First time chicken keeper

Space - the final frontier!  Well not for chickens - each bird ideally needs approx 1.5 square metre of run space, less for Bantams (small birds) more for very large birds, eg Brahma.

We recommend walk in runs - if you have ever tried to catch a chicken on your knees in a low integrated house and run - you will know why - Plus the runs are tiny!

House - Chickens are birds - yes I know you knew that - but all birds perch at night, even chickens.  Each bird needs approx 15cm (6" on old money) to perch, so a 1m perch (3ft) will support about 6 chickens.  Perches should be at least 30cm apart, other wise one row of chickens will have their noses up the others.... well I'll let you work that out.

We size our chicken coops (houses) on that basis.

Food - Layers pellets and layers mash is formulated for commercial laying hens, it has everything a chicken needs nutritionally.  Its basically wheat, soya, maize and lots of other ingredients.  A chickens natural diet is 60-70% insects really - they will find all sorts of invertebrates naturally in their runs, so they will get a mixed diet.  The generally accepted routine is also to feed feed mixed corn late in the day - just chuck some in and they will scratch around for it.  Oh and put a little mixed poultry grit in their food (hens teeth).  They should have access to layers pellets at all times - this is best achieved using round poultry feeders.

Bedding - Well - they don't lie on a bed as you have learned about - but they do like nesting material in their nesting boxes, it also prevents eggs breaking, and its useful under perches to catch the poo and help with the mucking out.

Basically all bedding used for chickens is horse bedding - whether its chopped straw (swish), Easichick (softchip) or Aubiose bedding etc.  Straw will compost quickly, wood chips or shavings won't.

Treats - don't give them anything long and stringy - this can cause crop issues (you can google what a crop is). Best to stick to treats designed for poultry such as pecking blocks, calci worms etc.  They may love pasta, tuna, cat food etc - but its not their natural diet!

Maintenance/Mucking out - a common question we get asked is - how often do I muck out - the answer is - well it depends how big the house is and how many chickens you have - sorry cant be much clearer.  You can poo pick (don the gloves) for a few weeks then give it a good thorough clean/scrape and disinfect.  Plastic coops are much easier than wooden coops to keep clean and mite free (I will mention mites again later).  There is no structural maintenance required with plastic/HPL coops, but wooden ones will crack, shrink etc and will require creosote or other insect repellent treatments.

Mites - there are two main predators of poultry - both red!  The big red ones (foxes) can get through a very small gap in a run eg 7cm (3"), the tiny red ones (mites) can live in a gap 0.1mm.  Mites are pin prick sized, live in tiny tiny crevices where your birds perch and are nocturnal.  They don't live on birds (if you have millions in the coop you may find some on a bird). If you don't inspect the poultry house and take preventative measures, you are pretty guaranteed to get mites.  If you see  peppering of white/grey dots over the surfaces of the coop - you have them.  Try running your finger along the underside of perches - if you finger is red - you have them.  We stock lots of preventative treatments and lots of "kill em dead" type treatments - just see the website.

more to follow...