4th Annual BYC NYD Hatch-a-long

[Sally Sunshine]

I have come to the realization I need more bantys... lol along with the still growing list Im working on adding to the flock

19 have hatched so far including the 1 banty egg. 6 to go

 

[Sally Sunshine]

How I spent some of my day...


Winter ride with the kids!!

My older DS is home for a few days!!! We exchanged gifts today so we don't have to haul all of our stuff out to my Mom & Dad's tomorrow...

oh how NEAT!!!

 

[cluck-cluck]

YAY! Caught up....now to go wrap...and wrap....and wrap....I have entirely too much fun buying presents....need to remember how much I hate to wrap!

I really HOPE I finished them last night, but unfortunately, I suspect my husband will show up with more to wrap

At least we are so tight, no money to go around, there aren't that many, LOL.

Good morning everyone.

What's going on inside our chicken eggs - Day 13:

Feathers are apparent and "egg tooth" is hardening.

Thirteenth day -- appearance of scales and claws

Your pictures are always so cool!

Set 14 Muscovy duck eggs last night. My first foray into the duck world, so hoping for some success. I've read on the difficulties of incubating Muscovy and researched techniques that have been successful, so giving it a shot. A fellow BYCer close by gave me some eggs to try.

Both incubators now loaded, temps holding beautifully steady, lets hope it lasts! I feel I have an incubation gremlin that lets me get almost to hatch day, then pulls a nasty trick. One time, the fan went out (replaced with two fans). Another time, the light (replaced with ceramic heat bulb instead). Another time, power failure.

Always seems to happen on day 18.


Got my gremlin chasing stick ready though, looking forward to a good hatch!

A week to go! Woot.

Oh good luck! I hope your duck eggs also do REALLY well!

My first thought ran to meningitis, since one of G's friends is in the hospital with it! But, I seem to be doing a little bit better now. My lungs aren't quite as bad, only slightly painful, no more burning fire. I have also been awake for about an hour and a half, which is awesome. Yesterday, the longest I was up for was about half an hour at most, and most of the time, it was only a flicker of a few seconds. So, I am doing better already!

As for the hatch, mine isn't going so well. I pulled my second tray out and I hardly have any eggs left! At first I thought I pulled the wrong tray out, but I know it's the right one. Then, when I was checking another tray (only five days old, but still looks like a very bad fertility rate), I slid it back in and heard a crunch. One of the very few eggs in that entire tray that actually had development, I had crushed! I quit right there, removed it, moved the eggs near it so they wouldn't get glued in, and didn't check anything else. I also lost one more duck egg, so I'm down to 3, out of 9! I have seven duck eggs to set, plus a turkey egg and three chicken eggs, but at this rate, it looks like all of the eggs I can collect in a week will at most get me 1-2 ducklings hatched!

Take care of yourself, that sounds like it was really bad. Make sure you don't relapse! I'm sorry about the accident! That really hurts, ugh!

I haven't been having a whole heck of a lot of luck with ducks lately. One getting run over, one starving to death, one dying of prolapse, then losing a baby and having fertility issues and losing ducklings still in the eggs! They at least started laying better, the past two days I've gotten an egg from each hen. Hopefully I can still hatch enough babies out to bring in a little bit of money. I have someone interested in some chickies, so that'll help a smidge. Once I lost my computer, I lost my budget, so I have no idea where I'm at with expense and income, though I'm fairly positive I'm in the red with the birds.

Oh dear, well I hope all is better in the new year!

As an early Christmas present, my sister gave me a sign that says, "I dream of a world where chickens can cross the road without having their motives questioned" with a picture of a rooster crossing the road in the backround. I love it, haha. I would take a picture, but it seems that my camera isn't working.

I love that! I'd actually, probably, might put that on my car, ROFL. Seriously, that's cute!

Love wrapping presents, mine have been under the tree for a week, LOL. I used to wrap all the presents when I lived at home, even my own.

Mom would just hand me a blank box and say "Wrap it, don't look".

The boys (2 and 3) have been a little hard on the presents this week, but the wrapping paper is mostly still intact. Tomorrow's the big day, they'll be so excited!

Hung my new door on the coop this am. Will finish trimming it when it isn't so frickity frick frick frick cold out, but it's snug and secure for now. All pleased with myself, never built a door before, but pleased with the results.

Also attached, a few photos of the IBs out exploring while I was fixing their coop. Love them, tough little birds.

Oh, it looks great, and the birds are so beautiful out in the snow! How lovely!

Someone (pages of posts ago) asked me to better explain how the diy chicken feeder we made works, so here goes--

It is designed so that you put a small amount of feed, to be eatten in 2-3 days into the coffee can in the center.

You'll notice down at the bottom of the coffee care there is a cut up 2 litter plastic bottle mounted so it makes a cone shape taking up a lot of the space inside the coffee can.
There are 2 reasons for this:
1) The shape helps guide the feed toward the 4 small holes cut at the bottom edges of the sides of the coffee can, so the feed will flow out & not just pile in the middle of the can.
2) It takes up part of the space so it holds LESS feed -- this is important b/c I can't afford *any* feed waste & I've found that if I try to put out large amts of feed in advance something
always goes wrong, esp. w/ the humidity we get, and big storms, and just silly things that happen, I don't want more than 2-3 days food supply at risk at any given time.

So the feed flows out the holes of the coffee can into the plastic bucket, just the circular area between the outside of the coffee can and the inside of the bucket,
again not too much food at once, just enough to provide some for the bird to eat by pecking though the little cut out areas in the bucket.

Notice that the cut out areas are not all the way at the bottom, there is a small amount of plastic wall holding in the feed,
to prevent it spilling on the ground where more of it is wasted than eaten.

The hole in the bucket are rounded and intended to be a larger version of the type of holes those little red plastic trays they sell for feeding chicks from.

The purpose of having the lid & part of the side walls of the bucket still in place is again to keep wetness away from the feed, and reduce the amt of feed spilled or pecked out but not eaten.

Here are pictures which should make this more clear now...

Fill inside coffee can, covering plastic bottle in center:



Food flows out small holes in coffee can into area between coffee can and plastic bucket, hens reach beaks in the holes in plastic bucket to eat dry feed



it hangs from the coat hanger , which still allows the lid to open for re-filling while hanging


Hope this helps - I'll let you know how it actually works
- we have had over 10 inches of rain the past 4 days, w/ more forecast plus winds gusting to 80 mph w/ poss hail &/or tornadoes & sleet & snow this week-- hence my preoccupation w/ keeping feed DRY w/ a 2-3 day supply available just in case of well, anything.

Thank you, that was me, and now I understand!!! Great idea!

​

~ Hatched ~

I hatched a little fluff ball
as cute as can be,
I held her, I loved her,
And let her sleep with me!

She was such a little sweetie,
when she came running to me,
Oh, how swiftly she has grown,
She was as cute as can be!

Then one morning
unbeknownst to me,
My little darling came running,
But OH NO, She was now a He!

I miss those snuggle mornings,
but alas it was not to be,
Now I have a BIG boy,
just to CROW with me!

SallyAnn









​

R.I.P.​

Melvin, Silver Laced Wyandotte Roo​

May 13 ~ December 24, 2012​

​

Oh, I'm so sorry Sally! But that was sweet! Poor Melivin, what happened?

 

[Brookhavens]

​

R.I.P.​

Melvin, Silver Laced Wyandotte Roo​

May 13 ~ December 24, 2012​

​

So sorry to hear he passed.

 

[Sally Sunshine]

Yup, I wish I lived on my farm and had horses.

Oh well... not during this lifetime anyway.

x2

 

[Sally Sunshine]

The "OE" eggs ALL hatched! we have six of them!!
One langshan pipped wrong end and drowned and the other is fluffing up but has a weird navel growth, like a double hernia?? I have had peeps "kick out" too soon and seen a big naval but this one looks like intestines or something.... I just read that I can maybe push them back in, so what the hell I will try..... so only one langshan

 

[Sally Sunshine]

Quote: Thank u

 

[Sally Sunshine]

I have a baby chick!!!!!!! Put 3 of my christmas eggs in lockdown yesterday well one just hatched!!!! 2 days early!!! Wow that was a surprise.

A Black Australorp mix.

 

[Hurley]

My condolences on the loss of your boy. He was lovely.
RIP sweet man.

 

[debs_flock]

Hmmm, whatcha doing to get ready for Christmas (or in this case Eve) dinner?

Deviling eggs.

It just seems so wrong.

Deb