Arizona Chickens

[wondertwinpower]

Quote:
OH NO that's exactly what I was worried about! I have trapped one squirrel and have seen at least one more, but my neighbor borrowed the trap and has not returned it yet. The area of the yard where I'm thinking of moving my coop and run to has two of those holes (and the dogs are VERY curious about the holes, they have made one of them big enough to stick a whole Weimaraner head into). What will DesertMarcy do with the snake? I got 4 sex link chicks from Marcy just before Easter (2 red, 2 black) and that started my chicken obsession!!!! I wonder how big a chicken has to be to be safe from a snake?

 

[desertmarcy]

OH NO that's exactly what I was worried about! I have trapped one squirrel and have seen at least one more, but my neighbor borrowed the trap and has not returned it yet. The area of the yard where I'm thinking of moving my coop and run to has two of those holes (and the dogs are VERY curious about the holes, they have made one of them big enough to stick a whole Weimaraner head into). What will DesertMarcy do with the snake? I got 4 sex link chicks from Marcy just before Easter (2 red, 2 black) and that started my chicken obsession!!!! I wonder how big a chicken has to be to be safe from a snake?

You guys are too funny

Actually I would LOVE to have more bullsnakes in my yard, but the problem with relocating snakes is, they do have territories like most animals and when you move them to a new place, it is like plunking you down in the middle of New York City, if you have not been there, you would be lost and so would the snake moved to an unfamiliar territory. Sometimes they adjust, but often they do not or that habitat is already "taken". I am overrun with rodents over here, and even though I see a rattlesnake almost every day, they sure are not keeping up with the squirrel and mouse populations.

I have a lot of rodent holes all over the place, but fortunately, so far, none are digging under and into any of the chicken pens.

A lot of snakes have eyes bigger than their stomachs, or mouths, so to speak and will kill a prey and then be unable to eat it. At least that happens with captive snakes, I assume it is the same with the wilds.

 

[BY Chicken Lady]

This is a great argument for hatching in the winter, so the chicks are grown out before snake season begins.

That is a good idea...that way they are too big to eat by the time the snakes are out and about. Can't blame the snakes...they are hungry too. It is our job as chicken keepers to make sure they cannot get into our chickens.

 

[BY Chicken Lady]

The ants have been a big problem in our backyard this summer.

I have used DE and noticed some reduction. However, as soon as it gets wet, it's useless.
Just standing in front of the nesting box collecting eggs, those buggers start crawling on my toes and stinging.

I moved the tractor, emptied it out, sprayed it out with the hose. Am waiting for it to dry and will sprinkle inside
with DE and new bedding. I moved the feed up off the ground. Some of the
reading I have been doing mentions that corn meal or corn starch helps get rid of ants. They eat it and can't
digest it. Also, orange oil diluted in water sprayed in and around the coop will kill them also.

I get ants every summer and they are a major problem. We have an exterminator but I am concerned
about anything going in the back yard with the chickens. This is our first summer with chickens.

I thought I lost one of the girls yesterday. We were bbq ing when my RIR just fell to the ground on her
side with her leg up in the air. It was so shocking to see. When we ran to check on her, she just jumped up
and ran away. I have no idea what that was about. My DH said he thinks she was probably drunk off the
frozen watermelon he was feeding them yesterday. She seems fine today.

I've heard of Fanting Goats...maybe you have a Fanting Chicken, lol. Can they really get drunk on frozen watermelon? I have given it to mine several times and nobody fainted.

 

[kacklinkelly]

I've heard of Fanting Goats...maybe you have a Fanting Chicken, lol. Can they really get drunk on frozen watermelon? I have given it to mine several times and nobody fainted.

I don't know but maybe the watermelon began fermenting before she ate it.

Anyway, she has been fine since. It was very weird to watch. I wish I would have gotten it on tape (oops video - showing my age here)

 

[flower]

Went to the coop and found this next to my golf ball decoy.....


Looks and feels like a nice egg!

VERY PRETTY !

 

[LadyKotaDoria]

What a coincidence that you just wrote that, because.....
YES! That is exactly what happened! This morning, I was in the pen doing some cleaning

OH NO that's exactly what I was worried about! I have trapped one squirrel and have seen at least one more, but my neighbor borrowed the trap and has not returned it yet. The area of the yard where I'm thinking of moving my coop and run to has two of those holes (and the dogs are VERY curious about the holes, they have made one of them big enough to stick a whole Weimaraner head into). What will DesertMarcy do with the snake? I got 4 sex link chicks from Marcy just before Easter (2 red, 2 black) and that started my chicken obsession!!!! I wonder how big a chicken has to be to be safe from a snake?

There is a ratio head to food. Don't remember what it is, off the top of my head it is something like 4 or 5 times, it was big enough I remember I was surprised at just how much it can open its mouth. It could be even more. I know my gopher snake, was about 1" and could eat pinkies only. At about 2" a small mouse. Unfortunately it died when I was gone. It was given 5 pinkies instead of a small mouse. It ate the pinkies, and then died because it could not digest them. The tempiture was not warm enough.

 

[BY Chicken Lady]

I don't know but maybe the watermelon began fermenting before she ate it.

Anyway, she has been fine since. It was very weird to watch. I wish I would have gotten it on tape (oops video - showing my age here)

Haha, that's funny. My grandkids ask to see pictures or video of everything I tell them about...they grew up with everyone being able to snap a photo or shoot a video from their phones. If I say I don't have a picture or video they are like, "What Nanny?! You didn't take picture?!"

 

[GreatWhiteAfro]

VERY PRETTY !

Thanks! Now I hope she keeps it up! Its two days in a row! Well the girl that laid the blue eggs took a break cause I haven't had another one from her in two days....hope she starts laying again. I read it can be sporadic when the first start laying.

 

[countrygirl74]

WOW - did I ever have to catch up on a lot of posts!! I was at our homeschool convention for a couple days then back to a crazy work week, so got really behind!!

I tried to read/skim what I could...

We are new chicken owners, having inherited the start of our flock from our friends who sold it to us. We currently have 8 hens and 2 roosters. How much should I feed and what do Arizona chickens seem to do the best with. Should they be wormed? Anything else? We are remodeling the chicken coop this weekend and are going to add misters to help keep them cool. Thanks.

Hi, I'm new to raising chickens and have learned a lot from this forum - thank you. I'm at 5400 elevation in SouthEast AZ so we don't get as hot as Tucson or Phx but it's still hot. We did get rain out here yesterday, not a lot but enough to cool everything down and it smelled wonderful! Here's a pic of my girls this morning (I think it's 62 degrees right now). There are two Easter Eggers (Purdy & Cheeks), two Silver Laced Wyandottes (Sylvia and Lacey) and two sex links (Lucy & Ethel). No eggs yet but hopefully soon!

Welcome!!

I would suggest you snake-proof your outdoor brooder if you are having that much of a problem. If you kill one, you leave a void in the ecosystem, and another will move in, especially if there is a ready food supply. You live in the desert and have moved into snake habitat. Garter snakes are not likely to eat chicks, probably was some other species. Sorry about your chicks, but can't be too sympathetic since I like snakes and hate to see people kill them. There must be a way you can keep them out of your brooder. 1/4" hardware cloth would work. Any snake small enough to go through that is not going to be able to eat a chick.

X2 - need to find out where they are getting in - I think you mentioned later that they were coming up through the ground!! Yikes - I have hardware cloth all around the bottom perimeter of my pens but I didn't really think about the snakes burrowing. Luckily my dogs usually find the snakes first and I have to save those poor little king snakes from being eaten.

Amdro granules are the best at taking out a whole ant colony, just don't let the chickens eat them.

X2!!! It's the only thing that I've found that works to get rid of the fire ants here AND I've had to use it where the chickens free-range. I just sprinkle the Amdro around the hole like it says, then I place something heavy over that area, like a bucket or old metal washtub. Once I've killed off the colony, I shovel up the area to remove all traces of the poison granules... so far, so good.

Hope all you dads had a great fathers day! My girls gave me a father's day present....




First egg!!! It's kinda small, I hope they get bigger! This is from my one of my EE's not sure which one...gonna have to get up early to figure that one out I guess.

Yay!! Congrats!!! Yes, they will get bigger as time goes on...

I woke up this morning to find this in my coop....



The one on the left was in the bottom of the coop under the roost and the one on the right was on a door beam directly behind the roost. They are both the same color so I am assuming they are both from the same girl. My question is, is it normal or just weird that she laid her egg from the roosting bar? And it seems like she laid 2 eggs because neither one of them were there yesterday or last night when they roosted, I checked the whole coop to make sure I didn't miss anything. Also one of the girls keeps going into the nest boxes, sits for about 5-10 minutes making a bunch of noise then leaves....no egg...nothing...pretty normal or no?

I'd say that's pretty normal, especially when they first start laying. I've had them drop some eggs in weird spots before but now that they are older, I don't really see that anymore. We have a few hens that like to "practice" laying an egg - when they first started, the entire coop would sing the egg song with the one who announced that she just laid an egg, when in fact, she DID NOT.

You guys are too funny

Actually I would LOVE to have more bullsnakes in my yard, but the problem with relocating snakes is, they do have territories like most animals and when you move them to a new place, it is like plunking you down in the middle of New York City, if you have not been there, you would be lost and so would the snake moved to an unfamiliar territory. Sometimes they adjust, but often they do not or that habitat is already "taken". I am overrun with rodents over here, and even though I see a rattlesnake almost every day, they sure are not keeping up with the squirrel and mouse populations.

I have a lot of rodent holes all over the place, but fortunately, so far, none are digging under and into any of the chicken pens.

A lot of snakes have eyes bigger than their stomachs, or mouths, so to speak and will kill a prey and then be unable to eat it. At least that happens with captive snakes, I assume it is the same with the wilds.

A rattlesnake every day???!!!! I need to send you some of my baby king snakes when I start seeing some hatchlings around here. I try to save them every chance I get and put them back out into the prairie across the street - they keep the rattlesnake population down!