Sumatra Thread!

[AllenK RGV]

Introducing myself to this forum thread as I had ordered a clutch of 1 day Black Sumatra chicks from mypetchicken and we have all made it through our first week together. After reading the first 55 pages(intimadating but informative) of this thread and then skipped to the last 55 I feel comfortable posting. I was very concerned that 7 have mostly all yellow feet and legs still, but have had the majority of my questions answered, and am expecting them to blacken up after reading. I will be incredibly disappointed if they(hatchery) didn't breed to APA standards as I want a true to breed birds with the green sheen at maturity. I am thinking if they aren't too pretty I will use this flock to pave the way forward to securing the property against predators. We have mesquite trees everywhere and they will be free ranging from probably 4 months on is my plan provided they can fly by then. I live about as far south as you can go in Texas and about 25% of my neighbors successfully keep chicken. We do have Coyote here but with 8 mesquite trees alone in the 50'x100' fenced in and staked down chain link fence enclosure I am betting they will do ok. If not I'll reinforce the base with "Hardware Cloth", I am a bit concerned about the hawks but we always have nesting mockingbirds on the property and they don't tolerate hawks in the least. I'm pretty sure my hunter killer cat is already trained against chicken as he is deadly afraid to meet these chicks so I bet he had a go at the neighbors flock and learned a lesson. Does anyone see any major flaws other than ordering from a hatchery? Time will tell if I got a true to APA standard but I need to know how to provide a safe environment before doing any chicken math.

 

[TattooedChicks]

Introducing myself to this forum thread as I had ordered a clutch of 1 day Black Sumatra chicks from mypetchicken and we have all made it through our first week together. After reading the first 55 pages(intimadating but informative) of this thread and then skipped to the last 55 I feel comfortable posting. I was very concerned that 7 have mostly all yellow feet and legs still, but have had the majority of my questions answered, and am expecting them to blacken up after reading. I will be incredibly disappointed if they(hatchery) didn't breed to APA standards as I want a true to breed birds with the green sheen at maturity. I am thinking if they aren't too pretty I will use this flock to pave the way forward to securing the property against predators. We have mesquite trees everywhere and they will be free ranging from probably 4 months on is my plan provided they can fly by then. I live about as far south as you can go in Texas and about 25% of my neighbors successfully keep chicken. We do have Coyote here but with 8 mesquite trees alone in the 50'x100' fenced in and staked down chain link fence enclosure I am betting they will do ok. If not I'll reinforce the base with "Hardware Cloth", I am a bit concerned about the hawks but we always have nesting mockingbirds on the property and they don't tolerate hawks in the least. I'm pretty sure my hunter killer cat is already trained against chicken as he is deadly afraid to meet these chicks so I bet he had a go at the neighbors flock and learned a lesson. Does anyone see any major flaws other than ordering from a hatchery? Time will tell if I got a true to APA standard but I need to know how to provide a safe environment before doing any chicken math.

Mine had very yellow feet to start, but sure enough 6 weeks later and even the toenails are starting to turn jet black and the white feathers on the face are nearly gone. Watch the comb and the shape of the body as they grow, that will tell you a lot about being kept to standard.

Hawks have been a big problem for me, especially the young, brash ones. Investing in hawk netting has been worth every penny. Do your chickens have a place or two on the ground to hide incase they can't get to a tree fast enough? Like shrubs or a collection of branches to slip under?

 

[AllenK RGV]

Follow on post I have never seen any of our Owls(just regurgitated evidence) around here but plan on coup training them at night hopefully they will come out of the trees in the evening later in life and return to the coop. I have an old 10x10 doghouse that I am brainstorming construction modifications for layer boxes and proper ventilation, raccoon secure locking doors ect.... to protect them from the big bad world, Automatic nipple watering systems ect..

 

[AllenK RGV]

Mine had very yellow feet to start, but sure enough 6 weeks later and even the toenails are starting to turn jet black and the white feathers on the face are nearly gone. Watch the comb and the shape of the body as they grow, that will tell you a lot about being kept to standard.

Hawks have been a big problem for me, especially the young, brash ones. Investing in hawk netting has been worth every penny. Do your chickens have a place or two on the ground to hide incase they can't get to a tree fast enough? Like shrubs or a collection of branches to slip under?

Oh Yes we have a mini chicken run almost as decking around the above ground pool, a tiki bar pretty much structure or citrus bush every 20 feet heavy duty evergreen screening lining the driveway, and of course dogs who will be easily trained to alert on any chicken distress call they hear they will be alerting us needs to be investigated.

 

[SilverKelpie]

I was very concerned that 7 have mostly all yellow feet and legs still, but have had the majority of my questions answered, and am expecting them to blacken up after reading. I will be incredibly disappointed if they(hatchery) didn't breed to APA standards as I want a true to breed birds with the green sheen at maturity. ... Does anyone see any major flaws other than ordering from a hatchery? Time will tell if I got a true to APA standard but I need to know how to provide a safe environment before doing any chicken math.

This is my 11-week old Sumatra from My Pet Chicken. She does have a lovely green iridescence in the sunlight that I haven't caught on camera, and black legs. She has white toenails, which I suspect is a flaw, though I haven't read the APA standard, or know if it is something that they might outgrow in the same fashion as the white feathers.

 

[AllenK RGV]

This is my 11-week old Sumatra from My Pet Chicken. She does have a lovely green iridescence in the sunlight that I haven't caught on camera, and black legs. She has white toenails, which I suspect is a flaw, though I haven't read the APA standard, or know if it is something that they might outgrow in the same fashion as the white feathers.View attachment 1088081

Thank you for the reassurance, if you read the first 55 or so pages of this thread they are some highly talented breeders who frown on ordering from hatcheries. I just wanted basic breed types for organic pest control and not show birds also I was hoping not to get good layers as both my wife and I are not ova eaters. I ordered 10 and naturally shipping was more than the birds themselves. I don't wan't to let any of them down so have been doing the 2x daily butt checks and did have to combat quite a bit of pasty butt but it looks like that may be behind(no pun intended but it is appreciated) us. Her tail angle in this picture seems a bit low but were she mine I would be thrilled to have her. Apparently ants evicted the cockroaches under our citrus and they decided to move into the house so my hope is these guys and gals will do the work of the exterminator for us. We bought a great dustbuster at Wally World and have been imprinting them on cockroaches which has been great fun to watch. My brood decimates them much to my enjoyment they currentlt live in a bathtub with pine shavings I added after yesterdays upgrade from a cardboard substrate. I hate what a mess they are making of their water so plan on putting something like this in the coop one arm inside and one outside since you have to glue this yourself.
https://www.amazon.com/The-Chicken-...srs=11455256011&ie=UTF8&qid=1500866275&sr=8-4

I truly hope mine will be as nice as your's appears. Thanks you so much for this information. Also I wan't whatever all of these scorpions are eating to be gone too! My wife is so afraid to go out at night as I can usually blacklight and remove 15 per night I have high hopes for this flock to fix a cockroach/scorpion infestation.

 

[Then I Will]

This is my 11-week old Sumatra from My Pet Chicken. She does have a lovely green iridescence in the sunlight that I haven't caught on camera, and black legs. She has white toenails, which I suspect is a flaw, though I haven't read the APA standard, or know if it is something that they might outgrow in the same fashion as the white feathers.View attachment 1088081

Your 11 week chick looks like a cockerel to me, SilverKelpie.

We can all frown on ordering from hatcheries, but some of us don't live close enough to anyone who keeps this rare breed to obtain better stock. Myself included, who won't even afford an incubator and buy eggs. The breeders had to start somewhere too... so I shall start with what I could afford.

 

[SilverKelpie]

Your 11 week chick looks like a cockerel to me, SilverKelpie.

We can all frown on ordering from hatcheries, but some of us don't live close enough to anyone who keeps this rare breed to obtain better stock. Myself included, who won't even afford an incubator and buy eggs. The breeders had to start somewhere too... so I shall start with what I could afford.

Well, that's a shame. That 10% chance is why I braced myself for the possibility of having to learn to butcher a chicken, though. Too bad it's one of my favorites. She's extremely quiet and always lurking under scrub or in the background, and that unusual personality really drew me to her. Bummer.

As for hatcheries, I get it, I really do. It must be lousy to work so hard on your stock and try to earn anything for it, and then see people go to some big business and spend their money there. For me though, the potential for bringing home a disease, the potential of having to deal with off-kilter personalities, and the extra difficulty of having to deal with multiple sources to get the variety I wanted, combined with the fact that I'm doing this casually and not for show, drove me to a hatchery.

 

[Lauravonsmurf]

Feel free to post pictures as they develop the show folks can explain the good and bad of your flock so if you choose to improve For type you can... they can also usually help explain genetics. This is one of the breeds I drool over as just stunning... Hatchery birds are what they are but can akways be used to get ones feet wet with breeds and chickens in general... besides you never know my daughter won in showing with Hatchery birds, everyone said it was impossible but she did well. She got lucky with her chicks maybe or maybe the feed store in question just had really good supplier. They did get some very rare birds in from time to time for very special orders and poultry was their speciality.

All my current birds are Hatchery... though I plan to hopefully get an incubator for some hatching eggs next spring for Cornish maybe.

As for predators be pro active, nothing is worse than a yard full of bloody feathers. I know I have come home to it. Here is what I have done and I live in suburbia based on previous suburban experiences of carnage... in my area are creeks which the wildlife including coyotes and mountain lions use to travel unseen through neighborhoods hunting deer and turkey that also use the creeks, so I got it all skunks, raccoons, dogs, cats, weasels, coyotes, possum, fixes, snakes, owls, vultures and hawks... I am very aware of these critters as I have seen them.

I have my backyard fence, then in second fenced in area I have my coop soon to be coops inside of... which sit on floors I made burrow proof, I used loose laid bricks so I can scrub them down and still have some drainage. The coops I have are not the best as they are kits... but they do include a covered with wood roof runs. This means when the birds are locked up nothing can swoop in and get them, my birds free range my back yard making them hawk targets though during the day, but they have lots of coverage, and I open all doors to coop run so the hens have 3 exits in case a hawk or cat tried to attack durring the day.

In a perfect world my coops would be built out of super sturdy wood (which I suggest over kit coop wood if coyotes are threat) with super strong but small opening wire framed/sandwhiched between wood panels to prevent it from being easily pushed in. I would keep the run completely covered with a solid roof and have multiple exits/enterances like I have now for day time free ranging and escape in case a gutsy hawk or other critter gets in during the day... if I could I would hot wire my coops at night, along with camera, door motion sensor and audio monitoring for the night... Maybe even a light that turns on from motion around the coop.

My current system (less sturdy secure) is working but something is trying to gain Night entry... gnawed wood on outside of the coop I just moved is proof along with obvious but failed attempts to dig under coop due to me bricking in the whole 10 x 10 space the little coop with run is in except for the raised beds which now have dug down wire in them. The critters stalking my birds at night though can squeeze through the black fence around this garden chicken coop area... I may need to wire additional fencing to it... I just moved the little coop to build a second, after finding the damage to the wood on it caused by critter teeth I must make sure I burrow proof it's floor as it is going to be placed in an old flower bed and I should add wood to it's base to repair damage so nothing can breach the coops at night.

But in a perfect world my birds would be secured like some dinosaur from Jurasic Park to keep them safe.. not there yet in building skills or budget...

Consider digging wire down and out around your coop and putting bricks, rocks, that sort of stuff on top to discourages coyotes digging under ar night... also real solid latches and locks, critters are smart... hit YouTube to see various critters attack coops caught on film... keep wire openings small as raccoons will pull chickens heads through at nigh and kill them that way. Some folks make sure coop or run roosts are placed in such a way that no animal can pull a sleeping birds head through.

Happy keeping.

 

[Then I Will]

[QUOTE="As for hatcheries, I get it, I really do. It must be lousy to work so hard on your stock and try to earn anything for it, and then see people go to some big business and spend their money there. For me though, the potential for bringing home a disease, the potential of having to deal with off-kilter personalities, and the extra difficulty of having to deal with multiple sources to get the variety I wanted, combined with the fact that I'm doing this casually and not for show, drove me to a hatchery.[/QUOTE]

If that was sarcasm, Silverkelpie, it is NOT appreciated. I spent months lurking BYC here for folks in the Pennsylvania area who raise Black Sumatras and had no bites- not even from other New England states. After years of saying I would never order from a hatchery, I had to swallow my pride and do what I thought I would never do.
I will be spending a lot of time and effort to breed to SOP in hopes that buyers in PA will be able to find me and not have to order from a hatchery when they want Sumatras. I was forewarned that this could be years of work and culling, but it was what I had to do. I am very enthusiastic and passionate about this breed, new to the breed, and willing to learn all I can about it. I found the breed when I decided to choose a rare/exotic breed to preserve.