Yup, Storey Guides to ANYTHING are great, lol.
We use to order chicks from Murray McMurray, but quit when we lost almost 50 chicks when they must've gotten cold during shipping. Now we order from Ideal Poultry and love them!
Not sure of the count, but we probably have about 65 chickens, including a coop full of 6 weekers. My middle kiddos are going out today to secure their "play area" outside their coop so they can start coming out daily. They'll go in w/the other chickens in a couple more weeks.
Ours mostly free ranged, but I started locking them up in our barn until about 4 p.m. because I got tired of looking for eggs, lol. It's Easter every day here! Also because we were having a coyote issue there for awhile.
We have gone thru chickens being picked off by owls, hawks, a fox, coyotes, but the worst was a stray dog attack. Got 23 of my chickens and most of my guineas. This was years ago, and we now have learned to shoot first, ask questions (or not) later. The 3 S's are Shoot, Shovel, and Shut Up. Whether it's a stray dog, wild animal, or a neighbor's dog. Just part of living in the country, though. Some people think it's ok to just let their animals run loose, even though there's a containment law out here....
I am putting in raised gardening beds this year and before I dared plant seeds I fenced it off. My chickens would scratch it all up fast if I didn't. Guineas are another story...they are great to garden with!
Oh, and we do the deep litter method. Total clean out twice yearly.
And we use fly predators for fly control now. Works great!
