Free-Range Chicken Gardens: How to Create a Beautiful, Chicken-Friendly Yard

Many gardeners fear chickens will peck away at their landscape, and chicken lovers often shy away from gardening for the same reason. But you can keep chickens and have a beautiful garden, too! Fresh eggs aren't the only benefit — chickens can actually help your garden grow and thrive, even as your garden does the same for your chickens.

In this essential handbook, award-winning garden designer Jessi Bloom covers everything a gardener needs to know, including chicken-keeping basics, simple garden plans to get you started, tips on attractive fencing options, the best plants and plants to avoid, and step-by-step instructions for getting your chicken garden up and running.

For anyone who wants a fabulous garden where colorful chickens happily roam, Free-Range Chicken Gardens is the guide that will bring the dream home to roost.

"Through personal experience and in-depth interviews with other backyard chicken farmers, Bloom, an award-winning garden designer, takes you from her early chicken-raising days, which she recalls as about 'as easy as herding cats,' to the ultimate goal of maintaining a fit flock that will contrast and co-exist with a backyard garden. She gives tips about keeping the backyard from becoming a barnyard; selecting from a diverse palette of poultry from Rhode Island Reds to Easter Eggers; growing the plants that will benefit from hens and beautify a lawn; keeping 'a simple chicken emergency kit'; regulating coop temperatures; and keeping predators away. Noise reduction ideas will also help keep neighbors' potential annoyance at bay. The presentation is enhanced by detailed charts — how many square feet of yard for how many chickens, the chicken lifecycle, feedings from egg to chick to pullet to hen — for help in creating a chicken-inclusive environment in a variety of settings. Bloom offers a comprehensive guide from mating to medicine that will particularly help beginners, and vivid color photography by Kate Baldwin helps Bloom make a persuasive case." Publishers Weekly Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.

“Numerous illustrations, full-color photos, charts and tables, garden layouts, and useful tips…offer a wealth of practical advice.” Booklist

“A comprehensive guide from mating to medicine that will particularly help beginners…Bloom makes a persuasive case.” Publishers Weekly

“This is one of the coolest books I have had the privilege of reviewing.” ReadingAllYearLong.com

“A fun new book.” Valerie Easton

“If you have a backyard flock or you’re thinking of getting one, I would highly recommend this book as part of your poultry library.” Plant Talk blog

“Bloom’s obvious enthusiasm for good design and for her birds will inspire both novice and experienced chicken owners to create a garden space for hens and humans to enjoy.” San Francisco Chronicle

“Jessi Bloom’s new book is as lush and inspiring as the chicken paradise featured on the front.” Genevieve Schmidt, The American Gardener

“Well-written and would be a true asset to every chicken owner. This book has now become one of my favorite chicken books.” Kym Pokorny, The Oregonian

“The only book I have seen that tells you exactly how you can have your chickens AND your garden too.” NW Edible

Bloom, a Pacific Northwest-based landscape designer, provides backyard poultry farmers and chicken fanciers with information on creating well planned integrated spaces that take advantage of the multiple benefits that free range chickens can offer gardens. Topics discussed include the benefits of free ranging, design principles for chicken friendly gardens, landscape material for chicken gardens, beneficial plantings, innovative chicken housing, and predator management. Chapters include detailed information on plant species and planting practices and the work is packed with full-color photographs and technical illustrations. Annotation ©2012 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Kate Baldwin lives and gardens in Portland, Oregon. She has contributed to gardening books, newspapers, and magazines including Portland Monthly, where her column, Dig, and gardening blog, Plantwise, appear.Jessi Bloom is an award-winning landscape designer whose work emphasizes ecological systems, sustainability, and self-sufficiency. She is a certified professional horticulturalist and certified arborist, as well as a long-time chicken owner with a free-ranging flock in her home garden.

Owner of Pacific Northwest–based landscape design-build firm N.W. Bloom — EcoLogical Landscapes, Jessi has been praised as an innovator in sustainable landscape design. Recognition for her work includes awards from the Washington State Department of Ecology, American Horticultural Society, Pacific Horticulture magazine, Sunset, 425 magazine, Washington State Nursery and Landscape Association, Washington Association of Landscape Professionals, and the Northwest Flower and Garden Show, including gold medals and the People’s Choice award.