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rozannadanna

Hi everyone - let's talk chickens and roses

rozannadanna
15 years ago

Anyone else besides me have chickens and/or ducks running around under their roses? The chickens and ducks have about 1/4 of an acre that they share with the roses since lasts spring. It was an experiment of sorts but I have discovered that chickens might eat the lowest blooms but otherwise don't like anything else about a rose. They have scratched and tilled under all the roses - it's now basically the "swept garden" that I was working for. No weeds, nothing - don't think about underplantings because the chickens will eat anything else but THE ROSES - my oh my the roses! They aren't blooming yet but the new growth, the leaves, the tiny little buds everywhere - it's astonishing. The roses that the chickens till and fertilize are going to be the best in the yard - hands down the best. I can't wait to post pics for everyone. And then of course there are the eggs -anyone want chicken or duck eggs - I got plenty - come and get them. For some reason most people turn up their nose at the idea of eating a duck egg but I can't tell the difference unless I am baking something using duck eggs and I found out the hard way that your baked goods will "fluff" up way more with duck eggs - like my cakes fluffed up and over the sides of the cake pan.

In these economic times, if you have a fenced area and have ever considered chickens I recommend that you go for it. Garden Valley Ranch has chickens with their roses and roses LOVE CHICKENS.

Comments (36)

  • jerijen
    15 years ago

    Roseanna! GREAT to hear from you!

    No Chickens here. :-(

    Our neighbor has some, but keeps them penned, I'd have chix and ducks out on the hillside, but all the poor things would be is coyote chow.

    Jeri

  • debnfla8b
    15 years ago

    Hi Roseanna!!!

    Wish I lived near enough to come over and get some duck eggs. I was raised eating duck/chicken/turkey/pheasant/quail and even peacock eggs....LOL

    I can't wait to see pictures of your rose beds!

    Deb

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  • sandy808
    15 years ago

    Wow! Thanks so much for letting us know about your chickens. When we sell our house and get our land, I was seriously thinking about getting some. Now I know for sure that I will. My big joke with my husband concerning our living in a deed restricted community has always been "I can't even have chickens here if I want chickens!" A few months ago, we finally realized maybe it wasn't a joke, but a lifestyle we want to go back to.

    Sandy

  • sammy zone 7 Tulsa
    15 years ago

    Good to hear from you, Rozanna.I am afraid that I can contribute nothing to the chicken subject, but I hope you keep posting.
    Sammy

  • generator_00
    15 years ago

    I have chickens but I can't turn them loose until I get the fence done. My past experience has been they will eat and tear up a lot of plants.

  • rozannadanna
    Original Author
    15 years ago

    Generator - they will eat everything but except for the low handing blooms they appear not to like roses - they leave the leaves and new growth alone. Like I said - that area was planned as a "swept garden" like from my great grandmothers time and with help from the chickens it is bare soil. No weeds, no grass, yea they ate the cannas and day lillies but I have more but they leave the roses basically alone.

    Most town now will allow a few chickens in your yard - no roosters because of the noise but most people can get away with a few hens - even NY city will let you have hens. They are quiet. Ducks on the other hand - the boys are quite and the girls make more noise than my roosters. But ducks are the best entertainment since TV- they are so funny - give them a kiddy swimming pool and they are in heaven. We sit and watch and enjoy. And the ducks lay more consistently than the chickens.

  • giles2009
    15 years ago

    l'orange duck better than orange roses[hint]

  • rozannadanna
    Original Author
    15 years ago

    Giles - I beg your pardon - l'orange duck? I could never eat one of my ducks - besides they are too old - after about 5 months most fowl would have to be boiled for a couple of days to be eddible.

  • ingrid_vc so. CA zone 9
    15 years ago

    No chickens here, no fences, and lots of coyotes, plus the odd bobcat and mountain lion. Interestingly a pea hen appeared one day and mostly stays at the top of the hill with the neighbors but she's come to visit several times. She delicately picked bugs off the roses and other plants and disturbed absolutely nothing. The most enjoyable occasion was the solid twenty minutes she spent outside our front door looking in at our dog and cat, who found HER totally fascinating.

    Ingrid


    {{gwi:240202}}

  • melva
    15 years ago

    Hey Rozanna!
    Good to hear from you! I have wanted to get a few chickens....hmmm...

  • sherryocala
    15 years ago

    Hey, Rozanna, you left Texas just about the time I started posting. In fact, I emailed you to see if you still had the roses on your website, and you replied, "No Teas and Noisettes in Colorado!" So glad to have you posting. Want to hear all about your roses - and chickens! I think I would like chickens, but though we have side fences, we have no back fence, so no chickens for this city girl.

    Pictures are a great idea!

    Sherry

  • rosie07
    15 years ago

    Hi Rozanna: I've never posted before on the antique rose forum but am always lurking and always learning something new. I, too, have chickens (3 hens) and roses. I have a chicken coop and a fenced area around it where I keep the "girls" penned up at night so as not to provide a meal for the many predators that like chicken as much as we do. However, I let them out to free range in the early afternoon until nightfall. They are very destructive to my mulched beds and any tiny plants or seedlings, but for mature roses (and other large plants) in unmulched beds, they are great. They sort of act like continuous miniature rototillers. The roses benefit from their constant scratching and, ummm.., eliminating. Just keep them away from the mulched areas or you will have a mess to rake or sweep up. The eggs are good too with really orange yolks, not the pale yellow egg yolks that you get in the grocery stores. I did have a rooster until he matured and started crowing at 4 a.m. That ended the rooster experiment and since you don't need roosters for hens to lay eggs, he had to go. I also have two big dogs and two cats along with the 3 hens and all coexist happily.

  • greybird
    15 years ago

    Rozanna, I love chickens, how about some pics of the chicks?

    Ingrid, that is an awesome perspective on your pets looking out at that pea hen, priceless! The dog and cat look like they get along well.

  • alameda/zone 8/East Texas
    15 years ago

    Coincidental that you posted Rozanna....I was wondering where you were. How are your roses? You have so many unusual ones. Would love to see some garden photos. I love chickens and my carpenter just completed my long awaited chicken pen. Now I can keep my 2 Jersey Giants penned up and hopefully raise some chicks. I have had varmit problems with coons. Earl, the rooster, was getting a little too familiar - he would come in the garage to the back door or the front door and crow until I came out to give him bread. Need I describe the elimination problem in the garage? Nearly slipped and fell a few times, so was glad when the coop was finished! I have some smaller chickens that run loose and roost in my horse barn. I have found they will pluck buds off some of the roses, and take a liking to a certain bush putting out new growth and strip it. I have a potted Brass Band that I just bought and was so thrilled at all the new buds on it. Came out the next day and [just like AIG] "And Its Gone". Not one bud left! I know Earl did it - I was probably late with the bread. And they do scratch in mulched beds and take dust baths. Mostly they dont bother anything......and are so much fun to watch. I have heard it said that if you have chickens you dont have bugs. Well, heaven help me if I didnt have chickens.....because there are multitudes of bugs. I have had luck putting up those wire edgers that you get at Home Depot - they seem to discourge them getting in the beds. But mostly I dont have a problem, there is plenty of room for them to forage. They are great fun!
    Judith

  • melissa_thefarm
    15 years ago

    Rozanna,

    That is a highly intriguing idea: thanks for posting it! And yes, it's good to hear from you on the forum!

    Melissa

  • rjlinva
    15 years ago

    Rozanna,

    I have had my chickens before I got into roses. I can't imagine life without them. I've got 3-4 roosters who are my constant gardening companions as well as a few ducks and a lonely gander (his partner of 11 years died last week). Our hens remain penned up, but we built an aviary for them to enjoy the sunshine.

    Interestingly, a couple years ago we had a pair of peafowl settle into our property. They inspired us to buy a few peafowl, but, when we added more to our "family," the two visitors left.

    The only downside I can think of regarding having free range chickens is that they do scratch up the flower beds. My roosters have seriously strong claws and do quite a number. Their companionship and antics, however, far outweigh this issue.

    By the way, I am listening to them crowing as I type this.

    Robert

  • zeffyrose
    15 years ago

    Nice to hesar from you Rozanna--------I've missed you.

    Looking forward to pictures of your garden

    As a teenager and 4-H member I raised chickens----it was fun until it came time to eat one of them---Just couldn't handle that part---but the eggs were very good.

    Florence

  • giles2009
    15 years ago

    gee-I never knew you didn't need a rooster to get eggs.
    we guys are becoming less important
    SAVE THE ROOSTER

  • seattlesuze
    15 years ago

    Welcome back, Rozanna! I thought about chickens here but dismissed it because of the dogs and cats, so Rosie's post is a good one. The swept yard look isn't one that's going to work for me here and I'm wondering if the chickens will destroy all of the perennials that are planted alongside the roses. There sure are plenty of bugs to eat and the eggs would be perfect for baking. How many do you folks have and for what size areas? Are the chickens out in the gardens all day? Is there such a thing as Rent-a-chicken where I could bring them in once a week and send them home when the bugs are gone? ;-)

    Sue

  • carla17
    15 years ago

    Hi Rozanna, I've wondered how you are doing. If I had a fence that kept dogs out, I would have chickens. Just the thought of no weeds entices me!

    Carla

  • patriciae_gw
    15 years ago

    My dear sweet Grannie kept part of her yard as 'Swept' and the chickens were allowed in that part. She kept it with a brush broom-a huge long thing made of limber branches that she could rake with-a difficult feat to master. The interesting part here is the allowed part. You can train chickens to stay in certain areas. The occasional adventurous chicken would cautiously sneak into the front-but not for long. That woman had eyes in the back of her head. Now I am a fan of the duck. I love Khaki Campbells. They are amazing for insects and they adore slugs..and dont do any damage. I love to listen to all the quackeling. The only problem is everything out there also loves duck. You are right that the eggs give more loft in your baking. They are higher in protein. If you dont have a male you wont get millions of childern-who are adorable but grow up to make more babies and the next thing you know you are knee deep in ducks. for anyone interested you can tell the males from females at a fairly young age by the fact that the beak of the male is green and they have only a hiss instead of a quack. Females have a dark beak. You give the males to your unsuspecting aquaintance who dont know the difference...ahem...

    patricia

  • sunnysideuphill
    15 years ago

    I've posted several times about the advantages of free range hens as Jsapanese Beetle control. Nine hens in the yard last summer. 6 JB's. Yup, 6.
    I think the hens ate them as they emerged.
    They have chosen the forsythia forest and a few balsam firs as their dustbaths of choice, so I haven't seen any of the "swept" look under the roses.

  • rozannadanna
    Original Author
    15 years ago

    Carla, the dog, 3 cats and the chickens and ducks get along just fine.

    The dog does try to eat the chicken food but that's no problem. The cats might try to get babies but not grown birds. Ain't happening and the cats run.

  • karenleigh
    15 years ago

    I got day old chicks last July. I now have 6 sweet hens: 3 Buff Orpingtons and 3 Plymouth Barred Rocks. They spend their days roaming around fenced backyard. I love my chickens!
    {{gwi:240203}}
    {{gwi:240204}}

  • lemecdutex
    15 years ago

    Hi Rozanna! Great to hear from you! Yes, we do have chickens here. The way we manage them is that they have a pen/house that they go to at night where I lock them up, and every morning I let them out to roam freely over the property. We do have a lot of perennials and stuff, but they have so much area to roam they don't do any serious damage to any one area. They do have a sort of circuit they run, with some variations, and some areas are their absolute favorites, like under the hedges.

    We also have ducks, and during the spring, they roam all over the grounds, but the rest of the year they hang around at the pond only. They are extremely good slug/snail eaters, probably the best there are. Pheasants are good snail/slug eaters, too, but they are also inveterate bulb eaters. For instance, you will not be able to keep them away from Crocus, I know from experience.

    I've found that they don't mess up the mulch areas as badly if there is a tall edge to the beds (for us, we use one layer of rocks as a small wall around the beds, it's about 6-8 inches tall, holds the mulch in even through all the scratching. But, they do love to scratch through mulch since so many goodies are in there to their way of thinking. If you have seedlings you need to protect, just put chicken wire around or over them, and chickens won't bother that area. They only want easy pickin's. I've so far never seen a sign of them pecking at roses, other than to pick out any bugs they see. Chickens love to eat beetles, so I'm not surprised they would wipe out Japanese Beetles.

    --Ron

  • rozannadanna
    Original Author
    15 years ago

    If anyone is interested we have a web page now- Bruce does it all

    http://www.rozannasgarden.com/

    Here is a link that might be useful: Rozanna's Garden

  • greybird
    15 years ago

    Rozanna, I browsed your website and just love your place! I am getting ideas on some garden structures to build, love the rustic arbor with the gate entrance.

    Wish we lived further out in the country, chickens and ducks would get run over in the road if I had them here. Other wise, I would have plenty.

    Where did you get the awesome gargoyles??

  • collinw
    15 years ago

    I have 7 chickens and besides scratching out the mulch, they are wonderful garden companions. These are: Rhode Island Red running away.

    Australorp (Black chicken)

    She is a laying machine.

    And the speckled one is a Silver Spangled Hamburg.

    {{gwi:240205}}

    {{gwi:240206}}

    {{gwi:240207}}


    and with chickens come..........

    {{gwi:240208}}


    I think that everyone should have a few in their yards. I live in town on a small corner lot and only my immediate neighbors even know I have chickens.....and that is mainly because I share the eggs.

  • linrose
    15 years ago

    Rozanna, I thouroughly enjoyed your website. You certainly seem to be a child of the earth, with roses being only a part of that. I've had chickens at various times, loved them, but the wildlife had their way with them and that was that.

    I do remember when I was a camp councelor way back when, we had "weeder geese" that ate the baby weeds in the vegetable garden and left the veggies. I'm not sure how they told the difference but apparently they did, and fertilized at the same time. Does anybody know about them?

  • lemecdutex
    15 years ago

    linrose, my grandmother told me about the weeder geese they had, they'd pen them up in the vegetable garden and let the geese get all the weeds and bugs, and then move them to another area. Of course, you wouldn't put them in with baby corn plants or they'd eat them along with the weeds (same thing with some lettuces and such). But, they love grasses and are good at getting rid of them.

  • zeffyrose
    15 years ago

    Rozanna-----I just checked out your website---It is truly a delight----

    Thanks for sharing such a wonderful place.

    Florence

  • AnneCecilia z5 MI
    15 years ago

    What a lovely website, Rozanna! I've been making DH wait for breakfast until I explored it all, LOL. It's good to see a post from you; I like others I'm sure wondered how you were doing. Quite fine, I see. :-)

    As for chickens, I wish I could have some for bug patrol but we have so many coyotes around here that I don't feel up to the struggle it would take to keep them safe. Had a small flock years ago when we lived in southern Michigan and it was hard enough there fighting off raccoons and stray dogs. Winters here in Michigan are hard on chickens, too. You need a real nice coop for them to stay warm through the long, cold days and nights.

    Love that photo of the Silver Spangled Hamburg, BTW.

  • rozannadanna
    Original Author
    15 years ago

    Thanks for the compliments everyone. Bruce built the website and is always changing and updating as the garden changes through the year so check back often. I hope Melva sees it - the first page with Stretch, the cat on duty. I had told Bruce about Horsie and Melva and that picture was kind of for her.

    He is adding a small video and wants to do small blurbs about gardening, especiall roses so I may be picking all of your brains about roses in different climates than mine. Heck - we might just come and video some of you that are close enough and put you all over the web - with your permission of course

  • melva
    15 years ago

    I saw it Rozanna...Stretch is quite a cat....and you are quite a friend...thanks.

  • melissa_thefarm
    15 years ago

    Rozanna, I like your website too, and I love the idea of chickens, but no one has more mulch than we do!! Can anyone tell me if weeder geese scratch up mulch as well? Do they return to a coop like chickens do? Must they be kept penned up? How do you protect them from all the wildlife, abundant here, that has a taste for poultry?

    By the way, although we have no chickens, something has been digging mightily in our mulch; searching for grubs, I suspect. I'm guessing hedgehogs are busy: I know we have them. It will be interesting to see what kind of beetle population we get this spring.

    This thread is a lot of fun!

    Melissa

  • lforro
    15 years ago

    It's wonderful to see how you've reclaimed that house and are really going to town on the gardens now. I'm waiting for the day when our silly suburban city council will let us have chickens. We can't wait!