Chickens In Your Backyard: A Beginner's Guide

Your backyard can be the source of the best eggs and meat you've ever tasted. The answer is chickens--endearing birds that require but a modest outlay of time, space and food.

As they learned to raise chickens, Gail and Rick Luttmann came to realize the need for a comprehensive but clear and nontechnical guide. Their book covers all the basics in a light and entertaining sytle, from housing and feeding through incubating, bringing up chicks, butchering, and raising chickens for show.

Througout the book, the Luttmanns express their wonder at the personalities of chickens--the role of brash protector played by roosters, and the instinctive motherliness of the hens. Given some freedom and attention, these birds can become much more than the egg-and-meat machines of commercial hatcheries and broiler factories. Chickens provide backyard farmers with enjoyable pastime, as well as a supply of good food.

Customer Reviews:

This is THE book to get started raising chickens.

By Melanie B. McMurry - February 28, 2001

This is the one book I found most helpful when I started raising my flock of laying hens. I can run to this book when I have a question or concern, and the information is usually there. Thanks to this book, I have not only raised many a hen from 2 day old chick, but hatched out my own broods in an incubator. This is the book I recommend when I am helping others get started raising hens, and they have had equal success. The majority of the book is information on how to care for your birds, rather than focusing on the butchering of chickens. The one (yes, only one) chapter on butchering is straight forward. It approaches the subject knowing the beginner butcher will be a bit squeemish and nervous, and takes that into account. Many other poultry books read like instruction manuals, but this book is written with humor and sensitivity. That is what makes it a great read, as well as an instructional one.

It's the book that got me started

By Rabbi Yonassan Gershom - August 25, 2000

We live on a hobby farm in Minnesota, and this is the book that got me started with my flock of happy hens. It's written in plain, down-to-earth English for the rank beginner who wants to keep chickens on a small scale for eggs, meat, or just the pleasure of having them around. It's especially nice for the free-run flock, with instructions on choosing breeds, raising chicks, housing, nutrition, hatching your own chicks under broody hens or in an incubator, etc. A must-have for anybody who is thinking about keeping chickens. Lots of humor, too!

Best Book for Beginners

By Jennifer Welch - January 26, 2001

I started my backyard flock with only this book for reference. It's got really good information and is a really fun read - lots of humor mixed in with the great information. If you're thinking about starting a small flock and you're a beginner, this is the book you should buy. It's got great information including a chapter with basic poultry terminology, info on hatching chicks, chicken diseases, raising chickens for eggs or for meat, and a whole lot more. And it's all written in everyday English that even a girl from the city like me can understand. Buy this book!