Mommyfox,
Congratulations from a fellow chicken fan! You'll have a great time watching your girls, and have the best eggs, too.
Fence your garden--they love greens, especially young, tender ones, and will eat your garden. After the plants are large enough to not miss a leaf or two, you can take the fence down and let the hens feast on bugs. If your hens are adults and a relatively heavy-bodied breed, the fence can be 3' tall. If they are banties or guineas, no way are you keeping them out of the garden with a mere fence!
Organic fertilizers are best, not only for the birds but for your plants. If you need to put insecticide/fungicide on roses, use insecticidal soap for bugs and a baking soda solution for powdery mildew (although the white residue from the soda looks a lot like mildew!).
We treat the individual fire ant mounds with Amdro, but if you put down a general fire ant killer and keep the ladies in the coop for a week afterwards, they should be safe. Check what it says on the fire ant killer bag.
You didn't ask, but chickens love treats! Kitchen scraps are gourmet dining for hens, and they also like to play soccer with an apple. A cabbage suspended from a tree limb at chicken-head height is a tether ball, and plant extra grape or patio tomatoes so your ladies can play keep-away.
Check out the Farm Life forum for lots of good hints on keeping chickens happy and healthy.

i'm green with envy!! i'd love to have a few hens.

i have such fond memories of the chickens my granny
kept

thats quite a bit down the road for us, but i'll live
thru your adventures, do keep us posted!

what kind of coop did you build?

what breed of hens are you getting?

tesa

Thanks for the tips! I will certainly check out the farm forum.

I'm going to get 2 Wyandottes and 2 Ameraucanas. I liked the coloring and body structure of the former, and the green or blue eggs of the latter!

Conspire and the world conspires with you. I had been mooning over the idea of chickens while my husband shook his head at the craziness and pointed out that it would take a few hundred dollars to get us started. Not one to be easily deterred from my goal, I plotted a way around this. The universe helped.

First, I put an old pond shell we had on Craigslist, asking $40 "or will trade for a chicken coop." Lo and behold, a lady who makes chicken coops wanted my pond shell! So she made me an A-frame coop with two nest boxes and a little run, and traded for the pond! (Which I couldn't use because I have little kids.)

Then, a friend of mine said she was getting rid of her turtles, and asked if I wanted their 100 gallon fish tank. Heck yes! I said. I offered to pay her, but she said it was payment enough for me to pick it up immediately and for her to not have to clean it. So I spent a weekend cleaning the heck out of that thing, then moved my fish into it, spent more days cleaning the heck out of my OLD tank, and sold the old one on Craigslist for enough to buy chickens and supplies!

I was truly meant to have chickens. It was fate.

I use beneficial nematodes to keep pest population under control, not total eradication. The problem with ant killer is that they also kill other bugs esp the benefical ones including praying mantis, lady bugs, and so on that are responsible for keeping pests under control. That's what chickens are for to keep pests under control? I sometimes use orange oil & molasses solution to drench individual ant mounts. You probably would have to water deeply everywhere every once in a while to keep benefical nematodes alive. I don't use anything for my roses. I just give them alfalfa tea and occasional seaweed foliar spray.

all hail the gardening gods!

thats great luck! post some pics when you can, i'd
love to see your new family members, and their home

tesa

Mommyfox, where are you getting your chickens? I'm in the DFW area and have wanted chicks since we moved here!

Re: ants, I also have small kids and I use instant grits on my ant piles and it works. Supposedly ants can't pass gas so they eat the grits and explode.

Grits don't kill ants. We looked it up on another thread. Woundn't that be great if it were true?

Urban chickens were too hard for me. I did it for 2 yrs. They were blue egg laying hens that ended up on a ranch instead of my backyard.

I miss the chickens who were friendly and funny but I don't miss the problems I had.

Chickens dig almost as well as a Lab. They'd dig up a plant quicker than I could stop them in decent soil. They'd tear the plant all to **** in poor soil before I could stop them. I didn't think of it but chickens have big,powerful and clawed feet perfect for digging.

Rats!!! OMG rats!!! Rats LOVE chicken food and chickens fling chicken food far and wide! Even with the dogs patrolling the area rats would risk life and limb (frequently doing so) to get at the darn chicken food.

Chickens potty CONSTANTLY. You will have to shovel and/or bury chicken waste everyday to keep the entire area clean. You're thinking "I'll just move them around" right?
Well.... Yes and no. I hope you have a LOT of trees to keep them cool or they will overheat.So around your trees will be really cleared out (they'll even destroy sod). The sunny part of your garden will stay the same most of the year.
Chickens get sick easily. They require shots and the like. Do you have a vet that knows poultry? How much money are you willing to put into this? PJ

"Grits don't kill ants. We looked it up on another thread. Woundn't that be great if it were true?"

(Shrugs) They kill my ants. I see a mound, I pour some instant grits on it and the ants are gone in a couple of days. Maybe I just have Yankee ants, lol.

And please, no voice of reality for my chicken fantasy!

Congratulations, Mommyfox!! I have one chicken, Speckles, a Barred Rock. My husband bought her (along with 2 ducklings and another BR who is no longer with us)as a surprise birthday gift for me. I was definitely surprised and would have made him return them except for the fact that I just didn't have the energy since I was scheduled for surgery two days later. He got them at the Keller feed store. I love Speckles' beautiful markings and she has the sweetest personality. She sits on my lap, loves special treats and has quite a variety of sounds she makes to communicate. We could never have guessed how much we would enjoy having a chicken as a pet! We learned to put her feed in a suspended bucket (lid on) with a hole cut into the side a couple of inches from the bottom. She can stick her head easily inside and eat, but it is much harder to throw food out. Since it is suspended on a wire it is harder for anything to get inside. We put her food bucket away in a metal trash can every night. We keep a scrap of linoleum under the bucket to catch any tossed food and put it out for the birds rather than leaving it inside her pen. We have coyotes and lots of hawks and owls in our area so we never let Speckles out unless we are right with her. My husband made her a secure run with the chicken wire buried a foot deep to make it harder for animals to get inside. Every night we lock her into her wooden coop. The only illness she has had was chicken pox. Seriously "fowl pox" is spread by mosquitoes and you can get a vet to vaccinate your chicks, but we didn't know about that. She got spots on her legs and comb for about a week, but no other ill effects. She does love to dig and can certainly uproot a plant she thinks may be covering bugs. I let her in the garden when I'm working and she mostly just digs around. She loves tomatoes though, so I have to keep her away from them. There used to be a great web site "CLUCK", Cooperative League for Urban Chicken Knowledge, with several Dallas members, but the web site had to be shut down due to hackers. I got a lot of info from them. I'm sure you are going to have great fun with your little flock. E-mail me if you think there is anything I could help with. Chickenmom (Debby)

I know I'm sure to run into issues with them, just like with any pet. But at least they're OUTSIDE pets that contribute something back. Believe me, I have no delusions about saving money on eggs by having chickens.

I do have several friends who have chickens, and they're being kind enough to hold my hand through the process, making sure I know what I'm getting myself into! Some of it, like the poo shoveling, I will just have to DO to know how much I can handle. (But isn't that what kids are for? Just kidding.) I do have a lot of trees, and it's mostly dirt out there where the coop will be, thanks to shade and rampaging kids.

Thanks for mentioning the shots; I had forgotten about that. I'm sorry chickens didn't work out for you! I'll keep you gals posted about how mine turn out!

I do have a lot of trees, and it's mostly dirt out there where the coop will be, thanks to shade and rampaging kids.

i was 12 when my granny passed away, so my memory might
be a bit fuzzy, but i don't ever remember her having
sick chickens. i dont ever remember them having to have shots. not that it aitn true, i just dont remember.

i do remember their run was huge, and she never let them
out, but i know they can destroy a garden quickly

i think if you go into it understanding what is required,
and willing to do the work, i think you'll be ok

attitude is everything, my friend who has hens, loves them
and so do her children. she doesn't seem to mind the work,
everything takes work, nothing is for "free", but what a
reward! to know that you made your dream come true, to know
that you give another creature a good life, to know that
you respect that creature, 'cause they give you eggs, and
sometimes meat, and alot of times entertainment, its a
good thing

anything is possible when you put your mind to it

regarding rats, she has two mousers, they seem to do a good
job, as she doesn't have rodent troubles, but also lives
in the country, not in the city where rats might be a problem even without chickens. oh, and btw, she rarley
feeds her cats, maby once every few days, that way they
are hungry, and on the lookout for a meal. i'd have to check on that, but i dont think she feeds them every day

cluck, cluck!

tesa

I don't know if shots are required or even recommended for chickens. The "pox" didn't seem to really make Speckles sick; I wouldn't have realized she had it except for the black spots on her legs and comb. Your friends will be advisors since they are experienced and close. You are going to have such fun! If you want them to be calm and tame I would suggest picking each one up every day while they are small and getting them used to you and being held. Speckles now just stops and squats down when we bend over to pick her up. She knows that most of the time she will get a hug and a treat; of course when we pick her up and take her back to her pen she makes these awful, croaking complaining squawks, as if she is being tortured. Her absolute favorite treat is grubs, so whenever we are digging in a new area we collect them for her. When she gets a special treat sometimes she will do this little shake all over and make a "hee-hee-hee-hee-hee" noise. She has us very well trained!

chickenmom, I think you have the knack for this! I didn't know they got actual chicken pox! My chickens had a standard hang on the wall feeder. A hole in a suspended bucket is clever as heck! PJ

txchristie, "yankee ants" LOLOLOL!

With the trouble I had you can find solutions ahead of time instead of scrabbling to find answers after it's a mess.

chickenmom, that is so funny, lol. My dog is named Speckles and she acts much the same as your chicken. Just noting a coincidence (not being mean) but chicken is her favorite meal. She can smell it when it's roasting and she gets what we call "chicken crazy".

My grandma had chickens and they were like pets to her- much like chickenmom. She would let them out every morning and in the evening she'd just call them and they would all come back and march into their little hen house. Every now and then one would be awol and she'd have to hunt it down. Usually because they were trying to nest somewhere and hatch their eggs. This was in a small town with properties that were about 1/2 acre. So, there weren't coyotes to get them and the neighbors just laughed when they saw a chicken trespassing in their yard.

My grandma had a good sized vegetable garden and so many flowers. Probably about 4,000 square feet of flowers. She didn't have any problems with them digging things up. In fact, she liked for them to patrol the gardens and eat the bugs. Perhaps it was the freedom they had, or maybe she fed them before letting them out, but it surprised me to read that they can be destructive. I know she used to save vegetable scraps and rice, etc. to give them.

I wish I could have chickens. It's against our HOA. I wonder if anyone would report me... hmmm.

I have really enjoyed reading this. I too plan on getting a couple of chickens and also a few guinea hens. I've had them before and really enjoyed them. They were free range chickens during the day but always came back to the chicken pen to roost. They never were destructive in the veggy garden or the flower gardens....but they sure ate a lot of bugs!

Dang! I got robbed! I had this whole organic thing going for my chickens and they went after my flowers and only ate a little bit of bugs. PJ

I got my first chicken! She is a black Australorp named Freya. She seems lonely; I will be getting her some companions soon. She's about half-grown; hopefully with some work she will get good and tame! Here's a link to where I posted some pictures!

Here is a link that might be useful: Chicken!

The ones we have eat everything except onions. Those they scratch out of the pot and throw on the ground to die. Grrrrrrr!
The eggs are fabulous, but dammit my container garden is dying. Pooh.

We have seven Australorp hens--sweeties every one! Freya is a flock animal, so get her some friends soon.
Get her to take treats from your hand, then start to stroke her while she is getting her goodies. After she gets used to your hands, pick her up gently. This way if you need to examine her for any reason, it will not be a traumatic experience for her. Australorps are kind, sweet and pretty chickens--you chose well!

If you need a quick fix on a couple hills of fire ants boiling hot water with some soap. Those that don't get killed by the heat the soap will remove the waxy surface of their shell and they will die very shortly. It is very handy if you are working in your garden and happen to run across a few, just keep a hand sprayer with soap added to the water, works on aphids also.

Has Freya gotten any friends yet? I read that an Australorp has the record for most eggs laid in one year. I think she missed one day. There is a darling little book called "My Fine Feathered Friend" written by a New York City food critic who found a chicken in his yard. Cute drawings too. The Murray McMurray catalog is lots of fun to browse. Give us an update when you add to your flock! Maybe some photos of hens and flowers!!

All chicken lovers MUST watch the film that aired on PBS (and is sold through them too) titled, The Natural History of The Chicken. It is sort of a documentary that has been re-enacted. You will laugh, you will cry, and you will never EVER look at a chicken the same again.

There are several chicken stories that make up the documentary. It's available in 6 parts on Youtube, but I'd highly recommend watching it on your t.v. if you can (some Video rental places may even carry it because it was such a big hit). Gather your family or friends around and make it an event. I own it and those who have seen it with me have asked to see it again (and will bring a friend) so it's become an annual thing and I've watched it about 10 times already. hehehe!

It's available through PBS and also through Amazon (used and new).

Here is a link that might be useful: Amazon link

I LOVED that documentary, Dragonfly!! I had no idea I could buy a copy! Thank you. In a much less lofty note try watching the clip on You Tube from Jay Leno with Terry Bradshaw and a woman from Arkansas who did CPR on a chicken. Rather rude and ribald in comparison to the documentary, but funny.

chickenmon....oh another fan! I just knew someone here would know that film. If you do buy it, be sure you know which format you're buying. The one I linked to was for VHS but it's also available in DVD.

I remember that woman on Jay Leno! That was a hoot!

Oh man! I got to get my hands on that! Also, a great humor book with poultry in it is "Enslaved by Ducks" by Bob Tarte.

I have five hens now - two Ameraucanas, a Barred Rock and a Red Star. The latter two are by far the calmest. They are all doing well, and so far have been a joy to keep. Though a fox did find his way into our yard and was checking them out! He found the coop to be fox-proof, however. HAHA, take that, you chicken-mooch! Today I had the pleasure of watching them all take a dust bath together - cutest and funniest thing ever!

I ordered the documentary; I think I specified DVD. I can't wait. Speckles will be 5 years old this month, so I'm going to tell my husband the video is a birthday gift for Speckles! In the book, My Fine Feathered Friend, when the guy saw the chicken taking a dust bath for the first time he thought she was having a seizure and he said his dogs stood stock still in total amazement staring at the chicken rolling around in the dirt!! The book has such funny little sketches too. Since he didn't know where to find chicken feed in NYC, the man had his Mom, who lived in Texas, mail him chicken scratch. I'm SO glad the fox was not able to get to your girls.

I have had chickens all my life. Have 18 hens and 2 roosters now. If they get started digging you cannot stop them. I use 2 ft rabbit wire fence around my beds or concrete wire that lays directly on the ground. Guinneas will dig too. The eggs are wonderful. When it gets warmer I just hate gathering my eggs. The so called chicken snakes love to live in the nest. They eat eggs and mice. My husband will not kill them. He wants them to eat the mice. But they scare me. You can tell if they have eaten eggs. They will have bumps along their bodies.

dirtduchess,

Are chicken snakes real common? What can one do to keep them out of the coop? Are they harmless (other than their appetitie for eggs)?

I am also thinking about getting 2 or 3 chickens. I also have fond memories of my grandma's ranch. I knew I was going to have to build a chicken coop and run but hadnt taught about shots, food, or mice and snakes. We do have hawks flying around and I do have 3 inside dogs that do like to go play outside (Pomeranians) I really want to be able to let the chickens loose at least some of the time. My grandma's chickens always stayed around her house. We went to the flea market about a month ago and my husband gave my 17 hear old daughter some money to buy whatever she wanted. Well we ended up coming home with 2 very small rabbits. They now have their own room (took over the wash room) And they are (thankfully) litter box trained. I take them outside every once in a while, and I am planning to build them a pen but I am planning on bringing them in at night. My dogs seem to be adjusting to them. Don't have to leave the door shut. But I also have a cat which stays outside. He like to hunt I'm wondering if he will try to get the chickens. I am now unsure about being able to handle raising chickens. Please keep posting and let us know how everything is working out.

Ah man, I want some chickens. But snakes? eek.

I've gotten three eggs so far! I'm quite excited. I built a fence around my vegetable garden, as much to keep out the kiddos as to keep out the chickens. Hard to tell who'd be more destructive there!

I heard a good fix for egg snakes. Put a couple of golf balls in with a nest of eggs. The golf ball will smell like one of the eggs, the snake will eat it and die. So only the snakes that eat your eggs will croak, not the snakes that just eat mice.

The little barred rock, who is now named Sootie, is so sweet. My preschooler carries her around in the crook of his arm, laid on her back like a baby. And she just lays there all relaxed and softly clucking. So cute! I'm really enjoying having the chickens. Hurray for sustainability and green livin'!

Chickens snakes are harmless. They just scare you to death.
Also they are only a problem in the spring and summer. Gather your eggs several times a day. Chicken snakes catch mice, moles, and golphers. But for desert they love eggs and baby chickens. Just part of the good life of the country.

Would chicken snakes be a problem in the middle of Dallas?

I doubt, with a small coop in the city, you'd ever encounter a chicken snake.

I enclosed my vegetable patch with a little fence. Just in time, too! I planted seeds today. I left the gate open a little too far, and I turned around and they had all squeezed through the gate and were watching me with eager anticipation! One of them started trying to dig through the little mounds I'd made for my gourds! I kicked them out and finished planting. I gave one a worm I found; she was so pleased! So far I haven't had much problem with them digging up plants. Of course, most of my plants are big suckers, nandinas and roses.

I also got the compost heap started properly, with lots of chicken poo in it! Good times.

"Good times."

That made me giggle. :->

This is so typically Austin I just had to post it:

KEEP AUSTIN FUNKY

Come join us for the first Austin Texas Funky Chicken Coop Tour! Have you been thinking about keeping urban chickens? Do you need coop design ideas? Interested in the slow food/locavore movement? Then this is the tour for you! Hey, this is even for those of you that already have backyard chickens and are thinking about changing your coop design (there's always room for improvement, right?). Also, feel free to come peck (oops, meant pick ;-) our brains on raising chickens.
WHEN: April 11, 2009 (10:00-4:30 pm). Tour will go on rain or shine.

WHERE: Click here for google map of coops. Click on a push pin or address on the map for a detailed coop description (NOTE: Please check the Coop Tour Blog and map the day of the Tour for any updates!) At A Glance map here.
COST: Free

We look forward to seein' ya there!

Please see the VISITOR GUIDELINES.

See web site for links and information: http://fccooptour.blogspot.com/

Here is a link that might be useful: Chicken Coop Tour

Oh, I love this thread! I am so glad mommyfox is enjoying her chicken experience, and that other chicken owners (servants?) are having fun, too.
I don't worry about "chicken snakes" which are non-venomous and fairly shy. I think my girls would gang up on any snake that ventured into their coop. You should see what they do with a mouse!
Our seven celebrated their first birthday last month. They enjoyed their cornmeal cake and cottage cheese substituted for ice cream. I did have a little trouble keeping their party hats on them, though.

This is a great thread, I am going to print it out and give it to DH, we have talked about chickens for years. We had them a couple of decades ago and we both remember how good that was
Mommyfox, congrats on getting the chickens and the great deals in the beginning

You didn't ask, but chickens love treats! Kitchen scraps are gourmet dining for hens, and they also like to play soccer with an apple. A cabbage suspended from a tree limb at chicken-head height is a tether ball, and plant extra grape or patio tomatoes so your ladies can play keep-away.

Marlingardener, I'm sure you were joking about the party hats, BUT I am not joking when I admit that I made Christmas "outfits" for my girls. We always get these cards from one friend with her dogs dressed up in Christmas costumes, so I decided to make little chicken capes, trimmed with fake white fur, for our girls to wear. It was a chicken rodeo getting them dressed for the photo, but great fun. We didn't try to get the little Santa hats on them after seeing how they reacted to the capes. At the time I still had both Speckles and Whitey. Whitey now reposes under the big rose bush behind the barn, but Speckles just celebrated her fifth birthday and lays nice brown eggs every other day. The coop tour in Austin sounds great. There is a group around Seattle that does coop tours and they have houses for their hens like you would NOT believe!!

I would love to have some chickens! We went on the Funky Chicken Coop Tour in Austin today. Great fun!

Oh Jana,

Please tell us more about the funky coop tour!
And what motivated you to go? Looking for coop ideas
or just did it for fun?

Don't all snakes eat eggs?

Also, be careful of skunks, they love chickens, and they are very resourceful about getting to them.

Do you know how to tell if an egg is good? You know you collect the eggs and find an extra, but you aren't sure how old it is....???

Shake the egg. If it does not slosh, sound like it has water in it, it is good. Water-filled-sounding eggs should NOT be opened.

Janie, who had chickens before, too.
(Now I just watch the neighbor's chickens who run loose and NOTHING ever happens to them!