Why you should raise chickens
1) Food, obviously! Eggs from backyard chickens are so much much higher in nutrition than store bought eggs, and they taste better too! Plus it's really nice knowing what goes into your food supply. Also, you can easily raise your chickens organically if you want and you're eggs are guaranteed cruelty free! For every happy backyard chicken you raise, that's one less chicken living on a factory farm.
2) Bug control. Chickens will demolish the grubs in the garden! They love cabbage worms and can destroy an earwig nest in seconds. I've often found an ant nest while digging in the garden and the chickens have attacked it scarfing down every single egg they can find. They're not as fond as the adult ants, but we had a lot of ants and they have made a huge dent in the population.
3) Fertile hatching eggs which I incubate all spring/summer long. I sell their children. I'm evil like that! 😉 No, but seriously. You can make some serious money by selling hatching eggs and/or chicks.
4) Extra eggs to sell. You can also make some extra money selling eggs for eating. Especially in the summer when production is at an all year high and feed expenses are at an all time low. Save that money for winter feed and you can take some pressure off your winter budget.