Egyptian Fayoumis Thread!

[wild chick]

This doesn't seem to be a popular breed, as this is the first post since mine in November. As I stated up above we got an EF rooster as the free chick in a hatchery order. I just loved him. He died on Thanksgiving day - all I can think of is an impacted crop. None of the others got sick. ccassidy, I was impressed with the disease-resistance description of this breed and it was so ironic that he is the only one who has died. (Well, we harvested the other roos to the freezer, but that's not what I meant) I'm curious to see what your crosses look like. What is the rooster over your EF hen?

 

[ccassidy18]

Wild chick,we haven't had any crosses yet. I just found this nest yesterday. I was half surprised,and half not

We have 8 roosters total,7 of which are breeding,and 5 of which are mainly the ones who have ready access to the Fayoumis hen.
Her offspring could be any of those roosters offspring

We had a hen die from a moth ball she ate one time,so we only have one left

But we will be using her extensively for breeding. We have noticed the disease resistance first hand,and it's amazing.

 

[smudge]

Any luck yet? We've a young Light Brahma rooster who just recently realized that the Fayoumi is a chicken. Talk about odd looking pair...

 

[floodthelast]

Wild chick,we haven't had any crosses yet. I just found this nest yesterday. I was half surprised,and half not

We have 8 roosters total,7 of which are breeding,and 5 of which are mainly the ones who have ready access to the Fayoumis hen.
Her offspring could be any of those roosters offspring

We had a hen die from a moth ball she ate one time,so we only have one left

But we will be using her extensively for breeding. We have noticed the disease resistance first hand,and it's amazing.

I would love to see any mixed babies too. I hadn't considered that. My rooster will be a bantam but that might still work depending on his size full grown.

 

[floodthelast]

Cleopatra is 5 1/2 weeks old and usually one of the chicks that hides in the corner during holding time. some days she squawks when picked up and some days not. Sometimes she will fly to my arm or stand on my shoulder. Today she was sleepy and didn't want to hop to my arm and fussed when I picked her up but calmed right down. Then she fell asleep in my arms. She woke up just a bit later and I tried putting her down but she resisted and hopped on my shoulder instead. She gently pecked my hair a bit then I had to put her back and hold everybody else. I may be in love. This is nothing like I expected. I imagine she will get wilder when she has room to roam but I am stunned by her sweetness.

 

[microchick]

Hi everyone. I was told about these chickens on another thread and have been spending the morning reading up on them. I'm very impressed to say the least. I have suspected Marek's on our property and am loosing birds at a fairly steady rate. Somebody asked me if I had ever considered Fayoumi due to their astonishing resistance to not only Marek's disease but other bacterial/viral infections as well. And well, the search was on.

I need to back read more in thread but I have questions for everyone.

Have you personal experience with the disease resistance of these birds?

Given that I'm trying to control stress in my remaining flock of Buff O's and OEGBs (standards and bantams each have their own pens), I am considering a separate pen and run for my Fayoumis when I get them which will probably be next spring so I have time to get a necropsy done on one of my sick birds and hopefully get the Marek's under some semblance of control. My runs right now are quite large as I do not free range due to predators, but after reading about these birds I am wondering just how big of a run do they require?

Anything else you think would help me, please pass it on. I wish I had known about these birds two years ago when I started my flock.

Thanks
Microchick

 

[smudge]

My experience is limited - I only have 1 Fayoumi. I will say that the temperament of my Fay is much different from my other hens. Picking up a Buff Orpington from its roost - not a challenge. My Fayoumi - shrieks and bolts any which way she can if physically possible. I've heard that they prefer too roost outside the coop. Mine uses the coop because, at the end of the day, she is still a chicken, and doesn't want to be alone.

The Fayoumi was the easiest to introduce to the older BOs - I honestly think they didn't recognize she was a chicken, so ignored her at first.

 

[RobG7aChattTN]

Hi everyone. I was told about these chickens on another thread and have been spending the morning reading up on them. I'm very impressed to say the least. I have suspected Marek's on our property and am loosing birds at a fairly steady rate. Somebody asked me if I had ever considered Fayoumi due to their astonishing resistance to not only Marek's disease but other bacterial/viral infections as well. And well, the search was on.

I need to back read more in thread but I have questions for everyone.

Have you personal experience with the disease resistance of these birds?

Given that I'm trying to control stress in my remaining flock of Buff O's and OEGBs (standards and bantams each have their own pens), I am considering a separate pen and run for my Fayoumis when I get them which will probably be next spring so I have time to get a necropsy done on one of my sick birds and hopefully get the Marek's under some semblance of control. My runs right now are quite large as I do not free range due to predators, but after reading about these birds I am wondering just how big of a run do they require?

Anything else you think would help me, please pass it on. I wish I had known about these birds two years ago when I started my flock.

Thanks
Microchick

Do you worm your birds regularly and do you change your wormers periodically? The reason that I ask is that I had penned up birds that started to die and it was suggested that it was Marek's. Well...if it really is Marek's then basically 98% of your birds die very quickly and your property is contaminated for years to come. The only birds that will survive will be carriers and only vaccinated birds can be kept (even Fayoumis) and all those birds will become carriers as vaccinated birds still get the disease, they just don't become symptomatic (and you'd never want to sell birds, eggs or really even go to the feed store). BUT...most things that affect chickens (disease or parasites) affect the legs and a sick bird can appear very much like a bird with Marek's. A necropsy showed that my birds had capillary worms. This was a surprise because I wormed regularly with Ivermectin but as it turns out Ivermectin doesn't do a very good job against capillary worms. I switched to Safeguard and suddenly I had no more sick birds. More recently my egg numbers started to drop so I changed wormers and the egg numbers jumped right back up. It's pretty cheap to worm your birds and easy if you use Wazine or something like that. If you don't worm your birds ever I'd suggest at least trying it and see if they don't all get instantly better.

 

[wild chick]

Hi everyone. I was told about these chickens on another thread and have been spending the morning reading up on them. I'm very impressed to say the least. I have suspected Marek's on our property and am loosing birds at a fairly steady rate. Somebody asked me if I had ever considered Fayoumi due to their astonishing resistance to not only Marek's disease but other bacterial/viral infections as well. And well, the search was on.

I need to back read more in thread but I have questions for everyone.

Have you personal experience with the disease resistance of these birds?

Given that I'm trying to control stress in my remaining flock of Buff O's and OEGBs (standards and bantams each have their own pens), I am considering a separate pen and run for my Fayoumis when I get them which will probably be next spring so I have time to get a necropsy done on one of my sick birds and hopefully get the Marek's under some semblance of control. My runs right now are quite large as I do not free range due to predators, but after reading about these birds I am wondering just how big of a run do they require?

Anything else you think would help me, please pass it on. I wish I had known about these birds two years ago when I started my flock.

Thanks
Microchick

I'm so new, I'm calling my 2cents worth just a penny. I got a straight run of Wyandottes from McMurry last June, which included the Surprise Chick. It turned out to be an EF, male of course. After I figured out what it was - desert bred, flighty, feral, light meat, small eggs etc etc I thought this one would be easy to put in the freezer because it didn't fit our program: cold hardy, good eggs, good meat, and easy to be friends with. Well, he started crowing by 12 weeks, and by 4 months he was my favorite bird of the flock and I decided I would never eat him. We dispatched 9 of the 11 cockerel Wyandottes in October, leaving the EF, and 2 Wyandotte cockerels to ponder over for the 9 pullets future. Red (the EF) had me smitten in love. He talked, he cooed to the pullets, he growled at ANY noise - a hammer, a sneeze (that was hysterical), a truck motor, he alerted the flock to anything flying overhead, including a low flying airplane. The girls LOVED him & pretty much ignored the W boys. Alas, he got sick and in two days he died, which was Thanksgiving Day of last year. We think he ate something poisonous as no other chickens got sick. I tried to do a necropsy but didn't have enough experience to find anything obvious. I wish now I'd taken photos and asked here on BYC or sent him off for professional necropsy. He was a vibrant bird and to this day I miss him. The Wyandottes are fine, but Red was the absolute best. I still don't know if he would have been happy in our climate of long winters & temperature lows of 0 to 10 F for several months. I'm still considering another EF rooster to take care of my free range hens. As for run size, I don't know. But I'd read that if one of the flock gets sick to isolate them, so when Red wasn't doing right, I caught him (he screamed like a girl and fought like crazy) and I put him in a large dog crate. He just about beat himself to death in there, so within 20 minutes I let him back out with the flock. In the last few months I've had to isolate the W's for different reasons, a day here or there and none of them acted even surprised that they were in a 2 x 4 cage. Red went NUTS, I can't imagine what he would have done if he was healthy! I'm not saying it's a negative, just saying that when you read about EF's not wanting to be penned up, this might be what they are talking about. He considered himself top Cockerel and came in with the flock in the evening and never protested being locked in the (7'x8') coop at night with the pullets. I hope you continue to post about your situation and if you get EF's next year. I'm following this whole thread on EF's because I really do like them!

 

[wild chick]

Do you worm your birds regularly and do you change your wormers periodically? The reason that I ask is that I had penned up birds that started to die and it was suggested that it was Marek's. Well...if it really is Marek's then basically 98% of your birds die very quickly and your property is contaminated for years to come. The only birds that will survive will be carriers and only vaccinated birds can be kept (even Fayoumis) and all those birds will become carriers as vaccinated birds still get the disease, they just don't become symptomatic (and you'd never want to sell birds, eggs or really even go to the feed store). BUT...most things that affect chickens (disease or parasites) affect the legs and a sick bird can appear very much like a bird with Marek's. A necropsy showed that my birds had capillary worms. This was a surprise because I wormed regularly with Ivermectin but as it turns out Ivermectin doesn't do a very good job against capillary worms. I switched to Safeguard and suddenly I had no more sick birds. More recently my egg numbers started to drop so I changed wormers and the egg numbers jumped right back up. It's pretty cheap to worm your birds and easy if you use Wazine or something like that. If you don't worm your birds ever I'd suggest at least trying it and see if they don't all get instantly better.

If birds aren't acting wormy do you deworm anyway on a schedule? This is my first flock, no chickens have been on this property for at least 20 years and they free-range about 5 acres. Should I deworm just because? I really don't like to medicate unless there's a reason. They'll be a year old in June.