Temperament is #1, and it's early times yet. 'Friendly' cockerels can become bad boys, because they are fearless and actually sizing you up as someone to push around later.
Do you have adult hens or roosters, or is this your first batch of chicks? Having adults around to 'civilize' cockerels...
Welcome!
I agree about buying fencing to manage them better, and the electrified poultry netting from Premier1 is a really good choice for you. Fencing is absolutely necessary, for your patio, the neighbors, and the safety of your birds!
As you've learned, chickens dig holes, eat plants, and...
I do know about them, concerning hay and livestock/ horses. Bad bugs!
They don't live here, at least so far, but getting hay from some other places can be a problem.
And I'm so glad your dog is okay!
Mary
Recently I bought six porcelain d'Uccles at a feed store, and it looks like four of them are cockerels. Figures, right? If anyone is looking for cute bantam boys, let me know!
Mary
What's hard is finding a flat nylon type collar with anything except those plastic (breakable!) locks. I still have one old collar, safety orange, with good hardware, if I need to use one, which is nearly never.
My story about idiots wanting to pet the cute doggy:
Years ago I found a middle...
I know that for bears, it's recommended that some meat/ bacon be attached to the electric fence, so the critter gets a nice zap in the mouth or nose.
Mary
You need shooting experience and training, don't just borrow a gun and hope for a good outcome!!!
Electric fencing will deter this cat, get it set up properly with a nice hot charger soonest!
And talk to your DNR about how close this cat is coming towards you and how unafraid it is, doesn't...
And the Herman Sprenger prong collars are by far the best ones! Our pointer broke his first prong collar, not a good thing, in the field, and I learned. Buy a good one!
Mary
I read this thread today, it's been a good fun read! Lots of good advice and interesting stories.
About transitioning to off lead at a distance: long ago I had experience training a Chessie for bird work, and a GSHP for field bird work. Different types of field work, but the transition from...
Good advice so far!
Our coop/ run combination is roofed, and built up to code for residential structures, because I'm in it and don't want suprises...
Please fix that run roof before winter, there's no way you will want to be out there at 2AM in a blizzard or ice storm trying to save it.
When...
So sorry!
I've had this happen once, with a first time broody hen, and agree, never again will she brood eggs here!
One survivor, who I found still alive, that she'd buried in the shavings! We were able to buy a few chicks to meld with this one lone chick, first under a heat lamp, and then the...
Years ago we bought Belgian d'Uccles from MurrayMcMurray hatchery, and their catalog then stated that some of the birds would have beards, and some not. That's what arrived, and because we wanted those cute muffs, we selected for that trait and bred out the beardless ones.
Recently i bought...
Years ago, three different hatcheries, SS straight run chicks. I wanted to have a small breeding group, so needed some cockerels. Maybe ten or twelve males over a couple of years, so not a huge number, but still...
As they matured, some were human aggressive (very!) and some were polite...