We hope the Boughton chicken coop really is
fox-proof as Mr Fox, or was it his wife, was sniffing around our garden this morning and we know the Fox family often pay us a visit at night.Warren chickens are a hybrid breed bred for the battery farming of chickens, also known as ISA Browns. They are a French breed of chicken, which is a cross between Rhode Island Red and Rhode Island White chickens. This means they are hardy and good egg layers. From what I can gather they probably lay brown eggs. It sounds like they could be a good breed of hen to start with, but I think I'd like to try something more interesting if our initial experiment proves successful. Our daughter had her eye on some Sussex hens, but we don't know what is available locally.
The photo is the best I could manage from the kitchen window. With reference to the photo below, the fox is just above the raspberries and blueberries.
Cheeky little fox! We're ordered out little run too, but have chosen the Eglu. We haven't yet decided which hens we're going to have. More research in that area is needed. :-D
ReplyDeleteWe don't have much idea about breeds either, so these sounded as good as any, at least to get us started. I'm a bit wary of buying birds suited to factory farming, but I think it's the meat birds that are bred so that they are too heavy for their legs. These look reasonably well proportioned.
ReplyDeleteVery jealous of your lovely big garden. I'll be very interested to see how you get in with the chickens in the garden (will they be in the garden?)
ReplyDeleteI'm not much of a gardener though my wife Sarah dabbles and she's lamenting the fact that the birds attack the prized spinach at every opportunity! All the books and net posts reckon that chickens are gardeners friend though Sarah remains to be convinced!
The bigger the garden the more work it needs. The plan is to move the chickens around the garden, but with foxes visiting it in broad daylight we plan to keep them in their run most of the time. Chickens eat slugs and other pests, but also love their (and our) greens, so we won't be giving them free run of the garden. We might position them on an empty bed sometimes in the Winter so they can munch their way through the grubs.
ReplyDeleteBuilding a run, as I see you plan to do, should help them have more space while keeping them out of the vegetables etc.