Topic: The definitive chook book?

[Ceri]

My coop is being built this weekend, my 6 Muirfield Black Rocks are reared and ready for their installation on 8th Aug.

Can anybody recommend the definitive chook book for keeping my lovely girls happy, healthy and laying?

[Palustris]

Never found a definitive one that is not geared to large scale rearing and egg laying etc, but the Broad Leys Publishing ones by Katie Lear, Starting with Chickens et al.  are a good guide to begin with (no pun intended).

[motherhen]

Two excellent books for this situation.  First 'The Big Book of Garden Hens' by Francine Raymond.  Second 'Hens in the Garden Eggs in the Kitchen' by Charlotte Popescu.  To buy go to www.citychicken.co.uk and select links.  This takes you to the Kitchen Garden website for Francine's book and the Omlet website for Charlotte's.  If you only want one book my preference would be for Francine's.  After 20 years of keeping hens freerange at the bottom of a country garden and recently in a city backyard, I was surprised at how much I learnt from Francine.

[Jesse]

I have a DVD on keeping hens in your garden by Francine, it is very good and gave me lots of useful ideas and encouragement when thinking about keeping hens and is still good viewing now that I have my hens. I'm not sure where it came from as it was a gift but I'm pretty sure I've seen it advertised in a magazine, either Country Smallholder or The Kitchen Garden magazine. I would say it's a good buy if you're still at the "thinking about it" stage.

[motherhen]

You can get the dvd from Francine's website.