2014 breeding season begins, post your results

[newduckie]

This is what the pied looks like that fathered this chick

And this is the black shouldered dad

 

[BYC-user-174785]

They do not look spalding to me, so your peachicks should not be spaldings.

 

[newduckie]

I have heard that peacocks are really bad to leave if you let them free range. Is it the same if they are raised there? Also, since it is looking like I have three males, will that make them stray looking for a companion, and are the males bad to fight. I really do not need four, and hate to buy more hoping for a female. They are pretty costly investments to have them up and leave..

 

[nurse1]

Ok question about hatching... My IB hen is sitting on 4 eggs due to hatch in about 7 days. Should I be doing anything to help now or while hatching ? Or will mom be ok? This is her first eggs ever.
Thanks

 

[zazouse]

Ok question about hatching... My IB hen is sitting on 4 eggs due to hatch in about 7 days. Should I be doing anything to help now or while hatching ? Or will mom be ok? This is her first eggs ever.
Thanks

Is she in a pen or free ranged?

 

[casportpony]

Crazy last night! My hen that lays from the perch was due to lay, so I decided to catch this egg. When I got to the aviary all three hens looked like the were going to lay, which meant going in to catch one might upset the others. At about 8:45 one got ready to lay her egg in the feed tray, then one got on the perch and the third hopped up on the dog crate. It was a chain reaction of eggs to come! The one in the feed tray popped her's out, so I went in as just in time to catch the one from the perch and just as I did that, I then had to run over and catch the one being laid on the dog grate! Boom, boom, boom, three eggs in less than one minute! Egg #4 was laid in a different pen in a much more sensible place, lol.

-Kathy

 

[autumnmfisher]

Posting results:
86 eggs laid all together from 4 hens, first year laying and one was egg bound early on and didn't lay most of the time - sold most.
incubated 7 that were ruined by incubator overheating

- and all were good till then.
incubated 4 more, two did not develop, the other two did great and are in a great new home, about a month old now

plan on incubating a lot more next year as it was great fun once we got a new incubator

That's it here... hope everyone else had a great season!!!

 

[nurse1]

Is she in a pen or free ranged? 

She is in a pen

 

[DylansMom]

They do not look spalding to me, so your peachicks should not be spaldings.

I agree, I see nothing in any of the pictures of the adults or chicks that looks "spalding" to me. And I have quite a few spaldings.

 

[casportpony]

So.....I decided before this year's hatching started, that I was not going to intervene and help any chicks that did not make the internal pip themselves. Last year I tried with 3 and all died within 24 hours. Last week I had my 4th hatch and there was an IB egg that I thought had made the int. pip, but when I peeled some shell to check for progress I discovered a chick that was still alive but had not pipped internally because it's beak was stuck between its legs. There were practically no blood vessels in the inner membrane so I knew it was ready, and heaven help me I went ahead and helped it out. I thought for 3 days it was going to die, because it just laid in a little "hospital bed" I made for it in the brooder. The third night it seemed so weak I thought for sure I would find it dead the next morning, instead I found it out of it's bed and trying to walk on a pair of spraddled legs and the worst curled toes I've ever seen. On went a pair of shoes, and by the next morning when it's brooder mates had removed it's shoes in an attempt to eat them, it was walking around on a brand new set of perfectly straight toes. Chick Shoes are amazing things! It's spraddle also corrected itself that day, without help from a hobble brace. I am at this point calling it "Forest", a name I borrowed from a friend who also had a little one she had to help out, that unfortunately didn't make it. Forest is definitely going to be a special needs chick, it seems to have some vision problems as well as a lack of coordination. It took 5 days of lessons to learn to drink from the quail waterer and 6 days to learn that the starter was for eating, not sleeping in. But it has learned both now and is doing both with gusto, also pooping normally. I am quite sure this chick will never be a completely normal pea, but at this point there is no way I can cull it, so it will be a permanent resident, for as long as it makes it.

Meet Forest.

@DylansMom , how's little Forest doing?

-Kathy