Raising Chickens - The Benefits of Keeping Chickens As Pets

Keeping chickens as pets has actually become quite popular these days. But if you are someone who lives in an urban area you need to check the rules and regulations with the local zonal authorities, so that you don't have any difficulties with the law in the future. There are some cities which have strict rules and regulations against it.
People usually want to keep chickens as a hobby nowadays. You can also keep a few hens, if you have children as these provide excellent sources of entertainment for them. If you keep your chickens as pets and give them a little training, they will even start to peck food out of your hand. You can even talk to them and they will listen. Often these chickens even learn to follow you wherever you go.
Moreover if you keep a chicken as a pet, your children will play with them, learn to give them food and older children will even help you raise chicks. There are various advantages to keeping chickens at home, you get a fresh supply of eggs everyday, throughout the year. A chicken will usually produce eggs for 4 to 5 years and they will live for almost 15 years!
On top of this, the chicken manure you get is full of nitrogen so you can use it as a fertilizer in growing small gardens. There are a few disadvantages to keeping chickens as pets, especially in a city. The first being lack of space. Again the manure which we have talked about needs to be utilized or else disposing it turns out to be quite a headache. There may just be some laws which won't even let you keep chickens in gardens.
But let's look on the bright side. It's very easy and simple to keep chickens, unlike other pets. You barely need a maximum of 10 to 15 minutes to play with the chickens' everyday. Now when you go for buying a chicken, make sure that you get a good breed which has all the vaccinations given.
You should also try and avoid roosters as they are impossible to take care of. They are also quite loud and very aggressive. You children can even help you with your chickens. They can feed them and change the water everyday. You can give them table scraps, wheat, corn or even soaked bread.
Another thing you could do, if you want to keep chickens as your pets, is read up books on them. Go in for some research and this will help you out a lot.
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