From a design from Backwoods or one of the homesteading mags..
The old "winter" pens. Bordering the woods - lost many birds to digging varmints, mink, etc.
Here's the new place, freshly moved from a wet area (not usually a wet area but it has been a monsoon here...
1 week of busy digging...
Howdy all,
The old pen is over 15 years old and the fencing has disintegrated to the point that raccoons have made some inroads and killed a good many birds this year. I am moving the pen far away from the woods to an enclosure where I used to keep my alpacas and llamas. Currently is is 138'...
Ha, here is a ramble. Is Serama singular with the plural Seramas. Would the group be called Seramae? Is singular Seram? Anyone know for sure? Seramaman?
Howdy all,
My black copper maran pullet who will turn 1 about mid summer did something very interesting last night. It was pretty cold and the chicks are in an old rubber feed bucket with a heat lamp and some chicken wire on top. It is located inside the henhouse. the BCM squeezed into the...
Howdy all,
I did a straight-run oriental assortment order of 25 chicks from Ideal a few weeks ago. I thought it would be interesting to add a few different looks to the group. today 26 fuzzy butts arrives. the order says 21 Malay, 4 Blue-Red Cubalaya. Well, so it isn't TOO assorted, but...
Well, OK, not TOTALLY accidentally, but I had been surfing Ideal Poultry's website months ago and saw they had an oriental straight run mixed bag. You could get asil, thai, yokohama - all sorts of neat birds. However, they were sold out. Well, I thought it wouldn't hurt to put my email...
Howdy all,
I think I will plan my next set for March 28th so the chicks will be born on or about my birthday. Isn't that cheesy! From a practical aspect - it will be a week and a half after I return from vacation, so there should be no major hatching while I'm outta town issues. What better...
When I built my winter pen, I never thought there would be 3 feet of snow to allow vermin to enter the pen. The whole bottom of my pen has chicken wire over 2" wire. There are sides and a roof. A mink used the high snow to get into the pen. I have found 4 chicken so far and I believe I will...
Howdy all,
We have a gray goose here on the farm who has been here at least since 1992 and may have been a couple years old then. How long do they live?? As a frame of reference there may have been more than 100 ducks live and die here since then, but Gus the goose keeps on going. He has 2...
Howdy all,
I remember last year a bunch of people buying these when the price dropped down. What is your opinion now with 1 year of experience using it? I use a Marsh Roll-X but it is pretty huge and bulky to use for smaller batches of eggs and the Eco looks pretty good to me.
Phil
Howdy all,
OK - where would I look to find the rules and regs about having eggs shipped to me from the Philippines. Can this be done? I am quite curious.
Dr.Phil
Howdy all,
Well, hatch rate for both shipped and local eggs in the Roll-X was just over 50%. One thing I did notice in the last 2 incubations is that once the eggs were removed from the roller and placed on the wire below, the eggs that rolled to the edge of the incubator did not hatch as well...
This AM I found out that 3 day old chicks when running full blast can squirt right though chicken wire. They poured out like lemmings off a cliff. I ran all over the garage trying to catch them. I accidentally squashed one moving a bag trying to catch another. All in all it was a disastrous...
The eggs started hatching last night (just one or two) which would be 12 hours early. Then today the eggs are nearly exploding with chicks. They are much better looking chicks than the last incubation earlier in the summer. Looks like about 80% or so, which for shipped eggs is excellent...
Howdy all,
40+ of 60 candled well last night during the big off-the-roller move. Wondering how many will be viable. The kids are as excited as I am! Interestingly, my control eggs (the local eggs) had a few more infertile ones than the shipped eggs. Of the shipped eggs, there were several...
Howdy all,
My chicks are now around a month old and I moved them into the big pen Sunday AM. They were originally put into the barn portion and I left the door open so they could go into the fenced grass and explore. They went out and I don't know if they have been back in. the weather is OK...
Howdy all,
I am nervous! This incubation has so much more stability, with 42% humidity and 99.5 deg about 99% of the time with no more than 1/2 degree variation that I have seen. The incubator was spotless when i loaded it and the roller has worked just as before. I put in about 1/2 doz...
Howdy all,
This incubation seems to be cruising along better. Tomorrow is day#14. I have not opened the bator at all. I won't until day #18. Only 1 day did the temp go over 99.5 (it was 100.5 briefly) when my son decided to play with the thermostat screw. Humidity has been 48% and temp...