Pasturing Poultry

~ This article first appeared in the Leader-Vindicator newspaper. ~

Chickens benefit from fresh air and green grass.  Just like people, the birds eat greens to maintain health and balance their diet.

We’re growing a flock of our own: We’ve had laying hens for some time, and new this year is a group of meat chickens.  Today I’m focusing on the hens’ housing.

I don’t want our birds stuffed in a smelly coop that needs cleaned out and harbors disease.  Thus I’ve been trying ideas to successfully keep the birds in pastures surrounding the house.  Instagram and the multitude of available homesteading books provide plenty of field coop designs.  Many are quite elaborate.  It occurs to me that the plan might not make sense.

The idea to keep birds in the field has good roots: It’s the reaction from an earlier idea to totally remove birds from the outdoors.  The problem isn’t the pasture plan itself; the problem is that once somebody has an idea the next person will improve it, and the next, and so on for years until the people improving don’t know what it is they’re trying to avoid.  I think the pastured poultry movement has reached this level of maturity.  It’s time to start deconstruction and get back to the original idea because right now we’re creating a lot of work by keeping birds in the wrong environment.

Chickens are barnyard birds.  They thrive in an environment of unlimited food waste, bugs, and protection by way of the regular activity that helps deter hungry chicken-eaters.  We have a barnyard bustling with activity and brimming with snacks.  It seems a good place for a chicken, but it was slow to surface as a possibility for my flock.

The birds’ relocation started with my inclination to combine chickens and their incessant scratching with compost and its need for turning.  Over winter I used our birds to stir small compost piles for the garden and in return for their scratching the hens ate well and gained a little warmth from the decomposing heap of material. 

Behind the barns at my parents’ I have a more substantial composting operation featuring huge heaps of materials that need turned with equipment.  One does not need a sharp mind to realize that the compost yard attracts avian visitors in droves.  The ducks, in particular, are fans.  On cold mornings they sit atop steaming piles of wood chips to enjoy free heat.  On warm days the ducks pick bugs around the edges.  If the ducks could move the pond they’d put it beside the compost yard because the ducks love the compost.

Ding.  Chickens would love the compost yard!

Since moving day the chickens have excavated more material than a mining crew and aren’t showing any signs of letting up.  It’s a glorious thing to behold, and the eggs keep coming as a byproduct of their efforts.  I am happy to skip the chore of poultry netting – the birds run around all day and return to their coop at night.  They have scratch grains, grassy yards, mountains of manure in various states of decomposition, and even trees and brush that all combine to provide a good place for living.

There are predators, of course, and though I believed the activity of the barns might keep pests at bay something has already eaten two of the hens, putting a dent in our egg business.  I’m recruiting my cousin to trap for vermin.

Our hens need a little field time.  They do not need only field time.  This summer I’m going to figure out how to best accommodate their needs in the barnyard and the compost yard.  Already I’m eyeballing the empty space in the rafters of the barn as a possibility for more secure roosting locations, and it seems I might need a goose or a rooster to act as flock security patrol – so long as the security does not attack my dad.  I’m working backwards from the current mindset and look forward to discovering how to do something that my grandfather likely understood as common sense. 

If you remember farmyard chicken protection strategies used by your family growing up I’d love to hear the ideas.  I can be reached at clarionfarms@windstream.net.