Well I'm not really sure what to do with this page, so I guess I'll, for now, use it like a diary of sorts........so here it goes....
3/20/2010:
For the last 5 weeks I've been in this site, and others, and reading books about raising some chicks of my own. and building a coop, and everything else that goes along with the hobby.......I'm hooked!!! Not sure I really know how or why, but I'm hooked. I have a coop planned out......I just cleaned out my brooder.... well, a wire dog kennel that I'm going to use as a brooder...well I just did that this morning. I have to pick up a shade or lamp I guess for my heat lamp...I have a bulb, and have a lamp or shade, but I see this morning when I was cleaning it off, that it's only rated for ujp to 100 watt bulbs.....well, 250 is my heat lamp....so this gives me an excuse to head to tractor supply, or my local agway and pick one up.....I'm secretly hoping that they have chicks that my wife and daughter will just have to have....I'm looking to get 6...
Well I have a dilema...my neighbor. Actually I have neighbors on all sides of me...but only really one that I'm worried about upsetting. I've checked with my town zoning official, and he said that I can have chickens as long as it's not a crazy number of them...20, 30....I'm only going for 6....and he said to stay away from roosters.....yup, I had that in mind already. If I lived on 40 acres with no neighbors, I'd probably have a few....but I live on an acre and a half.......so no rooster and I'm good with that.....and he said to keep the coop small....my plan for that at this time is inside demensions of 4 feet by 6 feet....that's the floor dimensions, with a height of about 5 feet...6 or so in the center when the roof is on....attached to that I plan on having a 6 or 8 foot long by 4 foot wide covered run....so when I'm at work, or at night if they wish, they have a safe place out of the weather to go outside......he's my issue.......When I'm out there I will let them out in the yard to scratch....I'm worried about my neighbor to the east of me...the only thing that seperates us is a driveway that leads to houses behind ours....that's it...so I know a chicken is going to wander into his yard and enjoy what it finds.....well like I said, they won't be out free ranging unless I am out there, and will round up and wander-er's?? lol....so I will go and get them if they wander out....but I'm worried that I may upset the guy with the whole raising chicks thing.... they are more than neighbors...consider them friendsm very good friends.....so this weekend, I plan on going over and talking to him to get his opinion.....I don't need his permission, but I want his opinion....I don't want to lose a freindship over chickens....
So that's pretty much where I stand.....I will try to add pictures as I go......which means I need to start taking some. ore
Thanks for stopping by. If you have any suggestions, feel free to send me a message...I'll take all the help I can get...
3/22/2010
Well I had the talk with my neighbor that I was a little nervous about upsetting. He's actually all for it. I don't know if he'd say if he wasn't, but he seemed more than good with the idea...even offered to help with the coop building!!! So that got me back into chick mode!!! Yesterday, we stopped at a Tractor Supply....just to see if I heard the little chirps....and also went to my local Agway store...no luck. They said possibly Thursday. My litte girl wants to buy one with her own money....and she wants to name it Charlie....at least that's the name as of yesterday. Today when I asked her if she still wanted to buy her own and name it, she said yes. When I asked her what she was going to name it, she said, "I wanna name it Henry's Mom." If that name sticks, it's looks like I'm also gonna have a girl named Henry!! So yesterday, I got my brooder aka dog kennel set up. Got it cleaned up, and the bottom half of it lined with cardboard. Today I rigged up my light on a rope with a pully system....hardly a system, but a pully none the less.....added some pine bedding chips, and I have my light plugged in...a test run if you will. As of right now, it's been on for about 50 minutes. Last I check about 10 minutes ago, it was holding at about 95, 96 degrees. I'm going to check again in a half hour or so and see where the temp is. If it's still in that 95, 96 degree range, I'm going to mark the rope so I know where it should be set for that temp, and from there, I will raise the rope to get the different temps I will need for when they get bigger. I have taken pics, and will post soon. I should have chicks this week, no later than this Saturday. I will post pics once I get them in there.....
Thanks for checking my page....stay tuned for udates and pics!!!
3/24/2010
I am now a happy daddy to two Rhode Island Reds, two Barred Rocks, and two Red Sexlinks!!! I'm sooooo excited!!! Took them about 40 minutes of sitting under the light to warm up, but then they started moving around a bunch more, and exploring the brooder more! Can't wait to get back home and check them out. I have to take my little girl to Agway after I pick her up from pre-school. She wants to pick her own out and pay with her own money and name it. I like the idea of her paying with her own money. Hopefully she'll grow up and be a doctor or a lawyer and continue to pay with her own money and not forget about good ole mom and dad!! Pics to follow!
3/25/2010.....4am
So yes I'm up at 4 am...well it's not 4am any longer. Showered, and then hurried down to check on my girls.....they're still there!! lol....so the first night of being a new daddy to 7, yes, 7 new fuzzy butts went well...better than I expected. I was good yesterday...only check on them like every 20 to 30 minutes. They are doing well. I do have one barred rock that seems a little more sluggish than the rest...but then again, this morning, she was up walking around, eating at the feeder and sipping some water so I think she'll be fine. Oh yeah, 7, not 6. So I went to my local Agway yesterday, on my lunch break, and picked up my 6. 6 is the minimum you have to buy....and I knew my little girl really wanted to pick one out on her own, and pay for it with her own money....like I said above....so I'm trying to do the math in my head, I'm slow and asked if I could just get 5 and then come back after I picked my girl up from school and bring her here to pick out the 6th one.....well the woman says, "I can't hold any, and I don't know if they'll be here when you get back".....ya...uh huh.....so she says "just get 7"....ya...uh huh......so being the sucker I am, and seeing as I was so excited that the chicks were finally there and I was going to be a new daddy to some little girls, I say, "7 it is". Pick up the girl, bring her to Agway, and with a little help from me, she picked out an all yellow Americanua...I hacked the spelling I'm sure but you know what I meant. I guided her to it, because we didn't have any of those, and I figured it would be easy for her to spot Charlie...yes, Charlie........out in the crowd.....it was cute. Told her we were going to a special store...and when we pulled in she says, "what's special about this place? We go here all the time. Nothing special here"....that is until we walked in and she heard the little chirps, and I led her to the girls....her eyes lit up....it was great! Well I best get my morning going....thanks for checking in...I'll have pics soon
oh, the whole "I don't know if they'll still be here when you get back" thing.....well I'd say that there was just about the same number of them left as there were when I was there 4 hours earlier....I'm a sucker
3/26/2010
Well I've had my girls for a couple days now. I love watching them....they are so cute. Had a little worry about heat so I heeded advice from someone here, and added a second heat lamp. They seem to be enjoying the extra heat very much. They are in my basement and the temp down there is about 55. I found them the first night and following morning really hanging out under the light. They would only venture out to grab a quick nibble of food, and a quick sip of water. So now with the extra heat lamp, they seem to lay more towards the middle of the brooder, and don't mind hanging out away from the light at the feeder a little longer. They seem much happier. I've wiped some dried poop from a few of the fuzzy butts. Since I've added the second light, they actually seem to be pooping more.......I don't understand it, but they seem happier and more active so that's all that matters.
I now understand what people mean when they say these little girls are addictive. I've only had my girls since wednesday afternoon, and I would love to walk into a Tractor Supply, or head back down to my local Agway and pick up a few more....if I lived on 10 acres or so......oh my.....I'd be elbow deep in chicken poo!!!
I've got a disk with some pics of them to load up on my computer, and will post some soon.....oh yeah, the disk, is at Wal Mart in Lisbon...if anyone is there, could you grab it for me?
Pics soon..stay tuned...
4/24/2010
My goodness. It's been almost a month since I posted here last. Well let me fill you in on where we stand. The girls are just over 4 weeks old now and getting big. I love the way they jump on the feeders and the water bottle and then swoop down on their sisters. Very funny. Not sure if they are fighting, or just keeping themselves occupied.....anyway, they are doing well. The coop is coming along very well. The walls are up...the roof is on and shingled, the doors are cut in, the framing for the run is about half way done.........so all in all, it is coming along very nicely. My father in law is helping me.....well, I must say, I am being a very good helper.....he has the skills, and I am there doing what I can. Of course it takes me twice as long to do the things he does, but thats why he's here....cause he has a clue as to what he's doing, and me.....not so much. Plus it's nice to spend some time with him and build this thing......but it's coming along very well. We still have to cut in the windows and frame them......won't be much longer now.....we've taken some pics, and I will post when I can. I need to figure out how to post them here. I have some from when I first got the girls, but I can't figure out how to post them here.......
I'll try not to wait so long before my next post here
3/20/2010:
For the last 5 weeks I've been in this site, and others, and reading books about raising some chicks of my own. and building a coop, and everything else that goes along with the hobby.......I'm hooked!!! Not sure I really know how or why, but I'm hooked. I have a coop planned out......I just cleaned out my brooder.... well, a wire dog kennel that I'm going to use as a brooder...well I just did that this morning. I have to pick up a shade or lamp I guess for my heat lamp...I have a bulb, and have a lamp or shade, but I see this morning when I was cleaning it off, that it's only rated for ujp to 100 watt bulbs.....well, 250 is my heat lamp....so this gives me an excuse to head to tractor supply, or my local agway and pick one up.....I'm secretly hoping that they have chicks that my wife and daughter will just have to have....I'm looking to get 6...
Well I have a dilema...my neighbor. Actually I have neighbors on all sides of me...but only really one that I'm worried about upsetting. I've checked with my town zoning official, and he said that I can have chickens as long as it's not a crazy number of them...20, 30....I'm only going for 6....and he said to stay away from roosters.....yup, I had that in mind already. If I lived on 40 acres with no neighbors, I'd probably have a few....but I live on an acre and a half.......so no rooster and I'm good with that.....and he said to keep the coop small....my plan for that at this time is inside demensions of 4 feet by 6 feet....that's the floor dimensions, with a height of about 5 feet...6 or so in the center when the roof is on....attached to that I plan on having a 6 or 8 foot long by 4 foot wide covered run....so when I'm at work, or at night if they wish, they have a safe place out of the weather to go outside......he's my issue.......When I'm out there I will let them out in the yard to scratch....I'm worried about my neighbor to the east of me...the only thing that seperates us is a driveway that leads to houses behind ours....that's it...so I know a chicken is going to wander into his yard and enjoy what it finds.....well like I said, they won't be out free ranging unless I am out there, and will round up and wander-er's?? lol....so I will go and get them if they wander out....but I'm worried that I may upset the guy with the whole raising chicks thing.... they are more than neighbors...consider them friendsm very good friends.....so this weekend, I plan on going over and talking to him to get his opinion.....I don't need his permission, but I want his opinion....I don't want to lose a freindship over chickens....
So that's pretty much where I stand.....I will try to add pictures as I go......which means I need to start taking some. ore
Thanks for stopping by. If you have any suggestions, feel free to send me a message...I'll take all the help I can get...
3/22/2010
Well I had the talk with my neighbor that I was a little nervous about upsetting. He's actually all for it. I don't know if he'd say if he wasn't, but he seemed more than good with the idea...even offered to help with the coop building!!! So that got me back into chick mode!!! Yesterday, we stopped at a Tractor Supply....just to see if I heard the little chirps....and also went to my local Agway store...no luck. They said possibly Thursday. My litte girl wants to buy one with her own money....and she wants to name it Charlie....at least that's the name as of yesterday. Today when I asked her if she still wanted to buy her own and name it, she said yes. When I asked her what she was going to name it, she said, "I wanna name it Henry's Mom." If that name sticks, it's looks like I'm also gonna have a girl named Henry!! So yesterday, I got my brooder aka dog kennel set up. Got it cleaned up, and the bottom half of it lined with cardboard. Today I rigged up my light on a rope with a pully system....hardly a system, but a pully none the less.....added some pine bedding chips, and I have my light plugged in...a test run if you will. As of right now, it's been on for about 50 minutes. Last I check about 10 minutes ago, it was holding at about 95, 96 degrees. I'm going to check again in a half hour or so and see where the temp is. If it's still in that 95, 96 degree range, I'm going to mark the rope so I know where it should be set for that temp, and from there, I will raise the rope to get the different temps I will need for when they get bigger. I have taken pics, and will post soon. I should have chicks this week, no later than this Saturday. I will post pics once I get them in there.....
Thanks for checking my page....stay tuned for udates and pics!!!
3/24/2010
I am now a happy daddy to two Rhode Island Reds, two Barred Rocks, and two Red Sexlinks!!! I'm sooooo excited!!! Took them about 40 minutes of sitting under the light to warm up, but then they started moving around a bunch more, and exploring the brooder more! Can't wait to get back home and check them out. I have to take my little girl to Agway after I pick her up from pre-school. She wants to pick her own out and pay with her own money and name it. I like the idea of her paying with her own money. Hopefully she'll grow up and be a doctor or a lawyer and continue to pay with her own money and not forget about good ole mom and dad!! Pics to follow!
3/25/2010.....4am
So yes I'm up at 4 am...well it's not 4am any longer. Showered, and then hurried down to check on my girls.....they're still there!! lol....so the first night of being a new daddy to 7, yes, 7 new fuzzy butts went well...better than I expected. I was good yesterday...only check on them like every 20 to 30 minutes. They are doing well. I do have one barred rock that seems a little more sluggish than the rest...but then again, this morning, she was up walking around, eating at the feeder and sipping some water so I think she'll be fine. Oh yeah, 7, not 6. So I went to my local Agway yesterday, on my lunch break, and picked up my 6. 6 is the minimum you have to buy....and I knew my little girl really wanted to pick one out on her own, and pay for it with her own money....like I said above....so I'm trying to do the math in my head, I'm slow
and asked if I could just get 5 and then come back after I picked my girl up from school and bring her here to pick out the 6th one.....well the woman says, "I can't hold any, and I don't know if they'll be here when you get back".....ya...uh huh.....so she says "just get 7"....ya...uh huh......so being the sucker I am, and seeing as I was so excited that the chicks were finally there and I was going to be a new daddy to some little girls, I say, "7 it is". Pick up the girl, bring her to Agway, and with a little help from me, she picked out an all yellow Americanua...I hacked the spelling I'm sure but you know what I meant. I guided her to it, because we didn't have any of those, and I figured it would be easy for her to spot Charlie...yes, Charlie........out in the crowd.....it was cute. Told her we were going to a special store...and when we pulled in she says, "what's special about this place? We go here all the time. Nothing special here"....that is until we walked in and she heard the little chirps, and I led her to the girls....her eyes lit up....it was great! Well I best get my morning going....thanks for checking in...I'll have pics soonoh, the whole "I don't know if they'll still be here when you get back" thing.....well I'd say that there was just about the same number of them left as there were when I was there 4 hours earlier....I'm a sucker
3/26/2010
Well I've had my girls for a couple days now. I love watching them....they are so cute. Had a little worry about heat so I heeded advice from someone here, and added a second heat lamp. They seem to be enjoying the extra heat very much. They are in my basement and the temp down there is about 55. I found them the first night and following morning really hanging out under the light. They would only venture out to grab a quick nibble of food, and a quick sip of water. So now with the extra heat lamp, they seem to lay more towards the middle of the brooder, and don't mind hanging out away from the light at the feeder a little longer. They seem much happier. I've wiped some dried poop from a few of the fuzzy butts. Since I've added the second light, they actually seem to be pooping more.......I don't understand it, but they seem happier and more active so that's all that matters.
I now understand what people mean when they say these little girls are addictive. I've only had my girls since wednesday afternoon, and I would love to walk into a Tractor Supply, or head back down to my local Agway and pick up a few more....if I lived on 10 acres or so......oh my.....I'd be elbow deep in chicken poo!!!
I've got a disk with some pics of them to load up on my computer, and will post some soon.....oh yeah, the disk, is at Wal Mart in Lisbon...if anyone is there, could you grab it for me?
Pics soon..stay tuned...
4/24/2010
My goodness. It's been almost a month since I posted here last. Well let me fill you in on where we stand. The girls are just over 4 weeks old now and getting big. I love the way they jump on the feeders and the water bottle and then swoop down on their sisters. Very funny. Not sure if they are fighting, or just keeping themselves occupied.....anyway, they are doing well. The coop is coming along very well. The walls are up...the roof is on and shingled, the doors are cut in, the framing for the run is about half way done.........so all in all, it is coming along very nicely. My father in law is helping me.....well, I must say, I am being a very good helper.....he has the skills, and I am there doing what I can. Of course it takes me twice as long to do the things he does, but thats why he's here....cause he has a clue as to what he's doing, and me.....not so much. Plus it's nice to spend some time with him and build this thing......but it's coming along very well. We still have to cut in the windows and frame them......won't be much longer now.....we've taken some pics, and I will post when I can. I need to figure out how to post them here. I have some from when I first got the girls, but I can't figure out how to post them here.......
I'll try not to wait so long before my next post here