Things to consider before keeping Hens

Security

I discovered recently, when given a taste of freedom hens can run fast, very fast….you will undoubtedly wear out before they do and indeed I did after 45 minutes of running around after one, who had decided to make a run for it. All ended well and I remain convinced the hen had been playing a practical joke, whilst her friends stood chluckling (sorry, bad pun!) in the background. After I fell to the floor exhausted, the hen simply wandered over and stood next to her run, stopping for a feed on the grass. I wondered whether our feathered friend had seen ‘Chicken Run’?!  This made me realise your garden needs to be secure if you’re allowing your hens to roam relatively free. Also, their home needs to be secured from foxes, which have been known to dig under fences. Digging your mesh down about a foot, making the joins overlap and wiring them together should keep your chickens safe and sound from any hungry, cunning, urban prowler.

Conditions

Hens love bright and airy conditions but, you will have to make sure the hen house is sheltered from strong winds, driving rain and provides some shade for hotter summer days. A waterproof roof is an absolute must to provide adequate protection from bad weather.

Equipment needed for keeping hens

The biggest decision will undoubtedly be the style of house you will use.

The latest in design is a plastic hen house, which tends to come with a framed outside run and can easily be moved around your garden. Plastic is extremely hard wearing and there are no nooks where parasites will live.

The fold method is a wooden house with a run built in that can be moved around by two people, this allows the hens to graze on fresh grass.

Rustic style are usually made from wood, They are dry and well ventilated but are more expensive to buy compared to other types of housing and can’t be moved around.

Economy range are generally made from rain proofed chipboard that is easy to clean, on the downside there is not always a lot of room for the hens to move around but, will suffice if planning just to put the hens in at night.

Traditional Ark tend to be a popular choice for hen housing  made from ready treated wood, night house, perches, nesting boxes, external run and although heavy can be moved around.

After taking all the options into consideration we decided to make our own with the help of my father in law who is a bit of a genius when it comes to design and build projects. To construct the house, we used bits of material which had been stored in the garage, with even an old piece of laminate kitchen work surface being used as the floor, aiding the easy cleaning of hen poop. The only disadvantage we have found is we cannot move the house around, so we selected a quiet spot at the bottom of the garden. As the hens have picked away the grass, we have put down lawn clippings as fresh grass for the birds. This decision has proven very economical, economically sound as we have recycled otherwise redundant materials and the hens have been very happy indeed!

Finally, in order to feed and water your lucky little hens, there are a number of cleverly designed dispensers available to automate this process – many plastic hen feeders and water dispensers allow you to pre-fill the centre with food/water and as the hens feed/drink, the stocks replenish, ensuring there is plenty available throughout the day whilst you may be out.

I hope you enjoy keeping these fantastic little additions to the family as we have!

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I was really interested, and contacted the Hen Welfare Trust, to find out more (my next article will cover considerations before keeping hens, and an equipment needed list.). I found out after an initial outlay for a hen house, chickens are an extremely cheap animal to keep. They love kitchen leftovers and they earn their keep by laying eggs.  Ex-battery hens which tend to be the large brown hens, are by nature very good egg layers. The idea of giving the birds the opportunity to stretch their legs and see sunlight in their old age really appealed to me.

After sorting out the accommodation for the birds, buying some feed and equipment, my Wife, daughter and I arranged to visit the next battery hen pick up. We had been warned the hens would be in a poor physical state because of the conditions that they had been kept in and there would be no guarantee all the hens would make it through the shock of becoming free range, let alone lay eggs. I don’t think anybody could have prepared us for seeing the hens in such a sorry state. Nearly all hens had vast amounts of feathers missing and their comb (the red sideways crown on top of their head) was a light pink colour and dropping to the side, which is a sure sign of an unhealthy hen.

My daughter picked out four hens and we placed them carefully into a straw lined box, and with great excitement we drove them home. We put the hens into their new enclosure and probably for the first hour, they stood rooted to the spot like statues, occasionally clucking. We had the feeling the outside world was just too much for them. We named the hens after old soul singers, Dusty, Lulu, Cilla and Aretha and then decided to give them some time to settle in without us staring! My Wife and I returned an hour later to find all four hens scratching around and Lulu with a worm hanging from her beak….we knew from that moment that we had made the right choice to rescue these hens! I found it amazing to think that although these hens had been enclosed in a battery farm for the first year of their lives, within and incredibly short period of time some deeply rooted, natural instinctive behaviour must have taken over, proving just where these hens should be.

Over the months the hens became stronger, their feathers started to grow back, their comb standing upright bright red and proud and they laid countless eggs! The hens have proven to be great pets, all developing different characters, sociable following you around in a pack and rewarding not only by laying eggs every day but by watching them flourish and enjoying their well deserved retirement.

Our hens lay amazing eggs which can be eaten in so many ways. I was given a tip from my late father – a few slithers of beetroot helps to turn the yolks a wonderful rich orange. And he was right, lovely to dip your soldiers in!

My next article will focus on some considerations and recommended equipment for keeping hens. In the mean time, I am off to create some egg-celent food…..groan!

LOCKnLOCK Egg Airtight Storage container / LOCK&LOCK $5.55

ZACK Vivace Egg Cup / Tealight Holder 23027 $21.20

BH4726 CUT WORK EMBROIDERED EGG BUN BREAD HOLDER 4 pcs $25.00

Free Ship!5-Speed Hand Mixer/Egg Beater W/Turbo,2 Mixer $24.69

Brand New Set of Eight (8) Egg Pancake Molds $4.99

5-Speed Electric Hand Mixer/Hand Beater/Egg Beater $18.20

STAINLESS STEEL MUSHROOM EGG BERRY SLICER GARDE MANGER $15.99

HELLO KITTY Food Vegetable Ham Egg Mold Cutter Set A49 $9.99

Silicone Egg Mold Ring for Bento Box Lunch HEART 464 F $3.67

Silicone Egg Mold Ring for Bento Box Lunch BEAR 464 F $3.67

Meeting up with friends and family for lunch and choosing one of the many world food options washed down with a local beer, cider, perry or wine whilst listening to a local band. Does life get much better than this?

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During a long weekend trip with my wife and daughter to Barcelona, a passion for the Spanish tradition of Tapas was enlightened.  A chance discovery of the La Boqueria food market (one of the largest in Europe} was an experience I will never forget.  The market is definitely not just there to provide a tourist attraction but to provide the people of Barcelona with the freshest, best quality, locally-sourced produce. The senses were bombarded in en

Within the market there are a number of Tapas stalls cooking small, exquisite dishes from the produce that is being sold around them. The freshness of the ingredient’s is unsurpassed and the variety of options seeming to be almost endless.

A Spanish waiter explained Tapa means lid or cover and the cuisines origins comes from inn keepers placing a slice of bread with ham or cheese on top over drinks being served, to keep out flies. The theory goes that the food offerings became more and more  elaborate with rival inn keepers competing to entice in clientele.

Modern Tapas is a mixture of small tasty dishes served in the earthenware (Cazuelas) or paella pan it’s been cooked in. Tapas can be eaten alone, shared one portion or as many dishes as you care to eat over any amount of time. All the traditional flavours of Spain can be found within tapas dishes. Wonderful fresh seafood, vegetables, meat, manchego cheese, Iberian Chorizo, Serrano Ham Paella, paprika, olives and tomatos. It is the ultimate in social relaxed eating. I hope to share with you some of my favourite recipes I have experienced whilst exploring this exciting cuisine.

Gambas pil pil

This dish is very simple but a really good way of showcasing large fresh prawns.  I love the simple pleasure of dipping bread into the oil the prawns have cooked in the combination of flavours is divine.

Equipment needed; individual Earthenware dishes (Cazuelas), knife.

Ingredients per individual dish

• 3-4 Tbsp of good quality olive oil
• 6-10 large prawns
• Clove of Garlic
• 1 Dried Red Chilli
• 1 Lemon
• Pinch of Pimenton (paprika)
• Basket of Bread

Method

1. Peel and devein Prawns.
2. Peel and thinly slice Garlic.
3. Add Garlic, chilli, and paprika to oil inside earthen ware dish. Place dish directly onto  hob, heat until hot but not smoking.
4. Carefully add prawns, cook  for 2-3 minutes till prawns are pink and starting to curl
5. Serve immediately in same dish being careful of hot oil, lemon wedges for garnish and bread for dunking
6. Enjoy

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Armed with a few tools and my rather small car, some may say that perhaps I had underestimated the task slightly…..at 8 foot by 6 foot, it would need to be completely dismantled, without any instructions! I realised that this would not be achieved in a single day and so drew a plan of the greenhouse and then marked each pane of glass and part of the structure with masking tape and a number or letter. “Genius”, I thought, as this would make life an awful lot easier when putting it back together at home. Once I’d finished this exercise, I returned home feeling quite proud of myself, promising to return the following week to complete the move.

What I did not bank on was the weather changing for the worse over the week and the vast majority of the ink on the ‘labels’ I’d painstakingly stuck on, being washed off…. In addition to this, I’d lost the plan I had drawn the previous week!

After much effort, probably too many expletives and a few cuts here and there, we’d amazingly managed to take it apart and shift it back to ours – incredibly, we achieved this without smashing a single pane of glass. Reassembling the structure was not as difficult as it could have been (although I recall that was not perhaps the thoughts going through my head at the time) and we now have our own little sun trap in which to grow our own fruit and vegetables, which did not cost us a penny (and after a bit of research, I worked out that it is about £800′s worth!). I have tried to insulate the floor of the greenhouse by laying down polystyrene (the type you get in packaging of ‘white goods’) and then hardboard on top of that, which should ensure that warm air is retained for longer periods.

Fingers crossed we’ll have our own living larder in the not-too-distant future!

We set about making bread for the very first time on boxing day with a simple recipe for a white split tin loaf.  A completely painless and straight-forward process! Having gathered the ingredients, we simply placed them in the bread maker following the instruction booklet provided. Obviously, being a male, I would have just thrown them in hap-hazardly without reading the instructions, however, bread-making is an exact science, my good Wife pointed out! The preparation time took a few minutes and once switched on, the machine took care of mixing the ingredients into dough, proofing and then baking. Seriously lazy cooking at its best!

The smell of freshly baked bread filled the house and if you have ever smelt bread baking, you will know it’s a sure fire way of stimulating your appetite. After a couple of hours our first loaf was ready and it was a success.  We excitedly removed the loaf from the tin, cut it into thick slices whilst warm and smothered with butter. I can honestly say there are few things that taste as good as this simple pleasure.

Since our first exploits of bread making we have not looked back, there are many advantages to baking your own – you control what goes in and there is no end to exciting variations you can experiment with. We now include Italian herb, cheese and onion, raisin and olives amongst our repertoire. It’s cheaper, which is important in these current times, and you can set the timer to bake bread at any given time – there are few nicer smells to wake up to in the morning!

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