Chickens: Winter Time Blues

With the sudden arrival of winter, comes the change in lifestyle for a farmer as well as his stock. While a farmer may still indulge in everyday luxuries, his livestock may not. Typically my chickens are freely running around my farm eating ticks, bugs, and veggies. This is a luxury they have spring through fall, but as the cold winter sets in and the forage dies out, they can still run about but they become bored and more prone to wander into the den of some desperate creature waiting to gobble them up. So, naturally in order to counter act their sense of adventure, I keep them in the coop through winter. While, I have nothing against chickens enjoying a seditary livestyle in a coop, I would like to keep my birds as happy and entertained as possible. Remember, a happy hen is a healthy hen, and a healthy hen lays lots of eggs.

- The first of many thing you can do is "Cabbage on a String"( pictured above) sounds silly right?? Well they love it and its simple and relatively inexpensive. You just take a drill bit and hollow out a small hole through the core of the cabbage. Then take a string and thread it through. Tie the string back to itself then hang it anywhere in your coop. With the lack of forage in the coop yard, it is a great supplement that will keep them occupied for hours and hours.

- A similar option is a commercial "Flock Block" made by Purina available online or at tsc or other feed store. Though it isn't the cheepest option(you could buy about 6 cabbages for the price of one block) but its all about personal preferance. It provides, probably a better balance of nutrients, and probably last just a little longer than a cabbage, but either will do the job of entertaining the birds, just is all on how you want to feed your birds.

- Another great way to keep your birds busy for hours and hours is a "Hay Mound". Implied by the name it is literaly a mound of hay, though leaves work just as well, if not better. You simply take old hay or leaves and mix your everyday chicken feed of your choice, corn works best because it wont turn to mush if it rains, in with the hay or leaves. You then mound it up in their run and sprinkle a little extra on top, and they will sratch at this and enjoy it for days!

- Another rather odd and unconventional way of keeping your birds busy is "CDs"(also pictured above). Yes, the disks, old ones in which you no longer listen to or blank ones. Siply tie them up in your run, and the chickens are fully intruged by them. The CDs catch the light which makes the chickens curious. They peck at them and enteract with them. Some people write novelty encouraging words for egg production on them such as "Mosart for prime Egg Laying". Of course that is just for fun.

- Another way, is cutting a pumkin in half and simply throwing it in the run. They will peck it for bout 3 day depending on the size of the pumkin and the size of your flock.

I'm quite sure there are many other ways to occupy your flock of chickens through winter, this is simply a few ideas to keep your chickens happy through the winter time and to avoid "Coop Fever".

Thanks,

Austin