Topic: i want chickens

[abstract gardener]

i will swap my chinese water dragon, with fully set up vivarian for some nice chucks.

[Jesse]

AG, what do you want the chickens for? Can't help flashing through my mind that you want to trade so that you can feed some rather large python or something!   :o

I am having a chicken run built (by my lovely husband) and hope to have some chickens soon. A friend is going to get some rescue hens for me for 50p each. When they farm hens in barns they only keep them for 1 year and then get rid of them. Perhaps you could find out if someone does a similar thing where you live. That's of course if no one wants to trade your water dragon! Won't you miss him?

[gilgamesh]

"Rescue" birds are not a good idea IMO. Lots of possible problems, so unless you are pretty up on poultry keeping, I'd avoid them. Also, I don't want to give hen jailers even 50p a victim.

[Jesse]

Oh dear, here I was thinking I was going to be good and help a hen. Please tell me what kind of problems I might expect, I don't want a huge problem on my hands. I was planning to buy two hens from a breeder (one Welsummer and one Rhode Island Red) and get one rescue hen. I thought barn hens would not be a problem as perhaps battery hens could be.

[gilgamesh]

Most "rescue" hens are of course laying hybrids. they are deliberately bred to produce maximum egg output in the first year, longevity isn't a desideratum. Depending on how they've been fed, their immune systems are often impaired (continuing use of antibiotics) and exposure to "outdoor" hens can roll them over (like the Carib indians when Columbus' men arrived), they often have difficulty in feeding (though that usually doesn't last long). The biggest problem is when they return to laying. They have a distinct tendency to suffer form what we oldtimers called "burst egg bag", more accurately internal laying, which leads to death by peritonitis. I'd recommend you to go & ask the denizens of sci.agriculture.poultry - some there have done this successfully, but I suspect some will agree with my views to varying extents.

[Jesse]

Gilgamesh, thanks for your advice. I have decided not to go that route as the hens will be kept as "pets" for my two young children and I don't want any unnecessary heartache for them. On second though I also think it better to support humane breeders rather than the "jailers", I had not thought of it from that perspective. Thanks.

[gilgamesh]

For long-lived pets, which produce a reasonable number of eggs and are fairly trouble-free, I'd suggest bantams rather than full-sized birds - avoid feather footed breeds as they need to be kept on boards or wire rather than the soil. Try rosecombs, or one of the Sussex varieties, and you can probably anticipate between 5 & 10 years of interesting ownership. If you want full-sized layers, I'd say you cannot do better than Black Rocks.

[Ceri]

While not disagreeing with any of the risks pointed out by gilgamesh, on a purely practical note, a friend of mine keeps a dozen chucks or more and 'rescues' them all from egg farms.  (He also keeps peafowl in his wood so I guess counts as a knowledgeable bird man!)  He just keeps them for rescuing sake - frankly when you have your own wood, and your address is just the name of your house and your town, you're not doing it to save money!  But apparently once they've been coddled a bit they lay for up to 3 years and then he just keeps them as retired birds.  He justifies buying them from an egg farm as the 50p he pays for the hen is less than its value in terms of 300 eggs per year to the jailer.  While I'd love to I may wait until I've had a couple of years hen experience before I go down the rescue road.
 Have you seen www.backyardchickens.com? Great site for coop photos - some mad designs -
I'm designing my hencoop at the moment and am getting 4 bantams and 2 big layers and I cannot wait.

[Jesse]

Hi Ceri, thanks for the link, I had not seen this site and it looks interesting, will have a good look later, still basically in the design stage of the hen run so will be interesting to get some more ideas. What breeds are you thinking about getting? I have had so many suggestions I don't know where to start, perhaps each of my three hens will be a different breed, that way if one is not such a good layer one of the others will be, that's the plan anyway. Where will you get your hens from. Someone suggested the livestock market in Guildford to me, is a livestock market a good place to buy from.

[teresa]

Hi,
Live stock markets you can see all different breeds and check the prices. The one I used has a fur and feather market on a tuesday but you have to get there early bidding starts at 10.00. You need to look at the cages before bidding starts to make a note of the number of the cage your interested in makes it easier.
Some of the cages ( sold by cage) have different varieties of hens interesting. But look for healthy and allert some look like they have been through the war.
One tip I can give is to add cider vinigar to there water daily just a few drops. In case wild birds drink from the hens water they can pass on some desiese I cannot remember what.
I have 3 Sussex white and 3 Marams my choice but check the breeders on the net for discriptions of hens from temperment to number of eggs per year.
Backyard chickens is a great site with lots of info and you can ask questions some real experts there.

[Margaret]

My mum kept chickens,of all types and from all sources,for over 20 years.Though some were beautiful birds that laid and laid,the most pleasure and reward she got was from seing pathetic ex battery hens which arrived in a dreadful state, go on to be happy healthy birds that could be taught to enjoy life again.Please don't disregard them,as with patience and time you too can get the pleasure and the satisfaction that she did of a job well done.

[Jesse]

Hi Margaret, I don't think I would disregard ever getting rescue hens but I think as a beginner it would be sensible to start with hens that are healthy and not prone to any complications. Once I have some experience behind me then I would probably consider the rescue hen route. I plan to start with 3 hens and I'm sure it won't be long before I want to increase this number to about 5 or 6.

[teresa]

If you can get rescued hens your lucky I checked that route but nothing localy, What I did find was now egg retailers  supply birds at a price to farmers they know how many eggs a year one bird will lay and at the end of say 2 years the birds are killed on the farmers land and sold off for chicken products.
Where as 20 years ago I too bought 6 hens from a battery hen house at 50p each feed them up on vedge peelings cooked in a pressure cooker stale cake raw greens all mixed up with layers mash after there moult you would no reconise the hens they were smashing. I would open the kitchen window shout morning ladies and they would all answer and out I would go with the hot breakfeast they loved it. Had one with laying problems very ill so she was put to sleep. So not bad one in six had them for 5-6 years.

[Multiveg]

I want chickens, but haven't got the room. I tried to imagine one of those little hut things with a run in the back garden underneath the washing line and infront of the fruit bed....

[gilgamesh]

Two years nothing. The economics dictate that a battery bird will not get beyond the end of her pullet year before going for petfood. The more people will give the jailers 50p for a bird (much more than they'll get in the petfood market) the better their profit, so the more pullets they will buy and lock up in the same way - just as everyone who buys eggs marked "farm fresh" or "barn eggs" is helping to sentence more millions of birds to the same treatment.

[teresa]

The key word is ECONOMICS.
Years ago if you could afford it you bought your family butter if not marge.
The same applies today if your family can afford free range eggs all well and good but most family cannot so they buy the cheeper version .
Unless we all get the same wages for all ages things will not change so no one should look down on the ones who cannot afford it.
Hens now are treated better then they were 30 years ago but remember to a farmer this is his income not his pets.

[Ceri]

just to add the the mix - I've been told that the whole 'free range' standard can be manipulated as well.  Apparently part of the free range definition is that the hens having free access to x amount of land during the day to do their thing - and it is a pretty big amount of land.  Apparently at many freerange farms the chickens are in large barns with not enough pop-holes to allow access for them all to get out.  This ends up with a fair proportion of the chickens not actually seeing daylight on a regular basis.

[gilgamesh]

That's quite correct - there are different standards set by different organisations, and at the lowest level, they are pretty poor. That's why we don't buy eggs. That's why we keep hens ourselves. Incidentally, that's also cheaper than buying even the cheapest cage-produced eggs off the supermarket shelf, they recycle almost all our green waste (no lawn clippings on my compost heap), and produce a good quality byproduct for the garden. Care to consider where the "pelleted chicken manure" in the garden centre tubs comes from - and the feed that went into producing it?  

[Ceri]

And that's why, on August 8th, my point of lay babies are being installed - hoorah - getting coop tonight and starting making the runs at the lottie.

whoopee