Chickenkeepers Factsheet

There are so many reasons to love chickens, but here are some of our favorites…

  • Produce your own food
  • Eggs that are fresh, great-tasting & nutritious (chicken is good too)
  • Manufacture great garden fertilizer
  • Fun & friendly pets with personality (yes, you read that right)
  • Great way to use food scraps and weeds
  • Easy and inexpensive to maintain compared to other animals

The Basics

  1.  Legal considerations- yes you are allowed to keep chickens some places say: four birds and no roosters.  Some places say: no nuisance, smell, noise, etc.
  2. Getting Chickens is a Commitment. Consider the following…
    1. Feeding and watering has to happen every day, regardless of weather.
    2. When you’re away, the chickens stay. In other words, you must find a way to care for them when you travel.
    3. You have to provide weather protection for cold, rain, sun, etc.
    4. A fence or coop are needed to provide protection from predators.
    5. Perhaps sharing chickens with a neighbor can split responsibility?

Care

  1. Chickens need a place for food and water, a perch to sleep on, a nest box, a place to scratch, shade, a place out of rain and wind, and protection from predators
  2.  There are a zillion ways to build a chicken coop that fills all those needs, brand new, or using up-cycled materials.
  3. Chickens can stay in a coop all the time (cooped up), or they can be allowed out during the day.  Some choices are safer than others.
  4. Feeding Facts
    1. Chicks need 4 to 6 mos. of feed and care until they begin laying.
    2. Chicken Feed- 50 lb bag cost about $18.
    3. A chick will eat roughly 9-12 lbs of feed in its first 3 months.
    4. A mature and active laying hen will need around 6 lbs of feed per month, and about 20% less if there is other food around like grass, weeds, or kitchen scraps.

Selection

  1. Breeds:   there are many, many kinds of chickens available. white eggs, brown eggs, or colored eggs.
  2.  Age: two choices- you can buy day old chicks or older hens.
  3.  Chickens have relatively short life spans and even shorter time for egg producing – about 2 years.  When chickens die of natural causes you deal with them as when any pet dies.
    1.  When chickens stop producing eggs you can decide to have someone process them (kill, clean, and de-feather) for eating.
    2. Once they start laying, you get one egg per day per chicken.  4 chickens can give you 28 eggs a week, every week, or about 8 dozen eggs each month on average.
    3. After two years you replace the chickens but don’t need a new coop, so the economics are much better: total cost for years 3 and 4 are $216 vs. egg savings of $500.  Plus fun.

Sources of chicks and chickens: Mt. Healthy Hatchery

Source of information and advice:  Back Yard Chickens