Want to start raising chickens? The rewards can be great! The most obvious being that you’ll get fresh eggs every morning. You just can’t beat that. The great news is that there is a huge “urban homesteading movement” going on right now so even if you don’t have a whole lot of space, there are resources out there to show you how to raise 1-3 chickens on whatever land you have!

This year we’ve decided to start trying to be more self sufficient. It can be a daunting task, but there are so many resources online for help and we just have to start taking baby steps. So our first steps this year will be raising chickens, starting a vegetable garden, composting, and also putting up a clothes line for drying clothes in the summer.

So next week we’ll be picking up our first baby chicks. From what we’ve learned reading around, they will need to be indoors for about a month before they can go out to their chicken coop/run. So once we get them we will be in hyper drive to build their new coop. We have about four acres, so we’re fortunate enough to have plenty of space to work with. I will be showing you the process of building our coop as we’re doing it as well.

But for now we needed to get ready for the chickadees we’ll be getting next week. We will be getting just 3 little gals to start off. Later we want to get a rooster and incubate some eggs for eating. But these three ladies will stay with us so we’ll be naming them. The ones we will eat we won’t be naming because it would just be too hard I think to personalize them like that.

Supplies Checklist:

• Baby Chick Feeder (needs to be smaller than the regular chicken feeder)
• Baby Chick Waterer (same requirements as above)
• Large Cardboard Box (based on how many you’ll be getting)
• Heat Lamp and Bulb
• Newspaper & Hay (or wood shaving) for Cover
• Chick Feed
• Food Scooper & Bin for Food

This is a pic of the setup. We still need to put down hay. We will be using hay because we have it in our barn anyways. Otherwise you can use wood shavings too. It’s important that the heat lamp is facing towards one side so that they can get out of the direct aim of it too. You don’t want to cook them! So we’ve setup the feeder/waterer on the opposite side of the heat lamp so they can cool down over there if needed.

For the heat lamp we bought a white bulb. The woman at the tractor supply store said she prefers the red bulbs because they give off more heat. We will see though. We’re going to try it with the white bulb for now and if they seem to be shivering, then we’ll run out and try the other kind (I’ll let you know).

For the chick feed, we bought the “starter” stuff. Most stuff that says “starter/grower for chicks” is aimed at chickens that you’ve bought from the store because they were raised in brooders. So this is supposed to be medicated to help fight off diseases they could have got there. If you are raising chickens that you have hatched yourself, then you more than likely do not need medicated feed. Since we did get them elsewhere though, we will be using it to be on the safe side.

So that’s what you need to get started! I hope this helps you out. Keep in mind that we are also new to this, so you’re going on this journey with us. We are by no means experts, but our experiences may help you out with yours.