We’re devoting this week to every homesteader’s favorite livestock — chickens! They’re usually everyone’s first livestock, and I don’t think I’ve ever met a homesteader who didn’t have chickens unless they lived somewhere that chickens were not allowed.
Today, I’m excited to tell you about a giveaway that’s being sponsored by one of my favorite hatcheries. Privett Hatchery, located in New Mexico, has been my go-to hatchery for heritage turkeys for more than a decade.
Privett is giving away five gift certificates for 25 straight-run Rhode Island red chicks. Straight run means that the chicks will be unsexed, which means that about half of them will be roosters. Rhode Island reds are a great dual-purpose chicken, meaning that the hens will be great layers, and the males will make a nice chicken dinner. If you missed my post a couple of weeks ago about having too many roosters, you can read it here.
Please don’t enter the giveaway without understanding the realities of owning chickens. Be sure to read 5 Steps to Starting a Backyard Flock Responsibly. If you live in the city, also check out this post: Keeping City Chickens: 7 Things to Consider. Every chicken keeper needs a good reference book on poultry. My favorite is Harvey Ussery’s book, The Small-Scale Poultry Flock.
To enter the giveaway, click on the various options below. Be sure to use your real name when leaving a comment so that we’ll be able to match it up with your name in Rafflecopter, if you’re a winner. The giveaway ends February 27, and the winner will have one week to get back to us with address and phone number, which will be needed when the chicks are delivered by the post office. The hatchery will have a preferred date, but if you can’t take delivery that week, they will work with you to figure out a suitable date.
Be sure to check our post on Thursday where Janie reviews another chicken book, which we’ll also be giving away.
a Rafflecopter giveaway
I’m looking to add to my flock for both eggs and meat so this would be perfect for our homestead.
-Jacki
We rescued done chickens when a neighbor’s place burned down. They are in our guinea coop (unfortunately, the guinea didn’t fare well last summer, so we adopted out the survivors).
One of our new chickens is a Rhode Island Red, Maureen. She is quite a busy lady, but hasn’t missed a day laying all winter! What a character!
We’ve had chickens for about 15 years. 🙂 I’d love to add to our flock.
Our chickens are rescues from a friend that had to move. They are still laying eggs, but my wife wants to get some younger chickens and build a bigger coop. I look forward to seeing what else we can learn from your site.
We had some Rhode Island Red’s many moons ago. Never liked turning them into chicken dinners 🙁
We are just now getting our first eggs of the year! Our hens have been taking a LONG break. 🙂 We are looking at getting more. I really enjoy our Rhode Island’s eggs. They are so good!
Love love love my chickens. And i love learning about new things that make them happy! Love the blog …always find good info!
Currently have 5 reds and 23 bards…so if I win that should even up the numbers!
We are planning on getting chickens this year! I look forward to the Chicken Week posts.
Chickens are the gateway livestock, and you can never have too many 🙂
Rhode Islands are good birds, great layers and good at keeping the grasshoppers down! What we have now are free ranged, cooped at night…..the extra birds make fantastic chicken and noodles!!
We’ve had chickens for years now. We add new ones to the flock every year, so these would be fantastic!