# Chicken keeping



## Anthony Reid (Jan 1, 2002)

Does anyone here keep chickens?

we are thinking about getting 3 or 4 when we sell our house and wondered if anyone on here has any advice for complete doughnuts - who have never looked after poultry.

We don't want to eat them (could never eat em) - but just as pets and egg layers 

Tony,
x


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## SueL (Mar 22, 2002)

Wizz does!


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## jeanette (May 3, 2003)

Hey Tony

Rich wants a goat!!!!!!

Mad hey !!

jeanettexx


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## Anthony Reid (Jan 1, 2002)

Thanks Sue!

Jeanette, I would love a goat - I have always loved them 

When I was young I lived near a city farm and spent a lot of time there. I spent most of my time with the kids(baby goats)... they have such a personality - kind of like excited children 

But mel says no 

Tony,
x
x


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## Dee (Jan 27, 2003)

Oh Mel .. give into the goat, hun!

The lawn will never need to be mowed again! 

As for chickens ... anyone else got the song in their head at the mo with easter coming up I keep finding myslef singing an amended version to Freddie (instead of breakfast we say easter) and then spookily it was on the Song Factory the other day!

Chick Chick Chick little Chicken
Lay a little egg for me!
I haven't had one since breakfast
And I want one for my tea!
So Chick Chick Chick little Chicken
Lay a little egg for me!​
Phew - pleased that is out of my system!


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## Jayne (Jan 26, 2003)

Interesting choice of pets    My uncle owns a working farm and has a huge flock of free range chickens in a field.  They are cute!  We don't see much of him these days, and all I can remember him telling me was about keeping a few roosters with the chickens because it was important to help them to keep laying and also for the social structure.  Don't know how true that is in practice, but it's what he said.  Think they take a fair amount of cleaning too, and smell!    Not sure about the veterninary side of them and what diseases they can get/be struck by, etc.  The ones on Big Brother always seemed ill!  

Sorry, not very helpful all that is it    Wishing you lots of luck with your new pet keeping venture though.  Will you get them from teeny chicks - arrrrr cute!  Jessica will love em   

Jayne x


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## Anthony Reid (Jan 1, 2002)

lol... dont know if we will get them from teeny chicks (although I think mel might make me)

Tony,
x


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## Pilchardcat (Feb 1, 2003)

You need a chicken igloo for them to sleep in, fox and badger proof   .....and thats all I know on the subject 

Good luck !   xx


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## Pilchardcat (Feb 1, 2003)

.........who's this  ...............


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## *Kim* (May 5, 2002)




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## Pilchardcat (Feb 1, 2003)

"They call him the Chicken Man"
        The Chicken Man
        The Chicken Man
They call him the Chicken man.....who lives down Essex way !


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## Mel (Jan 1, 2002)

Well you all know he is mad


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## Mummytoone (Mar 23, 2002)

If it helps, my bosses Mum is Head of the British Poultrey club, they have chicks at the moment, Could prob get you 3 or 4 if you want.
A good place to go is the South of England small holders show. I can find out when it is if you like. Or I could give you Sylvias phone number and you can call her, she is lovely.


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## Mummytoone (Mar 23, 2002)

http://www.seas.org.uk/diaidx.asp?m=7&y=2005

and another

http://www.poultryclub.org/


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## Mel (Jan 1, 2002)

Thanks for the links Lou and for the offer of the Chicks but Tonys idea is to get them when we move and we dont know what size garden we will get yet, so we will keep you in mind if thats ok 

Mel

x x


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## Nicky1 ☺ ☺ (Jul 9, 2004)

Awwww Ive always wanted a couple of chickens. 

I thought I'd be able to get some once we moved into our house, I had even twisted Johns arm to say yes!
But then someone told us we would need permission from the coucil to keep them (I can't see why when its my own house not the councils   but hey!) due to something or another and we just never got round to finding out how to go about it.

I had even planned witch part of the garden they would live in and my dad would build me the coop needed etc.. LOL

We are having to do with John finches,   ............for now  

Nicky x x x


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## Dee (Jan 27, 2003)

fingers-crossed said:


> The eggs taste so much better, but the poo well lol


Tony could "house train" them maybe? 

http://www.looniebin-of-jokes.com/pics/chicken.jpg


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## Nicky1 ☺ ☺ (Jul 9, 2004)

LOL Dee......










Nicky x x x


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## Wizz (Nov 6, 2002)

Awww Tony poor thing!!!! 
Take No Notice!   
(I secretly harbour goat keeping ambitions... but our next foray into livestock will have to be a bit more modest - bees! don't need to buy a field to accomodate bees.. )

We have an ark with a run that we move around the garden - can't let them roam very freely as 1. we want to keep our vegetables for ourselves and 2. we live in serious fox country. but they seem very happy enough in their run and we do tlet them out to "help" with the garden at the weekend...

our ark is a boughton from the forsham cottage arks range - they have a very comprehensive selection I think we ordered via a website

there are a few - well one or two chicken keepers on the garden chat board. Chicken keeping is brill! very easy, lots of lovely eggs and the chucks are hillarious to watch! Unfortunately we're now down to 2 chucks from the original 4 - (Penelope fell off the perch a coupkle of weeks ago ) so will be looking for a couple more soon. 
for LOADs of chicken keeping info for those new to it see the poultry thread on the rivercottage site http://forum.rivercottage.net/index.php discussion forum

Go for it tony!!!

wizz


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## Mel (Jan 1, 2002)

Thanks Wizz...

Im trying to ignore them but I keep finding little messages all round the site 

I'll check out that board though - thanks  . I did look around, but didnt find anything like that little gem 

Thanks again 

Tony,
x


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## Mookie (Aug 21, 2004)

DH used to have chickens when he was young (so quite a while ago! ).

They used to lay eggs and eat them but the best ones they used to show. I kid you not they used to ferry the chickens about the country and blow-dry them so they looked pretty!!!  

Information I should have been told before we were married!!!


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## Wizz (Nov 6, 2002)

I'll be looking out to hear your progress! Do you really have to wait til you move?!! The ark doesn't take up that much room... And i still get a thrill when i find a warm egg (2 yesterday - very thrilling!!)  - sad how we get our thirlls these days!!   

wizz


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## Jaq (Sep 23, 2003)

Hi all
We've got 6 Black Rock hens (except one (Ruby) is red - I think another cockerel must have got in on the act   ). Ours live in our paddock in a wooden house (made by DP out of exterior grade plywood, there is a book of hen house designs - another new hobby perhaps!) surrounded by an electric mesh fence, which we can move around every now and then. They are giving us around 4 eggs a day now, though we were down to 1 or 2 around Xmas as they were moulting and the days were so short - spring is a great time to get hens. Our neighbours got 2 Wellsummers last year, and they have a posh, bright yellow plastic egglu for them to live in.
A good book is "Starting with chickens" by Katie Thear. Oh, and I would recommend buying point-of-lay pullets (young girl chickens) - they will settle in and start laying a few days later (or in the case of ours, in the car on the way home   ).
Go for it!
Happy clucking!

Jaq

PS Your neighbours might think you've gone a bit mad as I bet you'll be like me, wandering around the garden making chicken noises as you "talk" to your hens.


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## Anthony Reid (Jan 1, 2002)

Wow 4 eggs a day - I bet your kitchen is full of 'Things to do with eggs' cookbooks 

We are thinking of starting out with four hens 

Not sure an Ark is going to be strong enough for us though - as the four or five foxes that live near the bottom of our garden somewhere,  come right up to the house and will sit there staring at you when you try to shush them away.

Way too tame  But lovely creatures though 

Tony,
x


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## Wizz (Nov 6, 2002)

Phew thought i'd "lost" the hobby board... !! obviously been swept up and reclassified in the housekeeping!    

tony - interesting what you say about the ark not being strong enough - and i guess it will be a worry with your foxy friends being so bold. we live in fox country (apparently quite densley populated with them) ourselves and shut the chucks up in their roost every evening and fingers crossed we've been OK- but there again haven't seen foxes about during the day. That said the ark is quite a robust structure so I don't really see hpw the fox could really get at them during the day anyway. When one of our friends lost her chucks to a fox it was at dawn/early morning and because the ark was opened out onto the garden (rather than a completely enclosed run) which wasn't fox proof.

anyway be good if you can sort something out when you move 
wizz


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## Anthony Reid (Jan 1, 2002)

I am guessing at what an Ark looks like... so perhaps it would be strong enough 

We have foxes in our garden everynight, the cheeky little buggers come up to our back door and tip the bins over. When you shout at them they will sit a few feet(10-15?) away just staring at you like your some kind of nut case 

It just worries me thats all 

Tony,
x


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## Jennifer (Jul 22, 2004)

I only just noticed this thread !  I keep chickens (4 hens and a minature cockeral) and they live in a childs wooden playhouse with glass paned window and door !  Very cute.  We put a wide shelf in there for nesting and a perch for roosting.  From 3 hens (the last one is not laying yet) we get on average 2 eggs per day !  Brilliant !  The eggs are like nothing you can buy.  We feed them corn, layers pellets and kitchen scraps.  They are really funny to watch and all have their own personalities, likes and dislikes !  
And, they eat all your slugs and snails !  Brilliant if you grow veggies like we do !

Chickens are great ! 

Jennifer xx


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## Jennifer (Jul 22, 2004)

http://www.thepoultryscene.co.uk/phpBB2/index.php

Check out this website for chicken keepers ! It is new and not very active but worth a look


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## sweetpeapodder (Feb 6, 2005)

I was all set for my chooks after moving to Scotland but when we got our deeds they said "no chicken keeping"    
Unbelievable!  We have a really good area at the back for them too - before my plans were so cruelly dashed I found some really good info at www.omlet.co.uk - they make the infamous egglu...


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## shupa (Jul 14, 2004)

Ah, the eglu! I am having one delivered on Tuesday. DH bought it for me for a wedding anniversary present. I can hardly wait!!!

Jo x


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## Nicky1 ☺ ☺ (Jul 9, 2004)

Wow they look soo cool! If I had chickens I'd have to be having one of those


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## shupa (Jul 14, 2004)

YAY! I am now a chicken mummy!  My three girls arrived this morning and now I am looking forward to the first eggs soon. Trying to think of names for them now...









Jo x


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## Guest (Aug 29, 2006)

please please please can someone answer this question for me, can chickens fly??   my mum and brother have been arguing about this since last xmas, if the answer is yes could you please send me a pic of the flying chicken in question?  

thanks, love n stuff, maz xxxxxxxxxx


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## shupa (Jul 14, 2004)

Hi Maz,

Didn't your mum and brother ever watch the film "Chicken Run"? Remember the Mel Gibson chicken who just pretended he could fly 

I have just found this on the Omlet (yes, really!) website... the people I bought my chickens from:

*"Will my chicken fly? 
There are very few breeds of chicken that can fly properly. A chickens flying could be described as making some large jumps. All our chickens have their wings clipped and are essentially ground dwelling animals. We will teach you how to clip their wings when we deliver your chickens." *

So now you win the argument, 

Jo x

PS, they can look at the FAQ where I found the answer if they go here:
http://www.omlet.co.uk/products_services/products_services.php?view=Chickens&about=faq


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## Guest (Sep 18, 2006)

hi jo,

my mum says you are wrong and shes right! (she was laughin btw) she said she knows that they can fly and she wont be told any different  

i think i might buy her a chicken and tell her shes got 3 months to make it fly, maybe then she will believe me  

 love maz xxx


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## shupa (Jul 14, 2004)

Well Maz, mine certainly can't manage it!!! She is welcome to come and train mine, I will be famous if she can do that!!!

Jo x


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## Ceri. (Sep 6, 2004)

If it helps the debate!!!.... my brother has chickens, and no his cant fly, they flap their wings and jump to a foot high but other than that no!


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