FREE-RANGE CHICKENS

(Page 9 of 9)

July/August 1984
By the Mother Earth News editors 
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I keep the route small: just enough to supply cash to buy what I need to grow my own supply of eggs and "frickenchicassee." If you try field-running poultry on any kind of profit-making basis, it gets to be hard-nosed business real quick. You're competing with commercial eggs that may be antiques by the time they get to market but are produced so cheaply they are often given away by stores just to get folks in to waste their money on "dollarabox" junk food. And let's be honest: We keep chickens in large part because they make good friends and neighbors. I like being awakened at 5:00 AM by a crowing contest being carried out under the bedroom window. Sometimes I answer. Sometimes the kids tune up and join in sleepily, the horse begins nickering, the dog barks, and the assorted cats milling around in the hayloft meow; time to get up and feed the zoo. It's all part of the fun of country living.

RELATED CONTENT

Try It Yourself

Give it a try, if you have or can wangle the space. You may have to scrape droppings off your shoes now and again, but that never hurt anyone. In compensation, you'll have your eggs and fried chicken fresh, wholesome, and on the cheap. That's worth a little cash money. And then, spared an existence cooped up in a pen, your birds will live out as close to a natural chicken life as their breeding permits. Maybe freeing them up will free something in you. It works that way with me, or I like to think it does. Looking to live and let live in the natural condition is as near a state of grace as I'll ever approach in this life. Can't put a dollar value on that.

EDITOR'S NOTE: John Vivian wrote "Building with Native Stone, "the piece that kicked off our Homestead Handbook series in issue 85. John's also the author of The Manual of Practical Homesteading (Rodale), Wood Heat (Rodale), and other publications on self-reliant country living ... including the Garden Way Bulletin "Eggs and Chickens: In Least Space on Home-Grown Food" (available for $1.95 plus $1.50 shipping and handling from Storey Communications, Schoolhouse Rd, RD 1, Box 105, Pownal, VT 05261). Two other useful "backyarder's" guides are The Family Poultry Flock, available for $7.50 postpaid from Farmer's Digest, Box 363, Brookfield, WI 53005 ... and The Backyard Poultry Book, which can be ordered for $2.95 plus $1.00 shipping and handling from Arco Publishing Company, Inc., 215 Park Ave. South, New York, NY 10003.

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  • susan 12/31/2008 4:26:54 AM

    Does anyone know about raising free range chickens without a coop? We want them to survive with out a coop.. and would enjoy hunting for any eggs that they might lay in their favourite spots.

    We have had a coop before and (a) do not need it because of the remote location from other houses; (b) foxes have found their way in on other occassion; and (c) there are the odd times when we are not around at precisely sunset to shut them in. The best solution appears to be getting them used to the rough area, and then letting them perch in the numerous trees etc. that are there. They are after all jungle birds arent they?

  • Sonya 4/20/2007 1:04:08 PM

    Great site. Is there any way we can get info mailed to us?
    Mother Responds: You can send this link by email.

  • Michelle 4/17/2007 2:16:26 PM

    My neighbor has free range chickens that frequently come onto our
    property as well as the other 2 neighbors' property. None of our 2
    acre lots are fenced and personally I don't mind the feathered
    visitors since they tended to stay at the back of the property.
    However, starting last year and now continuing this year, they have
    taken to coming up to my deck and around the front of my house to
    dig up my mulched flower beds. I have already had to move my tomato
    garden inside my child's play area to protect them, but I don't
    feel that 4 chickens should dictate how I landscape my yard. I gave
    up landscaping in the back thinking they would hang out back there,
    but now that they are venturing up to the house I'm not sure how to
    prevent them from getting at my flowers. I do not want to put
    chicken wire around my gardens, is there anything else I can try?
    I've heard that some animals are turned off from digging if you
    bury chicken wire in the ground, will that work for chickens? Are
    there any products I could purchase that may help? I don't want to
    have to ask the neighbor to put the chickens in their coop, I want
    them to have a good life but I also don't want to spend my time,
    energy and money to continually replace and repair the gardens they
    destroy. If anyone has any suggestions could you please email me at
    the above address. Thank you!

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