You ’ve read about it for years . Friends and home across the country have raved to you continuously about their hens ’ hilarious antics , their sunny disposition , and their delicious eggs . You incur yourself wavering , especially when you dash into the garden - provision gangway and discover the slight peeps coming from brilliantly lit tanks in the gist of the fund . You ’ve got enough yard space . Your local ordinances allow for it . Should you take the plunge and become a chicken owner ? perfectly ! And , if you ’re still not 100 percent sold on the idea , here are several reasons that should convince you to conjoin the poultry - lift night club .
1. Endless Opportunities for Education
That A you get in high - school biology mean nothing compared to what you ’ll learn by keep a mountain of chicken — particularly the first time you carry a just - fed biddy upside down . ( mark : Do n’t carry your shuttle upside down unless you ’re fall apart work boots . And waterproof clothing ) . What comes out the other end is every bit educational , as it will vary in color , flesh and solidness every single daylight . By see your bird , you ’ll learn how they sleep , how they wassail , how they eat and what they eat . Bid farewell now to the poor frog that get across your biddy ’ itinerary !
If you have children , raise volaille do as an splendid mean oflearningabout the great circle of life . You and your piddling ones can observe an brood egg , watch a chick hatch , and witness a juvenile person becoming an adult . Sadly , but of necessity , you ’ll also have multiple occasions to increase your veterinary and mortuary skills . In between the bollock and the afterlife , however , opportunities will bristle for you to search everything you knew about birds and discover much more you never possibly guess .
2. Slapstick Chicks
You have n’t know humor until you ’ve had a flock of your own . There is indeed a reason the term “ bird - brained ” exists , as you ’ll discover the first time you watch a hen chasing a butterfly stroke , hatch a rock candy , or trying to force her way through a fencing . Try not to laugh too hard when you go to collect eggs and find five girl pack into one nest box even though three other nest box sit down all vacant . And if you bump to leave anything remotely scoop shaped — a barrow , a bucketful , a baseball mitt — be fain to find a chicken contentedly sitting inside it when you go to retrieve it .
Changes in weather only add to the barnyard humor . If it ’s a cheery , hot day , you ’ll find your chicken streak carpet with birdie basking in the warmth , consist so incredibly still you might think that they ’ve all die from the rut . If it ’s raining , your tidy sum will either dash back and forth , ignoring their hencoop ’s obvious shelter , or they ’ll stand alfresco , glare at the rain as they get soaking pie-eyed . Afterwards , they ’ll mince around every puddle like fine ladies , doing their best to avoid drench their feet . If it ’s snowing … well , just try coaxing them out into that white clobber . You ’ll have more success getting a finicky 4 - year - old to eat their broccoli . The indignant protests your poultry will put on are worth filming for years in which you need a quick pick - me - up .
3. Perky Playmates
poulet love to represent . They perfectly adore all sorts of sports and games . Among their favorites :
4. It’s Easter 365 Days A Year
Remember that wheelbarrow , bucketful and baseball mitt ? Hopefully you inspected it before putting it away , because that comfy scoop form is irresistible to hen with an egg to birth . So is any diffused , mulch spot under a shrub , any indentation in a magniloquent grassy area , underneath your nipper ’s playfort , within your neighbour ’s garage , beneath your deck , and inside your tool shed . In curt , do n’t knock yourself outbuilding a cluster of nest box . Your young woman will lie their eggs wherever they please .
If you ’re favourable , they ’ll habituate a nest boxful . If you ’re not so golden , you ’ll need to go on an egg hunt once or twice a Clarence Day . If you ’re unfeignedly unfortunate , you ’ll find those stray eggs , but only after several month have passed . On the vivid side , you ’ll be set for Easter !
5. Free Fertilizer
The grass is always greener wherever your wimp have graze , but not because they ’re like Demeter , with wheat berry and bloom bloom in their footstep . There may be buds bursting to life-time where your birds have roamed , but it ’s for reasons utterly undivine : their manure . That ’s right … eggs are n’t the only thing chickens produce that ’s wedge - full of good .
Chicken poop is an first-class organic fertilizer , full of nutrients that benefit your plant . Because of the eminent nitrogen content of poulet manure , you ’ll take to compost it first ( usually about six months ) to keep the N from “ burn ” your botanical babies and do them to wither . Once it ’s ready for role , chicken - manure fertilizer will make your lawn and garden the envy of your neighbors — except , perhaps , those neighbour who come up eggs in their service department three months after the eggs were position .
6. Can You Hear Me Now?
That odd - sounding sneeze ? That incessant beeping ? That squeaky - toy squeak ? That thunderous rumble ? Believe it or not , those randomness all rise from your birds . Chickens have an unbelievable range of voice , one that far surpasses the gentle storybook cluck . There ’s the rumbustious “ I laid an testicle and you did n’t ” ditty , the “ I found a tasty bug ” lay , the “ Where ’d everyone go ? ” lament , and the “ Do n’t you dare take my egg ” alert , plus all sorts of sounds in between . If you happen to have roosters , you ’ll also have the privilege of becoming present with the dozens of different calls your son can make . Among the playlist : These are MY Hens , Not Yours ; I ’m a Fine Rooster , Look at Me ! ; and the ever - popular It ’s 5 AM and its sequels , It ’s 6 AM / It ’s 7 AM / It ’s 8 AM / It ’s 9 AM / It ’s 10 AM / It ’s 11 AM .
7. Who’s The Boss?
The terminal figure “ pecking monastic order ” owes its existence to the chicken . Like wolves , who have an Alpha male person and distaff and specific rank and file within the pack , chickens have a remarkably complex social structure that would make an anthropologist ’s optic flabbergast .
The Queen Hen
The head biddy is most decidedly the queer . She run through first , perches first , lead her pack of toady on amble of her choosing at time of her choosing , and heaven help the hen occupying the nest box when the queen resolve it ’s time to lie down . Her pack of daughter welcome their favorable reception rating because they knew enough not to challenge her — or they challenged her and got pecked savagely until they sympathize their place in the group .
The Queens’ Court
Further down on the totem rod are the hens who were too diffident or panic-stricken to try for a speckle in the cool - daughter ’ club , as well as those whom the head hen decide were n’t worth her while . Ousted queens often populate this group , creating their own camp separate from the current monarch ’s royal court . At the very bottom round are the juveniles who have n’t quite figured out how things act upon and the new arrivals , who are getting their heading and simply waitress for their opportunity to mount a coup , changing the flock ’s societal construction once again .
The Command-Roo In Chief
Roosters have a less complicated order : There ’s the commander , one or two lieutenants , and everyone else . If the head cock happens to be a young cockerel , he may learn the hard way that he isnotthe leader of the flock . After all , the term “ hen - pick ” had to originate somewhere !
Watching your volaille interact and put over to those of higher rank and file — or boss around those of lesser rank — can in spades deflect you from your own family and work dramas . fortuitously , feathered squabbles can easy be settled by tossing a handful of metric grain or corn into the penitentiary , something that would doubtless conjure up eyebrows if you tried it at the place . ( government note : DON’T ! ) Even if the Gallus gallus bickering preserve , the mint of those musket ball of feathered fluff waddling towards you in promise of a treat — a pizza insolence , perhaps , or the sandwich you on the spur of the moment remembered you were hold — is take a hop to work a smiling to your face .
revelation : Several pizza pie insolence were tossed out to my birds during the writing of this article .
