Hi,

I have been offered 2 Pekin bantam hens (Only 5 weeks at the moment).  I've been contemplating having 2-3 bantams in my garden but I really don't know a lot about what I need (Obviously I know I need to coop to keep them in but are there any on-line plans anywhere for one of the ark type houses?).  How easy are they to keep, what about red mite and similar pests I read about?   What about winter?   Say if I bought these 2 and then found a Wyandotte bantam, could I keep them all together?   Sorry, I know I sound a real dill but I want to be sure I know what I'm taking on.   Thanks.

i used to breed pekins....had some real top winning laveners in the 80's. the biggest prob with them is their feet. being feathered feet they get very dirty and hygene can be an issue. Also there is a sudden death type virus the breed are (or were) prone to.

I know nowt about hens but a friend of mine used to have them in Ireland and wanted them here but in the paperwork for the house they bought (the deeds I think) it states they can't keep livestock including hens.

We used to keep bantams and 'big hens' mixed together without problems. It's important to introduce new birds to a flock in stages (eg in a separate run alongside the existing run) so that they can get used to each other then all should be well. Space is important - cramped conditions breed problems.

> I know nowt about hens but a friend of mine used to have them in Ireland and wanted them here but in the paperwork for the house they bought (the deeds I think) it states they can't keep livestock including hens

No such problems out here in the stix!

yeah, to be fair she lives in the middle of Lochee!

Have you moved back to Lochee Christine? :-)

Cheekychow, Christine moved from there a long time ago... :-) She is now in the countryside, albeit in a village, but not part of Dundee (I remember the dogs taking themselves across the road to the only bit of grass available :-) )

Don't know anything about hens, but they will help keep the garden area free of slugs, etc. Are you sure it's a wise thing to take on with munsters? We lost a few ducks to ours in the past :-(

> Have you moved back to Lochee Christine? :-)
>
> Cheekychow, Christine moved from there a long time ago... :-) She is now in the countryside

LindyLou, it is my friend who lives in Lochee not Christine!

used to keep hens three years ago. they are pretty easy to look after, i had a proper hen run with nesting boxes at the top which i would shut them in at night for safety.
i would clean the nest boxes out once a week and put new nest material which i would sprinkle with powder to kill the mites they can get and clean water and food each day. part from that i would move their house every so often so they had fresh grass to keep them busy.
they did tend to wake up about 5.30am though and start making a lot of noise till they were let out but worth it as after we'd had them for about 6 weeks we had fresh eggs every day.
when we bought a couple more chickens we introduced them by putting them in the nest box when dark with the other chickens(we were told to do this by the place we got them from) and because they didn't see each other but woke up together they were fine and didn't notice two new hens had joined them.
  

> Are you sure it's a wise thing to take on with munsters? We lost a few ducks to ours in the past :-(

Yep, mine are trained well, they know what birds are for them & what aren't!   

>Yep, mine are trained well, they know what birds are for them & what aren't

So did Ozzie - they were for eating ;-) To be fair to him, he was only a pup. He soon learnt the error of his ways when the fence was made much higher :-) Didn't stop him from watching them very closely though. :-D

>yeah, to be fair she lives in the middle of Lochee

Ah, that makes sense :-)