When we bought our house two years ago, we were very fortunate two big out buildings were included on the property. One is a garage and the other we call a barn. The barn has a built on section with stalls already built in. One stall was all ready for chickens, complete with nesting boxes and roosting rods, and a little door (we call the guillotine) that leads to an enclosed outdoor coop. The barn had not been in use for I don't know how many years, so it was kind of a scary place to me. There were cob webs all over, and spiders galore. There were also a couple dead mice, and lots of muck to be mucked. :) My husband, @goatgarden, and I knew we wanted chickens, so the first August we lived here, we ordered chicks from Cackle Hatchery. Did you know you can mail order chicks? I didn't! Just place an order and the chicks get shipped to your post office, then the post master calls to let you know they are ready for pick up. My husband picked them up and brought them home. Since they were just hatched, less than three days old, we couldn't place them in the big coop yet. @goatgarden built a brooder box for them. Just a big box with an open top. We put shavings down on the floor, and added a chick waterer and feeder. And my husband also rigged a heat lamp for them that hung from the rafter. The chicks must have clean water available at all times, and heat to keep them as warm as a broody hen would. Right now I don't remember how long we kept them in the brooder. But I do remember cleaning out the brooder and changing the shavings every few days. We also kept a screen over the top of the box so predators couldn't get in and chicks couldn't get out. The little chicks are very cute, and when they hear you coming they get very loud with their chirping!
So eventually we moved them from the brooder that was kept in the garage (the garage had electricity for the heat lamp) to the coop in the barn. I'm sure those chickens were running around singing "freedom"! We started off with a feeder on the ground and a galvanized waterer on the ground, both indoors. Again, plenty of water is a must. Time has passed, and @goatgarden has learned different ways for watering and feeding. He made a feeder from PVC pipe that allows our son to pour their feed in the top, and the chickens to eat out of the bottom. This feeder hangs on the wall. There is less wasted food than the previous feeder. The previous one- as soon as we put feed in it, a cranky bird would flip it over and out of the way, and all the feed would be on the ground. My husband also made a new waterer from a plastic bucket. He hung it up just high enough the chickens can stand under it and drink from the chicken nipples he screwed into the bottom of the bucket. So my son pours water in the top, and the chickens drink from the bottom. And in the winter there is a water heater we can put in the bucket to keep the water from freezing. He ran an extension cord from the garage to the barn for power.
The flooring in the coop is mulch and shredded paper and straw. My kids clean it out every few months and sift it, and we use it as nice fertilizer.
We feed the chickens layer crumbles from the local Producers Exchange store. They also get vegetable scraps from the kitchen. My son has the chore of taking care of the chickens. He feeds and waters them morning and night, and collects their eggs.
Outside the outdoor enclosed coop is what we call the chicken yard. My husband and son first made a pallet fence closing in the space between the garage and barn so the chickens would have more outdoor room. But last month they worked really hard and built a fence to replace the pallets. I think it looks really nice.
My son lets the chickens outside in the morning, and when they've gone in to roost at night (see my previous post for a putting up chickens story) he closes the outdoor coop door and the guillotine.
And that is how we keep our chickens.
