Recent content by Johnboy78

I have a cube, this is my third year. I have eight hens. I live in NY on Long Island. They've made it down to zero on winter nites and I don't close the coop door. Every time I have to clean it I fall in love with it again. Cleaning out the poop is under 15 minutes. (the poop part is probably...

Last year I was having problems with renegades laying in secret places. Someone recommended spackle containers from the hardware store. Probably about 5 gallons, comes with a lid. Cut a rough square in the lid, put in some straw and make it so they won't roll. I didn't worry about additional air...

Mine started free ranging at about 10-11 weeks. Mine are really back yard chickens in a suburban yard about 100 x 100. Multiple trees and shrubs. Hawks are predominant predators here and mine got swooped within first two weeks. They scattered, hid and froze for nearly an hour. They have a lot...

I use Layena and have separate bowls for oyster shell and for grit in different places in my yard. The oyster shell and grit gradually disappear, seems like a "every so often" kind of thing. Since it's not an everyday thing like feeding it does run out periodically and it's one of the...

I got my first chickens, mixed 8 females last May and they were loose in my 1/4 acre backyard by July. They'd been out two weeks when I witnessed my first hawk swoop. We've got a lot of redtails that circle this area. My yard though is not an open good for gardening yard, it's a landscaped...

Last winter one of my Yokohamas age 9 mos did not join the others in returning to the coop. It was dark when I locked it up, I didn't know. She's always been the runt of my little mixed flock and Yokohama are not supposed to be coldhardy. That night it went below 15 degrees, I know it isn't...

I saw what looked like and egg on the deck a few days ago. When I got closer I saw it was a poop. A big one, and the white coating covered most of it. Now I'm noticing more of them, poops the size of large to extra large eggs. And the white (urea?) is fairly tough, hangs together when I hose...

Actually I'm not going to do anything. Herons are not a danger for chickens, the goldfish in my pond are more at risk. As for the hawks the girls have been avoiding them successfully for a year now. Based on the number of hawks I've seen overhead they avoid them daily. Less than 50% of my...

Within a week of being let out of the run at 10 weeks my little flock of eight was swooped by hawks. It seems like it has become a frequent part of their lives since then. My suburban backyard is heavily treed and shrubbed, flowers and tomatoes are not an option for me. But the abundance of...

Paulette, my chicken who went AWOL, is broody. This is my guess based on some experienced comments here. She came out from under the deck just now, I hadn't seen her in two days. (I'm not always in the backyard so I don't know how often she emerges) She seems very jittery, puffing out her...

Only experience is with two RIR girls as part of a mixed backyard flock now 1 year old. Placid and reasonable friendly, get along fine with the other breeds and lay big eggs.

After nearly 2 months without rain we got a nice deluge yesterday, at least 5 inches, and we were leaving to go out and I figured since it was pouring out I'd put them in early before we left. So I led the scratch parade to the run and just as I was putting the little bucket back into the...

I'd posted this winter how Paulette, a redshouldered yokohama didn't go into the coop and spent the night by herself somewhere during a 15 degree night. After that I threw scratch in the run to get them all in at dusk, then did a head count and locked them in. They've become accustomed to the...

Speaking only for my own chickens, they do not like herbs, did not touch the mint, the oregano, the parsley, the basil, or the tarragon. All the damage they did was due to the scratching between the plants. They ate only certain flowers in my flower box, most they did not like. This spring...