Bonnie Jo Manion

Chickens are gaining popularity quickly. Not only are chickens fun and educational, but they're also beneficial to you and your garden. When you free-range your flock, you gain helpful gardeners who aerate the soil, rid plants of insects, provide composting, and, best of all, supply food — their eggs!Here's how to gain insight on good and bad plants for a chicken garden, layer your garden for free-ranging chickens, and guard against chicken predators.

To convert a dog house with kennel into a chicken coop and outside pen, all you need is time, muscle power, a few additional construction materials, and your creativity. Many unique chicken coops have been built with a lot of imagination and a little of re-purposing and recycling materials. Of all the structures that may already exist in a garden, the most common is a dog kennel.

For raising chickens certain everyday tools are really helpful. They’re tools that assist you in composting, tools that are helpful in feeding your chickens, tools that are great for cleaning a chicken coop, and tools for raising chicks.Use two types of thermometers.Two types of thermometers that are good to have when owning chickens are the long-stemmed compost thermometer and a regular outdoor thermometer for measuring the internal coop temperature.

Chicken breeds, like dog breeds, can be categorized by their different purposes serving humans. Dogs are bred for many purposes, such as physical abilities, appearance, temperament, and show. Chickens have been bred for many purposes, too. Sometimes these purposes overlap, as chicken dual-purpose breeds do. Here are some of the categories:Dual-purpose breedsDual-purpose breeds have formidable egg-laying capabilities and heavy-breed configurations for meat consumption.

Whether you’re an experienced gardener, or an enthusiastic newcomer to gardening, it helps to know some basic garden terms to help you further understand garden structure in a garden for you and your chickens. Plant your garden structure that is compatible with your geographical location and your plant hardiness zone.

When you are free-ranging chickens, you need to choose functional plants that offer benefits to your chickens and your garden's soil. Specific types of plants return valuable nutrients back into the soil. In addition to having a layered plant ecosystem and creating a garden foundation anchored with strong structure by using trees, shrubs, and perennial plants, choose plants that are functional according to your needs and specifically helpful.

Besides having health and healing properties, many medicinal plants have properties that deter external chicken parasites like lice and mites. These insect repelling herbs can also be cut fresh and placed around your chickens, or they can be dried, and added to their feed. Consider these plants when you’re looking for natural insect repellents:Catnip is known for attracting bees and cats.

A damp or wet area is problematic in a chicken garden because chickens don’t do well with continual dampness, and it can create a large unwanted muddy area where nothing will grow. The following plants are good choices for damp areas:Alder treesAlnus. Deciduous trees. Zones vary by species. These nitrogen-fixing trees like ample water and can tolerate flooding.

Typically, hardscape comes in many common materials, such as concrete, concrete pavers, stone, decomposed granite, bricks, and wood decking. Choosing exactly what type of hardscape to use in your garden with your free-range chickens depends on your landscape setting, your budget, and how handy you are. Many of these hardscape materials have permeable qualities that advantageously allow rain and water drainage to seep into the ground rather than run off.