Recent content by Rhinoman

Of course I have an SOP! You recommended I get one when I became interested in breeding. I'll e-mail you about clerking.

Laying well at five months is great! I'm not completely sure if I'll be at the October show. We had planned to go to the Bronx zoo sometime in Oct and I was going to take a three day weekend. Maybe we'll go to the Bronx zoo the ninth and I'll take the four day weekend, thur, fri, sat, sun...

Yes, they're the kind that poke through the wing of the chicken. LOL, my wife and two of my daughters have pierced ears too! The chicks flap their wings a couple of times after you do it, than in about a minute they settle down and they never bother with it again. They're not hard to apply...

Here you go! We've not had any issues with the new style doors so far. No escapes, no double eggs, one empty tripped box so far, screw was adjusted, works fine now. Something I failed to mention in my earlier post with my trap door illustrations: on the back of the primary doors there are...

I used wing bands, got them from Randell Burkey; Jiffy wing bands. They also sell the pliers to apply them. The day old chicks wings seemed a bit small for application of the bands, so I waited two weeks and there was plenty of space. All my remaining birds still have their Jiffy wing bands...

Haven't seen a bug since! Joe, I'm getting eggs at about 60% now from the seven Ancona hens I have, they are large to extra large eggs. I bought some red sex links in Feb just to work with for the year to be sure everything is fine (perfecting my trap nest) still haven't lost a bird this...

Yes, I actually quoted myself! Trap nesting is how egg production was increased. It was used extensively, with no ill effects! So many old timers on this site write of times past when their backyard flock averaged 200+ eggs a year. You'll also read post from people who raise standard bred...

So today one of my six month old red sex-links laid us a duck-sized egg. When I cracked it I found it had three yolks! That got me to wondering what's the most yolks you've found in your eggs? Does anyone know what the record is?

My trap nest in the 8' x 12' Woods-style colony coop. We've been using them for several months now. I'm testing my preliminary design now with red sex links, which I figure are roughly the same size as Ancona's. Sometimes we find two eggs in a nest box or a box with an egg but no bird...

And...

I'm a lot less discouraged but a lot angrier. There's a very good explanation of why little black [mites?] were all over our eggs. My sixteen year old who "cleans the nest boxes every Thursday" simply tops them off with fresh wood chips! When I put my hand inside one of the boxes I noticed it...

I realize this is the Ancona breeders thread but I don't think there's very many out there Joe (certainly not here on BYC anyway)! You started it, so like it or not you're my mentor! You're supper busy but imagine my 65 hr work-weeks plus 10 more hr travel time to and from; and 7 kids, life...

They lay as well as my hatchery mix. I've built trap nest and intend to use them when the time is right. It just bugs the crap out of me not to know who's laying what. Of course never at the expense of SOP. I'm glad you like the cock bird because that means I've got a sense of what is right...

That's what I thought the bare backs were from! OK, just not enough experience here. What do think about the mites? It's weird like I said never saw not one on an egg than one day; bam, crawling all over our eggs? My (16 y/o) sons going to do the dust bathing this morning and clean out the...

Some of my birds have some bald spots here's an example. I had the same problem last year with my other birds and it just went away. I've been worried it was mites but was unable to confirm this upon examination. Today my 4 year old brought in her a basket of eggs, they were covered in little...