People enjoy keeping chickens for many different reasons. Some chicken keepers simply have a passion for poultry. Others focus on the benefits chickens provide. In no particular order, here are 30 reasons to love chickens: Chicks grow fast. Chicks grow quickly from chickhood to maturity. In less than a year your new flock will settle […]
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Chickens instinctively seek a high place to sleep at night. Without such a place to roost inside their coop, they may roost outdoors. Chickens that roost outdoors at night are vulnerable to both predators and adverse weather. Providing them with a comfortable place to roost inside the coop at night keeps them safer. What is […]
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Most bantam breeds are smaller versions of a larger counterpart. True bantams, on the other hand, are naturally small chickens. Rather than having been selectively bred for size, many of the true bantam chicken breeds existed long before the development of most of the other chicken breeds we know today. Difference between bantams and true […]
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An egg begins in the hen’s ovary, where the yolk is created. Then it travels through the chicken’s oviduct, which is about two-feet long and has five separate compartments, each with a different and specialized function. Some 25 hours later, the egg exits the hen’s body. The process through which each egg develops is nothing […]
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Chickens can swim, and some actually enjoy it. Others, not so much. That’s because a chicken is not as well equipped for swimming as a duck. But most chickens will at least wade into water to cool themselves down on a hot summer day. If the water is deep enough, a chicken might even paddle […]
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What you feed your baby chicks not only helps them grow and thrive, but also ensures good laying ability and fertility when they mature. On the other hand, improper nutrition can slow their development and have long-term negative consequences to their health and laying ability. Shipping causes stress. Chicks hatch with residual yolk reserves that […]
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Chickens need a constant supply of fresh clean water in order to remain healthy and lay well. An easy and inexpensive way to ensure they remain hydrated is to water the chickens from a bowl. But should you water chickens from a bowl? Let’s look at why it’s not such a great idea as a […]
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One of the realities of breeding chickens is experiencing deformities in newly hatched chicks. Most of the time deformed embryos don’t survive to hatch, but sometimes one does. The more eggs you hatch, the more likely you are to occasionally find hatched chicks with deformities of one sort or another. Why deformities happen in newly […]
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Chickens, and people, commonly carry Salmonella bacteria in their intestines, but don’t necessarily get sick. Chickens shed the bacteria in their poop, which — you know if you have chickens — ends up everywhere chickens go. Bacteria that enter your mouth can result in a common intestinal infection (salmonellosis). You can easily avoid this infection by not […]
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The United States was officially founded as a nation on July 4, 1776, when the Continental Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence. Although residents of the new country had plenty of chickens, many of the breeds we know today didn’t exist then. So let’s take a look at the chickens that were here at the […]
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