We have called the chicken "Tina"... as in Tina Turner... black body, white, grey hair do.
DH has gone to buy some chicken wire, a hay bale and some pellets. We have a woodshed that will be easy enough to convert (while still able to store the wood).
Tina seems to love apples and is so docile... even our teenage DD has held her and protected her from the magpie.
I don't know about feeding chickens meat, that doesn't sit well with me for some reason. Can you just feed them on grains and vegetarian (I know they eat bugs & worms)...
Okay... bread isn't good for chooks or any birds. It gets stuck in their crops, which can cause constipation and them to go egg bound... bad bad bad.... ouchies...
The best thing is for them to free range and get bugs out of the gardens and fruit & veg scraps. I used to buy my chooks a bunch of spinach a week as well. They love green leafy veges. Layer pellets are good and remember that a chook can't lay eggs without extra calcium, so either you can get shell grit at the place you get hay etc... get a medium course ground one, or you can grind up sea shells yourself if you are near a beach.
I wouldn't give chickens meat, but they do eat snails and lizards etc... so they do get meat that way... sometimes they break their own eggs and eat them. But personally I wouldn't do it. My grandma used to throw all scraps including meat/ham/chicken scraps to the chickens and they ate them
Cat food is high in fat and protein, so maybe not designed for chickens? They need a low protein and fat diet.
Yep, no more bread. Tina is eating layer pellets that i have embedded into apple halves. She didn't seem to like them by themselves. She is also currently foraging in our backyard. She seems more interested in the weedy garden beds than the vegie patch so far. She has had a good scratch around in a patch of bare dirt. She seems very happy. No sign of the magpie for the last few hours.
Gven that DH and I don't eat red meat we won't be buying it... so hopefully the protein she gets in our backyard will suffice. There are lots of worms and bugs. We don't use pestide (except on the rose bed which i might stop now) so everything should be safe.
I have 3 books on keeping chickens which i'll read as needed. I think i have the basics covered now.... but any anecdotes will be appreciated
We are thinking of buying 2 more Polish hens to keep her company.
My last chickens refused to eat the pellets... so I bought layer mash which is a mix of different grains and corn etc etc.... and they took to that better. Its more difficult to establish chickens that have resorted to fending for themselves onto pellets, but it can be done
ETA: Oh!!! Try them on a slice of watermelon.... or tomato.... they love the red stuff
Thanks Christy I've been reading up on Polish chickens and apparently because of their crest (head feathers) mash isn't recommended because it can get stuck in the crest and make their eyes sore. But I'll definitely give the red stuff a go!
Locking them up at night is the way to go as you never know what will come over the fence.
Extend the wire so foxes cannot did into the pen. If you have a tree overhanging the woodshed make sure it cannot be gotten into that way. Foxes etc have been known to climb trees to get into chook pens.
We used to give our chooks all kitchen scraps.
Have fun and enjoy fresh eggs, how I miss that. We cannot have chooks as we have a Jack Russell
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