Keep Chickens!: Tending Small Flocks in Cities, Suburbs and Other Small Spaces (8 page)

No, they don’t. Their beaks don’t do the chewing — their gizzards do. When a chicken eats, food goes into its crop, a pouch in the throat that holds food. The crop delivers food to the
proventriculus,
or true stomach, where hydrochloric acid and digestive enzymes are added. Finally the food passes to the
ventriculus,
or gizzard. The gizzard is a muscular pouch that contains grit. Grit acts like a masticating agent, mashing up the ingested food.

Do I have to bathe my chicken?

Not unless you really, really want to — and I can tell you from personal experience that the chicken
will not want to take a bath.
Chickens are hard enough to hold still under dry conditions. Try holding them still during a warm bath and blow dry!

Mother Nature takes pretty good care of hen hygiene. Chickens keep clean through preening and dirt baths. A dirt bath removes any mites from a chicken’s feathers. Preening removes fine particles of dirt and dust. However, chickens participating in a poultry show are bathed and groomed so that their natural good looks shine even more in the ring. Unless you are showing poultry or your chickens have shown an affinity for water, I’d refrain from bathing backyard hens. The chickens in your urban flock aren’t going anywhere, so they don’t need to get gussied up. Plus, a wet chicken is susceptible to colds.

Hens are female adult chickens. Pullets are female chickens less than one year old.

Buy baby chicks only from reputable feed stores on online hatcheries.

Can chickens catch colds?

Yes, they can. If you see that your chicken has the sniffles or is sneezing (yes, chickens sneeze), mash up a clove of fresh garlic in some cottage cheese or other goody that your chicken loves. You can also mix a teaspoon of fine garlic powder into a gallon of your chickens’ drinking water, but that way, all your flock will be drinking the remedy. The garlic won’t hurt them, but it may imbue your hens’ eggs with a strong, distinct scent and/or flavor. If your sick chicken fails to make a comeback after a few days’ worth of the garlic treatment, review
The Chicken Health Handbook
, by Gail Damerow, for more information.

Can chickens get frostbite?

Yes. Although chicken feet are quite resilient against frostbite, the wattles and comb are susceptible. So keep your chickens out of the wind and snow. The smaller the chicken, the more vigilant you need to be about keeping it warm in cold weather.

Do chickens have good eyesight?

Yes. Sight and hearing are a chicken’s two best senses (besides their sense of humor). They find tasty bugs and grubs by seeing them crawl around in the dirt, or hearing them shuffle under leaves or grass. Chickens don’t have a great sense of smell or taste, which perhaps explains why they think worms and beetles are delicious.

Do chickens make good pets?

Yes, absolutely! People keep all kinds of birds as pets: parakeets, canaries, cockatiels, parrots. Why not keep chickens? They are no more difficult to care for than any of these birds, or any other pets like dogs, cats, or fish. Keeping typical farm animals in a personal residence is nothing new — remember the miniature potbellied pig craze of the 1980s? Sadly, the attraction to pigs in residence went belly up a short time later. Very few true miniature pigs were sold to a pig-loving public. Most folks were in possession of a basic, generic pig that grew to 300 or more pounds within a year. The public reeled from Big Pig Shock. We cooled off toward farm animals as pets, and rightly so. Pigs, like most farm animals, didn’t work out because they are simply too large and require too much care and space from a typical city dweller.

Yet a pet-loving public would not be deterred from taking chickens under their wing. Chickens aren’t large. Chickens aren’t difficult to care for and maintain. And chickens are cute. For these reasons, it was only a matter of time before we invited chickens into our city and suburban neighborhoods.

And while they do make great pets, we are talking outdoor pets, not indoors. Chickens cannot be housebroken. While my hens would love to come in to the house and watch “Animal Planet” on TV, I don’t let them in because of their indiscriminate waste elimination habits (in other words, they poop anywhere, anytime, all the time). However, I heard of one chicken lover who kept her pet chicken indoors and controlled the relentless droppings by making the chicken wear a diaper (no lie!).

Are chickens smelly?

This is an understandable concern in any community, particularly those where houses sit close together. The answer depends on the chickens’ owner. Chicken coops that are not properly and adequately cleaned at least once a week will start to develop that barnyard smell. If you follow the simple guidelines for coop care described in
chapter 7
, you will be able to proudly say, “My chickens don’t stink!”

Are chickens dumb?

While chickens don’t grow up to do quantum physics or govern small countries, they are not stupid. Their intelligence is relative to their species. They are, after all, birds. They aren’t as smart as an African Grey parrot, but they hold an MBA when compared to a common finch. Chickens also do quite well in learning to respond to certain stimuli. My chickens have learned all manner of things. When they hear the back door open, they know to run to the coop gate to greet me. When I call “chick chick,” they come running, because they know I call them over to personally hand out special food treats. Or when I tap my fingers on the picnic table, they jump up onto the tabletop looking for imaginary goodies.

Can a chicken love you?

Yes — sort of. Although nature didn’t equip them with the same capacity for affection as a cat or dog, chickens do show fondness, in their own way. Just walk outside with a dish of scratch or cottage cheese and watch the chickens
lovingly
run right up to you. Okay, so chickens love you for the food, but that’s something, right? My chickens like to sit with me on the arms of my outdoor chairs, just hanging out and preening awhile. To me, that’s love.

Where’s the best place to buy chickens?

At your local feed store or on-line from a reputable hatchery. You can also obtain all your henhouse equipment and supplies there. Most feed stores carry the most popular purebred chickens, such as Barred Rocks, Rhode Island and New Hampshire Reds, Austra-lorps, and Orpingtons, and a few of the recently available commercial hybrids, like Red Sex Link and Black Sex Link chickens. If you are just starting to keep a small flock, you can get advice from the feed store employees or from the hatchery web site (usually great sources of basic chicken information), or you can buy one of the many books (like this one) they all have available.

On-line feed stores and hatcheries have a terrific variety of breeds available. The downside to ordering your chicks from an on-line breeder or hatchery is that sometimes a minimum order of chicks is required — between 10 and 50 — which far exceeds the number of chickens that residents are permitted to keep. This trend is gradually changing, as some hatcheries are responding to the resurgence of small backyard flocks. Some on-line hatcheries let you order just one chick in a breed, if desired. Unfortunately, ordering chicks by mail carries the morbid risk of finding one or more chicks dead after the ordeal of cross-country shipping. Reputable hatcheries have guarantees to prevent or resolve that occurrence.

Can you keep chickens in urban areas?

After all this, you’re still asking? City chickens are marvelous! Most city codes permit keeping several chickens in residential areas. They are easy-to-care-for pets that provide your family with fresh, organic eggs. They are part of the recycling and compost chain in your garden. And for you and your family, friends, and neighbors, chickens provide hours of fowl amusement!

Do you need a permit keep chickens?

Depends on where you live and the number of hens you intend to keep. Municipal codes in some cities and towns do not require a permit unless you want to keep more than three chickens. To apply for a permit, you may need to obtain the signatures of all residents within a certain distance of your coop, which evidences their consent to your keeping a small flock of chickens. See
chapter 4
for more information.

Where can I learn more about chickens?

I’ve listed various print and Internet resources at the end of this book. Over the past few years, the best book I’ve seen about chickens (besides this one, of course) has been
Storey’s Guide to Raising Chickens
by Gail Damerow.

If you are like me, the more you learn about chickens, the more you’ll want to know. One day, without your realizing it, your chicken illiteracy will have transformed into chicken enlightenment!

When the topic of keeping chickens in city or other residential areas comes up, you don’t want to get on the wrong side of your neighbors or the law. Upset neighbors can make your life miserable; the law can force you to send your chickens packing. As a prospective chicken keeper, long before you crack open your first fresh backyard egg, crack open the books on your city’s laws and ordinances regarding the keeping of chickens. Just as important is to poll all the neighbors adjacent to your property and get their “yes” vote on your feathered friends.

Don’t invest in any coop materials and supplies — and especially not any chickens — until you have first checked in with your neighbors to gauge their warmth toward having a chicken coop near their home. It is the considerate thing to do. Even if you find that your local laws don’t require a permit for your chickens, talk to your neighbors anyway. Include them in the process. After all, small flocks of chickens in a residential backyard may still be considered an eccentricity in your neighborhood (though this perception is changing). Your neighbors will appreciate your openness and courtesy about keeping what many consider to be strictly farm animals on a modest parcel adjacent to their home.

Assure your neighbors that the chickens won’t be a nuisance to them or any other residents. Reassure them that you plan to be vigilant about henhouse maintenance and sanitation, and that odor will be minimal. Tell them that you intend to have only hens, no roosters. Most people are concerned about the noise accompanying a rooster. Advise your neighbors that you know roosters are too loud and rowdy to keep in close quarters and, on top of that, city law prohibits keeping them. Hens have their moments of excited clucking, most often after they’ve just laid a big egg. However, unlike roosters, most of the day chickens are quiet, softly clucking to themselves.

By including your neighbors up front, you not only avoid any potential misunderstandings later about your pet flock, but you also incidentally create new chicken lovers in your community. When I first got started building my chicken coop, neighbors and their kids would occasionally stop by and check on the coop’s progress. Some even wanted to participate in building the coop. Everybody was excited, asking nearly every day for weeks, “Is the coop finished?” and “Did you get the chickens yet?”

When you finally do bring the baby chicks home, everybody and their kids will come over to see their fuzzy new neighbors. The kids love holding the fragile, peeping chicks, and the grown-ups are reduced to whispered awe as the chicks are gently passed around. From the start, my backyard flock was actually the block flock. Everyone stopped in during the chicks’ early days to cuddle them and marvel at their soft innocence and utter dependence. Everybody loves chicks. As folks keep coming over to visit, they will grow to love your chicks-grown-to-chickens. Some will want their own. Give them all the good advice you’re learning here. And remember — tell them to talk to their neighbors first!

If you have checked in with all your adjacent neighbors about keeping chickens, and they all consent, be happy, but not too happy. Before moving in your imminent flock, you have one more step: You need to find out whether chickens are permitted in your community. You don’t want to put time and energy into building a coop until you are certain you will be complying with all local laws and ordinances.