Predator proofing
Updated on April 17, 2025.I often hear horror stories involving a raccoon or a dog entering a chicken coop and massacring all the birds. Too many well-meaning chicken keepers set u...
Coop upkeep
Updated on April 7, 2025.It’s spring cleaning time! Pick a nice sunny day and thoroughly clean your coop. Scrub the roosts, remove all bedding, sweep the floor, and disinfect the h...
Happy chickens
Updated on March 29, 2025.A chicken who doesn’t get adequate enrichment and mental stimulation will be more inclined towards problem behaviors. Feather pecking, being noisy, bully...
Sweetie and frostbite
Chickens Just Want to Be WarmBy Melanie Moonstone.Melanie is the founder of Rooster Redemption, a non-profit 501(c)(3) animal sanctuary located in Skagit County, WA. You can follow...
The Coop Life: A Chicken Keeping Story
By Carina DeVeraCarina DeVera (she/her) is an animal advocate, outdoor enthusiast, and writer. She has been a dedicated champion for animals since she was a child, when — to the ch...
Lessons from the lockdown
The highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) has been decimating birds across the whole country since the beginning of the year. It hit California in mid-July and is still active i...
blackhead disease
Blackhead disease (histomoniasis) is a disease that affects turkeys, chickens, pheasants, quail, and some other birds. It is caused by the protozoa Histomonas meleagridis that are...
Personalized care
While it is convenient to treat all our chickens the same, sometimes their individual needs lead us to create specialized setups and personalized care. With our first 3 chickens, w...
Bedding materials
Bedding is an important part of keeping your chickens happy and healthy. In the hen house, the bedding provides a soft surface for the chickens to walk on, jump from the roost, and...
aromatherapy
Instead of using aromatic wood shavings like cedar and pine that are toxic to chickens, you can add certain herbs to the bedding in the hen house for a pleasant smell. Some herbs a...
opossum
On Christmas Eve, we got the visit of an opossum and I started to learn more about these fascinating creatures.Opossums are opportunistic omnivores. They eat a diet of insects, wor...
Gearing up checklist
So, you decided to bring chickens into your family. You have weighed the pros and cons of sharing your life with chickens, read everything you could put your hands on about chicken...
disinfectants
Disinfecting the coop is not something that is required on a regular basis. A good cleaning of the coop and equipment is enough to keep potential pathogens under control. However,...
pasture predation
In pasture raised egg operations, 10% mortality due to predation is common. Pastures are not a natural habitat for chickens. Their ancestors, the jungle fowl, live in forests where...
My ideal coop
During a decade of keeping chickens, we have modified, fixed and extended our original coop. We also added a few extra coops and structures in the yard to fit all the needs that ca...
Turkeys
As birds raised for meat, their bodies have been engineered to grow big muscles extremely fast, so they reach slaughter weight at 4-5 months of age. Their heart and skeleton can ba...
Peppa's coop
Peppa came to our micro-sanctuary last summer. She is a 6-year-old Brahma bantam who lost her vision and started to be bullied by her flock mates. Being tiny and blind in the chick...
Waterers
Chickens drink more than they eat (see did-you-know card on drinking water), so it’s very important that they always have access to fresh water. Let’s see the different ways to que...
Feeders
We talked about what to feed chickens a few months ago (see newsletters “What to feed chickens?” part 1 and part 2). Today we are going to discuss how to feed them. There is a gre...
Second coop
Having an extra coop can become very handy in many situations. Here are the multiple roles a second coop can fill: The hospital coop to separate a sick or injured chicken from the...
DIY coop
We would like to thank our friend Dan for his help with this newsletter. Chickens don’t require much gear, but they do need a coop. A big and safe coop. A chicken coop usually ref...
Chickens in the rain
It’s the rainy season here in California, and our beautiful hills are green again. While the chickens love the fresh new growths, how much do they enjoy the rain? Is it okay to let...