Ten Top Tips: Health
If you’ve ever witnessed or been part of an effort to change a city’s ordinance on allowing residents to keep chickens, then you know the topic of avian health is an important one. Bird health reaches far beyond the perimeter of the coop.
Many cities cite health or sanitation as a reason to prohibit chicken-keeping within their borders, and those municipalities that do allow backyard flocks often have strict rules of cleanliness. When left untended or improperly cared for, chicken health can deteriorate rapidly. That said, chickens are very simple to care for properly, and with a bit of regular work, your flock can be healthy year after year.
Having a healthy chicken flock boils down to following a few, simple protocols. Let’s explore each, one by one.
1. Good Sanitation
Let’s start with the most obvious. Practicing good sanitation with your birds and their housing seems like a simple reason behind good health, right? But it is a big topic, and one that covers a lot of ground.
Practicing good sanitation starts in the coop, the place where chickens spend at least half of their time roosting and laying eggs. Housing must cover the basics: shelter from weather and predators (more on that later), a proper
roosting space (chickens prefer to roost to sleep) and nest boxes in which to lay eggs. Each of these areas must meet the size, shape and environmental requirements needed for best health. What does that look like in practice?
Start with a coop that is the proper size for your flock or even slightly bigger (because we chicken-keepers notoriously love to add to our flocks). Build it or renovate it with chickens in mind, keeping nest boxes low to the ground, roosts elevated slightly and good insulation with proper ventilation.
Create locking doors and windows secured with hardware cloth to keep predators from getting into the coop when birds are most vulnerable: at dusk, dawn and overnight. Next boxes should be dark, dry, safe and soft, and eggs should be collected regularly to keep from inciting egg-eating behaviors.
Place a safe bedding on the floor of the coop, such as nontoxic sand, pine shavings or another hardwood shaving. Clean and monitor this regularly. (Some methods require cleaning only once a year, but you should fully research these ahead of time.) Keeping the coop clean, regularly maintained and inspected for security breaches or hazards goes a long way toward encouraging good health for you birds.
2. Biosecurity
Our chickens aren’t the only ones who require proper hygiene and cleanliness; you do, too. Did you know that you can transfer disease from one chicken to another from the dirt on the soles of your shoes? It’s true, and avian diseases and pests can spread rapidly and become dangerous very quickly.
When you visit another farm, homestead or coop; when you visit the county fair; or when you purchase new birds for your own flock, wear booties over your footwear or wash/ change it before re-entering your own coop and run. You simply can’t be too prudent when it comes to biosecurity and your own flock.
If you do add new birds to your flock, extend these biosecurity measures by quarantining any new potential birds for four weeks in an area away from your existing flock. Monitor for illness or disease before slowly introducing them to your older birds.
3. Quality Nutrition
Good food is crucial to good health. We know this for ourselves, and it’s true for our birds as well. The medicine is simple: Purchase the highest quality feed you can afford for your flock’s daily ration.
For many, this means organic chicken feed formulated specifically for the age and stage of your bird or flock. Enormous strides have been made in chicken feed for sensitive egg-eaters. I learned my youngest daughter had an egg and corn allergy as an infant. When we started purchasing corn-free feed for our chickens, she was able to eat their eggs. You are what you eat, after all.
4. Fresh Water
Quite possibly the single most critical element, next to safety, is water. It’s simple: Provide your birds with fresh water daily. You won’t need to
change out the water daily, especially if you have an expertly designed water font system that keeps the water high and prevents birds from perching — and therefore, defecating — in the water. But check it every day, and change it as needed for your flock, font and setup.
5. Supplements
Often overlooked and easily forgotten, supplements are an easy way to help keep your birds in optimum health, especially egg-layers. Domestic fowl have been bred to produce an abundance of eggs, meat or both, and because of this, they require an abundance of very specific supplements, such as calcium.
For some breeds and some flocks, a quality feed alone is not enough. Supplement your birds’ diets with oyster shells for added calcium and grit for aiding digestion; both are usually available wherever other chicken-keeping and farming supplies are sold. You can also purchase them easily online.
6. Dust-bathing
When you hear the word “cleanliness” what comes to mind? Maybe it’s a fresh shirt, and it’s probably the thought of a shower. Many types of birds — wild and some domesticated fowl — love to clean themselves in the water but not chickens. In fact, chicken health can be compromised by too much moisture and prolonged dampness in their enclosure and coop (another reason to keep it dry and clean).
Instead, chickens bathe themselves in a specific way, called “dust bathing.” Chickens recline in the dirt, flop around, then toss dirt up and around their backs and into their feathers. It’s fun to watch and probably gratifying for the chicken.
Chickens wrap up the grooming session with a preening activity, sourcing a preen oil from a gland at the base of the tail. The dirt prevents mites and lice from burrowing and making a home on the bird’s body, and the preening improves feather health until the next molt.
7. Expressing “Chickeness”
Basic health can be achieved by many of the mentioned additions to your flock, but to truly thrive, a chicken must express what famed farmer and activist Joel Salatin calls expressing “chickeness.”
Chickens want to range and forage for their food; they spend much of their day doing so. The more freedom you can offer your birds, including a variety of environments to explore, hunt and dust bathe, the happier they will be.
8. Take Care
Chickens rarely need medical care if the previously mentioned tips are provided regularly, but there are inevitably times when you need the medical support of an avian veterinarian.
Before buying your chickens, call the vets around your area and see which, if any, are specialized avian or “exotic” veterinarians. Ask about their on-call policies, hours and consultation/ emergency rates. You never know when you’ll need to call or make a visit, so be prepared in advance if something bad happens.
9. Safety
There’s a saying among chicken-keepers when it comes to predators: “Everything loves the taste of chicken.” Sadly and frustratingly, it’s quite true. Chickens have many natural predators in North America, including raccoons, foxes, raptors,
bears, weasels and, most commonly, the domestic dog. Providing secure housing and a safe run or fenced enclosure is of the utmost importance.
Research the predators in your area. Get to know each one, including the signs of their presence, tracks, the times of day they’re active and other relevant behavior, then create safety measures accordingly.
10. Be Educated
The best thing you can do for your chickens’ health is take the time to learn about it. Research the ailments, diseases and illnesses that are common and take measures accordingly.
Some chicken-keepers like to vaccinate for diseases such as Marek’s; vaccines are available through many hatcheries upon ordering. Others like to give their chicks medicated feed to help ward off coccidiosis. Learn how to spot mites, know the signs of reproductive ailments such as egg binding and, most importantly, check on your chickens daily so you can detect even slight changes.
Even small health issues, such as respiratory ailments, can grow into something serious if not watched. Learn, to the best of your abilities, what constitutes a “healthy” chicken, and you’ll know when to spot problems. Our birds rely on us to provide for them, and in turn, they’ll keep us flush with eggs and constant entertainment.
Columnist Kristina Mercedes Urquhart is the author of The Suburban Chicken: The guide to keeping healthy, thriving chickens in your backyard. She lives with her husband, menagerie of chickens and other animals, and two daughters in North Carolina.