Thanks for this thread! I finally bit the bullet and bought a maticoopx 30. I ran it for a few hours and everything seemed to be working fine. Can't wait to set eggs!
Last week I got four muscovys from a neighbor who had a friend that was overrun after theirs hatched back to back to back all season up to now basically. I'm not enthusiastic about the way they keep their birds and managed to get there right when they got em home and picked out a few for myself...
Pic from when I moved them last week to a different field. They had been in the to-be-garden area. Now they will be rotated on this ~half acre I've been working on improving with the sheep. It was a weedy mess of maybe 10% grass and 90% goldenrod, iron weed, poison ivy, multi flora rose...
It's been a busy summer. Last week I butchered all but one cockerel. The young ones (spring hatched) were not staying in the netting at all. I had to keep them in cages, which wasn't the plan at all. Ended up with only 2 cockerels with the flock and I picked the better looking one.
Also...
Just saw this and link not working. Unfortunately the original poster last made a post in 2016. I did some searches but couldn't find a blog post about someone making their own feather comforter. Hopefully someone will find it and share.
Last night I closed up the chickens and hauled the older chicks out. They settled in fine. Moved the chickshaw in the dark and finished setting up the fence this morning. They were quite excited to have a nice big area and lots of forage! I spread out the feeders and the little ones seemed to...
Forgot to post weights on Tuesday. I'm doing the second hatch chicks the same time because it's easier to do it all at once.
Chick/ wk2/ wk3/ wk4/ wk5/ wk6
1- 225, 352, 470, 589, 871
2- 205, 322, 421, 520, 797
3- 198, 311, 411, 510, 776
4- 219, 346, 473, 600, 858
5- 190, 303, 415, 528, 778
6-...
Well.. sadly this hatch was a big flop and I did indeed end up with just the four chicks. I'm thinking multiple things went into it...
-roo has favorite hens so some hens eggs were probably blanks. Solution, when hatching I need to have a pen for breeding group.
-incubator. I think the farmers...
Well I was waiting and hoping for more chicks but I think my hatch has turned out a big bust... :hit Still only the four chicks. No pips. No peeping. Tonight I'll try to candle. Quickly pulling out eggs individually to keep the incubator temp and humidity up.
I'm just so bummed!
In order of hatching. Kind of blown out from the heat lamp but there is membrane dried to the back of 2. You can really see in person that 1 and 2 are like bright blonde then 3 and 4 are the more buff yellow color.
1 has chipmunk stripe, 2 doesn't seem to.
No pips currently. Waiting for them...
The first chick to pip (last night) was not progressing. I kept an eye on it and ended up assisting it. It has membrane dried to it's back and I'm wondering if it managed to dry up that much to cause problems last night when I topped up water. I can't see anything else. Dunno. That was from an...
I was just thinking about something I read about with pigs... A bunch of people were breeding small homestead breeds to the big modern breeds. Like AGH x Hamp.. or kunekune x duroc.. etc.. anyways over years of forum posts and fb groups posts, across many years, I repeatedly read that the cross...
That's the way I like it :oops: Like lambing. Best is when I show up and there is healthy babies.
The first to pip wasn't making progress. Earlier I made cracks all the way around the top of the shell, as they are supposed to zip. Just now it still hadn't progressed. I went ahead and carefully...
I have one chick hatched. That big pip hasn't made progress. Not sure about it. The second egg behind it with the tiny pip last night is the one that hatched.
Bottom right corner. Fairly well started. The one right above it now has a tiny pip.
Also a pic of lockdown. The egg flats are nice and very open for rinsing off en masse so there is plenty of air flow. And room all around the flat. Right after that pic I added the lingerie bag. The five eggs...