*Buff Orpington Thread!*

[HallFamilyFarm]

Oh no!!! For the sake of education, what are the tell tale signs Buffy is a boy? Thank you HallFamilyFarm for responding.

At one month a pullet's comb will still be orange. A cockerel's comb will be turning red.

 

[Rock Home Isle]

The flock sure enjoys sprouted grains.

 

[HallFamilyFarm]

A few days ago Danyelle (12), Nicole (7) and I drove out to local tomato grower to get some yellow squash and some tomatoes. We bought two 5 gallon buckets of oversize cull squash. I asked if he had any #2 tomatoes. Instead he sent us home with 9 buckets of cull tomatoes so he would not have to throw them out in the woods. There were a lot of green ones. Those joined the squash in the freezer. the red ones we cooked 2 pots of homemade marinara sauce. The culls and bad spots we fed to the chickens. We did get a lot of food for us, but the birds ended up with about half of the cull tomatoes. I was a bit surprised at how fast the juveniles went after them. We will now make certain our garden gate is locked and may even get an alarm for it. You just can't trust these Orpingtons!

 

[Rock Home Isle]

Ya Gotta Love 'em.

 

[ButchGood]

A few days ago Danyelle (12), Nicole (7) and I drove out to local tomato grower to get some yellow squash and some tomatoes. We bought two 5 gallon buckets of oversize cull squash. I asked if he had any #2 tomatoes. Instead he sent us home with 9 buckets of cull tomatoes so he would not have to throw them out in the woods. There were a lot of green ones. Those joined the squash in the freezer. the red ones we cooked 2 pots of homemade marinara sauce. The culls and bad spots we fed to the chickens. We did get a lot of food for us, but the birds ended up with about half of the cull tomatoes. I was a bit surprised at how fast the juveniles went after them. We will now make certain our garden gate is locked and may even get an alarm for it. You just can't trust these Orpingtons!

My Orps LOVE tomatoes. I'll through an over ripe one out of the garden to them and they are like piranhas. Tomato only lasts seconds. I would hate to see what my garden would look like if all 26 got in there.

 

[SilverDuck284]

What are some other favored treats? I give mine all the veggie scraps out of the garden and about a handful of mealworms each, they just love them! I'm curious what else they will enjoy.

 

[HallFamilyFarm]

Since we have lots of watermelon rinds during the local growing season, we feed lots of watermelon rinds and damaged watermelons to ours. In the fall I gather pumpkins from local businesses and feed the pumpkins to the chickens. They love it all. Have not found anything vegetable they will not eat.

Here are some of last years watermelons.

​

Check out the Giant and sweet watermelon thread at
https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/657666/giant-and-sweet-watermelons#post_9201036

 

[Rock Home Isle]

Went outside early this morning to take a few photos of the flock....they saw me coming and here they came.

 

[redjackson]

This is "Ernesto"! He is our first BO and we really enjoy him. He is around 5 months old and has never crowed... What do you guys think of his quality??

 

[aveca]

What are some other favored treats? I give mine all the veggie scraps out of the garden and about a handful of mealworms each, they just love them! I'm curious what else they will enjoy.

chickens are omnivores, can eat almost anything you can..ours get their usual feed with the balance in that the companys mix...then ours have had everything from blueberries, black caps ( they follow be to the berry patch) , breads, peaches are a big hit....apples, copper river salmon , scrambled eggs, plus more, they dont get all of that stuff every day , but at the end of the day , if there are blueberries about getting a little past prime, they get spread around out there..i noticed where the free roamers have been, blueberry bushes are popping up, and black caps...they put fish and or fish oil in those show flock blocks for pheasants and gamebirds..every time we do salmon..its a feeding frenzy...again. thats not too often..they also graze the lawn grass like cattle...and we try to give greens in winter finly chopped and not tons and make sure there are grits a pleanty.if you ever make salmon patties using canned salmon, throw the bits you dont use out there..it wont last long..chickens were jungle fowl..they ate salamanders small frogs minnow fish, greens assortment of insects, greens ect...my orpington hen grabbed a big salamander the other day from a pile of small logs i was moving..i tried to grab it and stow it safley to the woods, but she was too quick for me..