horrible mothers when they do), so that is all you get normally. But then I realized that if you mix in a few chicken hens they will sit on the duck eggs :) I think I will get some chickens next year and see what happens. I live in a pretty wild area, with a good number of predators, but the wild pair of Pekins have been here for the four years I’ve lived here and are thriving. I built them a duck house a month ago, but they haven’t used it yet.
Kramerica apartment-raised chickens are the way to go. Followed closely by Tyler Chicken.
We’ve no interest in chickens (our neighbors have them, along with sheep and goats). We have recently begun raising rabbits- should have our first litter next week. Much quieter, and always in their cages, so no predator worries. Manure is all piled up in one location, and gardeners are always glad to get it.