I have a young raccoon that’s been coming around the past several nights. He came in the middle of the night the first time and got in the coop because my daughter accidentally blocked the automatic door with the ramp after it fell down. Fortunately, i woke up to the sound of distressed chickens...
I have two broody hens that are sitting on just 3 eggs each. They are due to hatch tomorrow. The first broody hen just hatched one chick about a month ago but I found it dead in the coop when it was just a couple days old. I assume one of the other hens killed it because the mom is not very high...
I have a broody hen who is hatching eggs. One was non-viable (actually exploded yesterday), one had a tiny peck in the egg for a few days, and a healthy chick hatched two days ago. I thought the remaining egg (with the tiny peck in it, looked more like the peck was from the outside, not a pip)...
Ok, I’ve asked about these two before. Now they’re a little older. The more gray Olive Egger and the true blue whiting (shades of brown/red). They are 11 weeks old.
Does anyone know of an automatic door that can be installed on a temporary coop like this? I have my 8 wks olds in it until they are old enough to join the big girls.
Here’s are some more recent pics of the same bird I posted earlier that was difficult to sex. The first two are of the TB Whiting.
The next pics are of an Olive Egger that is also 5-6 weeks old. Don’t compare size to the tiny OE in the pictures, she’s about half the size of all the others. It’s...
This one is 5 weeks old. It’s hard to see from the picture but it’s a single comb, much smaller than the ones I’ve identified for sure as cockerels (different breeds though, but also with a single comb). I was concerned about the color indicating cockerel.
Does a more red comb indicate being a cockerel? I’m more familiar sexing Olive Eggers and Marans with the larger comb size and redness indicating being a cockerel. I have three Red Laced Red Wyandottes that are 4 1/2 weeks old.
#1 (above) - I was really hoping this one would be a female...
I have several chicks that I incubated and hatched that are four weeks old tomorrow. There is one chick that is much smaller than the others (same breed) and seems to be breathing heavier than the other chicks. Not open-mouthed or in distress, but it just takes her a lot more effort. Her whole...
I candled the eggs today, Day 18 in preparation of lockdown. Most the eggs I candled were entirely dark inside with an aircell. Three of the eggs obviously had not developed. Two of the eggs were only about 1/2 dark and 1/2 light - thinking these were chicks that stopped developing, I removed...
This was my first time incubating eggs and none of them hatched or even began to develop out of 14 eggs. The three possibilities are:
1) all the eggs were infertile (unlikely IMO since the person I got the eggs from locally regularly hatches eggs
2) the eggs were stored improperly prior to...
My normal routine is to go out to the chicken coop at dusk to shut the door. Often, there are 2-3 of my hens lounging on the outside of the coop. After I make them get down, they’ll usually hop up into the coop on their own. The other night when I did this, I had a flashlight and shined it on...
My broody has been sitting on eggs which started to hatch today. Two of the three have pipped and one of those hatched. When I went out to check on her again, she had killed the first chick and had noticeably pecked the eggs that were starting to hatch including the one that had not pipped yet...
I am relatively new to chickens, candling, and hatching eggs. I started with 10 fertilized eggs under a broody (mail order).
Day 10, I candled them (first time to ever candle eggs). To my dismay one was missing and one had exploded - covering all eggs with nasty-smelling dried goo. I removed...
I have a broody chicken that I’m about to put fertilized eggs under. I don’t want to separate her if I don’t have to. There are three nest boxes in the coop. I moved her out of the only nest everyone was using. Then, most of them started laying in the one I moved her to, so I moved her to the...
When I went to lock up the coop last night, one of my chickens was missing. She sometimes tries to roost on top of the coop, so could have flown over our fence trying to do that. I also have netting over the coop/run, and somehow ends up on the outside of the netting - not sure how she does...
I have a flock of 6 currently. Three originals who are about a year and 1/2 old. A BCM almost a year old who was introduced about 6 mths ago. She was introduced by herself so had a hard time integrating at first. There are two younger pullets (25 and 28 weeks old) that have been with the rest of...