raising-chickens
Buying a Carton of Eggs? Get the Labeling Facts First
As backyard chicken keepers, we normally don’t have to worry about buying a carton of eggs from the store. We have the luxury of walking out to the coop and grabbing fresh eggs to use in our kitchen.
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10 Tips for Fermenting Chicken Feed
Have you given any thought to how fermenting chicken feed can benefit your flock of backyard chickens? Fermenting is all the rage nowadays, both in people foods (think yogurt, sauerkraut, sourdough bread, buttermilk, kimchi, apple cider vinegar, even beer and wine!) and chicken diets as well, although the process has been used for hundreds of years as a food preservation method.
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How Much Do Chickens Cost?
Everyone is looking for a bargain, and raising chickens for eggs is the second rung on the homesteading ladder. The first is growing your own veggies.
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10 Facts About Ducks: Are Ducks the New Chickens?
Over the last few years, keeping backyard chickens has become all the rage. Whether it’s wanting to know where their food is coming from, a desire to be more self-sufficient or merely wanting to go back to the basics, chicken coops are popping up in suburban backyards of families all across the country.
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Diatomaceous Earth Uses in Chickens
Have you ever wondered about diatomaceous earth uses in poultry? When I first started raising chickens for eggs, I noticed that many poultry people talked about using something that they only referred to as “DE”.
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Understanding Sex-Link Hybrid Chickens
At Backyard Poultry we get questions all the time asking for help identifying the breed of various chickens. Many times the chickens pictured are not purebred chickens at all but crossbreeds / hybrid chickens hatcheries produce for very specific purposes – such as egg production.
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The Economics of Egg Farming
When I started egg farming, I kept track of my costs. The numbers surprised me. Turning a profit leaves a lot of factors to consider.
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Selective Breeding: How to Breed Chickens
For those of us who are learning how to breed chickens or teaching others how to breed chickens, you must realize that breeds of poultry cannot be maintained. Your fowl are either improving or degenerating with each passing generation.
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How a Chicken Lays an Egg Inside of an Egg
Add to Favorites When raising chickens for eggs, expect the unexpected. Though quite rare, it is well-known that occasionally a hen will lay an egg inside of an egg. The cause …
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How to Raise Free Range Chickens
In the discussion of raising chickens, there have been two traditional schools of thought. The first is total free range. Usually, an evening feeding of grain or other treat is used to lure the flock back to the chicken coop for roosting.
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