Further Reading

If you start keeping chickens, then, as well as reading about them on the internet, I would also suggest you  get a good general book on chickens to learn more and use as a reference as you go along. I would also recommend you get a good book on Chickens’ Health which can pay for itself many times over when things go wrong (and they frequently do!).

If you are a beginner looking to keep chickens then my recommendation would be Anne Perdeaux’s excellent “A Family Guide To Keeping Chickens: How to choose and care for your first chickens” This is a very practical book that is ideal for the complete beginner.

Family Guide to Keeping Chickens Book

Another book I can recommend as a beginners / intermediate book is the Haynes Chicken Manual written by Laurence Beeken.

Two books I recommend

I wouldn’t be without The Haynes Chicken Manual and Diseases of Free Range Poultry.

It covers just about everything you could ever possibly need to know including some more advanced topics on hatching, and showing chickens.

For chickens health, there is still really only one book to consider and that is Victoria Roberts ‘Diseases of Free Range Poultry’ which is written by a vet from the UK.

The other books I have read have either been very expensive and technical, or aimed at the American market (such as the Chicken Health Handbook).

 

42 Comments

  1. Madam, great site and congratulations on it! Quick question, you mention that chickens may start moulting and not laying eggs from now until spring. I am new to chicken keeping and have just got three lovely hens. How will I know what is the natural moulting cycle and when is it; as compared to if they are sick? I am worried that the stress of the change of environment to thier new home may have an impact. Thank you.

    • If your hens are moulting, they will look scruffy and have missing feathers. There will be feathers all over the place too in their run. They usually don’t moult in their first year so if your hens are young, you probably won’t see this happen this year.

  2. Thank you for your reply. I have another quick question. I am going to get some Sebright Bantams. I am told that if I put them in with my normal size chickens, they will be bullied, so I am getting another run for them. If I put the runs so they are seeing each other, would they get on better when mixing in the garden? Thanks again in anticipation.

    • If you give hens enough space and have enough feeders around, they should be able to find their own area without being bullied. If you coop them all up together in a small run, you’re sure to have problems. If they live in separate runs, there will be a different pecking order in each – so mixing them may cause some bullying so just keep a watchful eye.

  3. Thanks again. One of my new hens laid an egg on it’s first day, but did not lay one today. It’s bottom is twitching and tail is low, does it mean it is egg bound? Has the recent re-house to my coop stressed it and made it egg bound? Anything I can do?
    Last question! Promise!

    • It’s unlikely to be egg bound – but you’d need to feel if there was an egg there and see whether she was constantly going to the nestbox and straining. They often get a penguin stance.

  4. The chicken I was worried about today laid an egg, the like of which I have never seen. It is like a Cadbury Mini egg. A small version of an egg, bascially. It looks a little sick to me, would you know what is wrong? Thank you,

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