the chook thread :)

[Ready To Run]

what do breed do you find the best for laying? what do you feed them? how many eggs/#of chooks do you get? how many hours a day do they free range?

[Gandalf]

*subscribing*

i'm getting chooks soon and those are all questions i wanna know the answer too :cool:

great thread idea :thumbsup:

[Ready To Run]

Thanks we have some rhode island reds and black ones (not sure what they are called) i want more, i like a bit of a motley crew :laughing:

[Ready To Run]

*subscribing*

i'm getting chooks soon and those are all questions i wanna know the answer too :cool:

great thread idea :thumbsup:

Dont know if you are interested but theres a thread on vege gardens in this section too ;)

[Atlantic Puffin]

I really REALLY want to get some chooks!!!!

At the moment we have a neighbour who has two dogs, and they let them out to run around and stuff, so i'd be too scared to have chooks at the moment incase they attack them. :(

Its okay though... they just put their house on the market! YAY!

[Gandalf]

Dont know if you are interested but theres a thread on vege gardens in this section too ;)
ok, at the risk of sounding like a total freak - i'm moving in with another mum who likes to do the outside work.

so i'm leaving chooks/gardening to her :p but i figured i could compile research anyway. :laughing:
i'll do the cooking with the eggs we get ;):laughing:

[Ready To Run]

I really REALLY want to get some chooks!!!!

At the moment we have a neighbour who has two dogs, and they let them out to run around and stuff, so i'd be too scared to have chooks at the moment incase they attack them. :(

Its okay though... they just put their house on the market! YAY!

Heres to hoping they get a quick sale :laughing:

[Ready To Run]

ok, at the risk of sounding like a total freak - i'm moving in with another mum who likes to do the outside work.

so i'm leaving chooks/gardening to her :p but i figured i could compile research anyway. :laughing:
i'll do the cooking with the eggs we get ;):laughing:

nothing beats the bright orange yolks of home grown eggs - they taste amazing :chef:

[4fullstop]

My Dad has Isa Browns - he gets an egg a day from them (although there are peiods of the year where they go off laying a bit). He feeds them all food scraps (I save all ours for him - my food scraps for his free-range eggs!) supplemented with chook pellets - which I think they need to help keep them laying. Because they get lots of food scraps, they don't really need much pellets, so I think are fairly cheap to keep. He has them in a 20x5m yard, and lets them out into the wider garden to forage for slugs & bugs probably once a week (or more if my Mum's away - they dig up her garden beds & she hates it!)
I wish I had space for some of my own :(

[aLittleLoopy]

We have Isa Browns, Australorps (the black ones) and white leg horns. Ours were brought point of lay (so just laying at 20 weeks) and we get about an egg a day off each! We feed them layer pellets and grains, plus they get lots of goodies free-ranging!

We also brought an Isa Brown rooster a little while ago and an incubator and now have over 40 chicks!! We'll sell the hens when they get older and the roosters will end up in the pot. I don't eat much meat, but when I do I would prefer that I know they have led a good life before ending up dinner - not like the poor factory chooks on sale in the supermarkets! (And no way am I doing it myself - we know where to take them for that).

Ours were free range full time - they would roost in their coop overnight - until recently. All the rain has led to what is called coccidiosis in two of our goats we think may be from the chook poo. It is a naturally occuring parasite that can get out of control in the wet conditions. It meant the goats ended up scouring (diarrhea). So the poor chooks have been locked up until we get more sunshine and treat everyone. But their coop is huge anyway :).

Chickens are great! And you cannot beat fresh, free range eggs for flavour!

[Atlantic Puffin]

haha... Yeah.. not that i need the chickens for eggs.......

We have a cleaner at work who brings fresh eggs... She only charges $2 a dozen!!... And they are SOOO good!...

She got to the stage where she was actually throwing them out on the grass because she had too many!... She says she gets between 15-25 eggs a DAY!

When i get chooks im going to get chicken-keeping lessons from her! haha

[Boobycino]

We had an austrolorp that laid every day and then every few days well into chicken retirement. She even went off laying and then back on. She was also very cute as a day old chick. :)

[Roopee]

We have Isa Browns and a Bantam.
I wouldn't recommend a Bantam- they get clucky and sit on the other eggs (which can be a good thing if you have a rooster!)which turns every one of them off laying- its a PITA!

We get 7 eggs a day, one from each bok bok. They all have names- schnitzel, roast, nugget.....you get the drift:cool:.

Ours free range all day and only go in to roost at night and to lay. They have a 2 story coup which DH and the kids built!!
They share the yard with our lab, or should I say, they allow our lab to spend time in the yard:laughing::laughing:- they really do rule the......excuse the pun..........roost!
They drink from the dogs dish, eat her food if they see it and crawl all over her- she takes it and doesn't hurt them- ever!

I have a bit of a bird 'thing', bit of a phobia, so I dont like it too much but we're learning to co-exist......and I just get the kids to shoo them away if they get too close to me.

[Leeee]

mum swears by her ordinary brown hens, don't know the name of the breed. i think they lay one each a day? they're good eggs, too. and the chickens are the ultimate composting machines lol

[AM]

Just subscribing, when I buy my new house I'm getting chooks, so I'm starting my research :)

My mum has chooks, and I currently get her excess eggs, there is no way I want to go back to buying eggs if i can help it, you can't beat homegrown!!

[Ready To Run]

Ooohh im so excited i just got my new girls. we found out a property here sells battery hens for $2 each. we got 8 and apparently they have got some good laying in them still. im glad we will give them a better life :)

[Hootenanny]

Sounds like there's a few wannabe chook owners, count me in. I have been building my chook house for AT LEAST a year and I WILL finish it by mid January and I WILL have chooks by mid feb. I love the big bottomed brown chookies, I think they are Isa Browns & Wyandottes and Barneveldors but don't know anyone who has had Barneveldors. Has anyone here had them, I've heard they are extremely placid.

[Nimrodel]

I have Rhode Island Reds and just love them. They are good layers and being a larger bird, we dont have any issues with cats etc trying to get them. They scare the cats off!!! We had the little one go broody a few times but most RIR's dont tend to stay broody which can be an issue if you want to breed either by getting a rooster or putting fertile eggs under them.

Ours free range all day on our half acre. We only feed them about 1 cup of scratch mix a day between the three girls, everything else they forage. They also get all our food scraps - we just chuck everything in the compost, they scratch around to take the bits they want and the rest stays there to break down. My friend also works at a local supermarket so will bring round a box or two of fruit and veg scraps every week or so for them.

The only problem we have had with them is that lately they have decided they dont want to sleep in the coop. They will go in there to lay but then roost for the night on the table outside our back door. Silly chookies!

For anyone looking at getting chooks there are a few good books around, my faves being Jackie French's 'The Chook Book' and 'Backyard Poultry Naturally' by Alanna Moore.

[aymee83]

Hi we have 4 australorp cross, our ladies east a combo of scraps and organic pellets, we usually get 3-4 eggs a day in summer and 1-2 in winter, they are great layers and have a good temprament too..

[mrsdj1234]

Can I join in on the chook chat?
I am picking up 2 dozen fertile light sussex eggs tomorrow morning to put in my incubator on Friday, so hopefully in a little over 3 weeks I'll have some very cute chicks hatching. From there I plan on keeping 2 or 3 and selling the rest of the chicks (at about 5 weeks old, when they don't need heat any more).

[CrissyG]

We got three from our local market two months ago -we get 3 eggs daily (always laid in same spots) girls love walking in a collecting eggs. Our bunny is best friends with one of the chooks and snuggles with it. They have an open air fenced yard roughly 1mtr x3mtr and old kids cubby and sheltered end near our shed with nesting boxes.

[CrissyG]

We also have a veg patch/es scattered around yard. Also a staffy pup that squeak barks when bunny escapes. I love that no food scraps are binned now - although bunny has to our run the chooks for the good stuff ;-)

[RmumR]

we have 3 australaups and one bantem.
the bantem got clucky and spent days sitting on the ither chooks eggs so we got her 5 day old chicks so now she's busy looking after them.

we ket them out when we get up in the morning and lock them up once its dark

[notquitesupermum]

For value for money, Isa Browns all the way.

[Berrie]

We had chooks when we were younger, they were simply lovely. I hope I can talk DP into getting some when we move out. He's iffy about them, he's also against sandpits so it's probably a mess thing - men! I don't know anybody who's kept chooks who doesn't like them. I miss them loads, but we don't have room for them any more because we have a granny flat for Oma :(

[spideysmummy]

Subscribing

[Happy2be3]

We have 4 and get 3 eggs a day atm. We feed them pellets and scraps (mostly pellets). They are free range all day and locked up at night.. They share the yard with our cats.

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