Raising Organic Chickens: Keeping Chickens in your own Backyard:- Housing, Feed, Care

A basic guide to raising organic chickens; housing, feeding, illnesses and care.

Raising organic chickens can be very satisfying, and you don't have to live on a farm to be able to collect your own eggs every day. As long as your council allows the keeping of poultry, you can easily set up a chicken coop in your backyard; thus backyard chickens! Better still, farming organic chickens in your own backyard, is far more satisfying.

However, before you decide on what chicken breeds you want to keep, you should be looking at why you want to keep them. Are you raising chickens for meat production, egg production or just because you want to have a couple of fowls scratching around in your garden keeping the slugs and snail population under control? Based on your needs, you will then be able to identify what breed of chicken you should keep.

However, remember that if you want to keep free range chickens in a garden rather go for bantams, particularly a breed such as Pekins as they do very little damage by comparison to other breeds that are far better suited to chicken coops.

However, raising organic chickens really is the beginning of sustainable living; chickens will be able to eat your table scraps and vegetable peelings, in addition to their grains. They will happily lay eggs for your personal consumption, and best of all, will provide you with some of the best type of manure for you to add to your compost heap which, in turn, will benefit your garden and vegetables no end.

Raising Organic Chickens and Basic Care

Chickens like routine, and should be let out and put away at a set time every day.

They should be fed little and often.

Housing should be kept very clean, and all manure should be scraped off the perches and floor of the coop daily.

Fresh water should be given daily, and chickens looked over to see any immediate apparent illnesses.

There is no need to keeping a cock bird if you are raising chickens for eggs. Sometimes, they are more trouble than they are worth.

Raising Organic Chickens: Choosing the Right Chicken Breeds for You

RAISING ORGANIC CHICKENS: Bantams

When space is limited, you would like to keep chickens in your garden and you don't have dogs that will kill your chickens, then go for bantams. They are small, make great pets and will also keep the slugs and snails under control. However, if you are looking for good-sized eggs on a daily basis, then bantams are not for you.

RAISING ORGANIC CHICKENS: Egg Layers

These are birds that are light in body-weight and as a result often take off to roost in trees and tend towards flightiness in general. Therefore, if you want to keep egg-layers, they should really be kept in covered runs. Alternatively, if you want to let them free-range, you will have to clip one wing.

RAISING ORGANIC CHICKENS: Meat Producers

Table breeds are heavier and therefore less flighty than egg-layers. They are also more docile and placid in nature. There are also many dual-purpose birds which are both excellent table birds and good layers. These are discussed under Chicken Breeds. However, if you are going to raise table birds, never name your chickens unless you want recrimination and tears from the kids who refuse to eat "Rusty" or "Speckles" minus its feathers while gracing the plate!

RAISING ORGANIC CHICKENS: How Many Chickens Do you Need?

For those of you who are raising organic chickens just for eggs, then 6 good layers will happily keep a family of 4 in eggs, all year around. Beware however, that at certain times of year there will be times when egg production will decrease. This happens when the chickens loose their feathers during moulting in late summer, early autumn, and in winter when there are reduced daylight hours.

Raising Organic Chickens: Buying & Sourcing your Chickens

Buying your chickens will basically come down to 2 things; how much money do you have, and how much time can you afford to wait before your chickens start to produce eggs or will be slaughtered for their meat?

The cheapest option is, without a doubt, buying day-old chicks. However, although they are cheap, there are some issues here that need to be discussed. First of all, buying day-old chicks often comes with a high mortality rate. If you haven't lost some on-route to delivery, you will often loose some more within the next couple of days. To prevent any further deaths you will have to invest in an artificial brooder, or find a foster mother for them to keep them warm.

Secondly, very few breeds can be sexed at that age. As a result, if you are after egg-layers, you really don't want to end up with a lot of useless cock birds. And then what do you do with them once you find that about 40 - 60% of your stock are male? You will either have to cull them, or separate them off and sell them at a later stage. However, you will have to off-set that against the cost of their food, care and housing.

Lastly, when you buy day-old chicks, you will have to feed, care and house them for at least 8 months or so, before they start to lay.

For those of you who are raising organic chickens for egg laying, it make more sense to buy pullets. A pullet is a female that is at least 20 weeks of age and less than 1 year old. Technically, she is capable of laying eggs within 4-6 weeks of purchase, which is significantly less than time then the 8 months you would need to wait if starting with day-old chicks.

The downside is of course the cost of purchasing pullets. They are more expensive, but then they too have had to be fed, vaccinated and cared for, for the last 8 months.

At the end of the day, you will have to decide what is right for you, and your situation. However, the best time to buy, whether it be day-old chicks or pullets is in the spring. Your birds will be about a year old, and will be far happier coming to a new home with good weather and access to new grass shoots and lots of sunshine.

Raising Organic Chickens: Housing your Chickens

Chicken coops can be simple homemade arks to chicken palaces and everything in between. Chicken coops can be bought or they can be made. We have a chicken coop plan for you which is 8 feet by 8 feet. In the end, it really comes down to space factors, aesthetics and money.

Whatever you choose should give your chickens 5 things:

1) Adequate protection from the weather and predators such as foxes

2) A large enough coop to give them space, but not too large where they won't benefit from each other's warmth, especially in winter

3) The coop should be free from draughts but still has good ventilation

4) The coop is positioned so that the front of it faces the the rising sun but it's protected from the midday sun.

5) Part of the run should be shaded.

If you are keeping 12 chickens in a covered coop with an attached run then your coop should be 5 x 7 feet and at least 1/5 of wall space should be allocated to windows. If you are not going to provide any outdoor access, then you could only house 6 chickens in this space.

However, unless you keep your chicken production to small numbers, one coop will never be enough. If you are going to breed chickens, you will need extra space for mum and her chicks. Sometimes too, you will have a sick chicken that needs to be separated from the rest.

RAISING ORGANIC CHICKENS: The Ark

The ideal type of housing is one which you can place directly over an area that you want to use in the future for vegetables and then move to another area at a latter date. These are known as movable arks and are ideal for a number of reasons.

When you have them in your veggie patch the chickens can scratch around in the dirt, eat the grass and insects and fertilize your soil at the same time, with very little effort from you. Once you feel that they have spent enough time there, you can move the ark into another position where the grass is better, and you can start all over again. You only have to dig over that area where the chickens have been, allow the manure and added compost to rot down, and once planted out, you will have the most amazing vegetables.

In moving your chickens around a lot you will minimize the chance of disease, they will always have access to fresh grass, and involves very little housework when cleaning out, as opposed to a permanently fixed hen house.

However, they still need to be cleaned and disinfected, and this should be done every 6 weeks.

RAISING ORGANIC CHICKENS: Fixed Hen Houses

These are useful if you are keeping a large number of birds that will also have access to an outside run, or is used for intensive chicken farming for a small number of birds. However there are a number of things here too that need to be taken into consideration.

These houses take a lot of time and effort to keep clean. All the perches, walls and floors have to be scraped removing the manure on a regular basis. Ventilation is an issue, and if not provided your chickens will end up with respiratory infections and other problems. The taller the walls, the better the air-flow, and in general, you should be able to stand upright in the chicken house. This also enables you to walk in without doubling over, and makes cleaning and egg-collecting a lot easier. My ideal chicken coop has the nesting boxes positioned whereby you can collect the eggs while standing outside the coop.

The floor of the hen house should be covered in a material that is not mouldy or damp or dusty so that it causes any respiratory problems. The ideal coverings would be wheat or oat straw, non-toxic wood shavings or shredded paper. This further helps with insulation, absorbs any droppings and keeps the birds busy, as they will enjoy scratching through it. This should be replaced twice a year and the hen house should be thoroughly disinfected after it has been cleaned, preferably with a high-pressure steam cleaner.

RAISING CHICKENS: Nesting Boxes

For every 3 laying-hens there should be 1 nesting box 1 foot square, and 14 inches high. These should be placed just off the ground and lined with straw or hay. They will need to be cleaned out regularly; at least once a month, dusted for parasites, and any broken eggs should be removed immediately. This is very important as once a hen gets into the habit of eating eggs, it will be almost impossible to stop.

RAISING ORGANIC CHICKENS: Perches

Perches should run the length of your hen house and be about 2 inches thick. However, if you are keeping bantams, then they should be 1 inch in thickness. If you are using wood, all perches should have the top edges rounded off, and the wood should be splinter-free. Each bird should be allocated 8 inches of roosting space. Never place the perches more than 2 feet off the ground for fear of injuring the birds, unless you are keeping a variety of bird that has long plumage.

RAISING CHICKENS: Chicken Runs

19 gauge wire with a 2 inch mesh is more than adequate for fencing in chickens. However, for egg-layers who are quite flighty, and to keep predators out, they should be built to 6 feet in height. At least a foot of wire should be buried underground to prevent foxes from digging underneath. In some countries now, due to bird flu, all chickens have to be fully fenced in, which means that the top of your run should also be covered with further wire mesh or netting.

The best way in dealing with fixed chicken houses is to have 2 runs attached to the sides of the house. While one is in use, the other is free. This is so that the ground can recover and the grass can regrow, and it also helps to cut back on parasites and diseases that occur through farming one lot of livestock on the same piece of land, year after year.

Raising Organic Chickens: Feeding your Chickens

Chickens have different nutritional needs at the different stages of their lives. Young chickens need more protein when they are young as opposed to when they are around 12 - 18 weeks when they no longer have a growth spurt and are growing more slowly.

However, despite the fact that chickens are foragers and will eat slugs and snails, insects, table scraps and the like, they also need protein for growth, tissue repair and to develop an immunity against diseases. They also need fats and carbohydrates for heat and energy, and a small amount of fibre aids in digestion. Finally, a chicken needs vitamin supplements and minerals for optimal health, strong bones and good eggshell formation.

RAISING ORGANIC CHICKENS: Day Old Chicks

When raising chickens that are a day-old they should be fed on chick crumbs for the first 4 weeks of their lives, and stay away from household scraps until they are much older, as they need the right protein levels at this stage to grow into healthy birds. They should be fed little and often, about 4-5 times a day at first.

RAISING ORGANIC CHICKENS: Commercial Feed

However, feeding chickens needn't be a fine balancing act where you fret and ponder at whether they are getting the right nutrients. Buying commercial feed in the beginning is probably the easiest way to go. You can purchase organic feed these days, and it takes the guess work out of what to feed them, this is normally in pellet form.

However, if you just feed them pellets they will soon get bored, just as you would get bored if you were given the same food day in and day out. Chickens love kitchen scraps and veggie greens, as we have already mentioned, and they also love eating corn. Pellets and chicken scraps are best given in the morning (a large handful each, per bird) and the corn in the afternoon. Wheat and maize are mixed in this feed in a ratio of 1:4 respectively. A small handful for each bird scattered on the ground will give the birds interest and exercise in foraging for it, rather than placing it in a feeder.

RAISING ORGANIC CHICKENS: Grit & Oyster Shell

Oyster shell should only be given to the chickens once they start laying. If they are given the shell too early, they could end up with egg-binding issues. Grit on the other hand should be given from day one as this aids in their digestion. It can either be left in yard all day for the chickens to peck at when needed or sometimes, it is left as a thin layer in the nesting boxes for the fowls to access. Each bird will consume about 1 tablespoon of grit a month.

RAISING CHICKENS: Water

Your chickens are made up of 50% water, therefore it stands to reason that your chickens will need a constant supply of fresh water. Chickens also are unable to perspire, and in the heat you will see your chickens with their wings and beaks open trying to cool down. If your chickens don't have access to water in these conditions, they will die.

Raising Organic Chickens: Health and your Chickens

The health of your chickens will be dealt with in another section, however, the only way of staying on top of your chickens' health is to make sure that you interface with them daily and are observant to any changes, no matter how slight.

Early symptoms when treated usually ensures a quick recovery for your birds. Therefore if you see a chicken that is standing away from the flock look carefully for any tell-tale signs. Are the eyes bright or do they look glazed? Are the wings dropping? Are any stools loose with stained feathers around the vent? Is there blood around the vent? Are they off their food? Do they have ruffled feathers? Do they have breathing difficulties? Can you see any bundles of worms in the run from parasitic infestation?

If in doubt at all regarding your birds' health it is best to call the vet as soon as possible for serious ailments that cannot be treated by yourself.

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