Anyone Raise Their Own Yardbirds?

[nortac]

I'm about to venture into raising chickens mainly for eggs. I'm in the process of building my chicken coop which I hope to populate around Easter weekend, or there abouts. Building a 6' x 12' covered enclosure with a second level roosting area with 5 nesting boxes. Starting out with just pullets, no roosters. It should be interesting!

 

[KellyScott]

Best of luck with it. We've been raising chickens for the past five years. Started like you plan to, just pulleys and egg producers, but it expended a bit each year and we've been raising meat birds as well for the past few years. Good luck - nothing better than eggs from your own backyard!

 

[simon1]

My granddad and uncle both had chicken coops, probably a bit larger than yours. Had several rows of wooden rods for perches, and several nest boxes. Got pecked many a time getting eggs out from under the hens. They had the area in front of the coop fenced off with chicken wire to give them a place to walk around, unless they were let out in the yard.

Dad had a row of cages inside our little barn that tilted forward a bit so the eggs would roll down into a little tray in the front. No more getting pecked. Something like this:

Have plenty of room here for a coop, but SWMBO says she doesn't want any of those "nasty" things. I'm not too fond of having floor shoveling duty again either.

 

[Deltaboy]

Good luck my folks had them for 40 years and sold eggs all over the place. We clipped their wings and they stayed inside a 20X30 6 foot chain link fence. We locked them up in the coop about dusk and released them just after sunrise.