First time since northern Idaho 24 years ago... I bought my wife a chicken coop for her birthday (no time to make anything like that myself anymore). She kept asking what I wanted for my B-day and I couldn't think of anything, so finally told her I wanted five chickens - with a maintenance contract.

Araucanas are cool. They have sideburns and lay blue eggs! Or Rhode Island Reds with their brown eggs. I hear they are pretty hardy. My wife wants some, too. I asked if she wanted them outside the fence so the coyotes could eat them or inside the fence so the dogs could. She wants a chain link chicken yard with chain link on top to keep all non-chickens out. The only problem is roosters. She freaks out about the dogs barking at coyotes in the middle of the night and disturbing the neighbors. Roosters don't just crow at first light. Sometimes they crow all through the night. So I think she is not ready for that. We would have to make sure we have no roosters, ever.

Wait, help a complete moron out for a sec, would ya?
I know ZERO about this stuff but my gut tells me that perpetually lonely hens who don't have any contact with roosters is a problem.
Am I wrong about this? You mean it is possible to just have celibate hens their entire lives?

Nope. No rooster necessary for eggs. If you want fertile eggs and more chickens, then you need a rooster. But if you did that, about half of them would be roosters, which would be my definition of Hell. You get an all-girl egg squad by buying "sexed" chicks. Even then, you might get a rooster or two. Unfortunately, what you need to do then is to kill them. If you are trying to populate an egg ranch, you are going to have to do a lot of rooster murder.

Goats and cows are a different story: To get milk, you have to breed them. But you can use artificial insemination rather than finding a bull or billy goat. They have the calf or kid, and then you wean them when they are old enough but keep on milking mama goat or cow. They will produce milk for a few years before they dry up and you have to do it all over again.

I know a little something of this....

Nope, you don't need a rooster. But hens depend on roosters for more than just reproduction. Personally I wouldn't be without one. They are your first line of defense against predators. They tell the hens whether the threat is from the air or from the ground. They find food and call the hens to it. They herd the flock to safety whenever they perceive danger. They even build nests for the girls to lay eggs in then guard the girls as they are laying. Roosters are important to the dynamics of a successful flock.

If you are in a position to have chickens and are able to keep a rooster then by all means do. You will have a much happier and better
adjusted flock. But most towns that allow chickens do not allow roosters. Yep...they noisy. After a while you don't really hear them but your neighbor might...

Predators are not a bad thing. Chickens only lay eggs reliably for about three years. After that they just become freeloaders. So the goal is to achieve a balance. Let them free range enough so that the predators pick off any extra roosters you might acquire and the older, slower hens.

Dogs and chickens have co-existed since time out of mind. Unless you've got a pack of wild unmanageable dogs they will get along fine. I had to whack my dog one time when he was young for chasing chickens. It's one of those barnyard rules that dogs are born with, sometimes they just have to be reminded.

Dogs are supposed to guard livestock. Not eat it.

**edit** also roosters should not be allowed to bully the dogs!

I do recall a hilarious video of a Jack Russel-like dog pulling a hen into a shed so he could hump her. Dogs will be dogs.

Oh good lord: I went to google it and youtube is filled with dog-chicken love.

Proof of the End Times.

I read that Lachlan Murdoch is now running Fox News, and he's not a Trump fan. Trump is quoted as tweeting "Whats with Fox News?" because they had Bernie Sanders in a Fox Town Hall broadcast talking about Fox hiring Donna Brazile! Oh, no! What is Trump going to watch now? Where are his policy ideas going to come from?

Don't worry though: Lachlan is apparently a Libertarian, so the News may take a more-conservative less-Trump direction. Meanwhile, Lachlan's brother James is looking to start up an anti-Fox network.

James is what???? You gotta gimme a linky dinky!

I think it was at Vanity Fair but I'm over their non-subscriber limit now. You might want to have a look at this:
Lachlan Murdoch is in a Trump Trap
They are having some shake-ups at Fox.