Chick, chick, chick, chick, CHICKENS

We eat A LOT of eggs and we’ve wanted our own laying hens for a long time. When we first viewed the property we would end up buying, I was already imagining where we could put the chicken coop (and goats…oops…never mind). Once we moved onto our 1.67 acres in June 2022, we knew we were closer to our micro hobby farm dreams. However, we had so much work to do in terms of clearing trees, house renos, building garden beds etc. that we didn’t have the time or money to invest in chickens right away. I wanted to feel fully prepared and be able to keep them safe from the wild variety of predators that lurk in the forest surrounding our home.

Fast forward to February 2024 when I got a bad case of chicken fever and decided this would be the year. Note that I said “I”. Scott was just pulled along for the ride. At first, I was set on getting pullets from the feed store. Pullets could be described as teenaged female chickens. They are usually between 17-19 weeks by the time you get them, so they are closer to laying age. This seemed perfect. We would get our chickens, house them, feed them for a few weeks and then be rewarded with what we wanted. I spent some time reading about what breeds were available and asking questions on Nova Scotia chicken Facebook groups. What I learned was that the pullets ordered from feed stores are VERY good laying hens, however, they are bred specifically to pump out a large volume of eggs and then die- usually within 2-3 years. While this is just fine, I felt like I wanted more longevity out of a flock. A few commenters also recounted some not very pleasant experiences with how the pullets were treated by the feed store on order day, or had stories about mixed up, incomplete or even nonexistent orders. One comment resonated with me the most. This person suggested that I look into heritage breeds from local breeders if I wanted healthier, more robust chickens with a longer lifespan. Heritage chickens are the types that were popular before the commercial breeds. The type of chickens our ancestors may have raised. I got all Laura Ingalls on myself and decided we would become heritage chicken breed owners. We were going to contribute to the preservation of these disappearing breeds.

This idea derailed my previous feed store pullet path, and redirected me onto local poultry sale sites and Kijiji, looking for people who sell heritage breed pullets. What I discovered then was that the majority of breeders did not want to hatch and grow out chickens for people as pullets. It was exhaustive of their time and space. Grow-outs would also cost more, the average price being $25/pullet. Most breeders wanted to sell chicks. This made sense. They only needed to hatch them, take care of them for a few days until they got picked up, get paid, and then start another round of eggs in the incubator. The idea of chicks really scared me at first. I felt like they would be so fragile and get sick or die easily. I don’t know how I thought I’d ruin or kill a baby chicken when I’ve raised a human child, but that’s where my mentality was at the time. I was also having a lot of difficulty finding sexed chicks since we didn’t want to have any roosters.

Now I was feeling really confused and a bit frustrated that I didn’t know which direction to go.  That’s when a lady who owns a family hobby farm here in Nova Scotia connected with me on Messenger. She asked me what my chicken goals were (yep, chicken goals are a real thing) so she could guide me in the right direction. She suggested that if I wanted to enjoy the whole experience with my three-year-old son Finley, I should go with chicks. She has two young children herself, and told me about the wonderful learning experiences they have raising farm animals together through their entire lifecycle. I really wanted that for Finley. I expressed my concerns about the logistics of taking care of chicks and she was kind enough to show me pictures of her setup and give me tips. It actually seemed a whole lot easier than what I made up in my mind. My next question was about sexed vs unsexed (called straight run) chicks. I told her we didn’t want roosters and she understood. It is much harder to find local breeders that sell sexed chicks because breeds that can be sexed at hatch are more rare than straight run. Breeders also tend to sell sexed chicks at a premium because they can. The options for dealing with unwanted roosters really come down to finding a breeder that will take roosters back, trying to rehome them on poultry sale groups or freezer camp. While I support the idea of culling a rooster and using it for food, I didn’t know if I or Scott would be able to bring ourselves to do the deed. Having a plan for roosters is a really important consideration before going out and buying a box full of cute fluffy butt chicks. It’s recommended that you keep at maximum 1 rooster for 10-12 chickens, so the size of your flock also plays into your decision. You need to ask yourself:

1.        Am I okay with having roosters?

2.        How many will we (and most importantly the hens) be able to handle?

3.        If you have extra or unwanted roosters, are you okay with culling or will you be able to rehome them?

Female Crested Cream Legbar

Finley with one of our chicks

Luckily, I found a woman who was hatching Crested Cream Legbar chicks which can be sexed at the time of hatch. Females have a very dark chipmunk-like stripe down their backs while males are much lighter coloured. We had to pay $15/chick as opposed to the going rate of $8/chick, but I was okay with the higher price since Cream Legbars lay gorgeous powdery blue eggs. I mean, c’mon, how fun is that?! The problem was that she only had 3 females available, and we wanted at least 8 chickens, so we had to find more. I returned to scouring recent hatch listings on local sites and groups looking for other sexed chicks but wasn’t having any luck. I came across a new hatch of Barred Rock chickens and decided to take my chances on these chicks. Barred Rock chickens lay light brown eggs and are a dual-purpose heritage breed, meaning they can be used for both eggs and meat. These chicks can SORT of be sexed at hatch by looking at a few trademark details. Female Barred Rock chicks are supposed to be identified by a small, precise white dot on their heads while roosters have a larger and messier white dot. Pullets are also supposed to have dark legs while roosters have light colored legs. The last trick is by looking at any visible barring in their wings. Pullets have larger dark bars and as they age are quite a bit darker than roosters. I decided to go for it and play chicken roulette. I didn’t want a large age difference between our chicks as that could lead to problems like pecking and since we already had the 3 Cream Legbars at home, I felt like we were in a time crunch. We decided that if we got any roosters we would try to rehome them on local poultry sale sites and if nobody wanted them, I’d just have to put my tough girl panties on, do the thing, and we’d have some very good food for Ramsay. This seemed like a problem for future Paula to solve, and present day Paula wanted those dang chicks.

All 9 chicks together

When Finley and I arrived at the farm where we were picking up our Barred Rock chicks, we were greeted by a flock of very loud, very angry geese. These things were enormous and weren’t very pleased with us intruding on their territory. Thankfully they were fenced in, but naturally, Finley was intrigued by these living alarm systems and wanted to go check them out. As we approached, they became more belligerent and started hissing at us, warning us that we were coming way too close for comfort. I scooped Finley up who started protesting nearly as loudly as the geese, and we trudged across the mucky yard into the trailer. There was a small crew of carpenters banging away at renovations as we chatted with the farmer lady and of course, Finley wanted to touch everything he saw including the wall-mounted raccoon and bobcat furs. The whole experience was so chaotic, and I just wanted to get our chicks and get back in the car without being nipped in the ass by an outraged goose. Needless to say, I don’t know that I did a great job of analyzing the differences or looking for female traits in the chicks. I know I got 6 black chicks. As far as I could tell they all had a dark wash to their front legs. With the white head dots, it was nearly impossible to tell which ones were smaller and more precise than the others. It was like comparing two cotton balls and saying which one was less cotton-y. It didn’t make sense to even try. I picked the chicks that looked the darkest, plopped them in our cardboard box, paid the lady and then quickly ushered Finley out past the furs and carpenters and the geese in the midst of their tantrum. For the life of me, I cannot understand why anyone would want to keep those feather devils.

The most important factor when raising baby chicks is creating a warm and draft-free space for them, called a brooder. They need to be kept at 35 degrees Celsius for the first week of their life and can be dropped down by 5 degrees each following week. By the time they are 5 or 6 weeks old, they should be fully feathered and do not need supplemental heat. I think most people have seen the red, fiery heat lamps from hell that have been used with chicks and other baby farm animals for eons. While they work, they are a significant fire hazard and I didn’t want to feel weary about leaving the house since the chicks would be kept in our basement. I ended up buying a heat plate from Amazon. It’s exactly what it sounds like- a square-shaped plate that puts out heat (but not enough to burn your house down!) and the chicks can hide underneath it. This worked like a charm because while they need one area to be kept really warm, they also need free space outside of the heat where they can escape and cool down if they get too hot. At first, we housed them in a plywood box we had that used to store firewood, and once they started to outgrow that space, we jerry-rigged a brooder out of Ramsay’s old XL dog kennel.

               Another decision to make when you are thinking about getting chicks is whether or not you will feed them medicated chick starter. Medicated chick starter has Amprolium in it. Amprolium is a type of medication called a coccidiostat, meant to prevent coccidiosis, which is a gastrointestinal illness that can very quickly become fatal in chicks. If caught early, it can be treated with a round of antibiotics for the whole flock. Medicated chick starter is especially useful if you are raising large amounts of chicks in the same space and if chicks are being raised on the ground with other poultry since coccidiosis can overwhelm a small chick in these situations. Embracing my inner Laura Ingalls, I aimed to raise our chicks as naturally as possible, but since I was already nervous about chicks and being a bubble wrap chicken mama, I decided to feed medicated for the first two weeks and then transition them into unmedicated feed. It went really well, and I can say all of our chicks have been super healthy.

               It’s been such a fun and enjoyable experience and extra special that Finley could help me. We’ve loved cuddling the chicks, watching them grow, and seeing them go crazy over yummy treats like corn on the cob and apples. We provided them with some daily entertainment in the form of mirrors in the brooder, branches for roosting on, giving them a basin of dirt so they could scratch around and dust bathe, and yes, even playing music for them. They like classical the best. Mozart was a winner.

The chicks checking out their roost

A couple of negatives that surprised us were the amount of dust they created, and the sheer amount of poo we’d have to deal with! I cleaned out their brooder every day and replaced all of their shavings at least every 3 days. If I didn’t do this, our basement would smell like a barn. I’m composting the shavings and manure, and it will make a perfect mulch to add to the garden in the fall. Because they grow so quickly, they create lots of dander and shed loads of skin cells. All of this dander and dust coated everything in the basement with a thin yellowish dust. It was pretty gross, to be honest. Scott hurried and worked so hard for 4 weekends in a row to finish up their coop so we could kick them out as soon as they were all feathered.

               In terms of coop design, we both watched videos on YouTube, searched Pinterest and read a couple of books (Storey’s Guide to Raising Chickens by Gail Damerow and The Self Sufficient Life and How to Live It by John Seymour). The most crucial factor for us was to try and create a space that would be as predator-proof as possible. We went for an 8’x4’ slanted roof coop that was just tall enough for me to stand up in. Scott built the nesting boxes so that we can access them from the outside by a hinged lid when the much anticipated time comes. We are so fortunate that Scott is able to get a lot of leftover materials from his construction job. He got the pressure-treated 6”x6” posts for the legs, the shingles, and flooring all from work for nothing. Yeap, these spoiled rotten girls (well, we hope) have luxury vinyl plank flooring in their abode. We also discovered a whole bunch of white vinyl siding left from the previous owner in one of our sheds, and an old window which we cleaned up and restained. We had to buy the 2’x4’s and OSB in order to complete the project. It looks amazing and it’s very functional. We added a "shit shelf" under their roosting bars that catches a lot of their poop while they sleep. I am using a mixture of sand from the yard and spent coffee grounds on it, so I can scoop it like kitty litter. It is working really well and makes daily cleanup easy. We can sleep well at night knowing the ladies are locked up safe in a draft-free and dry palace all their own. This weekend, we will be building their outdoor run. We’re keeping it pretty simple but also aiming for a high level of protection against predators. We will build a simple hoop coop out of flexible PVC piping with a wooden base and door frame, then cover the entire run with ½” hardware cloth. We’ll also lay a 2 foot length of hardware cloth all around the perimeter as a sort of apron, then cover it with dirt and rocks. This works to deter predators as they will try to dig at the base of the run, but when they come into contact with the hardware cloth they stop. They aren’t quite smart enough to back up 2 feet to dig and tunnel under. Fingers crossed.

               Now that we’ve had the fluffy butts for almost 6 weeks, we can say that we are definitely attached to them. We suspect we have 2, possibly 3, Barred Rock roosters in the mix of 9 chickens. I guess I lost the game of chicken roulette. We know we can only keep at most 1 rooster since we don’t have a lot of hens, and we want to avoid overbreeding them. Scott isn’t very enthused about the idea of a rooster crowing at 4 am, but I’m more open to keeping one if it remains friendly. One of the chicks that I’ve named Friendly Girl is a prime suspect, but I really do like him/her because they live up to their name. The only way to know for sure is to wait for that first “cock-a-doodle-doo”. Then it will be time to make some hard decisions about who gets to stay, who has to go, and if anyone (the roosters I mean, geesh) will end up in the freezer. Again, that’s a future Paula problem.

Friendly "Girl" and I