Comment by qq99

My neighbor has chickens and the predators are no joke. Raccoons constantly trying to weaken their coop, weasels always ready to slip into any little hole, hawks and other birds of prey circling overhead. They've lost a lot of chickens despite keeping a close eye on them and trying to keep a very sturdy coop. It's like a signal goes out to all the wild animals "COME GET TASTY CHICKENS HERE!" Of course we are in a pretty rural area. You can get some pretty cute fluffy chickens though.

> Chickens are very sweet animals, and are quite intelligent.

They did tests on chickens, and apparently they understand the concept of showing restraint on a current action, with the view on having a larger reward later.

Something along the lines of: "If you don't eat these grains now, we'll reward you with twice as many grains later".

That's something that dogs can't do, for instance.

> - You may have to euthanize a chicken, likely by hand (literally) via cervical dislocation. It still ranks among the worst things I've ever had to do in my life. Imagine euthanizing your dog or cat by hand...

I visited a farm as a kid and we had fresh chicken for dinner one day. They had one of those orange road cones with the top cut off a bit to fit the chicken in upside down so they could easily chop off its head. They then run around for awhile after that because their nervous system is still working for a minute or so. Just something to interesting to learn as a 5th grader, I guess.

> it's definitely _not_ the _monetary_ solution

Does this also take into account the current price of eggs in the same product category? i.e., organic, free-range eggs?

For current Erewhon prices, 8 eggs a day is $11.30 in free eggs a day, so $339 in eggs a month?

https://erewhon.com/subcategory/33022/eggs - $16.99 a dozen

Literally nobody is mentioning the fact that to own 13 chickens there were 13 roosters that were euthanized as chicks. 50% of chickens are born male. Nobody wants all those roosters. Some dude in a factory is squeezing the chicks and looking up their buttholes to see if they are male or female, then the males are thrown into a meat grinder (literally).

Saying all of that, I would rather eat eggs from chickens that had a half-decent life than those kept in horrible conditions.

> a large coop

It's large compared to the average, but the longer we've had chickens the more we're convinced they thrive better when given appropriate space (anecdata about average age of our chickens vs all other people with chickens we know), leading me to think something like yours is still too small even for 2 chickens.

For us the minimum is now such that there's at least some of the gras/moss left throughout the year instead of the puddle of mud we used to get. Plus I'm not gonne lie: seeing their (and their ancestors) behavior 'in the wild' it feels morally/ethically better as well. Especially the younger ones are keen explorers: easy to see when let ranging free - they'll go in a radius of like 100m around their nest, but not much further than that. Apart from that one mandatory weirdo obviously.

Chickens are really smart and curious animals. They can also learn from each other new behaviour, like eating unfamiliar food, or hunting for small animals (the cries of joy from our cock once he finally got a frog!!!) They also have really marked personalities, once you spend some time with them.

> - Your wife may one day want a chicken to live inside the house. You may one day agree to this, and then miss it when the chicken is living outside the house again...

Isn't the more likely case that they shit everywhere but the family loves them so much they won't let you put it back outside?

> I'm told the eggs taste way better, I don't really notice it

I didn't notice a significant difference in taste either. Eggs taste like eggs, it is one of the foods where there is the fewest difference between home grown and store bought, and also between different grades of store bought. And if there is any difference, I think that freshness is more significant.

One big difference, though it doesn't matter much when you eat it is the shell. Good quality eggs, including those from backyard chicken tend to have a stronger shell that breaks cleanly.

Maybe if you give your chicken specific food, your eggs can have a specific taste. How you feed them can affect the color of the yolk, which can matter for presentation, but it doesn't tell much else.

Definitely it's not about the cost and convenience.

And I haven't seen it discussed much, which tells a lot that the HN-ers are city dwellers with little experience in the countryside life. But the biggest, nastiest, deepest problem with anything animal is ... shit.

Animals produce shit and lots of animals produce loads of shit. And chickens don't have the notion of "this area is for eating, this one's for shitting", they will shit all over the place. So if you don't enclose them and can run to your porch, they'll shit it up so gotta be careful where you step or sit on. If you enclose them, better be prepared to wipe shit of your boots coze no way you can avoid it forever. Then the "pleasant" activity of cleaning up loads of shit from the chicken coop and dispose it somewhere.

Overall, having lived on a farm, my childhood memories of interaction with animals resume to "lots and lots of shit everywhere" :)

> - Your wife may one day want a chicken to live inside the house. You may one day agree to this, and then miss it when the chicken is living outside the house again...

This made me smile very wide, thank you for sharing :-)

My mom has a dozen backyard chickens and I agree with all of these. I'll tack on two bits from my own experience:

Good: Fresh unwashed eggs don't need to be refrigerated. They are perfectly safe at room temperature on the shelf for days.

Bad: You can't leave them with other pets without supervision. One of the dogs got himself a taste for chicken and already ate at least three. You can't train this out of the dog, unfortunately. I had to put down one poor chicken that was deeply injured but still alive. We constantly stay vigilant to keep the dogs and chickens separate.

I used to get tipped in eggs by this wonderful human at a bar I worked at and while I'm not sure I could tell them apart in a blind taste test I can say that the variety of pretty colors the egg shells came in and the richness of the yolk combined to make them noticeably more satisfying. I have a lot of experience tasting things though, I could absolutely see someone having a similar experience to mine and chalking it up to a superior taste. Or maybe there is a regional component to basic grocery store eggs and I live in a high quality zone, idk.

For me the biggest downside is that they reliably attract vermin. I tried a bunch of things to deter rats but they were ever present when we had hens

The ancestors of chickens used to eat our ancestors for hundreds of millions of years, so I have no issues with eating them as much as I want.

Some other downsides:

- The smell… Chicken crap is horrible. Our neighbour has chickens, we have flies. Lots of black flies.

- Bye bye garden… My dad has two chickens (did I mention the smell?) that free roam and absolutely tear up everything looking for a tasty bite.

- Can’t eat the eggs This isn’t necessarily a chicken problem but mostly a problem with chemical industry. We’ve had a lot of PFOA/PFAS contamination and public health advise says to not eat eggs from backyard chickens

"Predators, foxes and hawks, you need defenses"

This one is something I think people maybe don't consider. My brother has chickens, they have a coop but pretty much have the run of his property in a rural area. He has had to kill a coyote and a bob cat so far. Not a reason not to get them, but something to consider before doing so.

> - I'm told the eggs taste way better, I don't really notice it because I really only eat my own eggs, but perhaps I just got used to them

I eat fresh laid eggs very rarely (though have been thinking of raising my own), but can confirm that every time I've had truly fresh chicken eggs the taste is notably superior.

> You may have to euthanize a chicken, likely by hand (literally) via cervical dislocation. It still ranks among the worst things I've ever had to do in my life.

Traditionally it's done by decapitation. Head dies instantly. No need to suffer. Body runs for a while. Don't forget to ask for forgiveness...

> You may have to euthanize a chicken

Looking online on reasons to euthanize chickens, it seems to be about not prolonging their suffering when ill.

I don't really know much on farming practices, and I'm not commenting to say that things should be one way or the other. However, I do note that with a human, euthanasia is not a common practice, specially without consent, and one would typically just numb the pain until they pass on their own, i.e. hospice care.

Maybe that's not possible with animals because chickens can't really communicate on the effectiveness of drugs...

Still much better treatment than factory farming.

Right! The first egg our chickens laid cost $500, the second $250, etc. It would take a lot of laying for the cost to come even close to grocery store prices (back then) but we quit after a couple of years.

Sounds like a classic case of -not the cheapest option, but definitely the most rewarding-. The ethical aspect is a huge plus: knowing exactly how your eggs are produced and giving the chickens a good life.

"If you really like eating chicken, you may end up finding it difficult to eat them again in the future after you develop a bond with them."

Or you might find them delicious and need to raise more of them.

Great points! I agree with everything you said here with exception to the point about it not being a monetary solution. I've built an "extremely" janky coop for almost no cost in the past. At one point I got absolutely sick of eggs because there were so many than I ended up trading neighbors for other goods. The whole thing ended up making/saving me a ton of money in the end. Let me reiterate how unsafe this coop was however... it was as spacious as it was dangerous (very).

Seems to me another downside is the increased difficulty in traveling. As in, if I want to go away for a few days, I'll have to find someone to feed and water the chickens.

You make no mention of feed cost. Do you just depend upon free range "pecking" in the grass, or kitchen scraps... or what? 13 chickens is a lot of daily feed!

My dad used to have around 15 chickens — but then a fox somehow burrowed under the fence - which was buried in the ground around 20 cm - and slaughtered them all.

>I'm told the eggs taste way better

Can confirm. My dad's cousin is a little bit country and has had meat and egg chickens for years. She comes to visit sometimes, and always brings eggs. Store-bought quite literally pales in comparison, which is to say that the dandelion yellow yolks of store bought eggs have nothing on the rich, flavorful orange-as-a-child's-drawing-of-the-sun yolks from her eggs.

My sister has been keeping a coop in her backyard for over a decade now. She got the, because “I find the sound soothing.” (It really is quite nice)

One other advantage is that they will absolutely hoover up the ticks out of a yard. I’ve tried to talk my various friends who move upstate into getting some for this reason… but yeah it’s a couple grand up front and a new hobby.

> Your wife may one day want a chicken to live inside the house. You may one day agree to this, and then miss it when the chicken is living outside the house again

Whenever someone mentions how unique you can be with language and come up with amazing unique sentences never uttered by anyone before...I shall think of this

The concept is kind of analogous in many ways on if one should have solar power to hedge against power outages. I.e definitely can be worth it but will take up time and investment with long payback period.

Thanks for the detail. I never thought about vet needs for chickens. How would you know they are sick? I know with my cat, her mood and activity would shift. Is it apparent when a chicken is sick?

The eggs do taste better but that depends on what you are feeding them.

You don't have to eat your chickens, it’s up to you.

predators and rats and avian flu are the tough problems.

How does one travel/vacation if they have chickens? Are they self-managing enough to be left alone for 1-2 weeks a couple times a year?

Your hypothetical children may tell stories for decades about how they were the ones who had to scoop the poop into the outdoor composting area and that the strong smell of urea lives with them to this day.

uh, speaking hypothetically and not at all of our own family chicken adventure when I was a kid/teen.

Also, if you have to kill a chicken, study how to do it and practice beforehand. Botching it will also live with you - I learned this one the hard way.

All that said, I'm glad I had the experience of (helping) raise chickens. It was an adventure, and the eggs were great. I've pondered it on and off again as an adult but have thus far resisted the temptation.

A big upside; with chickens you have the best possible composting system. They will eat almost all food waste. (but, please be careful to avoid the small number of foods which are unhealthy for chickens) And, they turn that waste into compost. Depending on volume, they can also completely handle leaves, grass clippings, and other yard waste. For leaves, they love to scratch through them and will poop on them. They'll break down the leaves in record time.

Ignorant question: why might one need to euthanize a chicken?

> Chickens are very sweet animals, and are quite intelligent.

I hated chickens, the only animal I may have disliked more were sheep and that’s only because sheep are so unbelievably annoying.

Chickens to me were nothing more than noisy garbage disposals.

> - Chickens are very sweet animals

Personally, I find them rather savory. Although deep fried with a bit of honey is good too.

> Chickens are very sweet animals, and are quite intelligent. You will grow to love all the silly things they do. You can pet them, they are super soft, and can become quite tame. They can purr.

Chickens are ruthless and will not hesitate for a moment to kill and then cannibalize their coop mates. The best way to avoid it is to have a single breed as they tend to start by attacking anything different, literally spots or discolorations, on other birds.

Yes, chickens will eat other chickens.

> I'm told the eggs taste way better, I don't really notice it because I really only eat my own eggs, but perhaps I just got used to them.

All eggs taste the same. Which is great because eggs taste great.

> Your wife may one day want a chicken to live inside the house. You may one day agree to this, and then miss it when the chicken is living outside the house again...

Chickens are filthy animals and the thought of having one indoors is disgusting.

"We can't build a bigger coop - Joey's going into soup."

good luck with this

how hard would it be to break even with 200 chickens in a typical European town (excluding land costs)? i am just imagining if a small company decides to raise its own chickens-eggs for lunch time...

I’ve hear another downside is the sheer amount of poop to clean up.

Inside the house? How? They shit wherever they happen to be ...