I use net fence hooked to hot fence via alligator clip. It works well at keeping birds in and most other critters out. I do lose a few birds every year to hawks and now we have a pair of bald eagles nesting about a quarter mile away. Our cattle, sheep, and dogs respect the poultry fence.
I have 73 hens that are pasture-raised. I (with help from my husband) converted an old livestock trailer into a mobile coop. The trailer and fence is moved every week (plus or minus a few days) around our pasture. The birds are out during the day and put themselves up at night (I leave the back slide cracked just enough for them to get through).
Have fun!

If your wanting to get some day old chicks check out Ideal Poultry in Cameron, we are a Aggie Family owned and operated backyard poultry hatchery.

https://www.idealpoultry.com/

If you are wanting started pullets I recommend Bird and Bee Farm in Rockdale, they buy a lot of their birds from us and have a great selection.

https://birdandbeefarm.com/

HeadGames said:

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I've actually wanted to quit my job and build affordable and fancy chicken coops. You know, put my many poultry degrees to work. Just been too busy with my current day job.

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My neighbor who was a retired contractor did this and was so busy he had two people helping him. It was supposed to be a hobby but it tuned into a very successful small business. He marketed on Facebook and he had 4-6 coops out every week that were sold.

Yeah, I'm happy to see some "normal coops" on this thread vs the crazy fancy ones the rich white women build for their flock.

Gonna try to get this thread going again.

How'd you do with the freeze last night?

We were 8degrees I have 2 heat lamps on with a decent wind break and they are all alive. Just having to keep water coming.

Bumping this thread again….

Any newbies getting started?

Going on 4 years since adding a small flock to our backyard. Chicken math is real…went from 4 to 8 and now about 15 in our backyard with a few of our older hens retired at my parents country coop in caldwell.

Here is a pic of our newest layers egg we got last week. The black copper Marian's we got from Producers in Bryan in March finally started laying their dark brown eggs

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Go to Tractor Supply and buy a 40 pound bag of dry cat food and supplement with that. It will help with production

jakeaggie84 said:

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Bumping this thread again….

Any newbies getting started?

Going on 4 years since adding a small flock to our backyard. Chicken math is real…went from 4 to 8 and now about 15 in our backyard with a few of our older hens retired at my parents country coop in caldwell.

Here is a pic of our newest layers egg we got last week. The black copper Marian's we got from Producers in Bryan in March finally started laying their dark brown eggs

.

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I've struggled to successfully add new hens. How did you avoid the pecking wars when adding new chicks to your flock?

We added 10 new pullets from Producers to 3 hens in March. 1 turned out to be a rooster. Kept them in a trough for the 1st month, then moved them to the coop for a week before introducing 3 older hens. They got pecked at but everyone seems to get along well now.

Predators got me down to 3 birds but I am at 4 now. The two youngest should start laying soon. 2 tough and feisty leghorns that always lay, a buff Orp, and a Sexlink. (Rhode island Red Cross to Rhode Island white).

I have the predator issue sorted when I got gifted a bunch of used 10' dog kennel panels to make a big chicken run, but if I forget to close up the coop at night I sometimes lose eggs to rat snakes. I've gotten to the point now I just reach in there and grab them however I can and pull them out and toss them aside before the snake knows what is going on.

Chetos said:

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jakeaggie84 said:

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Bumping this thread again….

Any newbies getting started?

Going on 4 years since adding a small flock to our backyard. Chicken math is real…went from 4 to 8 and now about 15 in our backyard with a few of our older hens retired at my parents country coop in caldwell.

Here is a pic of our newest layers egg we got last week. The black copper Marian's we got from Producers in Bryan in March finally started laying their dark brown eggs

.

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I've struggled to successfully add new hens. How did you avoid the pecking wars when adding new chicks to your flock?

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I kept them separate but would let the little ones have some grass time in an area next to the older hens. That way they weren't too surprised when i put them together at about 2 months old. If they have enough space and some hiding places, they should be fine and work out the bullying after a week or two. If it is a small coop where they cant run and hide, more supervision would be important.

Added two "blue breasted brown leghorns" in May. Beautiful chickens but live up to the "nervous and flighty" reputation that leghorns have. Hopefully they make it up with a ton of eggs in the next month once they start laying.

MouthBQ98 said:

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Predators got me down to 3 birds but I am at 4 now. The two youngest should start laying soon. 2 tough and feisty leghorns that always lay, a buff Orp, and a Sexlink. (Rhode island Red Cross to Rhode Island white).

I have the predator issue sorted when I got gifted a bunch of used 10' dog kennel panels to make a big chicken run, but if I forget to close up the coop at night I sometimes lose eggs to rat snakes. I've gotten to the point now I just reach in there and grab them however I can and pull them out and toss them aside before the snake knows what is going on.

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Had a bobcat take out about 5 of our hens in may. Took care of that issue when it returned the third time.

I have had rat issues, so i would almost pay a rat snake a couple eggs to keep the rats away.

Out of our Easter 10 (6 leghorns & 4 ****oo muran(turned out to be Easter eggers)) Tractor Supply hens, we had 5 (2 LH & 3 EE) roosters which are gone now. Being left with 4 leghorns and 1 Easter Egger, we decided to try mail ordering from a hatchery in Ohio. Got our Rhode Island Red, Barred Plymouth Rock, Golden ****oo Muran, Wheaton Olive Egger, and Lavender Americuana chicks in yesterday. Pretty simple process.

Now when it comes to this chicken math and ROI and such, there ain't enough eggs in their butts to even come close to breaking even, but the lessons learned and fun my kids have had with them is pretty priceless.

I have $200+ of rare breed chicks in my cart now including this Ayam Cemani that my kids have dubbed the "murder chicken". It's gotta STOP!