Meyer Hatchery Chicken pics anyone??

[MamaShell]

HAPPY HALLOWEEN EVERYONE!!!!

Quote:

Originally Posted by LynnEBC


Ha ha. That is so me too! I'd love to ferment, but there is so many things going on here. Maybe one day in the future. Good job to those of you who do take the time to do it!

That's too bad you have to deal with people not being responsible with their dogs. I'm glad our free range area is still fenced from dogs. But we have hawks so I still don't get to free range much.

I hope your neighbor dives in. I wish we had a neighbor that has chickens. We gave our one neighbor a dozen eggs shortly after moving in for catching and holding onto our goats for us when they got out. I think I could sell a ton more if they would start laying again!

Complaining on here worked. I collected 3 eggs from the 50+ chickens today. One was from one of our bantam cochins and the other 2 were on my friend's side. I'm leaning more towards something stealing the eggs or egg eaters now. If I wait until the evening to collect we get nothing but the 2 days we've checked in the afternoon there's been at least something. I'm going to the feed store tomorrow to get some fake eggs. If those disappear then we'll know for sure we need to do some reinforcing of the coop.

Are you able to check even more often on weekends... sounds like an egg stealer or egg eater for sure. Hope you figure it out soon.... eggs from 50 hens sure would be nice!!

Hoping we all start seeing more eggs soon!!

I'm going to try a no-crow colar. I've been on the fence about it for a while, but with the time change coming, I'm dreading Peppy getting my neighbors up at 4am. I've been researching the velcro DIY ones and will be giving that a shot. I'm a little nervous for a few reasons. Peppy is not crazy about held anymore, although still friendly. I may just nab him after dark and wear protective gear just in case. The other thing is that people have been reporting sudden death when using these collars. I'm guessing from over tightening the collars. Oh boy! We'll see how it goes. Any experience/advice is welcomed

No experience here but very curious to hear how it goes.

I think I have an egg eater, too. I am still getting 17-18 eggs a day from 23 layers but I have not had an egg from one of my EEs in 2 weeks. She was a very consistent layer - almost every day. Now, nothing! She is only about 9 months old and is not broody or molting. I have found a little egg goo in the nest boxes on occasion and I believe that she sometimes lays under the coop and they may be eaten there. It's weird that it seems that it may be only hers that is getting eaten. Could she be eating her own egg? I need a video camera in my coop!

 

[autumnhearth]

So 2 new things today one good one bad...

So the good thing is... I was talking to my new neighbor, first long conversation since they moved in besides introductions and small talk, and she asked if we can have chickens in our neighborhood!!!! I'm so psyched!! We are not friends with any of our immediate neighbors (friendly of course... but not friends) so no one knows we have them. Kinda want to keep it that way. She said her husband wants bees and chickens!!! I brought her over and showed her my set up and gave her a doz. eggs. I would love to have more chicken people around. Strength in numbers??

That is exciting!

So Morgaine finally laid her first egg today! I knew it was coming soon, she's been going into the coop and checking out the nest boxes and squatting flat to the ground when I extend my hand to her. I guessed she was waiting for Halloween and I was right! Lots of crows cawing while she was sitting in the nest box, I call them her people, lol. Victoria stayed in the coop with her the whole time and when she laid everyone was in the coop. They were all making little urgent egg laying sounds, even though two of them had layed hours ago. And while she took quite awhile getting set up, she didn't make a fuss at the end, she just stepped out and joined her sisters scratching.


In the nest box


Victoria waiting patiently in front of the nest box. This is actually what made me grab my phone, though she changed positions when I got back, she was all puffed up like a ball with a tail, seriously how cute is she?


Just laid, purple bloom, looked streaky and dirty so I washed and polished it


Revealing all the big dark spots


Front left is Baby the Buff Orp's, middle is Clara the EE's, left Morgaine the BCM and back three are Amelia's the Golden Buff.

 

[trsturself]

That is exciting!

So Morgaine finally laid her first egg today! I knew it was coming soon, she's been going into the coop and checking out the nest boxes and squatting flat to the ground when I extend my hand to her. I guessed she was waiting for Halloween and I was right! Lots of crows cawing while she was sitting in the nest box, I call them her people, lol. Victoria stayed in the coop with her the whole time and when she laid everyone was in the coop. They were all making little urgent egg laying sounds, even though two of them had layed hours ago. And while she took quite awhile getting set up, she didn't make a fuss at the end, she just stepped out and joined her sisters scratching.

Love that you caught the moment. The egg is beautiful. Our BCM is 23 weeks old and doesn't look even close to laying. Our BO and BLRW are both almost 7 months old and showing no signs of laying soon. Argh! With as many girls as I have of age I should be getting nearly 4 dozen a week just from mine and my friend should be getting similar or more! And we got 3 yesterday. So aggravating! I got some ceramic eggs today. I'll put one in one of my nest boxes and one of hers and we'll see if they are still there tomorrow or the next day. If it is an egg eater hopefully it will break them of the habit! And if it's a snake or skunk same thing!

 

[autumnhearth]

Love that you caught the moment. The egg is beautiful. Our BCM is 23 weeks old and doesn't look even close to laying. Our BO and BLRW are both almost 7 months old and showing no signs of laying soon. Argh! With as many girls as I have of age I should be getting nearly 4 dozen a week just from mine and my friend should be getting similar or more! And we got 3 yesterday. So aggravating! I got some ceramic eggs today. I'll put one in one of my nest boxes and one of hers and we'll see if they are still there tomorrow or the next day. If it is an egg eater hopefully it will break them of the habit! And if it's a snake or skunk same thing!

Thanks. The dark spots are raised, almost like congealed blood, but I'm sure its just her ink jets getting warmed up. I'm glad to have been home, I was supposed to be out at lunch for my brother's girlfriend's birthday but I have a sore throat and ear ache. No trick-or-treating tonight for us, the whole family has colds. Morgaine is almost 30 weeks, we are now just waiting on Victoria the Dorking to lay. That's crazy about your disappearing eggs, I hope you are able to get to the bottom of it!

 

[jtn42248]

Thanks. The dark spots are raised, almost like congealed blood, but I'm sure its just her ink jets getting warmed up. I'm glad to have been home, I was supposed to be out at lunch for my brother's girlfriend's birthday but I have a sore throat and ear ache. No trick-or-treating tonight for us, the whole family has colds. Morgaine is almost 30 weeks, we are now just waiting on Victoria the Dorking to lay. That's crazy about your disappearing eggs, I hope you are able to get to the bottom of it!

On occassion one of my hens will lay and egg with bumps like that. They are, I believe, excess calcium deposits. If the egg is white they are white. If it is brown they are a darker brown...sort of like a concentration of color.

 

[autumnhearth]

On occassion one of my hens will lay and egg with bumps like that. They are, I believe, excess calcium deposits. If the egg is white they are white. If it is brown they are a darker brown...sort of like a concentration of color.

Yes, I think you are right! Actually after posting the above I thought about editing it. Our Buff Orp who lays a pinkish light brown egg sometimes has large off white bumps on hers and sometimes just light speckles, usually these are when she takes a long time to lay, extra time, extra calcium? I showed the egg to my husband when he got home and he made a face, I asked if he though it was ugly and he said yes but that's appropriate for Morgaine. I said she's not ugly and he said no she's not but her personality is. She's a bit of an unfriendly complainer but she could be much worse and she was very good about everyone being in the coop while she was laying, not like Clara or Baby who screech when another pullet comes near the ramp.

 

[jtn42248]

Yes, I think you are right! Actually after posting the above I thought about editing it. Our Buff Orp who lays a pinkish light brown egg sometimes has large off white bumps on hers and sometimes just light speckles, usually these are when she takes a long time to lay, extra time, extra calcium? I showed the egg to my husband when he got home and he made a face, I asked if he though it was ugly and he said yes but that's appropriate for Morgaine. I said she's not ugly and he said no she's not but her personality is. She's a bit of an unfriendly complainer but she could be much worse and she was very good about everyone being in the coop while she was laying, not like Clara or Baby who screech when another pullet comes near the ramp.

Sounds like you have some interesting children. Seriously though, I would not worry about the egg unless it were spotted with something that smears and is not poop. Sounds like there are just extra calcium deposits. You might revisit their feed and treats and make sure they are not getting too much.

 

[NanaLynn]

Happy Halloween Everyone! !

 

[NanaLynn]

Really nice. I love your cabinets. Shows that it has been a work of love. As for the smudges. When we bought this place the stove had that stuff around and behind the knobs that is all but impossible to clean. We tried Mr Clean Magic Eraser for appliances and it worked like a charm...with a little added elbow grease.

Thank you...we've been dealing with so many issues and learning as we go. Sometimes I wonder why on earth we decided to remodel the kitchen. We're getting there. Thanks for the Magic Eraser idea too!

Love the cabinets. I'm jealous you are getting a new kitchen but not of the hassle and work. lol
The counters and floors in the kitchen are on our "eventually" list. I have finishing work on the upstairs bathroom floor and we're going to start on the main level half bath floor soon. The half bath is huge so I'm not really looking forward to it. Plus we want to replace the vanity when we do it so that's another expense I don't really feel like throwing money toward at the moment. Especially with DH getting laid off at the end of next month!


Hopefully since you don't have a deep freeze like we can the nipple system will be fine. I've read a lot of people say even with the heated water the nipples themselves still froze since they are metal and exposed to the cold. Hope you have better luck.

My heated dog dish should arrive sometime this week. I love that it is thermostatically controlled so it won't be on all the time or I don't have to run out and turn it on/off.

Thanks! Yeah, don't be jealous of all the hard work for sure and all the snags along the way. There are things we have done wrong...so many things that we did wrong...seems like we are moving one step forward and two steps back every day.I'd love to see your progress on the bathroom. So sorry about your husband's job. I hope things get better for you guys soon.

We have the heater kit for our nipple system which has copper for each nipple which is supposed to transfer the heat to the nipples so they do not freeze and I just received the bird bath heater that goes inside the unit to heat it. I still need to somehow cover the unit a little more so it is out of direct cold wind. Then I still have to worry about the hose freezing, which if I was rich I'd just buy a heated hose, but I am not rich so I may just have to refill the waterer each morning still but at least it won't freeze throughout the day. At least it is better here with the weather, not like some of you with a lot of freezing days all Winter long.

Complain away!! Hopefully the white egg layers start for you soon. My Cochin had a pretty hard molt about 2 months ago but started back laying eggs before all the feathers grew in again. So hopefully yours don't wait till completely feathered. Does your store have the Feather Fixer feed? Maybe give that a try?

Gorgeous color!!!

GREAT job on the kitchen!! I'm sure it feels like it is going painfully slow but look how much is done. Having a sink will make it so much easier. Can't imagine not having that

I'm going to try that Mr Clean Magic Eraser... thanks for the tip!

Still no white eggs. I need to get out to TSC and get the feather fixer. I'd feed them eggs, but since there are so few, we want to eat them.
Yes, "painfully slow". We're still without a sink...long story..but today the plumber is here fixing it up the right way now. So hopefully we'll have a sink today....

LOL! I was not getting up at 330, I was leaving for work! You get used to it. I may try moving Peppy once the little ones are more settled. They are going in the coop themselves, but not roosting yet. Just huding together. Peppy is definitely maturing . He did the one-dropped-wing thing today to one of the little ones. I really hope he stays friendly, not that he's cuddly, but he is respectful and gorgeous if I do say so myself!

BTW congrats on your Silkie being a girl!!!!

Wow...that is such an early time to go to work. I did for awhile when I was about 23 years younger have to be at work by 4am when I worked at a bank while I was pregnant with my 2nd son. It was so hard to get up at that time and being pregnant did not help with that. Peppy sounds like a really good rooster so far dancing for the ladies like that.

Glad Patty Patty is a girl!

I second the magic eraser, we use it on our stove.

I'm thinking something must be stealing eggs, or group egg eating. We haven't had a single egg out of 50+ hens in almost 2 weeks. I understand the few older ones that are molting, but there are younger ones that were laying great a little while ago. Last year our young ones slowed down a little but never stopped in the winter, and this is pretty early in the season to stop completely. So... I'm going to put some mustard eggs and some wooden eggs. If they are broken we'll know there's some eating going on, if they go missing we'll know something is taking them.

And when I say molting I mean a hard molt...

I hope that you figure out what is going on with your chickens. As far as molting goes, my coop and run looks almost as bad with feathers everywhere.

Nice, didn't feed our the pumpkin today, as I forgot and it was in the car. Besides bf had a batch of farmers cheese ready for them so they got that instead and other scraps for dinner. Will be curious to see if we get more eggs tomorrow since they got a boost of protein today. Their coats look better today after feeding them tuna dn quinoa yesterday plus their normal feed. I can tell when my girls need s boost of proteins based on their coats, not fluffy, not as shiny and their demeanor, they are frantic and hyper like they need something. Anyway, after feeding farmers cheese they were calm and happy. So we will see if they give more eggs. We got 19 yesterday, we are averaging 18 a day now. I am going to be playing with their feed just a little and see if putting out more feed increases eggs the next day.

Love the lightness of colors in your kitchen remodel.

Lucky you with all those eggs! I gave mine their pumpkin a few days ago. They loved the seeds especially and are still working on the rest everyday. They were scared of it at first though.

Here they are backing away in fear of the huge orange ball I put in the run.


After I opened it up a few of the brave ones strolled over to check it out.


Here's Izzie the leghorn being one of the first to get a taste. Once one started the rest started attacking each piece too.

oh well that makes sense given their their egg production starts again 30 minutes after they lay. Will keep you posted....

Scary update, so we had two large coons visit last night. Have a survelance camera on the coop and we watched it this am. One looks to be the size of our smallest dog and she is 40 pounds. We guess the bore is around 30 pounds, no wonder he broke the coon trap early in the summer. So we had bought a new trap and they had managed to get the food and get out of the trap, now we know why. He is too big for the traps, we will have to get a different type of trap after seeing him. Weird to watch him climb on the enclosed run and walk around. So now the challenge will be not too worry too much about the gang.

Oh no, sorry about the coons. So scary!

 

[NanaLynn]

Complaining worked! We got 1 egg today. Much better than none. DH was home and checked periodically. We haven't done the wooden or mustard eggs yet though. I'll be out of town the next few days so I'm not sure if it will get done before then or not.

YAY!

Yup, thats a lot of feathers! But now that you put it that way... 50 chickens and NO eggs... something's gotta be going on. Do you have golf balls out there too?



http://www.amazon.com/Duke-Dog-Proo...8&qid=1414454086&sr=8-2&keywords=raccoon+trap


This is the trap we used... can't even tell you how many we have caught. (no this isn't one of them... took pic off internet) We put marshmallows with peanut butter in there and it works every time. We've caught some pretty big ones too. You know how I always have crazy stories.... My DH was disposing of one early one morning and he used his bow cause he didn't want to make much noise. Shot it and the arrow went through his chest and into the ground. Went back about 10 minutes later and the coon was sitting up with the broken arrow next to him with a look on his face like... "OK, what else ya got?" Tough buggers. We just set it periodically because they're always around.
Good luck... from the sound of them you need it!!

Yay... at least one right. But there has to be something going on... hope you figure it out!

Scary pic! Maxi our dog is our raccoon and opossum trap. She has killed about 4 opossums, one raccoon, a rat, a few salamanders and 2 squirrels over the past several years. I feel sorry for the squirrels and the salamanders. The others would have eaten my chickens, so I do not feel sorry for them for sure.

I don't know if this helps for a size comparison, but here are Malcolm and Trudi eating from a standard (7-cup capacity) metal dog dish:



They're too cute! They finally figured out the steps to their pool, so they've been having a blast swimming and throwing water everywhere.

Loving the look of the kitchen remodel!

School, winterizing, and coop building has me worn out--sorry if I seem scatterbrained at the moment.

Those are the cutest ducks!

Thanks!

It's okay I think we're all a little scatterbrained at times too!

I noticed a couple chickens were shaking their heads last night. Not a lot but definitely noticeable. Reading I found respiratory issues or bugs could cause it. Our little bantam EE has had a cold (yes, I know they don't actually get a cold but it's much easier than respiratory infection and you understand I'm speaking of the symptoms not the virus) for nearly a week now so I wouldn't be surprised if they all have it a little bit. The VetRx started helping after a couple days on the EE. She was almost her usual self today. I read those colds can also stop laying but not all of them are acting sick enough to justify no eggs. DH messed up the stuff in the nest boxes so we could at least tell if they are going in there to lay or not. No one went in there after he collected the one egg. Other causes of no eggs said worms, bugs, illness, etc. I guess they could have worms without showing other symptoms. When I get back in town I'll give them some pumpkin seed. I'll check them for bugs too.

On another note, I found one of my friend's chickens laying on the ground the other day. She can't support herself on her legs but she is alert and eating/drinking. I'm really hoping it's not mareks. I separated her immediately but there is such conflicting info out there. There was just a conversation on the CO thread about it. We are having a freeze tonight, I covered her dog crate with a thick moving blanket, hopefully it will be enough. My friend is expecting the worst but I hate dealing with dead animals!

Oh geez..I hope you figure it all out.

Thank you all for the info

Beardie continues to act better and better but hasnt put any weight back in which worries me, shes down to just a little over 3 lbs and she was regularly over 5 (granted she was a bit chubby at that point) I brought her inside for a little over 24 hours to monitor her crop and make sure she was still eating/drinking/pottying... Her crop didn't fully flatten after the first night so I put her on soft foods and watched her until the next morning. The crop was pretty hard so I put her on soft food, massaged it every hour or so and watched her. She had a good appetite and passed quite a bit of poop with mostly undigested grass in it (some of the stool was just chunks of grass). I let her out after the next morning bc her crop was nearly flat and much softer and she was starting to get stressed from being stuck inside. The last 2 days she has been acting great, shes always out foraging in the pasture, flapping her wings and preening, and is much more into eating treats, etc but she still hasn't put on any weight. Actually shes down a little under an ounce more

I'm hoping the next weigh in she will finally start putting some weight back on. I've started her on some probiotics and nutridrench everyday.

How's Beardie doing?

So 2 new things today one good one bad...

My son came in from taking the trash out at about 6:30 and said boy your chickens are really yelling a lot. At dusk??? They never do that. I threw my boots on and ran out and there was a huge standard poodle running around the coop/run. It was up to my waist! Biggest one I ever saw. Circling and barking at them like crazy. I could see a few chickens huddled in a corner looking dead, some were flying around inside the coop and others were flying around the run bouncing off the wires and feathers flying. The dog couldn't get in but they didn't know that! Poor things. My house backs up to the woods with hiking trails and I could hear a guy screaming for the dog but it wasn't listening at all. I tried to catch it but couldn't. After another minute or 2 it ran off into the woods. Sadly, that's why I can't free range them unless I'm not out there. We can't really afford to fence it in because it would have to be a really pretty fence (we would have to look at so much of it) and that would be super expensive so it's no fence and I have to put up with these invasions once in a while.

So the good thing is... I was talking to my new neighbor, first long conversation since they moved in besides introductions and small talk, and she asked if we can have chickens in our neighborhood!!!! I'm so psyched!! We are not friends with any of our immediate neighbors (friendly of course... but not friends) so no one knows we have them. Kinda want to keep it that way. She said her husband wants bees and chickens!!! I brought her over and showed her my set up and gave her a doz. eggs. I would love to have more chicken people around. Strength in numbers??
Her husband will be coming over for sure to check it out and hopefully they dive in in the near future. Will be nice to have someone else to talk chicken too. My friends and family just don't 'get it' LOL.

Those dogs! So sorry you have to deal with people and their dogs. Knowing first hand the damage they can do, I understand why you cannot let them free range unsupervised.

Good news that you have a new chicken friend or you will soon hopefully!

That's too bad you have to deal with people not being responsible with their dogs. I'm glad our free range area is still fenced from dogs. But we have hawks so I still don't get to free range much.

I hope your neighbor dives in. I wish we had a neighbor that has chickens. We gave our one neighbor a dozen eggs shortly after moving in for catching and holding onto our goats for us when they got out. I think I could sell a ton more if they would start laying again!

Complaining on here worked. I collected 3 eggs from the 50+ chickens today. One was from one of our bantam cochins and the other 2 were on my friend's side. I'm leaning more towards something stealing the eggs or egg eaters now. If I wait until the evening to collect we get nothing but the 2 days we've checked in the afternoon there's been at least something. I'm going to the feed store tomorrow to get some fake eggs. If those disappear then we'll know for sure we need to do some reinforcing of the coop.

Any luck figuring it out yet?

Hoping we all start seeing more eggs soon!!

I'm going to try a no-crow colar. I've been on the fence about it for a while, but with the time change coming, I'm dreading Peppy getting my neighbors up at 4am. I've been researching the velcro DIY ones and will be giving that a shot. I'm a little nervous for a few reasons. Peppy is not crazy about held anymore, although still friendly. I may just nab him after dark and wear protective gear just in case. The other thing is that people have been reporting sudden death when using these collars. I'm guessing from over tightening the collars. Oh boy! We'll see how it goes. Any experience/advice is welcomed

Agree with more eggs soon for all of us!

I never had a rooster so can't help with that, but I am interested is seeing how it works for you.

This made me chuckle, I wish I had a friend close by that talked chicken as well. I am sure my dear bf gets sick of my chicken talk, but it is one of my main tasks/chores is feeding, cleaning, collecting eggs, etc. so what does he expect right?! I am glad I have BYC for my chicken outlet.

x2 on the BYC outlet!

That is exciting!

So Morgaine finally laid her first egg today! I knew it was coming soon, she's been going into the coop and checking out the nest boxes and squatting flat to the ground when I extend my hand to her. I guessed she was waiting for Halloween and I was right! Lots of crows cawing while she was sitting in the nest box, I call them her people, lol. Victoria stayed in the coop with her the whole time and when she laid everyone was in the coop. They were all making little urgent egg laying sounds, even though two of them had layed hours ago. And while she took quite awhile getting set up, she didn't make a fuss at the end, she just stepped out and joined her sisters scratching.


In the nest box


Victoria waiting patiently in front of the nest box. This is actually what made me grab my phone, though she changed positions when I got back, she was all puffed up like a ball with a tail, seriously how cute is she?


Just laid, purple bloom, looked streaky and dirty so I washed and polished it


Revealing all the big dark spots


Front left is Baby the Buff Orp's, middle is Clara the EE's, left Morgaine the BCM and back three are Amelia's the Golden Buff.

Great job Morgaine. What beautiful chickens and eggs you have. Victoria is so pretty!

I finally took some down time to get caught up. I needed some chicken distractions today!