My Mom has chickens, and let me tell you, there are no eggs on the planet better than REAL free-range foraging chicken eggs. The yolks are bright orange and buttery and the taste is out of this world! While we love that we can get eggs from my Mom, we do not live next door to her. Sometimes we run out and have to buy them from the store. Gasp! The more we buy, the more I want to just start up a coop of my own in the backyard! Here are the top 5 reasons that I hope to do this SOON!
1) FREE eggs (well, not completely free), cheap eggs. The cost of raising eggs is so much less than it costs to buy the highest quality of eggs from the store.
2) Fresh eggs. If you have never plucked an egg from the coop and brought it into the house for breakfast minutes later, then you haven’t lived. Seriously, it is amazing! I love to eat the yolk just slightly runny and thoroughly enjoy all of the benefits of that nutritional powerhouse. Plus, the kids LOVE to help find the eggs, its like an Easter Egg hunt every day!
3) Learning and connecting. When you raise and care for something all by yourself you connect with it. We even named my Mom’s chickens and it is fun to get to know their personalities. Some chickens can be quite the unique individuals. My kids love to sit in the coop and feed them scraps. It’s such a fun way to connect (and disconnect from TV and our various media devices) with nature and learn all about the circle of life. This might just be my biggest reason to want to get chickens of our own! My kids would learn so much!!!
4) Chickens eat bugs. Do I really need to go into any detail on this one? Especially those of you who live in the Midwest, you KNOW about bugs! Especially ticks. Yep, chickens eat ticks. Heck you might just want to get chickens for this reason alone. I really dislike doing the tick-check every time I come inside, and having chickens might just make that experience more tolerable (because we won’t find and of those little buggers anymore!).
5) Chickens are easy. If you let your hens free range in the backyard, you will only have to clean out their coop every 3 to 4 weeks. The daily grind of having chickens is just like any other pet you might have: food, water, shelter. Hey, does your cat lay eggs? Go buy some chickens!
If you are curious about backyard chicken yourself, then I highly suggest picking up a copy of Oh Lardy’s NEW book: “The Guide to Keeping Backyard Chickens“. They detail everything you need to know, and even give you very nicely detailed (lots of pictures) instructions on building a cute coop in your yard. This book seriously rocks and you can read the whole thing in a day….and have chickens by the weekends end!
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19 Replies to “Top 5 Reasons to Raise Backyard Chickens”
Have always wanted chickens-now live in a rural area-this year the garden, next year chickens!
Hello Kate, My husband and I talked about raising backyard chickens back in 2000 when we bought this house. It’s like deciding to start a family, I think, in the sense that if you wait until the timing is right you may never get around to it! This just might be the year for us. My main concerns are the coop itself (warm enough/cool enough/safe enough/large enough) and veterinary expenses. I found the comment that mentioned what NOT to feed your chickens as well as the one that mentions what to do after the hens stop laying most thought provoking. I’m anxious to get my hands on as much information as I can in the coming weeks. I think we might be ready for some chicks! Thank you for the opportunities to enter your give-away.
Comment5 was the most useful
Sean’s comment on Amazon was helpful. I used to live somewhere with chickens, and I didn’t fully appreciate the eggs until I moved away….!
Can’t wait to live in a place that we can have chickens! Looks like this book could help us get started.
I think Sean and Dina’s comments were the most helpful (although all had some good info). I’ve been wanting to raise my own chickens for a while; maybe this book will help me convince the BF that it’s a good idea!
Having fresh eggs!
Dina N’s review was very convincing. We lost all our chickens to a predator recently, and I am missing fresh eggs terribly. I can’t wait to get new ones!
The review below was most helpful to me because I have raised chickens before. It’s good to know that this is just not for beginners and there is something for everyone to learn. The comment about the fermented food has me intrigued, plus I didn’t know there were veggies not to feed chickens. I thought chickens ate everything. “By Jenny Bradford
This review is from: Oh Lardy’s Guide to Keeping Backyard Chickens (Kindle Edition)
I really enjoyed this down-to-earth viewpoint on how surprisingly easy it is to raise backyard chickens. It’s an easy read, just like sitting down for coffee with a friend who doesn’t mind talking about chicken poop. I’ve had backyard chickens for almost 2 years and learned some great new information, including how to ferment chicken feed for nutrition during molting and what kinds of veggies NOT to feed my hens. Highly recommend this beautifully arranged and well-illustrated book for anyone at any level of raising a backyard flock!”
I have been considering having a few chickens just for these same reasons! I’d love to win this!
Disappointed I can’t enter–not on Facebook.
Sourcing. I know what my chickens eat and that their eggs are fresh!
I love talking to the “girls” in the early morning. And fresh eggs…
This book looks great!! The review I likes was the one “A truly humorous and informative book on chickens! February 26, 2014 By Dina N” Knowing the book is humorous is an extra plus in my book!!
I love the fact that with your own chickens you are more in control of what you eat, the freshness of what you eat…and they help control bugs!!!
My parents have chickens. Unfortunately at this time we rent and can’t get any yet for ourselves. Someday I hope to have a flock of our own.
I’m eager to get started both for kids’ learning and for the incredibly nutritious eggs! I’d love love love this book to get a handle on exactly how to get started. Sean’s comment was great.
This book looks really helpful. I liked Dina N’s review/comment about the fact that the authors address having chickens in a range of climates. I worry about how I would protect them from the temperature extremes that my area experiences. It’s reassuring to know that there is information and help out there!
The ease of raising them! I refuse to buy eggs from the grocery store and have a sweet lady down the street that I buy them from (plus I enjoy seeing the chickens – exactly where my eggs came from). Would love to have my own someday! 🙂