About Nell
📍 Addison County, Vermont
Nell Harrigan has kept a backyard flock in Vermont for six years, growing from three feed-store hens to fourteen, through a failed first coop, a fox, and a lot of frozen waterers. She compiles The Cluck Post's recommendations from specs, research, and the experience of long-term chicken keepers.
I'm Nell Harrigan. I got three hens from the feed store about six years ago, put them in a flat-pack coop, and assumed that was the hard part done. It wasn't. The coop didn't make it through our first Vermont winter. A fox took two of the girls the following spring. By the time the flock had grown to fourteen, I was hauling water twice a day in January and had started hatching my own chicks in the kitchen. Nearly every category on this site exists because I ran into that problem myself, usually the hard way.
How I pick: I'm not a vet and I don't run a farm. I keep a backyard flock and read a great deal before I buy anything. Recommendations here come from specs, what long-term keepers report, and what's held up, or fallen apart, in my own run. When a pick comes from research and owner consensus rather than something I've used, I say so.
What I won't do: I won't pretend I've tested every coop or incubator on this site. I won't recommend the cheapest flat-pack coop because it's the easiest thing to link to; I've watched one come apart. And I won't give dosing advice for medications. If a bird is sick, that's a question for a poultry vet.