Why We Got Backyard Chickens

This past June we started our backyard chicken flock with 6 young pullets and we have never regretted it! We love having chickens, and for us it is a no-brainer. However, I have had SO many people ask us “WHY?!?” So I thought I would do a post about how we decided to get them, why we love them, and some reasons that may convince you to start your own flock!

Almost exactly one year ago we brought home a brand new Bloodhound puppy, Wilma. Being a bloodhound, she is a natural hunting dog, and knowing that someday we would love to live on a homestead with lots of animals, especially chickens, we wanted Wilma to grow up from puppyhood being around chickens so that we could train her to not be aggressive toward them.

My parents conveniently had a small chicken coop that they were no longer using. So we hauled it to our small, city lot. My dad fixed it up for us by reinforcing some chicken wire and repairing the feed box and door.

So we started tossing around the idea of getting chicks in the spring. I’ll be honest, the thought of getting chicks kind of overwhelmed me. We don’t have a big garage, nor did we have a lot of the equipment you need to raise chicks such as heat lamps. I looked at many homemade chick brooders on Pinterest, but I was still overwhelmed by making one, so I started doing more research.

That’s when I discovered the term “pullet.” A pullet is a young hen, under one year, but older than a chick. Old enough that we could put it straight into the chicken coop and skip the brooder stage. We would also know that they were definitely females and avoid accidentally getting a rooster or two. This idea was very appealing to me. I knew that pullets would be more expensive than getting chicks, but since we were only wanting about half a dozen or so, I was willing to pay a bit more for the convenience of getting older birds. Also, they were a bit harder to find than just walking into your local farm supply store and getting chicks, but not impossible to find.

I scoured Craiglist until I came across the perfect listing for us! I found a group of 6 Sapphire Gem pullets for $30. They hadn’t started laying yet. We hurried to get our coop all prepared and went and got them the next day.

For us, this worked out perfectly. We were able to put them right into the coop without having to worry about a brooder. Six birds also proved to be the perfect number for us. Our coop has 12 nesting boxes, so they have plenty of space, and when they started laying eggs we got about 3 dozens eggs a week, which is too much for just the two of us to eat, so we sell a dozen here and there for some extra money, which is a great perk!

We love having chickens for many reasons, so I’ll just make a quick list here for you.

1. Fresh Eggs – This is obviously the most obvious perk of having chickens. I am never out of eggs. (Except the one time Alex sold 3 dozen in one day and didn’t tell me. It worked out fine though, because I just ran out to the coop and the girls had already laid 3 more.) It is so nice using the nutrient rich, dark yellow-yoked eggs that we get from our own backyard. We know exactly what the chickens are fed and can feel good knowing that we are eating something healthy.
2. Extra Money – This ties in with having fresh eggs, but since our hens produce more than we can eat, we sell eggs for money! We usually put this money right back into the chickens with the purchase of straw, feed, etc. So it’s a great way to pay for having them, they just earn their own keep!
3. Entertainment – If you haven’t just sat in an Adirondack chair with a cool drink and watched some chickens do their thing on a summer day, then you probably don’t know what I’m talking about. You need to do this. Chickens are so fun to watch! The way they strut across the yard, scratching for bugs, and randomly get scared and run to the other side of the yard is really very entertaining.
4. Companionship – OK. This probably sounds so stupid, but our chickens love us and we love them! The girls will follow me throughout the yard wherever I go, and will run to us when they hear us coming outside. Our chickens are very tame and enjoy getting pet and held. I have caught Alex on a few occasions, just sitting with them, hand feeding them sunflower seeds.
5. Compost – Chicken poop makes great compost! We have a little backyard compost bin that we toss all of their droppings and old straw in to make great fertilizer for my garden come spring!
6. Education – We have learned so much about chickens since we started. We didn’t even begin to know it all, we just started and we are learning along the way! We learned how to care for a sick chicken, how to tell if one is sick, what foods they can eat, etc. It also teaches responsibility, just like any pet or animal. If we ever have children, it will be a great way to teach them responsibility (feeding, watering, gathering eggs).

Most of all, we just really love having chickens. We may live in town, but we would love to someday live on an acreage and have a homestead. This is something we can do now (since our city allows it) to help our home feel more like a homestead. We are learning and building our skills so that someday, if we can have a big coop with 100 chickens then we know how to care for them!

I encourage you to check your local laws regarding backyard chickens, and if your city allows it, give it a try! We love ours and I think you will love it too!