Chicken Coops for Sale in New York, New York
Chicken Coops for Sale in New York, 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.
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Chicken Coop Near Me in New York, New York
A good place to start any search is the internet. Simply plugging in the phrase "chicken coops for sale in New York 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 New York New York chicken coops. What to look for when buying a chicken coop in New York, New York With the massive increase in poultry keeping there has been an equally big rise in the array of poultry materiel for sale. Fowl real estate is a case in factor. It's also a traditional instance of the great old bandwagon being got on as numerous would-be chicken housing experts peddle a range of holiday accommodation claiming to be the suitable option to your chicken housing requirements. Frequently the cost looks appealing, your diy-chicken-coop-planshome looks attractive, hell even the clean-cut family standing there feeding the chickens look desirable. Undoubtedly they recognize a professional chicken house when they see one? There are many inexpensive and nasty cages flooding the market. I understand this as I've tested a variety of them in the area, as well as seen a ewe run straight via one when the feed bucket showed up. The outcome was just a costly pile of firewood as well as a small group of bemused as well as currently homeless bantams.
Chicken Coop Basics in New York, New York
Generally these standardized models are built of rapid grown up timber - come the very first decline of rain they swell, leaving you either defending a door that will not shut, or tearing the doorway furnishings off in a vain attempt to launch the squawking occupants. The initial warm day indicates the hardwood dries out as well as splits, the felt roofing system bubbles and also boils, as well as come nightfall the chickens choose not to enter. This is not due to their disappointment at the decline of their once desirable commercial property yet due to the fact that the hovel is currently a sanctuary for, and most likely crawling with, the chicken caretaker's bane, red mite. Add the fact that it stated on the blurb that it would match 4 large chickens when that stocking thickness was based on the Circle Line at 5pm on a Friday, and just what are you left with? A number of joints and some kindling. A decent coop for thee to four birds ought to cost you around ₤ 300 though this can rely on whether you elect for a complimentary standing house or one with a run connected. Assuming you are ranging your birds in a large room as well as the pop opening door allows enough for the type you maintain, after that the primary requirements of housing boil down to 3 factors which will specify the variety of birds your home will certainly hold; perches, nest boxes and also air flow. Many breeds of chicken will perch when they visit roost at night, this perch should ideally be 5-8cm broad with smoothed off sides so the foot rests pleasantly on it. The perch should be higher than the nest box entry as chickens will certainly likewise normally search for the acme to perch. A perch less than that will have the birds roosting in the nest box over night (which is incidentally when they generate the most poo) bring about dirtied eggs the following day. They shouldn't nonetheless be so high off the floor of your house that leg injuries might occur when the bird comes down in the early morning. Chickens require regarding 20cm of perch each (in tiny types this is certainly less), plus if more than one perch is set up in your house they ought to be more than 30cm apart. They will hunker up with their next-door neighbors however are not that keen on roosting with a beak in the bloomers of the bird in front. Ideally the house must have a least one nest box for every single 3 birds and also these ought to be off the ground and in the darkest area of your house. The house must have adequate ventilation: without it after that condensation will accumulate every night, also in the chilliest of weather condition. Be aware, ventilation works with the principle of warm and comfortable air leaving with a high void attracting cooler air in from a reduced space - it's not a set of holes on contrary wall surfaces of your home and at the exact same degree, this is exactly what's called a draft. If you have a house with a run attached then the factors above are still real, yet you must likewise take into consideration the run size. The EU optimum legal equipping thickness for a complimentary variety bird is (as well as let's face it, among the motivations for keeping some hens in your home is potentially boosted or much better welfare) 2,500 birds each hectare, that's maximum one bird each 4m squared. Take a close look at a few of the bargain homes - it could well be your home has the ideal perches, correct ventilation as well as sufficient nest boxes for a reasonable number of birds, yet will each of the chickens have anything more than an A4 sized piece of ground to spend the day on? Therefore as the saying goes, "you obtain exactly what you spend for". You may think you've got hold of a bargain, yet you and also your flock might rue the day you did. Purchase the appropriate house and also it will last for a few years, if not longer given the correct therapy. Eventually your poultry and your chicken maintaining encounter will be considerably the better for it.chickens coop
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