Your spring chick-list: get your henhouse ready
Build your garden

Your spring chick-list: get your henhouse ready

Here's our chook expert's handy spring chicklist for chicken keepers: coop care, bedding and feeding tips to keep hens healthy and laying well.

A cat sitting in a tree branch within a cat enclosure.
Organic life

The sustainable pet household

Simple, practical ways to care for dogs, cats, chickens and other pets more sustainably, from smarter feeding choices to greener waste habits, without compromising on love or wellbeing.

A silver spangled hamburg chook being trained using a handful of chook food.
Build your garden

How to train your chickens

Chooks are smarter than many people realise. Jessamy Miller shares practical techniques to train your flock, improving handling, behaviour and everyday enjoyment.

Chooks in a backyard, eating greens from a raised garden bed.
Build your garden

How to prepare for bird flu

Bird flu is a highly infectious virus that can harm backyard poultry. Not yet in Australia, it's still important to be aware of its impact.

Elaine Janes with her rooster Hugo.
Organic life

A life filled with the joy of chooks

Celebrity chook lady Elaine Janes has a very special connection with her feathered friends, it all starts with a firm hold.

Dugald Jellie builds henhouses for schools using recycled material.
Organic life

Introducing master henhouse builder, Dugald Jellie

Everything Dugald Jellie creates, from cubbies to fences to sheds, is made by hand using recycled materials saved from landfill.

A henhouse with a number of chooks scratching in a sandbox. One chook, a barnevelder, is sitting on the edge of the sandbox.
Build your garden

How to maximise your hens’ egg production with a balanced diet

If you are dreaming of an achievable and rewarding way to supply some of your own food, you can’t go past keeping laying hens, such as the barnevelder.

From left to right: My Hamburgh, Spangles, Lulu the Langshan and Spare Spangles, another Hamburgh. Buffy the Silkie is hiding at the back.
Bees, poultry & livestock

Fun names for chooks

Calling your chook Meryl Cheep, or Yolko Ono might be going too far for some, but there is plenty of fun and nostalgia to be had when naming your chooks, writes Jessamy Miller.

How to hold a hen
Bees, poultry & livestock

How to hold a chook

There are all sorts of reasons you may need to hold your hens, such as checking for parasites; Jessamy Miller explains how do it safely for your chooks and you.

Clear your yard of any possible hazards for chicks.
Bees, poultry & livestock

Raising chicks naturally

While the mother hen has the lead role in the chicken-raising show, Jessamy Millers says there are steps owners can take to ensure chicks are robust and healthy.

Chooks take vegie scraps and turn them into a valuable garden product.
Soil

Chooks poo power

Chooks do much more than lay eggs, so we decided to dish the dirt on chook poo in your backyard.

You can make your own chook mash.
Build your garden

Feeding your chooks

If you want to mix your own feed you will know exactly what you are giving your hens and it could save you money.