NorseDad
Chirping
Hey Folks,
I've only been on BYC for a little while, but I finally got around to taking photos of my set up and flock. I wanted to say how great it was for me to find this site as a resource as a beginning keeper. A bit of back story: I am a 33 year old man living in Central Florida with my wife and two sons. I have a lot of love for animals. I have two coonhounds, a rescue pit bull, a ball python, a cockatiel, and 36 different species of tarantulas. Since my wife and I met 12 years ago, we have always expressed a desire to live a more self-sufficient life. We like to garden, and keeping chickens was one of the things I promised myself I would do once we owned our own property. After a lot of work cleaning up our credit scores, eliminating debts, and saving, we managed to buy our fist home this past August. It's not a huge piece of land, but it's ours. One of my requirements for a home was that the zoning and local ordinances allow chickens. So, after closing the house and taking care of initial repairs and projects, my wife gave me the greenlight.
I spent a lot of time reading books like Storey's Guide and asking questions here on BYC before settling on a coop and what breeds I wanted. I knew I wanted a breed that had decent egg production, wasn't overly broody (can't have a rooster here), and most importantly was friendly. I have a 6 year old and 6 month old, and I wanted them to enjoy chickens with me. I ended up deciding on Speckled Sussex. I hired a local company to make my hen house and run, and found a farm about an hour away that had the chickens I wanted. I decided to forego chicks this time, and the farm I contacted sold pullets at 8 weeks old: perfect.
My local area has two rules: up to 4 hens and no roosters. So I planned to get 5 hens just incase the worst should happen. My six-year-old and I headed up to the farm a little later in December than initially planned as I was waiting for the coop to be delivered. When we got there, they were low on Sussex. I was able to get 3 Sussex pullets, and ended up also getting 2 Easter Eggers to fill in my numbers. It was my first experience wrangling chickens, and I must have looked ridiculous loading them into my small pink dog crate. It took me 30 minutes, and I was realizing just how out of shape I was when the farmers teenager swiftly came to my aid.
The trip home was a bit surreal. It was a great feeling to have been patient for so long and finally getting to get chickens like I wanted. I was definitely feeling like an old seasoned farmer rolling up to my local feed store with my Rural King hat and minivan full of chickens to get my pine shavings and feed. What's that? Of course I'll be signing up for the Tractor Supply Co. rewards program. I'm a farmer now after all.
Things have been going well a month into it. I've found some weak points to the coop and run and made my own modifications. It's fun to troubleshoot. You don't truly learn about keeping until you're into it. I replaced the hardware cloth flooring with laminate, insulated the roof, added additional ventilation, installed some natural limb roosts, and build a little roosting bar stand in the run out of some scrap. It's a great feeling to look out my windows to the back yard and see 5 happy chickens running around. I love going out there and sitting in the run while I'm trying to build up trust. They've moved from terrified by my presence to wary, to curious. I've gotten the most brave Sussex to eat from my hand. I'm looking forward to my first eggs and getting to experience these girls growing up.
Here are some pictures of my coop and run. I'm in the process of tearing down the old messed up chain link fencing in the yard and replacing it with privacy fencing. Once that is done, I'll try out some free ranging.
Here are some pictures of my girls:
Queen is one of my two Eggers. I lover her cute muffs.
Goldie is my second Egger. No muffs or beard, but some pretty lacing.
Winifred, Mary, and Sarah are my 3 Speckled Sussex. Mary is the largest, and the bravest. The only one who will let me feed her directly so far. Sarah is in the middle and is starting to trust me more. Winifred is the smallest, and is finally starting to grow her tail out.
All of them seem to be doing well. Here they are enjoying some leftover steamed carrots and some cooked grits from breakfast.
I've only been on BYC for a little while, but I finally got around to taking photos of my set up and flock. I wanted to say how great it was for me to find this site as a resource as a beginning keeper. A bit of back story: I am a 33 year old man living in Central Florida with my wife and two sons. I have a lot of love for animals. I have two coonhounds, a rescue pit bull, a ball python, a cockatiel, and 36 different species of tarantulas. Since my wife and I met 12 years ago, we have always expressed a desire to live a more self-sufficient life. We like to garden, and keeping chickens was one of the things I promised myself I would do once we owned our own property. After a lot of work cleaning up our credit scores, eliminating debts, and saving, we managed to buy our fist home this past August. It's not a huge piece of land, but it's ours. One of my requirements for a home was that the zoning and local ordinances allow chickens. So, after closing the house and taking care of initial repairs and projects, my wife gave me the greenlight.
I spent a lot of time reading books like Storey's Guide and asking questions here on BYC before settling on a coop and what breeds I wanted. I knew I wanted a breed that had decent egg production, wasn't overly broody (can't have a rooster here), and most importantly was friendly. I have a 6 year old and 6 month old, and I wanted them to enjoy chickens with me. I ended up deciding on Speckled Sussex. I hired a local company to make my hen house and run, and found a farm about an hour away that had the chickens I wanted. I decided to forego chicks this time, and the farm I contacted sold pullets at 8 weeks old: perfect.
My local area has two rules: up to 4 hens and no roosters. So I planned to get 5 hens just incase the worst should happen. My six-year-old and I headed up to the farm a little later in December than initially planned as I was waiting for the coop to be delivered. When we got there, they were low on Sussex. I was able to get 3 Sussex pullets, and ended up also getting 2 Easter Eggers to fill in my numbers. It was my first experience wrangling chickens, and I must have looked ridiculous loading them into my small pink dog crate. It took me 30 minutes, and I was realizing just how out of shape I was when the farmers teenager swiftly came to my aid.
The trip home was a bit surreal. It was a great feeling to have been patient for so long and finally getting to get chickens like I wanted. I was definitely feeling like an old seasoned farmer rolling up to my local feed store with my Rural King hat and minivan full of chickens to get my pine shavings and feed. What's that? Of course I'll be signing up for the Tractor Supply Co. rewards program. I'm a farmer now after all.
Things have been going well a month into it. I've found some weak points to the coop and run and made my own modifications. It's fun to troubleshoot. You don't truly learn about keeping until you're into it. I replaced the hardware cloth flooring with laminate, insulated the roof, added additional ventilation, installed some natural limb roosts, and build a little roosting bar stand in the run out of some scrap. It's a great feeling to look out my windows to the back yard and see 5 happy chickens running around. I love going out there and sitting in the run while I'm trying to build up trust. They've moved from terrified by my presence to wary, to curious. I've gotten the most brave Sussex to eat from my hand. I'm looking forward to my first eggs and getting to experience these girls growing up.
Here are some pictures of my coop and run. I'm in the process of tearing down the old messed up chain link fencing in the yard and replacing it with privacy fencing. Once that is done, I'll try out some free ranging.
Here are some pictures of my girls:
Queen is one of my two Eggers. I lover her cute muffs.
Goldie is my second Egger. No muffs or beard, but some pretty lacing.
Winifred, Mary, and Sarah are my 3 Speckled Sussex. Mary is the largest, and the bravest. The only one who will let me feed her directly so far. Sarah is in the middle and is starting to trust me more. Winifred is the smallest, and is finally starting to grow her tail out.
All of them seem to be doing well. Here they are enjoying some leftover steamed carrots and some cooked grits from breakfast.
)
