BDutch's bantam flock & natural breeding projects #5 🪺 🪺 and #6

[Shadrach]

Watermelon is stays okay if kept cool, a bit like apples.
I think its because the chickens are not so thirsty anymore. In summer they do eat it gladly.

Here its only possible to buy gmo free if you buy organic. And there is no organic all flock.

I think the price at the mill where I buy is fine. The agri/pet/gardening shop is much more expensive, especially the organic starter. They ask € 13,50 for 5 kg. And don’t sell larger bags.

Have you tried looking for growers feed rather than all flock.
For example.
https://www.smallholderfeed.co.uk/products/poultry/poultry-grower-pellets/

 

[Nero70002]

Hi! I’m curious about your project, and will be watching Anyone wanna do a tldr?

 

[fuzzi]

The chicken my neighbour didn't want, Chipie, turned out to be my senior chicken, not sure if she is 7,8 or 9 by now. I think the issue with her was more due to personality than to health .
I admit if I ever decide to get chickens again, I will maybe get ex-batts. Now I know what I am getting into : just giving them one or two year in a happy place before they die of reproductive disease.
The chickens that hatched here act healthy. It's the one I bought from a breeder as point of lay pullets I have troubles with.

I wish this was possible ! But even if we burned a whole acre of ground, worms don't live in the soil. They arrive with living hosts, flies, snails, mice... and those hosts will still be sufficiently near by that the chickens catch the worms again. In my case, the chickens who did not get worms or got them last, were the one who never left the chicken yard. If my chicken stayed locked up in their run all day they would not have worms... but I think we all agree that is not what we want.


I am very interested by all your thoughts on this.
I would love to see things in your light, RC, so hopefully you can convince me.
The statement made by MJ, to me, makes it very hard or impossible to qualify the relationship as one of friendship or comrades, because precisely of the authority of the keeper on life and death.
To take an extreme example which I don't mean as an analogy, could a slave be friend with the master ? Yes, possibly, in very exceptional circumstances. In most cases, the relationship would be too biased. If the friendship was true, the master would necessarily free the slave at some point.
I don't mean our chickens are slave. But owning the right to decide of their life and death, for me, means I am above all a keeper of a life and that excludes a relation on an equal basis. The chickens did not choose to live with us.
I can see, like Fuzzi, how we can work in the same direction and develop a sort of partnership , especially with the roosters.

As for Janet, MJ, it would be another long discussion. Since you saw her in the nest and thought she was broody, she must not have given evident signs of pain and been uncomfortable. And maybe she was just waiting quietly to die at home when her time had come. How can we know ?

I have some sounds to share with you in relation to Shadrach's remark about broodies not being friendly. Only one of these hens is broody, the 2d one, but all three make it clear I should move away . (It's not my habit by the way to touch hens who lay, I just did it this time to see their reaction.)

The body language of the second one!

 

[BDutch]

Have you tried looking for growers feed rather than all flock.
For example.
https://www.smallholderfeed.co.uk/products/poultry/poultry-grower-pellets/

Last year year I bought organic grower pellets (made for broilers). But the mill stopt to supply it.
This year I bought organic chick/broiler crumble from another supplier. There is very little choice in organic chick feed where I live unless one wants to pay exorbitant prices.

 

[BDutch]

Hi! I’m curious about your project, and will be watching Anyone wanna do a tldr?

You are welcome to follow and contribute if you like. But please no abbreviations who are not very commonly used by everyone who writes English. What is tldr?

 

[MaryJanet]

The statement made by MJ, to me, makes it very hard or impossible to qualify the relationship as one of friendship or comrades, because precisely of the authority of the keeper on life and death.
To take an extreme example which I don't mean as an analogy, could a slave be friend with the master ? Yes, possibly, in very exceptional circumstances. In most cases, the relationship would be too biased. If the friendship was true, the master would necessarily free the slave at some point.
I don't mean our chickens are slave. But owning the right to decide of their life and death, for me, means I am above all a keeper of a life and that excludes a relation on an equal basis. The chickens did not choose to live with us.
I can see, like Fuzzi, how we can work in the same direction and develop a sort of partnership , especially with the roosters.

As for Janet, MJ, it would be another long discussion. Since you saw her in the nest and thought she was broody, she must not have given evident signs of pain and been uncomfortable. And maybe she was just waiting quietly to die at home when her time had come. How can we know ?

I have some sounds to share with you in relation to Shadrach's remark about broodies not being friendly

For me, when you took that video, you were exercising authority.

I mean authority in the sense of authorship: creating the contexts in which the animals live. That covers things like taking a video, treating ailments, providing food, and providing quality of life (and death).

 

[MaryJanet]

I hope when my time comes someone will ensure I have an easy death. That to me is an act of friendship or a service.

Me too.

 

[fuzzi]

You are welcome to follow and contribute if you like. But please no abbreviations who are not very commonly used by everyone who writes English. What is tldr?

I didn't know, but found this with a search:

"TLDR is an acronym that stands for "Too Long Didn't Read."

 

[Nero70002]

You are welcome to follow and contribute if you like. But please no abbreviations who are not very commonly used by everyone who writes English. What is tldr?

Oops yeah, tldr means too long didn’t read, and it’s basically used in place of summary. So what I’m asking is would anyone be kind enough to summarize what has happened so far?

 

[BDutch]

Oops yeah, tldr means too long didn’t read, and it’s basically used in place of summary. So what I’m asking is would anyone be kind enough to summarize what has happened so far?

Sorry, thats really impossible.
If you want to skip the hatch from last year you can start around February of this year. When I’m considering an early hatch with broodies for 2 reasons:

1. I like to have 2 pullets that start to lay when the oldies stop at the start of the moult before winter.
2. Me and my husband planned a vacation in April and I like to be at home when the chicks hatch.

The early hatch was not very succesvol with just one, probably male, chick. No updates now because we are on Madeira and our neighbour looks after the chickens as long as we are away from home.