Tips For Backyard Poultry Owners

Tips For Backyard Poultry Owners

Although there are no formal statistics available to the number of backyard chicken flocks in the United States, it has grown considerably in recent years. Often flock owners don't have much knowledge or experience raising chickens prior to bringing their poultry home.

Colorado State University Veterinarian Extension Specialist Dr. Regan Adams provides some useful tips for backyard flock owners

Adams: "The first and foremost thing to realize when you have animals — whether they are your pets or your production animals — you are their steward. Part of that contract is that you will take care of them. So you want to feed them well and nutritiously, that you have fresh water, that you have a good place for them to stay as well as doing a daily assessment of their health."

Dr. Adams adds watching your birds for a few minutes each day to detect abnormal behavior or signs of disease which may include — coughing, sneezing, diarrhea or abnormal feces. This daily observation proves very useful. She continues

Adams: "So they need to learn to understand the habits of their birds so they have early recognition that something is wrong with them. Often as an Extension Specialist I get a lot of telephone calls, 'My birds looked fine yesterday and now they are all dead.'"

Another important tip is not to spread disease to your flock by bringing in new chickens without quarantining them for at least two weeks prior to adding them to your flock.

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