The blasted things escape from my neighbor's pen all the time and dig up my plants and make large holes in my hard. If I ever get chickens, it won't be to add to my garden.

Agreed brandon. My neighbors chickens would scratch up every seed I planted, every plant I put in the ground.
My dogs ate one of their chickens, which I thought was fair justice but I had to lock my dogs in the yard after that ... From which they commenced to dig trenches in my yard and destroy my flower beds. Great.

They finally figured out chickens were to much work and got rid of them. We get our eggs from the local farmers market. I do get to have their leftover chicken poop, That, I will add to the garden.

Was thinking about getting Guinea fowl though. Wonder if they destroy gardens?

I read that Guinea fowl are supposed to be less destructive than chickens but are not tame unless raised with a chicken. Sounded like they would prefer a tree instead of a coop otherwise. Not sure how that would work with sub freezing temps - would they be smart enough to go inside a coop then? Irregardless, even Guinea fowl will destroy seedlings unless they are protected till they are bigger but they are supposed to keep established plantings scrupulously clean of bugs. Also snakes which they hunt down in posses. What might work is having a garden fenced high enough to keep them out when there are seedlings but have a "chicken" run adjoining the garden with a gate so that the Guineas could be admitted or excluded as desired.

I thought about getting some Guineas until I found out there is an active den of foxes near me as well as dogs running loose. That and the fact that my garden is far enough from my house to make it more bother than it's worth make it not worthwhile at this point.

Hi! I'm new to the area :) I grew up on a bit of property in Texas and preferred the guinea fowl to hens... They were a great natural alarm system, ate ticks and fleas... And left our gardens alone.

Now when I say great natural alarm system I mean every sound set them off. We had about 8 to 12 at a time. Raccoons will kill them and if you have any chicks you would have to have a safe secured place for them because smaller predators love them. Your neighbors may hate them if they live within earshot.

I actually have mixed feelings about Chicken. I am so glad I added them because for the last couple of years, I have not purchased any eggs, and my near friends and family also. Those fresh eggs are really delicious....really !

Also the chicken manure has dramatically changed the way a lot of my plants were growing (I have seen some significant growth. I usually lay straws or grass clipping in their run and weekly pull them and put it in a compost pile and very happy with it so far. I used to spend a lot of money on compost, topsoil etc, but don't plan to do that anymore.

By the way, I haven't seen a lot of common insect that usually invest my vegetable gardens (or garden as a whole). I think they are very effective at it. I am a strong believer of all organic, so pretty much everything chemical free.

Having said that, there are drawbacks! yes, some folks talked about their neighbor's chicken coming and running a havoc in their garden bed ... that is true. You have to really protect your garden (especially when they are young) and also they will go after those young tomatoes!!! They pretty much dug up all my Lilly!! They made a huge mess with the pine straw bed I had worked so hard to put out ... Oh, did I mention they will come to my driveway and deck area and do their bizzness :))

But oh how they were so cute when they were baby chicks and also it is just so darn peaceful when you are walking around and those chickens are browsing all around you. I don't think I will give up on them, I will figure out how to adopt to them :)

Guineas do great in a garden.....chickens make great tillers, though....