Raising Chickens For Dummies

Practical how-to advice for raising chickens in virtually any backyard!

Raising chickens on a small scale is a popular–and growing–pastime. And Raising Chickens For Dummies provides an up-to-date, thorough introduction to all aspects of caring for chickens, including choosing and purchasing chickens, constructing housing, and proper feeding. Raising Chickens For Dummies provides authoritative, detailed information to make raising chickens for eggs, meat, or backyard entertainment that much easier.

Raising Chickens for Dummies

Learn to:

• Raise chickens in virtually any backyard
• Choose and purchase chickens
• Construct the right housing
• Feed and care for your chickens

Kimberly Willis

Poultry breeder and enthusiast

with Rob Ludlow

Owner, BackYardChickens.com

Your hands-on guide to modern chicken-raising methods

Thinking about raising chickens? This comprehensive, practical guide gives you expert advice on all aspects of keeping chickens in your backyard. Whether you're interested in chickens as pets or as a source for eggs or meat, you'll find all the latest information on housing, feeding, healthcare, breeding, and much more.

• Do you speak chicken? — learn about basic chicken biology, breeds, and behavior
• Select your chickens — from eggs to chicks to adults, decide which to buy, how many you need, and find the healthy ones
• Take care of a small flock — choose a type of housing, construct a chicken coop, feed your birds, and do housekeeping
• Make more chickens — discover how to mate your chickens, incubate eggs, and hatch and nurture chicks
• Reap the harvest — manage laying hens, collect and store eggs, butcher meat birds, and package and store meat

Open the book and find:

• Basic chicken-keeping requirements
• Misconceptions about chickens explained
• Top tips for healthy chickens
• Do-it-yourself housing ideas
• The best feed for your birds
• Advice on controlling pests and predators
• Hints for optimal egg production
• Information on raising meat birds
• Answers to combat laying issues

Kimberly Willis has raised poultry for more than 30 years. She currently keeps a flock of laying hens and Bourbon Red turkeys on her small farm and works at an MSU county Extension office in Michigan. Rob Ludlow runs BackYardChickens.com, the leading chicken-raising information resource on the Web. Rob and his family raise a small flock in their San Francisco Bay-area backyard.