Arizona Chickens

[carnivore]

The wild birds will eat the pupae before they hatch. There are a couple of good videos about how to spread them on Spalding Lab's website.

You want some to hatch and lay eggs to make more pupae.

 

[Sill]

They love it & so do we..

. It is more nutritious, better quality, some draw backs.. You have to order in advance.. Go to Phoenix to pick up..
Howerever, I heard the BAKERS is closing.. I wonder where we would pick up from?

NOOOO!

Tell me it ain't so! Bakers is my favorite nursery! Pretty soon we will be left with the big box DIY stores to get plants from. Picking up our organic chicken feed there is a great excuse to buy some new plants for the yard.

 

[Gallo del Cielo]

Quote:
Well, if that's it, I should be O.K. I have containers made to release them to keep ants and birds away, the same ones I use for green lacewing larvae. It's what I also did last year ('cept they were already emerging when I put them out). I had asked the Arbico folks about it when I got them last year and they thought it would be fine. I'll let the thread know how it turns out.

 

[pipemum]

I checked my second bag of fly predator this morning. Looks like enough have hatched that they are ready to spread tonight. For those that are curious, I took some pictures of the pupae and the wasps. The wasps are tiny. Sorry, there is no scale from which to judge...but the pupae are about the size of a shortish packrat turd. The wasps that hatch out of them seem much smaller that the should from the size of their pupating form. Those black specks in the bottom corner of the bag are the wasps.



Gallo, what are your release containers like? I put mine in the compost piles and in a few places throughout my garden and chicken run (safe from the chickens though)...and covered them lightly with soil and debris. I'll have to watch the videos on spreading that desertmarcy mentioned for this next bunch (I ordered a free sample and paid for one bag). I wonder how easy these things are to raise? Probably not too hard, but I'm guessing easier for me to purchase every month rather than attempting it myself.

 

[pipemum]

I found my EE's second soft-shelled egg this morning--the first was over the weekend. What in the world is going on with her reproductive system?

eta: I've been going through the internet searching egg issues, and I'm thinking it's just plain stress in her case. Perhaps the foot wound was worse than it looked and the minor infection really stressed out her system. I'll keep an eye on her, and have already boosted the calcium in her feed, so...I guess I'll just give her time. Her eggs, though smaller and thinner and round like a golf ball with a strange calcium swirly on top...are still edible!

 

[Gallo del Cielo]

I checked my second bag of fly predator this morning. Looks like enough have hatched that they are ready to spread tonight. For those that are curious, I took some pictures of the pupae and the wasps. The wasps are tiny. Sorry, there is no scale from which to judge...but the pupae are about the size of a shortish packrat turd. The wasps that hatch out of them seem much smaller that the should from the size of their pupating form. Those black specks in the bottom corner of the bag are the wasps.



Gallo, what are your release containers like? I put mine in the compost piles and in a few places throughout my garden and chicken run (safe from the chickens though)...and covered them lightly with soil and debris. I'll have to watch the videos on spreading that desertmarcy mentioned for this next bunch (I ordered a free sample and paid for one bag). I wonder how easy these things are to raise? Probably not too hard, but I'm guessing easier for me to purchase every month rather than attempting it myself.

The pupae you see in the bag are fly pupae, not the wasp pupae (they are inside the fly pupal cases). The female parasitic wasp seeks out fly pupae in the ground and lays eggs in it. We had a couple Arbico scientists come and speak at our Tucson Aquaponics Project meeting and they recommended nailing a coffee can to the inside wall of your chicken coop (out of reach of chickens) and put them in there. I use cottage cheese containers with the lid on and about a 1" hole in the side and then hang them in a shady spot around the garden and coop area with a piece of wire out of reach of things that would like to eat them (ants and birds).

I think it would be fairly easy to raise them yourself, but that would mean maintaining a big mess of flies. Yep, I'll leave that to Arbico.

 

[Gallo del Cielo]

I found my EE's second soft-shelled egg this morning--the first was over the weekend. What in the world is going on with her reproductive system?

eta: I've been going through the internet searching egg issues, and I'm thinking it's just plain stress in her case. Perhaps the foot wound was worse than it looked and the minor infection really stressed out her system. I'll keep an eye on her, and have already boosted the calcium in her feed, so...I guess I'll just give her time. Her eggs, though smaller and thinner and round like a golf ball with a strange calcium swirly on top...are still edible!

You know, I've been meaning to tell you that I have an EE with thin egg shells too. She's four and a half now and every year when the temperatures start to rise her shells get thin, so much so that they often are broken by the other hens if I don't collect often. Occasionally, she'll lay an egg without a shell and I often find them in weird places (e.g. under the roosts, in odd places in the yard or run). She only exhibits this problem when it's hot out and never in the winter. Coincidentally (or not) I had another EE, who was eaten by coyotes, that showed the same thin shell problem (no shell-less eggs though).

 

[pipemum]

The pupae you see in the bag are fly pupae, not the wasp pupae (they are inside the fly pupal cases). The female parasitic wasp seeks out fly pupae in the ground and lays eggs in it. We had a couple Arbico scientists come and speak at our Tucson Aquaponics Project meeting and they recommended nailing a coffee can to the inside wall of your chicken coop (out of reach of chickens) and put them in there. I use cottage cheese containers with the lid on and about a 1" hole in the side and then hang them in a shady spot around the garden and coop area with a piece of wire out of reach of things that would like to eat them (ants and birds).

I think it would be fairly easy to raise them yourself, but that would mean maintaining a big mess of flies. Yep, I'll leave that to Arbico.

Oh, of course! No wonder the pupae are so much bigger. The container idea is brilliant.

 

[pipemum]

You know, I've been meaning to tell you that I have an EE with thin egg shells too. She's four and a half now and every year when the temperatures start to rise her shells get thin, so much so that they often are broken by the other hens if I don't collect often. Occasionally, she'll lay an egg without a shell and I often find them in weird places (e.g. under the roosts, in odd places in the yard or run). She only exhibits this problem when it's hot out and never in the winter. Coincidentally (or not) I had another EE, who was eaten by coyotes, that showed the same thin shell problem (no shell-less eggs though).

Hmm, interesting. My EE's egg issue did start as the temps rose. Her egg this morning wasn't eggsactly shell-less, but thin enough that it was already crushed when I found it. And yes, found under the roost in the run!

 

[LadyKotaDoria]

Time is getting short for me, and I am finding my self just spinning my wheels at times. But things are getting done. Roof lined up to be fixed checked, A/C -heat pump scheduled to be serviced checked, electrical scheduled to estimated work checked, garage sorted with trash gone, keeping packed, sale stacked checked, and next... Next..

Thursday, May 1 all my girls are up for good homes, although they could go any time now. I am asking $15.00 each. Lousy being almost 2 years old $10.00, she is still laying very well, for me. There has been no forced laying. I would like to have them all gone by the 15th of May.

LUCY'S IN FRONT OF RHODE ISLAND RED, THE EE IS ECLARE (lays brown eggs), THE ONE IN THE MIDDLE IS TYPSY A RED STAR OR PRODUCTION RED

THIS THELMA, SHE IS FROM DESERTMARCY, AND AS YOU CAN SEE A VERY NICE SIZE PBR.

LISA IS A PINCIL OR A PARTRIDGE BARRED ROCK

MARRY IS A BUFF ORPINGTON, SHE IS JUST A YEAR OLD MAY 7 AND HAS GONE BROODY TWICE.

I have eggs that will be going into lock down tonight, do to start hatching Friday and Saturday. Flower has first pick of any NN, they are her eggs, of course when they hatch everyone will know how many. Mary is setting on 12, this time around she is doing much better. First time she broke 2 eggs, this time not a one, I will be giving all the peeps to her, if she can handle it. If they are all hatching about at the same time she may be excepting. I will watch.