Chicken Coops for Sale in Port Richey, Florida
Chicken Coops for Sale in Port Richey, Florida
Eggs! Raise Your Own Hens In A Chicken Coop Built From Scrap
From a long line of egg farmers in Holland, Karin’s dad finally builds her a chicken coop
Where bylaws allow, or can be bypassed, I highly recommend building your own chicken coop. Imagine getting fresh, free-range organic eggs every day? When my parents came to visit me in Jaffa a few months ago, Dad found himself bored. Back in Holland, my family the Van Der Meers were one of the biggest egg producers in the country before the Depression. So you could say, eggs are in our genes. With Dad nothing to do for a few weeks, I brought up the idea of having him build me a chicken coop. That got him kind of excited. He foraged for wood in my backyard and came up with a coop that resembles a bus stop. The Chicken Express? Step right up and I’ll tell you how to build a coop in a few easy steps. And no you don’t have to invest much, unless you want to make your coop designer.
In warm climates very little is needed to keep your hens happy – basically a roof over their heads, a lengthwise pole for curling their toes around when they sleep at night (you might want to raise it high where feral cats might stalk your chickens), and some fencing to keep them from, well, flying the coop.
Here are our chickens before we bought them.
As it turns out, Bedouin chickens which we bought in the Negev Desert, are very agile creatures and even sleep in our blackberry tree some nights. The fencing doesn’t help them that much, but it does keep them contained somewhat, and out of the mouth of our crazy dog.
Here’s what you’ll need to build the coop:
- A corner on your roof, garden, or backyard for the chicken coop, a couple meters by a couple meters at least
- An old door or piece of plywood for a roof
- Some plywood for the sides
- Chicken wire, if you want to contain the chickens outside the coop (they eat weeds so consider letting them run loose)
- A wooden pole
- Some boxes, or crates for roosting. Throw in something soft.
- Feed
Find a corner to build against, saving yourself the need to build 2 extra walls. Be lazy. Make sure there’s a roof for the chickens to protect them against the sun, and rain, and in the winter if it gets cold, you can throw a carpet over the sides to keep the cold wind out. Make sure they have three walls.
We built a 2 meter or so pole, installed horizontally, down low about 50 cm off the ground but noticed some street cats were preying on our hens and raised the pole to about 1.5 meters off the ground. Most chickens can fly to this height but see what works for yours. It really doesn’t take much to make your chickens happy. But they do need a pole to sleep on at night.
What you feed your chickens:
- A basic seed/corn meal
- Compost – can include eggshells (ours really love labane cheese – could be because they are Bedouin hens)
- Garden weeds and greens (let them go wild!)
- Worms and bugs (they feed themselves while aerating the ground)
- Endless supply of water
Chickens do need basic feed, that which can be bought at a feedlot. Some inquiring around on where to find chickens and feed might be in order. Animal markets for livestock might be your best bet. Ask around in places like that. We bought a huge drum of feed consisting of corn meal and other seeds, and feed our chickens a regular diet of all the vegetable-based compost that would otherwise be composted. But don’t worry. Chicken doo makes an excellent compost too. One of my friends can’t eat eggs unless they are free-range and fed with organic oats. So it’s really up to you to decide how to feed your chickens, depending on your health needs and sensitivities.
We have five chickens and one rooster. The rooster is just for the fun of it. You don’t need one if you have neighbors nearby who will complain about the noise. And roosters DO make noise, waking us up as early as 1:30 am.
Bedouin women (crouching like crows) selling “bede” hens at the market
Unlike commercially-raised chickens, our hens don’t get “sunshine” 24 hours a day. Some parts of the year the chickens won’t lay. They will molt and take a break. And not every chicken will lay every day once she starts. We bought young chickens and it took them a couple of months to start laying. Now three of the five are laying, but like I said, not every day.
See a video interview with my dad about chickens
We bought our chickens at a Bedouin market (for about $10 each) because it was important for my husband that we have a “wild” variety – chickens that haven’t been genetically manipulated. Our eggs are on the small to medium size, the yolks absolutely huge compared to the white. One hen is laying eggs with the most delightful little beige specks on them.
Dad (left), the closest link to my family of egg people is determined that next time he comes to visit me in the Middle East he’ll be smuggling in white hen eggs – “the real good layers” – from Canada. He keeps asking me about building an incubator for these eggs to become hatchlings. Hopefully it will happen and when it does, I’ll report it here on Green Prophet.
Meanwhile, I am dreaming about how many eggs I will collect tomorrow. And how exciting it will be for my little baby daughter, when she gets bigger, to go out and collect them like I did when I was a little girl (that’s me in the top photo). My family had a coop in a suburban town outside Toronto until our evil neighbour complained and we had to get rid of it.
Before the complaints, I would go out and collect our eggs and sell them to our neighbors for a dollar a dozen, to cover the price of feed. Seriously, it was so much fun. If this blogger, and lazy environmentalist who is addicted to the computer can start a coop, you can too. Get cracking and join the new movement of urban farming.
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Chicken Coop Tips in Port Richey, Florida
A good place to start any search is the internet. Simply plugging in the phrase "chicken coops for sale in Port Richey Florida" into any one of the numerous search engines and a wealth of information will pop up. This information will provide links to other websites that will be informative and will provide the right direction for finding Port Richey Florida chicken coops. What to look for when buying a chicken coop in Port Richey, Florida With the significant boost in poultry maintaining there has been an equally big surge in the range of fowl stuff on sale. Chicken real estate is a proceedings in factor. It's additionally a timeless instance of the good old bandwagon being got on as various potential chicken housing experts market a range of cottage declaring to be the excellent option to your chicken housing needs. Commonly the rate looks attractive, your house looks attractive, heck even the clean-cut family members standing there feeding the chickens look appealing. Definitely they recognize a professional chicken house when they see one? There are lots of inexpensive and also awful coops swamping the marketplace. I recognize this as I've tested a number of them in the area, as well as seen a ewe run straight through one when the feed container appeared. The outcome was nothing but a costly pile of fire wood and a tiny group of bemused and also currently homeless bantams.
Chicken Coop Ideas in Port Richey, Florida
More often than not these standardized models are constructed of fast grown wood - come the first decrease of rain they swell, leaving you either fortifying a doorway that will not close, or tearing the doorway furniture off in a vain attempt to release the squawking residents. The first warm and comfortable day implies the wood dries as well as splits, the really felt roof bubbles and also boils, and come nightfall the hens choose not to go in. This is not due to their dissatisfaction at the decline of their as soon as desirable building yet because the hovel is currently a haven for, and also probably abounding, the chicken keeper's nemesis, red mite. Add the fact that it said on the blurb that it would suit four huge chickens when that stocking thickness was based upon the Circle Line at 5pm on a Friday, as well as exactly what are you entrusted? A number of joints and also some kindling. A decent coop for thee to four birds need to cost you approximately ₤ 300 though this could depend upon whether you choose for a free standing house or one with a run affixed. Thinking you are varying your birds in a large area and also the pop opening door is big sufficient for the type you keep, after that the major needs of real estate come down to three factors which will certainly define the variety of birds the house will hold; perches, nest boxes and also air flow. Many types of chicken will perch when they visit roost during the night, this perch should ideally be 5-8cm vast with smoothed off sides so the foot sits easily on it. The perch should be higher than the nest box access as chickens will certainly also normally look for the highest point to perch. A perch below that will certainly have the birds roosting in the nest box overnight (which is by the way when they generate the most poo) resulting in dirtied eggs the following day. They should not nevertheless be so high off the flooring of the house that leg injuries can take place when the bird comes down in the morning. Chickens require about 20cm of perch each (in tiny breeds this is obviously less), plus if greater than one perch is installed in your home they should be greater than 30cm apart. They will hunker up with their next-door neighbors but are not that keen on roosting with a beak in the bloomers of the bird ahead. Ideally your home ought to have a least one nest box for every single three birds and these must be off the ground and in the darkest area of the house. The house must have ample air flow: without it then condensation will accumulate every night, even in the chilliest of weather. Know, air flow works on the concept of warm and comfortable air leaving through a high gap drawing cooler air in from a lower gap - it's not a collection of holes on other walls of your house and at the same degree, this is exactly what's called a draught. If you have a house with a run attached after that the factors above are still true, yet you should likewise take into consideration the run size. The EU optimum lawful equipping thickness for a free variety bird is (and also allow's face it, one of the motivations for keeping some chickens at home is potentially improved or better well-being) 2,500 birds per hectare, that's maximum one bird each 4m settled. Take a close take a look at some of the deal homes - it could well be the house has the best perches, correct ventilation and also ample nest boxes for a reasonable variety of birds, yet will each of the chickens have anything greater than an A4 sized piece of ground to invest the day on? Therefore as the claiming goes, "you obtain exactly what you pay for". You may assume you've got a deal, however you and your flock could possibly rue the day you did. Purchase the ideal house as well as it will last for a couple of years, if not longer offered the correct therapy. In the long run your chicken and your fowl maintaining experience will certainly be considerably the far better for it.chickens coop
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