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What eggs you get will be safe to eat unless you are medicating the birds. Then it will depend on the medicine and what the manufacturer says on the label. Fowl Pox will not effect humans, so you cannot get it from your birds. It is spread by mosquitoes and by the time you notice the sores all...

Not only will hawks kill chickens but they will scare them and stress a flock so much that the hens won't lay well. Having hiding places for your birds is a good defence and it is best to place them in corners as frighten birds will run and pile up in the corners. Roosters will usually help warn...

No armadillos eat insects and soft grubs and worms. They won't bother your chickens except to maybe dig a hole under their fence. They can make alot of ankle killer holes in your yard though. I remember one summer we had one to dig a den under a big bush in our front yard. The dogs would have a...

One way to solve the perching on top of the nest box problem is to place them outside the hen house. Mine are attached to the outside wall with openings cut in the wall so the hens can go into them. My walls are vinyl siding that I recycled when I built the house. The nest boxes are made of old...

Cat is right. I live down along the Gulf Coast and I gather mine everyday in the late afternoon/evening. I don't wash mine everyday, unless they are dirty, more like every third day. They will actually last longer without washing and I don't put them in the fridge until they are a week or so...

Hi, Glad to hear that your girls are enjoying the summer. Yes, if you want them to lay their best they will need some good yellow corn in their diet. Either ground up in their feed or fed as whole grain corn. Wheat does not supply chickens with all the nutrients that they need so while it is ok...

I have a different design for a 5 gallon water that doesn't need a tight fitting lid or for the bucket to be turned over. You fill it from the top and the water drips out into a catch basin that the chickens drink from. You can adjust the drip rate and use it to meter out medicated or vitamin...

What a beautiful young girl. My nests boxes are some 3 foot high to make them easy to keep clean. They have a landing board, 4 inches wide, along the front. My girls have not problem getting up to them.

There are some ways to deter and kill carpenter bees, as far as preventing them totally the best way is to cover all your exposed wood sofits with metal flashing or vinyl. We have western red cedar siding on our house that is stained and they have never touched it, but any pine, popular, or...

Having broody hens will definity cut down on your egg production. Not only will the broodies not lay but they will fight with the laying hens to keep them away from what they see as their nest. Anything that upsets your flock will cut back on their laying and may even cause them to go into a...

It has been my experience that chickens know what worms are safe to eat and they won't eat any toxic types. Tomato hornworms, cutworms, budworms, corn earworms and loopers are all fair game as long as you haven't used any toxic chemicals on them. BT is ok and safe to use. I've seen my hens turn...

Good quality store bought laying pellets or mash, while an excellent feed for hens, can be expensive and wasteful if not fed in containers. Because they are both made of finely ground feed the hens will scratch them into dust. Even a certain amount of the pellets will crumble into dust and be...

Hi, regarding some of your questions. A rooster will make alot of noise and can make it at all times of the day or night, especially if there are bright lights around at night. You do not need a rooster to get eggs. In fact hens will actually lay better without a rooster chasing them around, but...

If she has been setting for several days you should be able to take her off the nest for awhile to switch the eggs easily. Any hen that is a good brooder won't give up setting just because she is taken off the nest for a few minutes everyday. In fact after they have been on the eggs for 4 or 5...

Yes, 60 degrees is too cold and if the chicks are healthy they will let you know with loud chirping and huddling when they are cold. If you have a large group of them they will help to keep each other warm but there is a danger of some suffocating if they have to huddle for long periods. Also if...

Hi, happy for you and I hope all goes well. How long before the other eggs hatch depends on when they were started incubating. If they were all put under the hen at the same time they should all hatch over the next 48 hours or so, but I have had hatchings to last over three days. The chicks...

Sure, I will try to post some photo's to this forum. I wanted to put some in my bukisa article but their site isn't up to that yet. Here are the two photo's I downloaded. The first is of the finished waterer and the second is of the basic supplies needed. You will need two each of the washers...

Whatever it is don't put anything oily on her feet or legs while she is setting on eggs. Those unhatched chicks are breathing through those egg shells right now and if they get coated with any oil the chicks will die.

I feel for you and know where you're coming from. I agree a gun, traps, or poison used safely are probably your best bets. But I have to say that over here in the southeast, where coyote numbers have only risen in the last 20 years or so, they have actually have done me a favor. I use to have...

Hi riz, So this is your first time doing a hatching with a broody hen, I wish you and her the best of luck. How many eggs you can put under a hen depends on the size of the hen and the size of the eggs. With a Brahma, which tend to be a large heavy breed, and using medium eggs, I would say you...