Nevadans?

[laceynoelle]

Quote:
Ive been going through life exhaustedly. I thought it would be fun, but plling three 12 hour days in a row and more nine hour days seriously took al the energy out of me. Im so happy its thursday. only one more day to get through before i can catch up on all my sleep. Urg!

The concert was good i think. but most of it was kinda hazy. mom said we sounded great. I think she was crying, but thats not because the music was great, its because she was talking about me growing up so fast, and how it had been only a little bit ago when i was practicing for my 6th grade zone concert, etc etc.

But the good news is she ordered some sort of profesional DVD i can put up eventually...i hope. That and the chicks are doing awesome. Theyre so active! but i do have a few questions:
1. Why did my silkie die? It smelled really bad, like it was rotten on the inside and had a bunch of watery with stuff coming out its butt. It literally baked itself to death. It kept running under the heat lamp, and getting way to hot. I kept moving it, and later just moved the heat lamp up and hoped for the best; when i woke up in the morning it was dead. So is that some sort of disease? all the other chicks look fine, but im still a little worried.
2. With OEG chicks, can i tell by their feathers if they are male or female? Because all the adult males and females are far different, so will the chicks be the same or will the males molt into their final plumage like ducks?

 

[SunnyDawn]

Can't help with the chick questions, never had those breeds, but I'm glad the concert went well. Cute story about your Mom. Mom's tend to be like that.

Get some rest. I know at your age it doesn't seem important but you actually need a lot more sleep than us old farts do.
Although I can't really talk. I don't seem to sleep like normal people. I lay down to sleep but it just doesn't happen. I keep asking my hubby to tell me his secret. He puts his head down and POOF, he's asleep.

I'm so jealous!!!
Are you still getting more babies on March 17th?

 

[laceynoelle]

I dont know. I really hope so, but dad is trying to get me to cancel my order. So far i am, i think. I want to have some real chickens. i like banties, but they just arent as good tome as a RIR or wyandotte. I like the dual purpose breeds that do all sorts of stuff.
Im pretty sure it'll go through, because i think most the banties are males, and at this point i agreed to give away or eat all the extras, which i was intenting to do anyway.

 

[laceynoelle]

Oh, and who needs sleep?

Actually i really wish i could fall alseep like that, but i stay up hours trying to sleep. kinda ironic, huh?

 

[Takari]

Ah, sleep. I could use some more of that

I only manage to get 7 or 8 hours of sleep a night on school nights.

School's been taking a heck of a toll on my sleep this week. For me, it was essentially mid-terms week, so lots of studying. But only one more week, and I'm free! For a while anyways

Plus, I get chickies this weekend! So it's all better

 

[Humbrd]

Quote:
Sounds pretty! Can we see a pic?

yes, we need pics... and i'm assuming the is a leghorn amaacauna mix?? does she have the pea comb?? what color are her legs?? and her earlobes?? i send 3 legEEs with bud_kingston to yuma? and we're waiting to see what color they lay.. they have peacombs and a cool iridesenty earlobe....

I'll get a a pic of the egg today but until then you can see the hen on my web site. http://www.scsr.nevada.edu/~randlesh/rollingrrr/rrrbreeds.htm (Be nice it was my first try as creating a web page and still needs lots of work) You can also get there via my BYC web page. I put a link there. I have other chickens too that I'm selling. I have a couple of buff and some brown leghorns that I don't want to breed, so I'm selling them. I also have a pair of buff and of white Cochen hens but no roos at this point. I do like the buff ones though so I'm looking for a roo for them, but I think I will sell off the whites.

 

[SunnyDawn]

Yea, laceynoelle and Takari, I know what you mean about lack of sleep. I have a terrible time trying to get to sleep although last night and the night before I got close to 7 hours which is great for me so I'm feeling pretty good today. I don't remember having trouble sleeping when I was young though. I guess life is more stressful for young people these days.
Humbrd I just looked at your birds, beautiful! Love the ameraucanas and the marans! That buff polish is adorable!

 

[Bloomie]

Quote:
Okay, the 'why' and 'when' first!

Well, these two are hens, not chicks, so it was a bit more complicated. One was given to me this summer
as a 5 mo. old (Jean) and the other (Rosie) I got off craigslist as a 3 yr. old. Jean had just started molting
when I got her. This is Jean, a Speckled Sussex, about 2 weeks ago.
https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/uploads/44629_dsc09238.jpg
Recently, after she was fully refeathered, I noticed Jean had some crusty, dried poo on her butt one day.
I thought it might fall off. It didn't and it soon began to accumulate so today we washed her really good
and clipped the feathers around her vent. She has never laid an egg for me but is now so red in the face
and comb she almost flashes. I've been including red pepper flakes/cayenne pepper powder in the mash
every few days to see if we could get things started & I hated the thought of all that poo in the way.

Rosie, a Silver Laced Wyandotte, arrived in horrible shape, underweight, molting & with a nasty, pasty,
super stinky bare butt.
[URL]https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/uploads/44629_dsc08085.jpg[/URL] [URL]https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/uploads/44629_dsc08097.jpg[/URL]
This was Rosies 2nd full on bath. As her feathers grew in she was still kinda splatting poo so it looked like she
had dreads on her rear-end.

She is much better now (this was 2 weeks ago) but I guess I hadn't done
a good enough job the 1st time.

She's now been scrubbed, clipped and blow dried.
https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/uploads/44629_dsc09102.jpg
Her comb has been a dusky pink color though her wattles have really reddened up this past week and she
has become quite vocal, so I was really quite surprised when about an hour after her bath she got in a nest.
A first from what I've seen. When she got out, after about an hour, I was completely astonished to see ...
an egg.

She was the last one we expected to lay. There were at least four others that I had thought would
begin to lay before her. I texted a picture of the egg to my dad and had him guess who had laid it, he guessed
wrong of course and when I told him who it was ... he told me to bathe them all!

I think it's the peppers, not the bathing, that worked ... and that's not just self-preservation talking either!

As far as the 'how' goes ... I learned that here, on BYC, of course!

Thank you for sharin' yer pasty butt with me

.......eeeeerrrrr ya know what I mean

You've done a wonderful job of improvin' yer birds appearance.

Between BYC , the web and a book I bought at the feed store, I'm rite confoos'd

Seriously, I appreciate all of BYC's member experience with chickens, and the pictures really help me cuz I'm a visual learner.

I have a few questions for ya'll.

I've read that its "best" to have a "closed flock" and after the flock has lived out their egg layin' ability, then you should do another "closed flock". This approach is supposed to keep from exposin' the current flock to diseases and the "pecking order stress"
1) But what happens to that "risk" of exposure & stress when yer hen (s) lays eggs and hatches them, adding more chickens to the flock?
Seems odd to me.....but I aint too chickie savvy ?

2) Whats the best way to introduce new birds to the flock, whether hatched by a hen or purchased from the feed store?

3) 3 of our hens are wantin' to lay and sit on eggs.....or sit on an empty nest and not lay eggs.
Would it be a good idea to slip a few chicks under them hens and allow them to raise them? ( CalRanchers suggested that )
or should I raise them in a stock tank/brooder box with all the right goodies to grow them healthy? ( IFA suggested that )

I was going to buy 12 pullets from the feed store next week....now I'm scared to do the wrong thing by the lil' chicks and unintentionally kill them

 

[Penturner]

Hello to all the Reno and vicinity folks.
SunnyDawn, Nice to see you are making a comeback with your chicks. Here is the picture of the Incubator I was telling you about. It is the bottom half of a small commercial Ice maker.

I had a top made of 1/4 inch plexiglass but it warped just as the incubator reached 100 degrees or so. That can be fixed but I had the material for this top laying around in my shop. It works really well but is not a feature that can be repeated. That is 1 inch thick plexiglass and cost about $100 for a piece that big. Otherwise the "Box" sets up off the floor and is one piece double wall plastic filled with insulation. other than the top there is only one hole int he entire enclosure and that is a small drain hole in the bottom. it has been holding a temp of 100 to 101 for almost 36 hours now with the new top. I have not scrubbed it down yet but it will clean up very well when I do.

As you can see when you look inside the components are jsut placed in the incubator for now and nothing has been permanently placed yet.

I think it has finally leveled out at that 100.7 degree temp

I do not expect to keep the incubator still air like this. I was just messing around and doing some experimenting with this set up. this box contains a fan and will have 3 90 watt bulbs in it. the fan will carry air to and from the box through 1 1/2 inch PVC pipe. the only thing that will be in the egg chamber will be the thermostat, egg turner and eggs. nice clean and tidy.

I hope to get the heat box version together in the next couple of days and will let you know how it turns out. as a comparison the box is not being heated with just that one 40 watt bulb. I am thinking the 270 watts will have no problem keeping things toasty. temperature fluctuations may be a problem though.

I actually got two of these Ice maker lower half pieces. the other one is in even better shape and i do expect to make a second incubator just in case I need a back up.

 

[Dark Helmet]

Im in Pahrump. Might be nice for us to find other like minded people in the area. Chickens, horses and goats here