Really dumb question....

[Wisconsin-Chick]

You guys are totally the BEST. I pictured all of you shaking your heads thinking I must be nuts! Haha! So glad I joined this site! My next question-do you free feed your chickens? Or only feed them at certain times of day?

 

[lazy gardener]

The only other comment I have to make... actually I have 2 comments to make! #1: No question is a dumb question. We all learn by asking questions.

#2: You might want to stay away from the birds that have pouffy heads. They have a hard time scanning for predators, and are often the first ones picked off by a predator. Also, the birds with the normal "hair-do's" sometimes bully the puff heads. I assume you have cold winters. IMO, birds with feathered feet or large floppy combs are best left for more temperate climates. My preference for my zone 4 flock is to choose birds with pea or rose combs, and non feathered feet. You might want to check Henderson's chicken breeds chart. Also, best to get all of your new birds at the same time and from the same source. That will make integration easier. Is your coop and run big enough to house an expanded flock? (4 s.f. in the coop and 10 s.f. in the run per bird.)

Enjoy your flock.

 

[Folly's place]

I have always kept feeders full in the coop or run, and let the birds eat as needed. For laying hens, layer feed and separate oyster shell. For your tiny group, Flock Raiser and separate oyster shell, and separate grit if they aren't out free ranging. Some scratch and scraps as treats, not meant to be a total diet. A few more hens would be good, so enjoy! I'm paranoid about biosecurity, and so extremely careful about new birds and visitors. Mary

 

[Ridgerunner]

The last part of the mating ritual after the rooster has done his job and hopped off, the hen stands up, fluffs up, and shakes. This fluffy shake gets the sperm into a special container inside the hen near where the egg yolk starts its journey through the hen’s internal egg making factory. That egg yolk can only be fertilized during the first few minutes of that journey. After a successful mating, that sperm can normally stay viable for two to three weeks. That means the rooster only needs to mate with a specific hen once every two weeks or so to keep her eggs fertile.

A fertile egg is no different than a non-fertile egg as long as you don’t incubate it. Don’t store them above 80 degrees. As long as you gather them all once a day they are fine even if they are under a broody hen. It takes longer than that for anything noticeable to happen.

Unless you know exactly how much each hen needs to eat, it’s best to keep food available to them throughout the day. That way the bullies don’t keep the weaker ones from eating enough.

Last thought: Don’t hurt your chickens by being too embarrassed to ask a question. We all have to start somewhere.

 

[Wisconsin-Chick]

I seriously cannot thank you guys enough for all the help! I will never ever be afraid to ask a question especially after I already asked the really awkward ones. Haha!

We do have really harsh winters, my husband is building a coup for in the garage for when it gets to be too cold for them to be in the outside coup he built when we first got Penny & Copper. The outside coup doesn't have a bottom on it obviously because they peck at the grass/ground all day. On the few days that it's poured, even though 3/4 of the top of the coup is covered(for shade), we've moved the coup into the garage & used pine shavings for the bottom. When we've put them back outside again, we just throw away the shavings. But when we finish the coup in the garage, we were thinking of putting down a type of plastic at the bottom of the coup & then the pine shavings so the shavings aren't just on the garage floor. Is that a good idea or no?

 

[Just sayin]

I happened to have taken some pics this morning of my rooster Cogburn and his multi-cultural harem.

You know all those videos you've seen of male birds going to great effort to perform magnificent displays to impress and woo a potential mate?



Doesn't happen with chickens.



With chickens, it's "run them down and grab 'em". Just preparing you. There isn't a lot of romance to bein' a chicken. He is a very good lookout guard for his ladies, and there is a very sweet and chivalrous thing he does when he finds a particularly good bug he'd like to offer them... but sometimes I think he does it just to lure them in closer so he doesn't have to chase them. I guess he earns his keep in ways other than romance.

Good news is it doesn't last a long time... And the hens don't brood about it. Part of life

 

[Wisconsin-Chick]

See, I had no clue that's how it was done! Thanks for sharing

 

[Just sayin]

No problem. Everything I know about chickens, I've learned in the last several months since getting these.

Truthfully, we weren't supposed to have a rooster at all. He was supposed to be a girl. Sexing is not 100% in chicks. We really don't want to hatch any chicks, and I wasn't even real fond of the idea of fertilized eggs. I had some bad experiences with a friend's farm eggs long ago that just about put me off eggs forever. But I've since learned that there was something seriously lacking about my friend's chicken management and egg collecting routine. If they're collected promptly and chilled, they aren't going to develop.

So the rooster gets to stay if he doesn't become a jerk. That's the rule so far. He is at least becoming a very pretty bird - people buy lawn ornaments that aren't as pretty, right?

 

[Amastacia]

...

#2: You might want to stay away from the birds that have pouffy heads. They have a hard time scanning for predators, and are often the first ones picked off by a predator. Also, the birds with the normal "hair-do's" sometimes bully the puff heads.

...

x2. last year i tried to introduce a Polish to my mixed flock, and it didn't go well. the other birds almost killed him a few times before i did some flock rearranging with a friend and got the problem birds out of the flock. stick with "normal" looking birds will probably be easiest.

 

[BayBay Peepers]

If you put plastic down before the shavings I believe that will reduce your clean up a lot. And you save your basement floor a bit. You can go either way and not hurt anything. And I agree with the above posts with all day access to feed and water. I also leave a dish of oyster shell and grit (separately).

When introducing new birds keep them quarantined for about 30 days. That way you know if they have any illness or at least get a pretty good idea. Then just go slow. Let them see each other, but no touch for a while. When you're ready to integrate I've had a lot of luck putting in new birds at night. It's almost like they wake up and decide the new ones must have been there all along

Also: As long as your coop is draft free your chickens should be quite alright. I leave our run gate open and give them the option of in or out. Most of the winter they want to be out, but those -40 days we had last winter they chose to stay in.