Our rooster has been well behaved until now, but last week we had a hen with a neck slashed so badly on the back we had to put her down. We thought it was a hawk. But today we had another bloody hen, similar injuries, and saw the rooster just tearing into her. Why the new behavior? Will it...
Hello, is there any withdrawal period before eating eggs from chickens that have been dusted with Sevin? The label doesn't mention it that I can find. Only butuchering withdrawal.
I DON'T want to debate the morality of using Sevin please. Just how long before I can eat the eggs. Thanks for...
We got a giant double yoker today. By far the biggest chicken egg I have ever seen. Pictures at my blog. Ouch!
http://novitiatehomesteader.blogspot.com/2010/01/giant-egg.html
If one just happened to be selling a meat bird to an acquaintance, how much would they charge per bird?
We'll be raising "label rouge" free range meat birds that take 12 weeks to reach butcher weight. Not as fast as a cornishX. I have no idea what the feed cost might be. Chicks are between...
We are giving the girls a few hours of extra light with a light bulb and are only getting about 1/2 the eggs as before. Also NO Auracana eggs. Is that normal?
We fenced a good sized run for our chickens, mostly to keep them out of the garden. It's 6 foot chicken wire. They are still getting out. Are they going over it? Or is there a hole somewhere where they are escaping. I don't really want to clip wings if I don't have to. So...how high can...
How cold should it be before I start shutting the windows at night. Actually, we just moved and haven't put the glass on the chicken coop yet. Just square holes and hardware cloth. It's getting down to about 35 at night. I could put glass on on Sunday, maybe.
We had a barred rock hen that had some kind of discharge caking up on her rear feathers under her vent. Not laying, not eating, barely drinking, not really moving around. Not even going after treats. We tried anti-biotics, electrolytes. The only thing she would eat was a couple mouthfuls of...
several of our free range chickens have had diarrhea lately. Today, ones backside was covered with a sulfur colered gunk. A few of the others had a few drips of a similar substance. Any guesses? We'll start with giving the henhouse, waterers, etc. a thourough cleaning I suppose. Thanks, Russ
I was thinking of trying some "colored rangers" for meat birds this fall and I was wondering, how long to keep them on chick feed before switching to a broiler feed of some sort?
Any good/bad experiences with this breed?
How do they taste? Tender? We'd let them range some.
We aren't too...
We've been keeping our 18 week old layers in the coop and run because they were laying all over the yard. So now we're getting eggs in the nestbox, but I would like them out to free-range. Do they usually lay during the day? Can I let them out late afternoon? How long before they "learn" to...
We have16 hens ages 17-18 weeks. They are (or were) free range. We started getting one egg a day in the nest box, and an occasional one under a bush somewhere (if we found it). We decided to lock them in their henhouse and run and see what happened. Now we are getting three eggs a day. So...
I guess I have a general idea. Hen decides to sit on eggs and hatch them. But what does she start doing? What would we do if we wanted her to hatch the eggs? We have a roo, so the assumption would be that the eggs would be fertilized.
It's starting to happen! We got 3 eggs today. 1 green araucana eggs, and two brown ones. 2 of them were actually in nest boxes. One was underneath an ornamental bush. In the next couple of weeks we should have lots of chickies laying.
I was getting rid of a box of styrofoam packing peanuts today, when the box broke and they blew all over the yard in the 20 mile an hour wind. The chickens went crazy and started chasing and eating them. In a panic I tried to grab them from the chickens and pick the packing peanuts up as they...
They seem to be pecking at the little morning glory weeds that grow in our lawn. We were planting some bigger ones, obviously a different varient, on an arbor. Any idea if they will get sick if they peck at it. Or will they just avoid it if it is poisonous.
We found a hen on top of our henhouse today. About 10 feet off the ground. How high can these gals fly? She then launched herself from the roof over the garden fence and into the garden...to eat peas.