Hi, my wife and two small kids have an enclosure and got a chicken Coop this week. We are ready for the next step which is to get chickens. What kind do you have available now and what are the best breeds for a first time backyard chicken owner looking for mild tempered egg producing chickens?
lnowing what you know now what advice would you give a first time owner that you didn’t think of yourself?
Hi Henri! Congratulations on the chicken coop! We have a lot of breeds available right now, but they’re all baby chicks and not quite ready to go into your coop yet. If you purchased nearly feathered chicks, you wouldn’t have to wait through the entire brooder process inside the house, and you could just run a heat lamp on an extension cord out to the coop as long as it’s secured well enough to prevent fire hazard. My favorite chicken breed is the Barred Plymouth Rock, but some of the other favorites are Easter Eggers, Golden Sexlinks, black Australorps, Buff Orpington, and Rhode Island Reds. A lot of these standard breeds will be available again next week. I love your question about retrospective tips that I might give myself or others that are keeping chickens for the first time! I think my biggest tip is that free range for your chickens is easier than it sounds! Free ranging means you have to clean the chicken coop and run less often because the droppings are spread over a larger area and get baked in the sun and broken down into the soil naturally without you having to clean them. Plus,it makes your girls happier, and they are able to forage for more raw nutrients in their diet which makes their eggs healthier, and if you do it right, they put themselves to bed and all you have to do is close the door!