Chicken Coops for Sale in Cleveland, New York
Chicken Coops for Sale in Cleveland, New York
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.
Read more on urban farming:
Share this:
Chicken Coop Easy in Cleveland, New York
A good place to start any search is the internet. Simply plugging in the phrase "chicken coops for sale in Cleveland New York" 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 Cleveland New York chicken coops. What to look for when buying a chicken coop in Cleveland, New York With the massive boost in poultry maintaining there has actually been a just as huge surge in the variety of fowl materiel on sale. Poultry housing is an instance in factor. It's additionally a classic instance of the excellent old bandwagon being got on as different potential poultry housing professionals pitch a selection of lodging declaring to be the suitable option to your chicken real estate needs. Often the cost looks appealing, your house looks appealing, heck also the clean-cut family members standing there feeding the chickens look eye-catching. Undoubtedly they understand a high quality chicken house when they see one? There are many low-cost as well as horrible coops swamping the market. I know this as I've examined a variety of them in the field, and seen a ewe run directly through one when the feed bucket showed up. The outcome was nothing but an expensive pile of firewood and a tiny group of bemused and now homeless bantams.
Chicken Coop For 4 Chickens in Cleveland, New York
Generally these standardized designs are built of rapid grown up timber - come the very first decline of rainfall they swell, leaving you either blockading a door that won't shut, or ripping the door furnishings off in a vain effort to launch the squawking inhabitants. The very first warm and comfortable day implies the lumber dries out and splits, the felt roofing system bubbles as well as boils, and also come nightfall the chickens refuse to enter. This is not due to their frustration at the decline of their as soon as appealing home yet considering that the hovel is currently a haven for, as well as most likely crawling with, the chicken keeper's bane, red mite. Add that it stated on the blurb that it would certainly suit 4 huge hens when that equipping density was based upon the Circle Line at 5pm on a Friday, as well as just what are you entrusted? A couple of hinges and some kindling. A respectable coop for thee to four birds need to cost you approximately ₤ 300 though this can depend on whether you elect for a cost-free standing house or one with a run connected. Assuming you are ranging your birds in a big area and the pop hole door allows enough for the breed you keep, then the main requirements of housing come down to 3 factors which will define the number of birds your home will hold; perches, nest boxes and also air flow. A lot of breeds of chicken will certainly perch when they visit roost during the night, this perch needs to preferably be 5-8cm broad with smoothed off edges so the foot rests conveniently 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 less than that will certainly have the birds roosting in the nest box over night (which is incidentally when they create one of the most poo) leading to dirtied eggs the list below day. They should not however be so high off the flooring of your home that leg injuries might occur when the bird gets down in the early morning. Chickens need regarding 20cm of perch each (in small breeds this is certainly less), plus if greater than one perch is mounted in your home they need to be greater than 30cm apart. They will certainly hunker up with their neighbors however are not that crazy about roosting with a beak in the bloomers of the bird in front. Preferably your house must have a the very least one nest box for each 3 birds and these need to be off the ground as well as in the darkest area of your home. Your house should have appropriate ventilation: without it after that condensation will accumulate every night, also in the coldest of weather. Be aware, ventilation works with the principle of cozy air leaving via a high gap attracting cooler air in from a lower space - it's not a collection of holes on other wall surfaces of your house as well as at the very same degree, this is exactly what's known as a draught. If you have a house with a run affixed then the factors above are still true, however you ought to additionally consider the run dimension. The EU optimum lawful stocking thickness for a free array bird is (as well as let's face it, among the motivations for keeping some hens at home is possibly improved or much better well-being) 2,500 birds each hectare, that's maximum one bird per 4m squared. Take a close look at a few of the bargain houses - it could well be your house has the ideal perches, correct air flow and also sufficient nest boxes for an affordable variety of birds, but will each of the chickens have anything greater than an A4 sized item of ground to invest the day on? And so as the saying goes, "you obtain just what you spend for". You could believe you've grabbed a bargain, however you and also your group could possibly rue the day you did. Purchase the appropriate house and also it will last for a few years, if not longer given the appropriate treatment. Eventually your fowl and your poultry keeping encounter will certainly be considerably the better for it.plan plan
More Posts
Chicken Coops for Sale in Amsterdam, New York
Chicken Coops for Sale in Cleverdale, New York
Chicken Coops for Sale in Barrytown, New York
Chicken Coops for Sale in Cincinnatus, New York
Chicken Coops for Sale in Alpine, New York