So you want to raise some chickens, huh? Having your own miniature poultry farm can be a very rewarding experience. Chickens are probably the source of one of the healthiest and tastiest meats there is in the world, and their eggs are a pretty important food staple in cultures around the world. Chickens also make very decent pets, something most people don’t consider until they start their own homemade backyard barn.
One important thing you need to remember, though: when you want to raise chickens, plan your way around the process before you actually start anything.
This is pretty important – chickens might be one of the easier livestock to grow, but it’s better to be safe than sorry later on in the game. This might sound grim, but going through a grim period of planning is better than ending up with a half-baked chicken coop with unhealthy chickens who hate you.
There are pretty much three things you need to take note of when you start chicken plans for your backyard:
Know what you’re raising chickens for. A lot of people miss out on this – they just get chickens and later on, they have no idea what they got it for. You can have a chicken as a pet, raise them for food or breed them for competition. It doesn’t matter what you want them for, so long as you know what you want them for.
Once you know what you’re getting them for, take note of the kind of chicken you want to buy. Get the wrong kind of chicken, and once you hit deep winter, there’s a huge possibility that you might end up having a dead bird within weeks. You don’t want that. Go to a hatchery, and talk to the main guy about breeds of chicken. Plan your way around your area, and everything else will be easy as pie.
How do you plan on feeding your chickens? How do you plan on keeping their living area clean? These are two other things you want to consider.
After making sure that you’re prepared for any situation with your chickens, put your plan into action and start raising those birds!