Details

Raising Chickens For Dummies

2. Aufl.

von: Kimberley Willis, Robert T. Ludlow
16,99 €
Verlag:	Wiley
Format:	EPUB
Veröffentl.:	13.11.2019
ISBN/EAN:	9781119675952
Sprache:	englisch
Anzahl Seiten:	432

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Beschreibungen

Titelbeschreibung

Your hands-on guide to modern chicken-raising methods Thinking about raising chickens? You've come to the right place! This new edition of Raising Chickens For Dummies provides the most up-to-date, thorough information on the many aspects of keeping chickens in your backyard. Inside, you'll find hands-on, easy-to-follow instructions on choosing and purchasing chickens, constructing housing for your birds, feeding your chickens for optimal health, combating laying issues, controlling pests and predators, optimizing egg production, and much more. Raising chickens on a small scale is a popular—and growing—pastime. If you're interested in keeping chickens as pets or as a source for eggs, Raising Chickens For Dummies gives you plain-English explanations of everything you need to know to about caring for chickens. Inside, you'll learn about basic chicken biology, breeds, and behavior, which chicken breed is best for you, how many you need, ways to spot healthy chickens, how to build a chicken coop, best practices for mating your chickens, how to incubate eggs, how to hatch and nurture chicks, manage laying hens, collect and store eggs, and butcher meat birds. <ul> <li>Offers practical advice on choosing and purchasing chickens</li> <li>Helps you construct the right housing for your chickens</li> <li>Provides tips on feeding and caring for your chickens</li> <li>Includes top tips for raising healthy chickens</li> </ul> Whether you're a first-time poulterer or you've been raising chickens for years, this comprehensive guide provides practical how-to advice for keeping chickens in virtually any backyard. Raising Chickens For Dummies (9781119675921) was previously published as Raising Chickens For Dummies (9781118982785). While this version features a new Dummies cover and design, the content is the same as the prior release and should not be considered a new or updated product.

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Introduction 1 About This Book 1 Foolish Assumptions 2 Icons Used in This Book 3 Beyond the Book 3 Where to Go from Here 4 Part 1: Getting Started with Raising Chickens 5 Chapter 1: The Joy of Chickens 7 First Things First: Dealing with the Legal Issues 7 Knowing what info you need 8 Finding the info 9 Confronting restrictions 10 Assessing Your Capabilities: Basic Chicken Care and Requirements 11 Time 11 Space 12 Money 12 Focusing Your Intentions: Specific Considerations 13 Want eggs (and, therefore, layers)? 14 Thinking about home-grown meat? 14 Enticed by fun and games or 4-H and FFA? 16 Considering Neighbors 17 Chapter 2: Basic Chicken Biology and Behavior 19 Familiarizing Yourself with a Chicken’s Physique 20 Labeling a Chicken’s Many Parts 21 Checking out the differences 21 Honing in on the head and neck 22 Checking out the bulk of the body 24 Looking at the legs and feet 25 Checking out chicken skin 25 Finding out about feathers 26 A Picture of Health 28 On Chicken Behavior 29 Processing information 30 Communication 31 Table manners 32 Sleeping 33 Socializing 33 Table of Contents Romance 34 The celibate hen — living without a rooster 35 New life 35 Bath time 36 Interacting with Other Poultry and Animals 36 Dogs and cats 37 Ducks and geese 38 Turkeys 39 Guineas 40 Pheasants and quail 40 Livestock 40 Chapter 3: A Chicken Isn’t Just a Chicken: Your Guide to Breeds 41 What You Need to Know: A Brief Synopsis 42 Common breed terminology 42 How breeds are categorized 44 If You Want It All: Dual-Purpose Breeds 45 For Egg Lovers: Laying Breeds 46 White-egg layers 47 Brown-egg layers 48 Colored-egg layers 50 Best Breeds for the Table 51 Show Breeds 53 Perfect for Pets: Bantam Breeds 55 Heritage and Rare Breeds 57 Chapter 4: Buying Chickens 61 Planning Your Flock 61 Deciding what you’ll start with: Eggs, chicks, or adults 62 Choosing the Sex 65 Getting the right number of chickens 65 Counting the Costs 66 Starting with Chicks 68 Where to get chicks 68 When to buy chicks 71 What to look for 72 Handling chicks 75 Starting with Adults 75 Where to buy adult chickens 75 What to look for 76 Transporting your birds safely 78 Raising Chickens For Dummies Part 2: Housing Your Flock 81 Chapter 5: Choosing Your Housing Type 83 What a Chicken Needs in a Home 84 Shelter from wind and rain 84 Protection from predators 85 Temperature control 85 Enough space to move about normally 86 Sufficient lighting 87 Fresh air 88 Clean surroundings 89 Surveying Your Housing Options 90 Raising chickens in cages 91 Keeping birds cage-free, but indoors only 94 Pairing a shelter with a run 94 Offering shelter with free-range access 95 Mobile housing methods: Pastured poultry 96 Choosing a Type of Housing 101 Chapter 6: Designing and Constructing a Coop 105 To Repurpose, to Build, or to Buy? That Is the Question 106 Checking on housing restrictions 106 Making do with what you’ve got 107 Building from scratch 108 Buying a chicken coop 109 Choosing the Right Location 111 Combining Form and Function: The Basic Coop Blueprint 113 Coop size and shape: Giving your birds some breathing room 113 Ventilation: Allowing fresh air to flow 114 Roost and relaxation 114 Feathering their nests 117 Wiring, Fixtures, and Other Important Amenities 120 Providing the hookups (electrical, that is) 120 Lighting up 121 Baby, it’s cooold outside! 122 Fighting the heat 123 Being Mindful of Materials 123 Getting to the bottom of flooring 124 Constructing the frame 124 Wrapping your head around fencing 125 Supporting fencing with posts 126 Table of Contents Chapter 7: Coop, Sweet Coop: Furnishing and Housekeeping 127 Bedding Down 128 Making Nests Comfy and Cozy 129 Setting the Table and Crafting a “Pantry” 130 Feeding containers 131 Watering containers 133 Proper feed storage 135 Cleaning House 136 Gathering cleaning supplies 137 Seeing what you need to do and when 138 Disposing of manure and old bedding 140 Part 3: Caring for Your Flock: General Management 143 Chapter 8: Feeding Your Flock 145 Feeding Basics 146 Understanding why you need to manage your birds’ diet 147 Knowing what nutrients chickens need 149 Comparing your feed options 151 The plain truth about homemade feed 155 Food to avoid feeding chickens at all costs 158 Choosing the Right Commercial Feed 159 Demystifying commercial rations 160 Selecting a form of feed 162 Double-checking the label 163 Supplementing Diets with Grit 164 Deciding When to Put Out Feed 165 Determining How Much to Feed 166 Keeping the Diet Interesting by Offering Treats 167 Hydrating Your Hens (And Roosters) 168 Chapter 9: Controlling Pests and Predators 171 Keeping Pests from Infesting the Coop 172 Preventing pests 172 Identifying and eliminating common culprits 173 Fending Off Predators 177 Providing safe surroundings 177 Recognizing common chicken predators 178 Figuring out who’s causing trouble 183 Catching the troublemaker 185 Dealing with the neighbor dogs 186 Raising Chickens For Dummies Chapter 10: Keeping Your Flock Happy and Healthy 189 Providing Biosecurity for Your Flock 189 Maintaining biosecurity 190 Knowing when to quarantine chickens 191 Keeping Disease and Parasites Away 192 Giving vaccinations 192 Putting up barriers against parasites 194 Learning about chickens and human health 196 Controlling Environmental Conditions 198 Dealing with heat, cold, and dampness 198 Keeping your chickens from eating poisons 200 Safely Handling Your Flock 201 Catching chickens 201 Carrying and holding chickens 203 Taming chickens 203 Diffusing Stress 205 Managing the molt 205 Introducing new birds carefully 206 Discouraging bullying behaviors 207 Employing Optional Grooming Procedures 208 Marking birds for easy identification 209 Trimming long, curled nails 209 Trimming wings and other feathers 210 Chapter 11: Handling Health Problems 213 Making Decisions about Treatment 214 Choosing to treat ill chickens 214 Deciding to eliminate chickens 215 Finding a vet to treat chickens 215 Treating Injuries 216 How to give your bird the once-over 216 Ways to keep an injured bird safe 217 Skin injuries, cuts, and puncture wounds 217 Foot sores (also known as bumblefoot) 218 Head injuries 219 Broken legs or wings 220 Frostbite 221 Egg binding 221 Getting Rid of Parasites 222 Internal parasites 222 External parasites 226 Table of Contents Recognizing and Dealing with Disease 230 Checking for signs of disease 230 Understanding some common chicken diseases 231 Administering Medications 237 Encountering Death 238 Reporting Diseases and Deaths 240 Part 4: Breeding: From Chicken to Egg and Back Again 243 Chapter 12: Mating Your Chickens 245 Rooster or Hen? 245 Sexing young chickens 246 Sexing mature chickens 247 Reviewing the Reproductive System 248 Roosters 248 Hens 249 How an egg forms 250 Sperm Meets Egg: Fertilization 251 Reproductive Behavior 252 Courtship and mating 252 Nesting and brooding behavior 253 Mating Methods 253 Flock mating 254 Pair and trio mating 255 Artificial insemination 255 Selecting Birds for Breeding 256 Choosing the right combinations 256 Producing purebred chickens 256 Producing hybrids 258 Producing sex-/color-linked colors 259 Getting Birds Ready to Breed 260 Feeding future parents 261 Maintaining lighting and temperature 261 Trimming feathers 262 Chapter 13: Incubating Eggs and Hatching Chicks 263 Making More Chicks: Incubation Basics 264 Choosing Your Hatching Method 265 Looking at the two methods: Hens versus incubators 265 Determining which method is best for you 266 Letting Mother Nature Do It: The Hen Method of Incubation 268 Understanding why some hens brood and others don’t 268 Encouraging your hens to brood 269 Adding eggs to the nest 270 Raising Chickens For Dummies Giving a sitting hen what she needs 271 Caring for a hen and chicks 273 Going Artificial: The Incubator Method 275 Choosing an incubator 275 Accessorizing your incubator 277 Setting up and caring for your incubator 278 Finding and storing fertile eggs 281 Caring for eggs in the incubator 283 Looking Inside the Egg 284 Egg ultrasound: Candling an egg 285 Knowing what to look for: Stages of embryonic growth 286 Hello, World! Hatching Your Eggs 288 Playing doctor: Helping a chick hatch 288 Handling the bad hatch: When things go wrong 290 Chapter 14: Raising Chicks 291 The Basics of Brooders 292 Knowing when chicks need a brooder 292 Choosing the brooder size and shape 293 Getting the temperature just right 293 Lighting the brooder 295 Choosing brooder bedding 295 Buying a commercial brooder 296 Making Your Own Brooder 297 Building the body of the brooder 297 Heating the brooder 299 Putting safety first 301 Helping a Hen Provide Warmth and Protection 302 Feeding and Watering Chicks 303 Starter feed choices 303 Medicated feed 304 The feeding process 305 You can lead a chick to water 306 Raising Chicks in Your Brooder 306 What to do the first hour 307 The first few days 307 Trimming beaks 309 Preventing disease 310 Watching the Stages of Growth 310 One month: Tween-agers 311 Six weeks to maturity: Teenagers 311 I’m a big chicken now: Young adulthood 312 Chicks and Children 312 Human health issues 313 Lessons on proper handling 314 Table of Contents Part 5: Special Management Considerations 315 Chapter 15: Managing Layers and Collecting Eggs 317 Knowing What to Expect from Your Hens 317 The layer’s life cycle 318 Internal factors that influence laying 319 External factors that influence laying 320 Managing Your Hens’ Laying Years 321 Getting young hens ready to lay 321 Helping your pullets avoid stress 321 Providing encouragement 322 Using lighting to encourage laying to start 322 Encouraging Egg Production After It Has Begun 323 Providing supplemental lighting to keep hens laying 323 Keeping up a routine and minimizing stress 324 Retiring old birds when the laying days are done 324 Collecting, Cleaning, and Storing Eggs 325 Getting your eggs in one basket 325 Cleaning your cache 327 Assessing Egg Quality 327 Identifying parts of an egg 328 Looking at the outside 328 Looking at the inside 332 Storing and Handling Eggs 334 How to store eggs 334 Eggs to discard 335 What to do with excess eggs 335 Dealing with Production Problems and Bad Habits 337 Addressing the failure to lay 338 Bringing order to hens that lay all over the place 340 Getting a broody hen to go back to laying 342 Handling hens that break and eat eggs 342 Chapter 16: Raising and Butchering Meat Birds 345 Raising Meat Chickens 345 Looking at the three main approaches to raising meat birds 346 Choosing the right chickens 347 Choosing the right time of year to raise chickens 349 Deciding how many chickens to raise 350 Caring for meat chickens 351 Planning for D-Day 355 Knowing when your birds are ready 356 Deciding whether to hire a butcher or do it yourself 357 Hiring Out the Butchering 359 Finding a butcher 360 Knowing what to expect 360 Raising Chickens For Dummies Preparing to Do the Deed Yourself 362 Choosing the location 362 Gathering equipment and supplies 363 Following the Play-by-Play of Butchering Day 367 Beginning with the kill 367 Removing the feathers 371 Cleaning and inspecting the bird 372 Packaging Home-Butchered Poultry 376 Rinsing and checking the chicken 377 Cutting the chicken in a usable fashion 377 Avoiding freezer overload 378 Part 6: the Part of Tens 379 Chapter 17: More than Ten Tips for Keeping Healthy, Stress-Free Chickens 381 Choose the Right Breed for Your Needs 382 Set Up Suitable Housing 382 Supplement Lighting When Needed 383 Control Pests 383 Protect Against Predators 384 Control Parasites 384 Vaccinate 385 Feed a Well-Balanced Diet 385 Provide Enough Clean Water 386 Beware Disease-Transmitting Dangers 386 Use Quarantines Whenever Necessary 387 Chapter 18: More than Ten Misconceptions about Chickens, Eggs, and So On 389 Bird Flu Is a Risk to Reckon With 390 You Can’t Raise Chickens If You Live in the City 391 Roosters Crow Only in the Morning 391 You Need a Rooster to Get Eggs 391 Keeping Chickens Penned Is Inhumane 392 Chickens Are Vegetarians 392 Big, Brown, Organic Eggs Are Best in Taste and Quality 392 Fertilized and Unfertilized Eggs Are Easily Distinguishable 393 Egg-Carton Advertising Is the Absolute Truth 393 Chickens Are Good for Your Garden 394 Chickens Are Dumb and Cowardly 394 Index 397

Autorenportrait

Kimberley Willis has raised numerous breeds of chickens and other poultry for eggs, meat, and showing for more than 40 years. Robert T. Ludlow owns and manages BackYardChickens.com, the largest and fastest-growing community of chicken enthusiasts in the world.

Back cover copy

<ul> <li>Choose and purchase healthy chickens</li> <li>Construct the right housing for your flock</li> <li>Feed and care for your chickens</li> </ul> Your trusted resource for keeping chickens This hands-on guide offers complete coverage on chicken care, from feeding your birds for optimal health to controlling pests and predators—and everything in between. Learn what you need to know about the stages of growth, from chick to adult, and discover the best way to collect, clean, and store eggs. Whether you're a first-time poulterer or you've been raising chickens for years, you'll find fast, authoritative advice for keeping chickens in virtually any backyard. Inside... <ul> <li>Understand basic chicken biology and behavior</li> <li>Supplement feed with grit</li> <li>Recognize and deal with disease</li> <li>Safely mate your chickens</li> <li>Get tips on the latest urban farming trends</li> <li>Package and store home- butchered poultry</li> </ul>