Principles of Poultry

Livestock farming begins with chickens

Chickens were my first foray into crime, at least of the city zoning ordinance violation sort. 

My Mom never liked chickens, so we never had them growing up. I started keeping them when I lived in a good sized Midwestern city, which had recently legalized limited chicken-keeping. Zoning allowed us to keep four hens, with appropriate setbacks, etc, etc. I built a coop and bought four started pullets, girls just beginning to lay, from Craigslist. My daughters were around four or so at the time. 

The birds were an immediate hit. We started getting eggs within a week, nice brown ones, and the girls loved the birds. They would carry them around. They named them all, but I only remember Carmelita and Petunia from that first batch. Brown ones even make better Easter eggs, since, according to my daughter the art historian, the Renaissance masters started with a brown canvas to make the colors more lustrous. 

There really is no downside with laying hens. True, you have to feed and water them, as well as get someone to keep an eye on them when you’re away. And, of course, there’s cleaning the coop once in a while. 

But the upsides are legion. They are so easy to keep. They have surprisingly pleasant dispositions, usually anyhow. They make cool spaceship noises and sound so self-satisfied after they lay an egg. They are a great introduction to livestock for kids, as well as for adults. The manure is great for your garden. They have a relatively forgiving learning curve, and a chicken coop is the traditional first carpentry project. You’ll learn so much from chickens. Plus, you get delicious fresh eggs, about one per bird per day, with the occasional double-yolker. It’s hard to imagine not keeping chickens. 

Start by building your coop. The essentials are a roof and walls. Chickens hate to get wet— ever hear the expression, “madder than a wet hen?” That didn’t come from nowhere. They don’t really require insulation, and they definitely don’t need heat. Where I live, temperatures can easily drop to -20˚ F or below. The birds don’t care, except for a few breeds prone to frosting their combs and wattles, because they wear down jackets.  But they do need shelter from the wind and sun, and good ventilation. 

The other elements of a coop include a nesting box, a roost, and a run. The nesting box gives them a dark, cozy place to lay. Chickens instinctively roost in trees, so the coop needs to be a simulacrum. An old wooden ladder hung horizontally a few feet off the ground works great. A run is just a protected enclosure for them to scratch around in. The fence is more to keep predators out than to keep chickens in.