Spring Chickens

Spring is in the air- or, at least on the calendar. Since tomorrow is March 1st, I've been thinking about this year's batch of chickens. I'm really looking forward to it. We've raised chickens for about 7 years now, and it is a ton of fun. One of the most satisfying things is seeing my young daughter (she's almost 4) get to interact with them and collect their eggs.

We've raised lots of chicks- purchased locally or online as day-old babies- and we've also purchased fully-grown birds here in town. Both approaches are really satisfying: the former provides the fun of watching the chicks grow, and the latter provides a pretty much immediate supply of fresh eggs. This year we'll be going with option #2.

Regardless of the approach you take to starting your backyard flock, they'll have to live somewhere. Building a chicken coop is a great DIY project if you're handy, or want to be. If not, you can probably find someone in your area to help you out.

Here's a couple of pictures of coops that I've built recently to help get your creative juices flowing.