So we are now into the seventh week of flockdown since Defra announced that it is a legal requirement for all bird keepers across the UK (whether they have pet birds, commercial flocks or just a few birds in a backyard flock) to keep their birds indoors and follow strict biosecurity measures to limit the…
Housing measures for poultry come into force across the UK at 00:01 Monday 29 November 2021. Avian flu is back again. While it causes no threat to humans, it can rip through flocks of wild bird who in turn can pass it on to domestic fowl. This means whether you are keeper of two ducks…
From past posts, I imagine you are all au fait with the likes of chicken maths and then chick maths. This my friends is a totally different story all together. This is egg maths. It all stared with red mite which are pesky little critters who feast off the skin of hens. It ended up…
A week or so ago, a friend tagged me in a post on Facebook about a local animal rescue charity looking for new homes for some ex-commercial hens. I have my current flock of young hens (yet to lay) and I knew I could give them a lovely home so I contacted them and arranged…
A is for araucana, a breed of chicken from South America which lays blue/green eggs and has a beard under its chin. B is for broody, when a hen gets the unwavering urge to hatch eggs. C is for coop. All hens need somewhere to live. D is for development. Chicks grow at an alarming…
When I first started keeping chickens, I felt like I had to learn a whole new language. Well, if not quite a language then definitely a glossary of terms. As with most past times, there are certain phrases reserved for the people who take part in whatever activity it is. There was a lot of…
The penultimate post in my chicken keeping series is raising chicks. There are two ways to do it. With a cockerel in your flock, if a hen goes broody and wants to sit on eggs, you can let her and let nature take its course. In three weeks, fertility dependant, you could have a clutch…
I don’t know whether I should have written this post first. I feel like I’ve sucked you in with the desire to keep hens but not I am going to tell you all the bad points. Sorry. I feel I have to tell you though, it would be silly of me not to tell you…
The first thing many people ask when they start to keep chickens is ‘do you need a cockerel.’ The short answer is no. Hens lay eggs with or without a cockerel so, if it s eggs you are after, the male is not necessarily needed. The other thing people often wonder is, if you do…
The next in my series on chicken keeping is choosing the right hens for you. I am afraid choosing chickens is like choosing everything else. It is all down to personal preference and what you want them for. I would sit down and ask yourself this before you read on. If you just want to…
