Keeping Backyard Chickens | SF Tips

With the current egg shortage, are you looking at keeping some backyard chickens? Here's some tips from the SF Team.

What comes first, the chicken or the egg?

With the current egg shortage across NZ, it turns out the chicken comes first, with huge spike in New Zealanders purchasing backyard chickens.

What’s stopping you keeping chickens for fresh eggs every day?

Here’s a few tips you need to remember if you are about to purchase some feathery friends.

1. Check your local council rules around owning chickens. There may be a limit to how many chickens you can own, some guidelines around noise and hygiene and restrictions on roosters.

2. Ensure your chickens have adequate shelter and a safe outdoor area. They will need somewhere to shield from the elements, nest, sleep, and roost, while also an outdoor environment for foraging, dust baths and roaming.

3. Ensure fresh water is always available.

4. While feeding your chickens your food scraps seems like a great idea, there are a couple of scraps you need to avoid feeding them.

- Raw meat

- Avocado pits and skins

- Rhubarb leaves

- Raw green potato peels

Scraps should be no more that 15% of your chickens’ diets.

5. And most importantly, feed your chickens a quality feed. You will need a feed that meets the health, growth and production needs of laying poultry with quality sources of energy, proteins, amino acids and calcium. Look for a complete feed that contains all the essential vitamins and minerals and grit for egg production.

Explore the NZ made, textured, complete feeds in the SF Poultry Range!

The SF Poultry Range