Review My Shopping List!

[castillo_de_luz]

Here's my two cents (I'm not an experienced chicken keeper, just going off my own experience) :

Metal trashcans work wonderfully for me. I have two; one three gallon (I think) for scratch and one ten gallon (I think) for feed. I can fit a fifty lb. bag of feed in the ten (?) gallon.

It's hard to hold tarps down unless you screw a board over them; otherwise the wind just rips them off. I even had some hard plastic screwed down with a board and the wind still managed to rip it off.

Hay or pine shavings are much more economical than pellets.

I just use a regular chicken feeder like you find at the store and remove it at night. If you use crumbles there's definitely more spillage and mess but once they transition to pellets I rarely ever have any spillage (I put my feeder up on a cement block so they can't poop in it).

Congratulations on your new pullets!

Good to hear positive experiences with the metal bins -- I have high hopes that they'll do the trick.

Thank you for the note on the tarps, I definitely need to figure out a way to secure them really really well (windy here). Securing with a board setup might do it.

I was going to do a mix of hemp and the pellets -- my run isn't big, 8x6. Locally they prices are pretty good but I have no problem switching to something more cost-effective.

Silly question but... if you remove the feeder at night, where do you store it? Or do you empty it out, rinse, and just leave it for the next day?

 

[Evadig]

Silly question but... if you remove the feeder at night, where do you store it? Or do you empty it out, rinse, and just leave it for the next day?

I put it in my basement or in the laundry room. When it's emptied I just refill it. I don't clean it unless it got dirty or when I'm deep cleaning everything during spring cleaning or winter preparation.

 

[TexasBlues]

Good thing about chickens is you can personally make pretty much anything they need.
I use dry leaves for bedding. Scrap wood for perches. Old buckets to hold feed. A 180$ feeder is nuts. Just use a gravity feeder bucket and take it out or close the holes at night.
That grit price is crazy high. Grit can be bought by the truckload. A cubic yard of crushed granite is $50 here.
That water bucket is $60! I bought the rent a coop nipples for like $6 and put them on a bucket.
I still buy good non gmo chick starter crumble . It’s about $0.85/LB.

 

[rosemarythyme]

Silly question but... if you remove the feeder at night, where do you store it?

Metal trashcans work for that too - the small ones available at Home Depot hold a 7 lb round gravity feeder perfectly.

As far as the overall list... I mean a lot of that stuff is just plain useful to have, so no reason not to have them on hand (like Epsom salts and eyehooks and zip ties).

I do recycle what I can for the chickens. Like my treat/grit/oyster shell jars are reused gelato containers. As I only have 9 birds I only have to refill infrequently (the actual bags of stuff are in the garage, so no pest issue):

My roost bars in the run are fallen branches. If you have trees around they're free obviously, and saves you from having to haul them off for pick up or chipping.

Let's see, what else... I don't do tarps, period, as I fear the damage that a snow load could do without being able to fall through in to the run (my run is unroofed but netted over). I don't winterize in general as I find it unnecessary but you likely have worse winters to deal with than I.

For the dust bath, a litter box is probably on the small side. If you can, keep an eye out for free or garage sale kid's plastic sandboxes, like the Little Tikes turtles. They're perfect weather proof dust baths. I got mine from a family across the road:

I'd ditch the herb mix but I'm not into holistic stuff, so...

 

[Mrs. K]

Do know they are your chickens and your set up and money. Spend it how you want.

I do think AArt gives good advice, start out with the bare minimum and add as you need for your set up.

 

[nuthatched]

I appreciate you worked hard to make that this but almost none of it is needed or a good product.

 

[Mrs. K]

Also, I take down food every day. I try and put out only enough for the day. It actually varies quite a bit. If a lot is left, I feed less the next day. If it is completely empty I feed a bit more. This really keeps me from wasting feed.

I found that if you over feed or have it constantly available they spill it out, trample it and it begins to stink.

 

[castillo_de_luz]

Good thing about chickens is you can personally make pretty much anything they need.
I use dry leaves for bedding. Scrap wood for perches. Old buckets to hold feed. A 180$ feeder is nuts. Just use a gravity feeder bucket and take it out or close the holes at night.
That grit price is crazy high. Grit can be bought by the truckload. A cubic yard of crushed granite is $50 here.
That water bucket is $60! I bought the rent a coop nipples for like $6 and put them on a bucket.
I still buy good non gmo chick starter crumble . It’s about $0.85/LB.

I'm sure you're correct about all of this, but I'm not in any way a DIY person. It seems like there's a majority of chicken folks on here who prefer to make these things themselves, but that's not the way I want to do this.

Scrap wood, old buckets... nope, none of that here. Dry leaves I can do and I'll probably take some from the pile and add them to the run.

 

[castillo_de_luz]

Metal trashcans work for that too - the small ones available at Home Depot hold a 7 lb round gravity feeder perfectly.

As far as the overall list... I mean a lot of that stuff is just plain useful to have, so no reason not to have them on hand (like Epsom salts and eyehooks and zip ties).

I do recycle what I can for the chickens. Like my treat/grit/oyster shell jars are reused gelato containers. As I only have 9 birds I only have to refill infrequently (the actual bags of stuff are in the garage, so no pest issue):
View attachment 3756686

My roost bars in the run are fallen branches. If you have trees around they're free obviously, and saves you from having to haul them off for pick up or chipping.

Let's see, what else... I don't do tarps, period, as I fear the damage that a snow load could do without being able to fall through in to the run (my run is unroofed but netted over). I don't winterize in general as I find it unnecessary but you likely have worse winters to deal with than I.

For the dust bath, a litter box is probably on the small side. If you can, keep an eye out for free or garage sale kid's plastic sandboxes, like the Little Tikes turtles. They're perfect weather proof dust baths. I got mine from a family across the road:
View attachment 3756690

I'd ditch the herb mix but I'm not into holistic stuff, so...

My run has a roof, so the tarps/clips/ties are for the sides to roll down in bad weather -- and winterization is 100% necessary here.

I have no problem starting to save and reuse containers, I just don't have any of that right now.

Thank you for the note on the dust bath, I wasn't really sure what to use for it and someone suggested a high-side litter box. I'll keep an eye out for someone trying to get rid of something similar to that sandbox, or just buy one down the road. The herb mix just seemed... nice? I have friends that put herbs in their nest boxes so I figured this wouldn't hurt.

 

[castillo_de_luz]

Also, I take down food every day. I try and put out only enough for the day. It actually varies quite a bit. If a lot is left, I feed less the next day. If it is completely empty I feed a bit more. This really keeps me from wasting feed.

I found that if you over feed or have it constantly available they spill it out, trample it and it begins to stink.

There will be occasional days where that's not an option for me, so the self-closing feeder seemed like a better option. I definitely don't want to have too much feed laying around in general.

A lot of the comments I'm getting seem to indicate that there's something wrong with buying stuff instead of DIYing it, which I know works for many people -- but I'm not one of them. I don't think I really understand the problem with buying a shovel, motion lights, and some tarps -- feels like basics to me, but of course, I'm not experienced here.