All About Chooks - part III

Okay, time for part three of the 'chook' series.

You can read part one here and part two here... this has come about because I've been doing talks around the place on chooks, and because of the renewed interest in chook keeping generally.

If you live on the Sunshine Coast, I'll be doing a talk on backyard chooks on Saturday January 7 at Yandina Community Gardens from 9.30am. Its a free talk, just turn up and you'll find me in the Blue House.

This is part III of my chook series and I'll cover; chook social behaviour, bringing chooks home for the first time, a typical daily / monthly / quarterly routine if you're new to chooks, and free ranging your chooks in your permaculture garden.

Chook Social Behaviour - chooks are sociable creatures so its best not to keep just one. A few chooks will be much happier together. They'll develop 'friendships' and will find their own pecking order. The best way to learn about chook behaviour is to observe them. You'll see who the dominant chooks are - the ones who eat first, find goodies in the garden, lead the way and explore further than the others. Chooks are quite sweet little creatures and you'll get hours of enjoyment just watching them do their thing and be chooks.

Bringing chooks home for the first time - chooks can easily be transported in a cardboard box with some straw or shredded paper on the bottom to absorb any droppings during the trip. Cut plenty of holes in the box so its well ventilated and be aware that you need to keep the chooks cool - which is important here in the subtropics. Chooks run at a high temperature naturally, so keeping them cool is vital.

Having everything ready before you get your chooks is the way to go. Have the food hanging up for them, their water ready, bedding on the floor and the house all prepared for them. Put your new chooks in their new home and shut them in for a few days. If you let them out, they'll find their own places to roost - if you lock them in their house for a few days to get used to it and they'll come home every night and roost there, which makes it easy for you.

Introducing new chooks into an existing flock - this can be a little tricky. If you just bring new chooks home and put them in with your chooks, they'll fight and can be pretty brutal too. Instead, keep your new chooks in their cardboard box (in a cool, well ventilated spot) until dark and your 'old' chooks are all settled in for the night. Then take the new chooks and put them among your old chooks on the roost. Chooks are dozy at night and this will be easy to do.

First thing in the morning I put out grain on the ground in their yard to distract them. Let them all eat and keep them locked in their yard for a day or two so the new chooks get used to the place.

There may be some fighting but that's normal, they need to sort out their pecking order, but using this method you'll keep the damage to a minimum.

Routines - a typical daily routine for keeping chooks is; in the morning, open up the chookhouse, rake the floor over or change the floor bedding if needed, clean off perches (use an old paint scraper for that), check water and clean / refresh as needed, fill feeder up, feed them some greens... let them out into their yard or to free range for the day, then at the other end of the day; collect eggs (or if you're home during the day, do this earlier to keep goanna problems to a minimum), at dusk the chooks should be back home and on their perches and you just need to put their food container away in a metal rubbish bin for the night to help keep vermin to a minimum. Check the house over, do a head count and lock them in their lovely predator proof house for the night.

No matter how vigilant you are with your chooks, they is a good chance that at sometime you'll come home late, accidentally leave a door open, or just plain forget to put them away for the night and you may lose some or all of them (if its a fox) - its sad, but its part of owning livestock. And it seems more and more that foxes are hunting during the day so you need to weigh up them free ranging versus the chance of losing them...

Back to routines, on a monthly basis you can add garlic to their water as a worming treatment - here's a link to a post on natural chook care and how to do the garlic treatment.

And quarterly, chooks will benefit from a treatment of something like a nasturtium seed each (for treating parasites) or I use a herbal treatment from Greenpet in their water which might be easier for you. Greenpet are good for a whole range of naturopathic and homeopathic treatments for animals - both livestock and pets.

Free-ranging your chooks - every permaculture book talks about free-ranging chooks and the role they play in a healthy permaculture garden. But chooks don't belong in the vegie patch. You either need to fence the vegies or the chooks. Chooks do very well in an organic orchard and in the Food Forest. Take responsibility for your chooks too and don't let them wander over into neighbours' properties (we'll had that problem here). It might suit you better to just let your chooks free range in the afternoon rather than all day too. Its up to you.

What other tips do you have for healthy chooks?

Cheers,
Sonya