Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
There is a long-standing controversy over the basic need for a chicken coop. One philosophy, known as the "fresh air school", holds that chickens are mostly hardy but can be brought low by confinement, poor air quality and darkness, hence the need for a highly ventilated or open-sided coop with conditions more like the outdoors, even in winter. [8]
The first wild animal to be domesticated was the dog. Half-wild dogs, perhaps starting with young individuals, may have been tolerated as scavengers and killers of vermin, and being naturally pack hunters, were predisposed to become part of the human pack and join in the hunt.
The hybrids are fertile and have resulted in several of the modern breeds. Despite their early domestication, geese have never gained the commercial importance of chickens and ducks. [37] Domestic geese are much larger than their wild counterparts and tend to have thick necks, an upright posture, and large bodies with broad rear ends.
Chicken tractors allow free ranging along with shelter, allowing chickens fresh forage such as grass, weeds and bugs (although these will quickly be stripped away if the tractor remains in the same place for too long), which widens their diet and lowers their feed needs. Unlike fixed coops, chicken tractors do not have floors so there is no ...
Urban keeping of chickens as pets, for eggs, meat, or for eating pests is popular in urban and suburban areas.Some people sell the eggs for side income.. Keeping chickens in an urban environment is a type of urban agriculture, important in the local food movement, which is the growing practice of cultivating, processing and distributing food in or around a village, town or city. [1]
A behavioral definition of free range is perhaps the most useful: "chickens kept with a fence that restricts their movements very little." [ citation needed ] This has practical implications. For example, according to Jull, "The most effective measure of preventing cannibalism seems to be to give the birds good grass range."
A free range pastured chicken system. Pastured poultry also known as pasture-raised poultry or pasture raised eggs is a sustainable agriculture technique that calls for the raising of laying chickens, meat chickens (broilers), guinea fowl, and/or turkeys on pasture, as opposed to indoor confinement like in battery cage hens or in some cage-free and 'free range' setups with limited "access ...
Chickens are relatively large birds, active by day. The body is round, the legs are unfeathered in most breeds, and the wings are short. [19] Wild junglefowl can fly; chickens and their flight muscles are too heavy to allow them to fly more than a short distance. [20] Size and coloration vary widely between breeds. [19]