The Buckeye Thread

[Theresa D]

Love your birds

Ive just started letting mine free range, just a little scary,but they get to bed on their own

That was my biggest fear,rounding them all up.

 

[PA Farmer24]

LOL yeah I had mine penned up for about a month. was working on the pen/coop and said what the hay let them out. they all stuck around and stayed very close. Now they our let out every day and while the do go out and run around they stay pretty close and even at times just hang in the pens. Thanks as well. I do love this breed and I am glad that I found them.

 

[Theresa D]

Me too I love their color it hides them pretty good in the brush,and they chase bugs everywhere!

 

[PA Farmer24]

This was a video I filmed a few weeks as well of my golden Silver Cockerel gettin his crow on for the first time. LOL So

hearing it for the first time. Also is the rest of my birds. This was before I started letting them out.

 

[Theresa D]

How cool that sound is! I cant wait,mine r still babies,9 weeks,I seem to have 4 cockerels though, I wonder if they will have a melody

 

[knittychickadee]

The best option if it is available to you is to have hens hatch and raise chicks. The best hens to hatch and raise chicks are game hens. I can let the game hens hatch, and they will keep the chicks in the coop for the first week or so (or until they are strong enough to travel) and then venture out with them staying close at first but keeping them out of harms way. As they grow, they take them farther and farther out. If the game hens hatches them out in the blackberry patch (or under some bush, under the front porch, in the tractor pit, etc.), then they wait til they can walk & keep them close to the coops and will take them somewhere safe at night. They pretty much take care of themselves. My game hens have not lost a chick outside to date. Some birds of mine have roamed free from day one with the mother game hen (freezing temps in the morning and all) --- this is the best way to raise birds if your set-up permits it.

Buckeye hens are good at hatching too, but they are different at raising the chicks than game hens. I do not trust them to free range with their chicks. Other hens may pick on the Buckeye mother, and she is not as aggressive as the game hen. Buckeye hens can sit and hatch a greater number of eggs in a clutch due to their size. I just keep the Buckeye hen and chicks penned. When they are about 6 weeks old, I remove the hen and move the chicks to a transition (temporary pen) in whatever coop I want to train them to. I keep them in there about a week or two. I then let the young birds out in the coop with the grown birds. The coops are opened so all birds can free range. The young birds are hesitant at first to go outside the coop. My coops are large & can each hold 30-40 birds easily. They start venturing out & then going father and farther. When the cockerels get unbearable, I pen them. When 16-20 weeks old, then I butcher all but the best (the keepers). Buckeye hen in a pen with chicks:



When I incubator hatch & brood chicks indoors, depending upon the temperatures outside, I will move them to a pen in one of the barns when they are from 3-6 weeks old. If it is still cold outside, I can put a couple of lights in the pen (using 75-100 W bulbs). I let them grow and then move them to the coop like I would the Buckeye hen raised birds. The process is the same thereafter. People will do it differently & it will depend on each person's individual set-up as to what will work for them. You have to find what works for you. One thing I have discovered over the years is that chicks 4 weeks and older, in my neck of the woods, are not as fragile as I once thought. They are quite precocious & can do for themselves quite well. Here is one of the pens in the barns with incubator-hatched chicks. I think they would be just fine without the lights but I like the extra light as the barn is shaded & can be kind of dark.:



I once had a couple of Buckeye chicks who were late (incubator) hatchers after I had hatched some & shipped. I was left with two chicks. I only kept them indoors for a couple of weeks as I did not want to raise just two chicks. The temps were warm outside that particular year so I put them out in a little plastic (dog gate) pen. They took care of themselves and became adults outside completely free (never penned except for the first three weeks). I could not do it this way if I did not have my dogs and donkey (with the pastures surrounding my barns). Predators do not venture on my place even though behind me is a National Forest with plenty of animals that eat chicken.

This is one of my 4 dogs who stay outside most of the time (I let them rotate to indoors). This dog is half hound (probably beagle), and I believe half yellow pit. He was a stray I took in. He is good at keeping predators and strange dogs away:

Great looking dog Chris, I love anything with hound in it. I agree a good dog is key to free ranging. I've got a German Shorthaired Pointer that keeps everything that doesn't belong on the property either scared away from it or dead. She's in the house with us at night because my birds are locked up tight at dusk, every window and itty bitty space anything could possibly fit into covered with hardware cloth fastened down with screws and large washers so it can't be pulled loose by nasty coons etc. I find it funny that she has learned the noise the roosters and birds with youngsters will start making when a hawk comes around, and she will quickly look up in the sky and in the trees trying to see where it is.

 

[Pathfinders]

Great looking dog Chris, I love anything with hound in it. I agree a good dog is key to free ranging. I've got a German Shorthaired Pointer that keeps everything that doesn't belong on the property either scared away from it or dead. She's in the house with us at night because my birds are locked up tight at dusk, every window and itty bitty space anything could possibly fit into covered with hardware cloth fastened down with screws and large washers so it can't be pulled loose by nasty coons etc. I find it funny that she has learned the noise the roosters and birds with youngsters will start making when a hawk comes around, and she will quickly look up in the sky and in the trees trying to see where it is.

Our Anatolian has also learned to watch for hawks, and manages (most times) to keep them at bay with his barking, although once in a while a brave one will attempt to drop down. But most of what we have here are Sharp Shinned, and they are too small to take a chicken, especially one as heavy as a Buckeye.

 

[007medic]

So, the time had come for all the randy cockerels to go either to the breeding program or to freezer camp. They lived an excellent short life for 22 weeks, ranging through the pastures, the woods and the barns. They never knew disease, care or worry. We can sit down to dinner with the knowledge that this meal is thanks to responsible, ethical and humane stewardship.The fruits of yesterday's labors:




And folks, lemme tell ya', if you're working solo to process your birds, do yourself a sterling favor, save up all your nickels, dimes and quarters for a year and get you one of these:





You will bless the ever-lovin' stars in heaven above if you get one of these babies, especially when you see it clean a couple of birds in about 20 seconds.......(no lie!)

 

[Theresa D]

I've been looking at this,it is pricey,do you notice any bruising on your birds? I havent started that far into chickens but will be doing our own.

 

[Pathfinders]

What brand of plucker is that?