A clients friend approached me to house-sit her two boxers plus her chickens. What would be a good price to charge for taking care of the chickens for a 10 day house-sitting?
Things to know before setting a price: How many chickens? are any not happy to go into the coop at night before dusk? Where I live, dusk isn't till 9:00-9:30 pm and that is quite late for a visit. Have they had any problems with predation? Once a raccoon attacks, you can get more attacks. How early do the chickens need to be let out of the coop? Dawn where I am is 6 am and the birds set up a racket if not let out within a hour. otherwise, it is just feeding and watering and egg gathering each day unless the visit is over 3-4 days. Coop cleanouts have their own cost depending on size of coop. I charge =$10 for up to 3 chickens +15 for larger flocks. up to 6
Sounds like fun!
What exactly are you supposed to do? And how many of them are there? I guess it would vary, depending on how many of them you need to take care of. It would be much different if the owner had let's say 10 or 100 :D
And how many hours a day is it going to take you to take care of the chickens?
Chickens generally require very little work, unless they need you to collect eggs and clean out the coop during your stay. If you are only feeding them and refilling their water dispenser, I'd recommend an extra $10 a day, but it's dependent on what they actually need done for them and how many chickens you would be watching.
I have been asked. I didn’t charge extra because I just had to shoo them back into the coop. I didn’t realize this meant chasing chickens but ya live and ya learn