You might raise them for eggs, meat or exhibition around your farm or homestead, but one thing is certain – you care deeply for your chickens. Whether you’re just exploring raising chickens or have been doing so for a while and want to expand your flock, having the right supplies is essential. With a wide range of poultry products in our inventory, you can make Tractor Supply your go-to for everything your birds need all year long.
Giving Them a Place to Stay: Coops, Pens and Accessories
You and your family aren’t the only ones who enjoy a tasty chicken dinner – predators such as foxes, raccoons and even housecats might go after them. Chicken coops, pens and nesting boxes ensure they have a secure and comfortable place to stay at night, and some include runs for an area to wander around during the day. Essentials for any coop or pen include:
- Chicken bedding: Ensure a comfortable time in the coop with poultry shavings for cushioning, or nesting pads and herbs that provide a better environment for hens to lay eggs.
- Chicken nesting boxes: When it’s time to start laying eggs, promote a safe atmosphere for hens with nesting boxes.
- Chicken brooders: Before chicks can enter the coop with the rest of the flock, they must stay in a brooder for a short time to ensure proper development. These typically include a heating source such as a lamp for adequate warmth.
- Coop heaters: Keep them warm when outside temperatures drop during the fall and winter. A nearby outdoor heating system may also help ensure they’re toasty.
- Poultry odor control: It’s easier to enter the coop and care for your birds when it smells fresh.
As your flock grows, you might consider adding poultry containment parts and security accessories to better safeguard your chickens. For example, automated doors can help ensure they don’t escape, while covers allow them to spend time in the run even in light rain. If your chickens’ dwelling space could use a tech-driven upgrade, consider smart coops and accessories. Free-range chickens might not need a coop, but you can still provide temporary containment as they roam around with chicken wire and poultry netting.
Keeping Them Well Fed: Chicken Feed and More
A healthy chicken is one that gets adequate nutrition from poultry feed and treats packed with vitamins and nutrients. Baby birds will require chick feed for a period before they can transition to chicken feed for adults, and you might select formulas based on your flock’s purpose (meat or eggs). You will also need:
Chicken Feeders and Waterers
To ensure the entire flock eats enough, place chicken feeders in the coop, pen and other areas they gather around. Your birds also require a consistent supply of water, so having multiple chicken waterers in areas where they go can help keep them hydrated. Be sure to clean out and refill their waterers regularly, ideally once a day.
Feed Storage, Scoops and Grinders
It helps to keep things organized with feed storage and scoops for conveniently dishing out the right portions of chicken feed. With feed grinders and related parts, you can mix meals to ensure your birds get a sufficient amount of nutrition.
Chicken Treats and Live Insects
Rewarding them with occasional chicken treats or live insects is one way to show your love for your feathered friends, and these can be formulated for special diets so they don’t take away from their nutrition. Chick treats are created for growing birds, but it’s best to wait at least 18 weeks before giving them more than their feed.
Protecting Their Well-Being with Chicken Supplements and More
Finding a local veterinarian who has experience with chickens is critical before you start raising them, as vets can provide regular checkups and respond to more involved medical concerns. However, some poultry health and wellness products empower you to respond to some issues and prevent others, such as:
- Poultry vitamins and supplements: Boost their intake of key nutrients with chicken supplements in different forms that are simple to administer.
- Poultry fly and pest control: Keep pesky insects – and any diseases they might carry – out of chicken pens and coops.
- Poultry dewormers: Protect them from these parasites which can have a significant impact on a chicken’s overall health.
- Poultry mating saddles: When roosters mate, it can sometimes damage the feathers and skin on a hen’s back, so mating saddles act as a shield for their sensitive bodies.
- Poultry first aid: Ointments, sprays and other topical solutions enable you to tend to their wounds.
Caring for Chicks: Hatching Supplies
From specially formulated feed to chick vaccines, baby birds have many specific considerations. Chick starter feed contains the vital nutrients newborn chicks require, including protein, healthy fats, amino acids, calcium, phosphorus and Vitamins A, D and E. When it comes to vaccinations, chicks should receive them as soon as they hatch or immediately upon arriving to you in the mail. Your vet may recommend different vaccinations depending on where you live, but some common ones include Fowl Pox, Marek’s Disease and Infectious Laryngotracheous.
Chick eggs also require incubators that create the ideal environment for their hatching and development. In these enclosures, you can achieve the proper temperature and humidity levels for chicks to thrive. If you need to replace any components, you don’t necessarily need to invest in new equipment, thanks to incubator parts and accessories available in our inventory. If you’re relying on your chickens’ eggs for food or selling them at the farmer’s market, egg collecting supplies help you keep them organized for secure storage.
Streamlining Processing and Identification
More than just a hobby for many, chicken raising offers a gateway into homesteading or even supplementing income by selling eggs or chicken. If you intend to raise these birds for meat, make sure you have poultry processing and identification supplies, such as ID bands for managing your flock and tracking specific birds and poultry carriers for convenient transportation from the coop or pen to the processing area. From chicken pluckers to restraining cones, we also carry a wide range of poultry processing equipment to simplify these tasks.
Stimulating Their Minds with Chicken Toys
A chicken’s life doesn’t only consist of eating, sleeping and laying eggs – as with your dog or cat, they like to have fun. More than that, elements that add engagement in the coop or pen, such as chicken toys, swings and perches can enhance their mental stimulation.
Rocking perches and swings allow them to rest their little feet and go back and forth, while balls that hide treats make them work for the snack. Pecking toys such as xylophones can turn chickens into musicians as they peck away. If you’re searching for chick toys, baby birds often enjoy mini roosting bars.
Supplies for All Types of Poultry
From comfortable coops and pens to chicken vaccines, there’s a lot that goes into raising chickens, and you want a partner that offers the products to support them from hatchling to adulthood. Discover the wide range of poultry supplies for chickens and other birds in our selection; visit your local Tractor Supply store today or browse our inventory online.