Joy of Keeping Chickens, Ducks, and Turkeys: A Practical Guide to Raising Backyard Poultry

Your guide to keeping chickens, turkeys, and ducks--from choosing a coop that will protect from predators to marketing eggs and so much in between!

This is a comprehensive and beautiful guide for anyone raising chickens, ducks, or turkeys. Written in charming prose from the perspective of an organic farmer, Jennifer Megyesi discusses all the basic details of raising the birds--general biology, health, food, choosing breeds, and so on--and she cuts through the smoke to identify what terms like ＂organic,＂ ＂free-range,＂ and so on really mean for poultry farmers and consumers. Topics include:

• Housing chickens, turkeys, and ducks
• Feeding your poultry
• Keeping poultry for eggs
• Keeping poultry for meat
• Common illnesses and diseases
• And more!

No poultry book would be complete without information on how to show chickens and other fowl for prizes, and this is no different, but The Joy of Keeping Chickens, Ducks, and Turkeys also stresses the importance of self-sustainability and organic living, and the satisfaction of keeping heirloom breeds. Readers will appreciate the comprehensive nature of this readable, informative guide, and Megyesi’s enthusiasm about keeping domestic fowl. Coupled with Geoff Hansen’s gorgeous full-color photographs, this text makes for an instant classic in the category.

Jennifer Megyesi runs Fat Rooster Farm, a small, diversified farm nestled in the Upper Valley of Vermont. She specializes in growing heirloom varieties of tomatoes and raising heritage breeds of chickens and turkeys, and with help from her border collie/Australian shepherd, Freyja, a flock of sheep for lamb production. Megyesi is also the author of The Joy of Keeping Chickens and The Joy of Keeping a Root Cellar. She lives in Vermont.