Interested in raising chickens for eggs? Learn about different chicken breeds, what age to buy, coop design, health care, chicken nutrition and more!
Tis the season for chicken lovers everywhere to resist the urge to purchase just a few more chicks. I am telling you, once you start raising chickens for eggs, it becomes an obsession.
You won’t be able to stop! They have quickly become one of my favorite animals on our hobby farm. Along with this season of chicks and chickens comes a lot of questions! So in today’s post, I’m going to try and answer the most common questions you may have.
Raising Chickens for Eggs: What Breed?
The breed you get will determine how often an egg will be laid, the color of the egg, and the size of the egg. If you want friendly hens, the breed can play a role in that as well, although I think regular handling is more important in that regard. There is nothing wrong with having a fun mix of breeds either – it’s all up to you!
Here are some common breeds and a few qualities about them:
Rhode Island Red
- Most common of backyard chickens.
- Good layers.
- Large brown eggs.
- Cold hardy.
- Good layers.
- Friendly.
- Large brown eggs.
- Cold hardy.
- Good layers.
- Come in beautiful laced varieties.
- Large brown eggs.
- Cold hardy.
- Decent layers.
- Blue, green and shades in between.
- Cold hardy.
- Note: these are not the same as a true Ameraucana chicken, but have many of the same qualities. If you are wanting purebred or show quality hens, be sure you’re getting a true Ameraucana.
- Color of chicken guarantees it’s a female – gold or black.
- Prolific egg layers.
- Very friendly.
- Large brown eggs.
Raising Chickens for Eggs: The Coop
When I first got chickens, I kept them in a chicken tractor. A chicken tractor is basically just a moveable coop with an open bottom. It allows chickens to graze and eat bugs while still keeping them safe and contained. You move the tractor regularly to supply them with an area that is clean and ready to be grazed. Mine was a pretty simple design, you can read the tutorial I wrote about how we built it by clicking here! While I liked the chicken tractor because I didn’t have to clean a coop and it let my chickens graze, there was one major drawback. It just wasn’t going to work for winter where I live! And I also got 7 chickens instead of 3 as originally planned so it became a tight fit…oops.
To remedy this issue, we turned two old stalls in a barn we were tearing down into a chicken coop and run. It worked out really well, and this year I added a fenced area around the coop so they have more space to wander and graze.
I also love this detailed article from Hobby Farms about building DIY chicken coops. Super helpful!
One of my favorite features we built into our coop is the poop catch under the roosting bars. Now, you may be laughing at that sentence, but hear me out! The chickens will roost at night when they sleep, and that is where the majority of their droppings will be.
It can make for a pretty nasty area under the roost. By building something to catch it all, you really limit how much you have to clean up AND you can use it wherever you want for fertilizer.
Win-win. Oh, and did I mention that my coop really doesn’t stink? Yep, you read that right. It seriously doesn’t smell bad. And it’s mostly due to this awesome design. You can get all the details on my coop here!
Whichever housing system you choose for your chickens should have a few basics: It should be safe, secure from predators, easy to clean, and well ventilated. All of this will help you maintain healthy and happy chickens.
Niki Berry says
Thanks for the info!!
Alli says
You’re welcome!