Chickens are Moving Off the Farm and Into the Suburbs By Patti London Photos Fine Lifestyles
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his time last year we were studying the Meyer Hatchery catalog trying to decide on a few varieties of chicken to add to our growing urban farm. I’d wanted chickens for a few years but Marc was convinced only after seeing the cool chicken coop our Cleveland Heights relatives built for their small flock. We needed breeds which were friendly and cold-weather tolerant, for obvious reasons. We chose three different hens, all brown egg layers: a Barre Rock with
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Fine Lifestyles Magazine Cleveland
black and white speckles; a creamy yellow Buff Orpington; and a beautiful mahogany Buckeye, the only breed to be created by a woman, Nettie Metcalf, who began the breed in Warren, Ohio in 1896. They’re named Beatrice, Daphne and Phoebe, respectively. We ordered the chicks in early spring and were given a mid-May date to come down to the hatchery to pick them up. Postal delivery is also an option, as long as you contact your post office
and let them know that a live delivery is expected. Meyer Hatchery is only an hour away and we were in this project for the full experience, so we made the drive. We borrowed the brooding supplies, which consisted of a large plastic storage tote with part of the lid cut away and replaced with a screen, a feeder and watering trough for chicks, a heat lamp and thermometer. The chicks were only a day hatched when we picked them up