Chicken Coops for Sale in Riverview, Michigan
Chicken Coops for Sale in Riverview, Michigan
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 Easy in Riverview, Michigan
A good place to start any search is the internet. Simply plugging in the phrase "chicken coops for sale in Riverview Michigan" 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 Riverview Michigan chicken coops. What to look for when buying a chicken coop in Riverview, Michigan With the big rise in poultry maintaining there has actually been an equally huge rise in the range of poultry materiel on sale. Chicken housing is a situation in point. It's also a traditional instance of the excellent old bandwagon being got on as different would-be fowl real estate professionals peddle a range of cottage declaring to be the perfect solution to your chicken real estate needs. Commonly the rate looks appealing, your house looks desirable, hell even the clean-cut family standing there feeding the chickens look desirable. Definitely they understand a top quality chicken house when they see one? There are several affordable and horrible cages flooding the market. I recognize this as I've tested a number of them in the field, as well as seen a ewe run straight with one when the feed pail appeared. The outcome was just a pricey stack of fire wood as well as a small group of bemused as well as currently homeless bantams.
Chicken Coop Plans For 20 Chickens in Riverview, Michigan
Typically these mass produced models are created of fast grown up wood - come the initial decline of rain they swell, leaving you either defending a doorway that won't shut, or tearing the door furnishings off in a vain attempt to release the squawking citizens. The very first cozy day means the hardwood dries and also splits, the really felt roof bubbles and also boils, as well as come nightfall the chickens refuse to enter. This is not due to their dissatisfaction at the decrease of their when attractive residential property however considering that the hovel is currently a haven for, and also possibly abounding, the fowl keeper's nemesis, red mite. Add on the fact that it claimed on the blurb that it would certainly match 4 huge chickens when that equipping thickness was based upon the Circle Line at 5pm on a Friday, as well as what are you entrusted? A few hinges as well as some kindling. A decent coop for thee to 4 birds ought to cost you approximately ₤ 300 though this could depend on whether you choose for a free standing house or one with a run affixed. Thinking you are ranging your birds in a huge space as well as the pop opening doorway allows enough for the breed you maintain, then the primary requirements of housing come down to three points which will certainly define the number of birds your home will hold; perches, nest boxes as well as ventilation. Most breeds of chicken will certainly perch when they visit roost at night, this perch must ideally be 5-8cm broad with smoothed off edges so the foot rests pleasantly on it. The perch must be higher than the nest box entry as chickens will likewise normally search for the highest point to perch. A perch less than that will have the birds roosting in the nest box over night (which is by the way when they create one of the most poo) resulting in dirtied eggs the following day. They should not nevertheless be so high off the flooring of your house that leg injuries can happen when the bird comes down in the early morning. Chickens require concerning 20cm of perch each (in small breeds this is obviously much less), plus if more than one perch is installed in your home they need to be greater than 30cm apart. They will certainly hunker up with their next-door neighbors yet are not that crazy about roosting with a beak in the bloomers of the bird ahead. Preferably the house needs to have a least one nest box for every three birds and also these should be off the ground as well as in the darkest area of your house. Your home must have ample ventilation: without it then condensation will certainly develop every night, even in the coldest of climate. Realize, ventilation works on the principle of warm and comfortable air leaving via a high space drawing cooler air in from a lower space - it's not a set of openings on contrary walls of the house as well as at the very same level, this is what's referred to as a draft. If you have a house with a run attached then the points above are still true, but you should also think about the run size. The EU optimum legal stocking density for a free variety bird is (and let's face it, one of the inspirations for maintaining some hens at home is possibly improved or far better welfare) 2,500 birds each hectare, that's maximum one bird each 4m squared. Take a close consider a few of the bargain homes - it could well be your house has the ideal perches, proper air flow as well as sufficient nest boxes for an affordable number of birds, but will each of the chickens have anything more than an A4 sized item of ground to spend the day on? Therefore as the claiming goes, "you get just what you pay for". You may believe you've grabbed a bargain, however you as well as your flock might rue the day you did. Purchase the appropriate house and it will last for a few decades, if not longer offered the correct therapy. In the end your chicken as well as your poultry keeping experience will certainly be a lot the far better for it.plan coops
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