Arizona Chickens

[Stynch]

My newly expanded and well-integrated flock enjoying their morning "red bowl treats". They see me coming with the red bowl and start pacing at the gate until I get there!! Today's treat was leftover spring mix salad, cottage cheese, and a frozen banana. Even the new girls from LDK have gotten the hang of things around here!!

 

[Arizona Son]

Huge issue is still the flies. They are out of control. Those fly bags capture thousands, but man, they stink so much and the flies are horrendous and the situation is bad. It's so depressing because I can't enjoy my created patch of heaven and I feel like I'm keeping a filthy yard (it's not at all). Before it gets too hot, I'd like to have family and friends over for a bbq, but I'm too embarrassed about the fly situation--it's really that bad. They do seem limited to the garden and chicken area, at least my house and the rest of the yard aren't overrun. I'll have to order some of the fly larvae parasite stuff asap.

Flies are unreal this year! I talked to some of my long-time neighbors and they said the flies are worse this year than they remember for the several years past. I guess they are cyclical, depending on when conditions are just right for them. I have noticed that the flies tend to congregate in any areas where the earth is damp, and also in areas of shade that are cooler. I run a lot of misters and sprinklers in my chicken yard during the summer, in order to keep heat related losses to a minimum. So the ground is usually damp or downright wet in certain areas. The chickens are kept cool, but it seems like every fly in the surrounding 50 acres is in my yard!
I too, have tried those hanging fly traps that smell like a rotting corpse. They work amazing at catching flies and taking them out of circulation, but the constant godawful smell makes enjoying your outdoor areas pretty difficult. Seems there is no easy solution. The fly predators would work great if nobody else in your neighborhood or surrounding area has any conditions/habitat for breeding more flies. I live in horse country, and have horses and cattle here on my property, and the surrounding properties have livestock as well, so it's really kind of impossible to get away from the flies. Except at night when they seem to disappear as soon as it gets dark.

Somebody needs to invent a fly trap that works great but with no odor detectable by the human nose!

 

[pipemum]

I just ordered a 6-week supply of fly predator from Arbico. It should work as my yard seems to be the culprit. I'm in a subdivision with no neighbors with weeks of unpicked up dog poo (as was the case in many other neighborhoods I've lived in), no horses, livestock, trash, ag stuff. As bad as the flies are in that one portion of yard, the other 80% of my yard is fly-free...which doesn't do me much good as the other 80% is barren, hot, and not people-friendly, lol! I'll report back on the Arbico.

 

[azelgin]

The fly predators would work great if nobody else in your neighborhood or surrounding area has any conditions/habitat for breeding more flies. I live in horse country, and have horses and cattle here on my property, and the surrounding properties have livestock as well, so it's really kind of impossible to get away from the flies. Except at night when they seem to disappear as soon as it gets dark.

Somebody needs to invent a fly trap that works great but with no odor detectable by the human nose!

I've had great luck with the fly predators. I have my own three mules and about 70 chickens. The National Forest borders my land for about a 1/4 mile on one side, with the free range grazing allotment. There is another ranch on the other side. I deal with about 100 head of cattle, when you count them all up.
I can't buy enough predators, to take care of all the flies, but I buy another 10,000 a month, when they run cattle around us, to spread around the areas outside of my property. I've heard that flies travel about 1/4 mile. Must be about right, because we do a good job of controlling them.
We have fewer flies, than the restaurants in town.
We've been using them for the last 10 years and have the order time and amounts pretty well dialed in. You need to start them before the fly population gets started. It cost us about $200 a year, but at least we can go outside and not be overwhelmed with flies.

 

[pipemum]

Pipemum, I think you're in the Tucson area. Arbico Organics has a retail outlet in Oro Valley if you want those fly eliminators (the predatory wasps) right away. You don't have to wait for shipping: http://www.arbico-organics.com/category/contactus

Just ordered! I didn't read this till after I'd ordered, but even with shipping, it'll probably get here before I'd make it to the store.

Smoked one of my meaties last night. It'd gone from butcher to eating in less than 8 hours and wasn't tough at all. Of course, it was a cornish cross, not some old rooster. The rigor had passed already. I keep thinking about how in the good ol' days, grandpa* would butcher a chicken and grandma** would make it for dinner. Nobody complained about chickens being too tough to eat without resting in the fridge from 24-48 hours. Is that really true, or just another thing one of the more vocal groups here at BYC have made a BYC "truth?" Tried my flowerpot smoker for the second time (google it, works great when the hotplate works, but my hotplate has an automatic shutoff when it gets too hot so mine doesn't work for smoking unless I'm unplugging/replugging it every 10 minutes). Since the hotplate wasn't working, I moved the chicken to a repurposed gas grill that I've attempted to turn into a smoker. I attempted to seal the holes and used coals under a pieplate of woodchips. That at least cooked the chicken, but the smokey flavor was too subtle (too many holes in the grill, tin of chips didn't get smoking as they should have). I definitely need to experiment more, I've got lots of ideas for next time. My first attempt at flower pot smoker was a smaller chicken, and I watched it like a hawk and did unplug/replug every few minutes for an hour. Talk about a waste of time--I finished that little bird off in the oven when I couldn't stand the hotplate issue anymore. The smoke flavor was incredible though, so the smoker worked at it should. I just need to figure out how to use coals in it. I did try to disengage the autosensor on my last hotplate, and ended up breaking the thing when I reassembled it.

* and **: Not MY suburbanite grandparents, but you know, other people's folks that grew up on a farm.

 

[pipemum]

Sorry for thread-bombing. One more thing--someone from Ideal Poultry got back to me. I'd emailed asking if I should be holding my breath on any packing peanuts brahmas being female. She said, probably not, staff can sex with 90% accuracy. Since these little suckers are handling the heat so poorly already, I guess I'm glad that it's unlikely any are female. Would be a cruel as keeping a St. Bernard here in the summer!

 

[Sonoran Silkies]

Sorry for thread-bombing. One more thing--someone from Ideal Poultry got back to me. I'd emailed asking if I should be holding my breath on any packing peanuts brahmas being female. She said, probably not, staff can sex with 90% accuracy. Since these little suckers are handling the heat so poorly already, I guess I'm glad that it's unlikely any are female. Would be a cruel as keeping a St. Bernard here in the summer!

Someone recently posted on the Arizona Poultry Organization facebook page that they have brahmas available. https://www.facebook.com/groups/175439452578315/

 

[pipemum]

Someone recently posted on the Arizona Poultry Organization facebook page that they have light brahmas available.

Oh, thanks...but I have brahmas already! They came as packing peanuts with a CX shipment. At 2.5 months old, I still can't tell genders, and I emailed Ideal to see if I should be holding out hope that any peanuts were female. The rep said, no, most likely not.

 

[MagicChicken]

Quote:
LOL! I hear you about shipping getting there sooner. That store is a two hour round trip for me.

I cook most of my birds the day I butcher them. The last one was a 15 month old rooster. Usually I cut them up and toss them in the stock pot, simmer them for 4+ hours until the meat is falling off the bones, then pull off the meat and parcel it up for use or freezing. 4 hours is usually sufficient, but that 15 month old rooster was too tough for a knife after 4 hours. Left him in for another couple of hours and he was fine.

My early 60's version of the Joy of Cooking says the birds are best if cooked right away. I haven't noticed a big difference between "rested" and "not rested" birds. They all taste good. I do usually slow cook with moist heat, which may make a difference.

Mine are "heritage" dual purpose birds that are generally slow to mature. For the first 8-10 months they are mostly bone and leg meat. So far I've only eaten males. I had a 2:1 ratio of cockerels to pullets. Hoping for some extra pullets with this year's hatch but it's looking like the same 2:1 ratio. Oh well. Should be good eating through the rest of the year. They are tasty.

 

[mom-to-5]

So I asked before....no one with brahmas?  My 2.5 month old chicks are already hot, in the shade, in damp dust bath areas.  It can't be more than 85 degrees in the chicken area.    I think it's their super feathered feet that keeps them hot.  I'll start leaving out pans of water for them to stand in.  Maybe I can set up a mister for them, but I've had so many irrigation disasters that it seems like one more thing that can go wrong

I have one light brahma umong my small flock of 8. The one day it got to 96 here in Mesa she was panting but so were have of the others. I went to go buy a mister for them and by the time I got back home the side of the house they are on was already shaded and they were no longer panting so I decided to wait on the mister. Hopefully they will all make it through the summer ok.