i wanna practice castrating roosters; anybody wanna sacrifice one to the cause??

[Edited on July 9, 2010 at 6:34 PM. Reason : deux]

7/9/2010 6:34:05 PM

haha, I'll help!

7/10/2010 12:32:31 AM

i gots dem eggz

7/12/2010 5:26:27 PM

here's the converted rabbit pen. the white shit on the floor is some cabbage i tore up and gave them. so far they only lay in that square bucket. it was a beneful dog food bucket i found amongst the junk in the woods behind this place. the square lid is hinged, so i tore the large part off and put it with the remaining lid piece down. i stuck some wheat straw in there and the remaining lid piece keeps it in. the other bucket sits upside down and i cut an arch shape in it. i'll take some more pics of those nests if anyone is interested it it. plastic beats the hell out of wood for chicken nests b/c it won't rot away due to the chicken shit. the shit just sprays right off with a water hose too. there's also some straw in that enclosed house thing, which has a door on the end that you can't see in those pics. there was some 2x4 along the floor, so that's the reason for the funny-shaped entrance. i put as little time and effort into it as possible.

right now i'm putting my laying mash in some divided dishes like you would feed a cat in simply because they were laying out there in the woods and were $free. the chickens waste too much food out of them with their scratching, so i'm gonna have to get something different. any suggestions? i was thinking about one of those long trough things with the top that snaps on and has the holes for them to stick their beaks through.

[Edited on July 12, 2010 at 7:58 PM. Reason : afds]

7/12/2010 7:56:49 PM

found a deal on some rhode island reds from a guy i know, so i'm gonna build another coop and get me about 15 of them i think

should be getting 1-1.5 dozen per day, so i'll have some to sell

7/16/2010 9:49:02 PM

now i've got:

2 red sex links
3 black sex links
9 rhode island reds
4 orange/black/etc. that i have no idea what are
1 mottled up gray hen that idk what is

i'll post some pics sometime and maybe y'all can tell me what they are

7/27/2010 9:58:47 PM

here's the pen when i was still working on it.


i put one of grandaddy's old nests from his commercial chicken houses in there. also modified some of his old automatic rooster feeders.


got one of his old automatic waterers. it still needs some adjusting and maybe a new spring if i can find one.


what breeds are these? i have one of the gray ones and 4 of the orange ones.

7/30/2010 8:25:13 AM

^ hard to say. looks like they are still growing out some

7/30/2010 8:46:52 AM

i'll post some more pics when they're grown

[Edited on July 30, 2010 at 8:52 AM. Reason : i don't really care as long as they lay eggs pretty good. just curious i guess.]

7/30/2010 8:50:09 AM

one of those funny-looking yellow chickens has started laying. she lays a really dark brown egg. not as dark as a cuckoo maran egg, but still pretty dark.

9/18/2010 11:18:38 PM

give me your eggs

5/29/2011 8:51:06 PM

There's a chicken coop on Cox Street behind the YMCA, next to one of the overflow parking lots.

5/29/2011 9:10:39 PM

i get 12-14 eggs per day in this kind of weather

5/29/2011 9:12:17 PM

This is at least a year in my future but I've been doing more research. I know the basics of chicken farming after working on one but am curious what breeds other backyard breeders go with in this area. I'm thinking I might go with some Rhode Island Reds and maybe an "easter egger" just for shits and giggles. I worked with commercial breeds so don't know too much about the heritage breeds.

5/29/2011 9:20:49 PM

rhode island reds and sex links (stars) are easy to find at a decent price and they both lay very well

don't overcomplicate it with all the crap you read online. raising chickens is unbelievably simple. laying mash, water, scrap fruits/vegs, and some oyster shell to keep the shells hard. that's all there is to it.

my sister got a pair of those that lay the green/blue eggs and threw them in with grandaddy's sex links. they didn't mix well and they died soon after that, due to constant anxiety i think.

[Edited on May 29, 2011 at 9:26 PM. Reason : dasf]

[Edited on May 29, 2011 at 9:27 PM. Reason : grandaddy was a commercial chicken farmer for a long time. 2 large houses.]

5/29/2011 9:24:32 PM

Yeah some of the coop designs I have seen online are ridiculous haha. I'm building a coop, not a townhome My main goals in building a coop and run are easy access to the eggs and easy to open up and clean. Since I only plan on having about five hens I'm not going to need anything large. I'm thinking something like this: but probably simpler in design.

Will definitely be a change from the commercial hatchery I worked in

5/29/2011 9:34:04 PM

why do you need an enclosed house? my chickens just have a tin roof and 3 tin sides and they laid all through the winter. not in the numbers they do when it's warm, but better than most other folks' chickens did this past winter.

let all the shit fall on the ground and then all you have to do is rake/shovel the straw/mulch/shavings out every once in a while.

[Edited on May 29, 2011 at 9:38 PM. Reason : they roost on some limbs i nailed up in the top of the 3-sided house thing]

5/29/2011 9:37:37 PM

It has to do with the chicken laws in Raleigh more than anything.

5/29/2011 9:45:08 PM

haha do they have a coop inspector or something?

5/29/2011 9:45:38 PM

In Durham they actually do! Which I think is pretty ridiculous. In Raleigh it's not that bad but apparently if a neighbor is a douche and complains about your chickens animal control can come and seize them if your coop doesn't meet their requirements.

5/29/2011 9:47:10 PM

do you have a link to their requirements?

that's dumb as shit. i could turn my chickens loose in the woods and the only thing they'd have to worry about is predators.

[Edited on May 29, 2011 at 9:53 PM. Reason : raleigh probably wouldn't like the way i let my dog just roam free either. love the country.]

5/29/2011 9:49:38 PM

I'm trying to find them online right now actually I have a paper copy laying around from when I did the Tour d'Coop a few years ago.

Here is Durham's ridiculous system: http://www.ci.durham.nc.us/departments/planning/limited_ag_permit.cfm

I have a friend that went through the process a year ago and he said they were downright retarded with the things they made him change about his coop when they came to inspect it. Things like he didn't have the wire extending out far enough from the coop to keep out predators, when he had it out and buried 6'.

5/29/2011 9:53:18 PM

haha the way i looked at it, chickens are cheaper than the materials to do all that predator proofing. if a dog digs in there, oh well.

5/29/2011 9:54:57 PM

That's kind of how I feel too. And I have no qualms with butchering and stewing a chicken once it falls out of production. But usually these city chicken laws are written by people who are horrified by the idea of killing the meat they eat

5/29/2011 9:57:27 PM

by the time they quit laying they're barely fit for boiling imo.

better used as coyote bait up here

[Edited on May 29, 2011 at 9:59 PM. Reason : if i'mma spend time butchering something it's gonna be something tasty like a deer]

5/29/2011 9:59:07 PM

haha yeah the meat will be tough as hell but it still makes a delicious broth

5/29/2011 9:59:57 PM

oh yeah, especially if you get them as fat as i've got mine

5/29/2011 10:00:54 PM

^ x a lot- Durham's laws are a bitch to build to code. Our pen had to be completely enclosed, even on top, with fence going down a foot underground. Coop is elevated with so many square feet per chicken, and so is pen. It looks nice but it took us about 6 months to build, on and off, on the weekends with 3 kinds of chicken wire.

You have to get a limited ag permit, and ask all your neighbors for permission, which was a huge pain in the ass for us because one of the neighboring landlords lives in Anchorage, AK.

+ side is we haven't lost any chickens and I know where the eggs are. We get about 9-12/day, depending on the weather. They lay less when it's 98 like it is right now.

5/30/2011 2:27:42 PM

bump

4/5/2012 10:18:13 AM

I was running with the dog when all of a sudden she starts pulling hard right out of no where. There were chickens all over the side of the road. They must have flown the coop (haha I just really wanted to say that! The coop was pretty far away though) Apparently these people just let their chickens do and go wherever they want

4/5/2012 10:27:55 AM

Building a coop this weekend. Did people use treated wood, or just paint it? My father expresses some concern with them plucking at the wood. thoughts?

4/5/2012 10:30:05 AM

Guy down the street from my parents' place just used pressure treated wood.

4/5/2012 10:35:31 AM

I used treated.

4/5/2012 10:53:38 AM

Do they pick away at the wood at all?

4/5/2012 10:56:59 AM

mine don't

4/5/2012 10:59:59 AM

^^ When I worked on a chicken farm some of the chicken would do that but I think that has more to do with the conditions they're kept in than natural chicken behavior. Chickens with lots of space to roam (at least for a chicken) probably have better things to do with their time than peck at wood.

4/5/2012 3:07:40 PM

Almost there

6/3/2012 12:40:25 PM

We used pressure treated wood and then painted it with non-toxic paint. Seems to work. That reminds me, I need to re-stain the pen this summer.

6/3/2012 12:46:56 PM

I dont think I ever put my finished coop up. It's a meh picture. I'll get a better one later.

4/9/2013 8:04:45 PM

nice coop! where'd you get the plan?

4/17/2013 12:03:36 PM

BTTT...I just picked up 6 chicks to add to the 3 hens I have. Anybody else raising chickens at this time?

1/27/2016 2:15:20 PM

I just had to get rid of all mine because of my job. Fortunately, my neighbor wanted chickens so I gave everything to him, now I still get fresh eggs and don't have to pay for feed (and the bantam still jumps over the fence and comes to roost in her old coop every now and then)

1/28/2016 9:03:16 AM

My mom has 14 chickens that I help out with, she does the tour de coop every year too.

[Edited on January 28, 2016 at 9:24 AM. Reason : ]

1/28/2016 9:24:07 AM

1/28/2016 9:53:41 AM

Raising another batch of chicks this year, they're coming in May. Going to split the batch with another homesteader.

Speckled Sussex
Australorps
New Hampshire Red
Ameracaunas

and some ducks! Gonna try raising some Khaki Campbells this year

2/2/2016 11:47:57 AM

^nice!

had some asshole predator (not sure if chicken-hawk or raccoon...) raid my coop yesterday. getting a new coop on Saturday, but had to reinforce the old one. lost one chick, have one with a messed up wing, and 3 others with some comb damage. poor chicks...

3/8/2016 9:24:47 AM

^^where are you homesteading?

3/8/2016 1:02:05 PM

Good ole Durm. Got goats and horses too, but they're boarded in Hillsborough.

3/11/2016 3:02:11 AM

bttt. Anyone raising chickens still on here? What do you do with all the eggs?

5/30/2017 8:16:57 PM

Give them away? Sell them? How many do you produce?

5/30/2017 9:03:53 PM