Arizona Chickens

[H2OKarensa]

Heelers&Chickens_OhMy :

Predators I need to be wary of in the Phoenix area? I'm building my coop and I'm unsure of what predators to prep for. I'm near Mesa.

Be prepared for anything coming from land or from sky.
Coyotes, neighborhood dogs, owls, hawks.........
Bury your fence or apron it if you can and put some kind of roof on your run like poultry netting or chicken wire etc.

My girls free range in the afternoons when I'm home, but I still lost one of my juveniles over the weekend even while I was outside working in another part of the yard. She just disappeared. I'm assuming hawk, but I'm not sure.​

 

[Heelers&Chickens_OhMy]

I suppose I should be a bit more specific...

I think I can prepare for coyotes and dogs just fine, I have an overly excited pit bull I live with who's still learning about chickens.....so I think I can predator proof there.

My yard is not very big, I'm not sure if a hawk would try to get that close to me? Literally, I have about 40 grassy square feet max for these chickens. However, I'll take your word for it that hawks are fearless!

I can leave my chickens in the backyard with my heeler when I can't be out there and I'm hoping that another predator in the backyard is enough to scare off any birds - would you agree or no?

I AM curious about crafty animals, like raccoons or possums - do we have any of those?

Thank you for your help!

 

[Eggs4Sale]

Dtchick,
We're hitting 112 degrees here now, and our 8 Black Star hens are giving us 7 eggs a day, average. We've had RIR, Barred Rock, and Ameracauna before, and egg production always dropped like a rock in extreme heat. The Black Stars are handling it exceptionally well, with no interference from us at all. They even stand out in the sun to peck at yard critters in the worst heat of the day. I don't know how a black chicken can do that. As an added bonus, they are very nice. Laying hens will even tolerate my 5-year-old looking under them for eggs or petting them. Other breeds we've had would understandably peck at us if we bothered them at egg-laying time.

We have other younger hens and roosters that are about a month shy of laying age (the hens, anyways!), and of the multiple varieties we have, the Blue Andalusians and the White-Faced Black Spanish are supposed to handle heat very well. They don't look like they'd be wonderful meat birds, though, but they're supposed to be decent for eggs. They're sure pretty to look at. I can't attest to anything yet, though, as they are not old enough.
Our larger chickens (Rhode Island Red, Barred Rock, and the feather-legged cochins and brahmas) do not seem to be taking the heat in stride as well as the others. They don't seem ill, they just have their beaks gaping and wings lifted more often than the others. I feel hotter just looking at them!

 

[Eggs4Sale]

Heelers&Chickens,
When I finally put my dove-sized youngsters into a pen out is the grass, I failed to cover the pen with chicken wire. Somehow, word passed through the grapevine, and I saw more hawks in my yard in one day than I had seen in 10 years combined. They were literally lurking in the trees, patiently biding their time. Big guys, little guys (American Kestrels) you name it, they were there. And think of this: Did you know a snake can climb a brick wall? I have seen gopher snakes here, in an effort to get away from my dogs, stand up on tippy-tail and grab a branch 4 feet off the ground, pull themselves up, and coil along the branch to elsewhere. No snake has eaten a chick yet, thank goodness, but just be aware that just because your yard is small, or there isn't something there RIGHT NOW that might eat young chickens, doesn't mean they won't come from near and far. If you don't cover the yard with netting, at the very least have several brush piles or something similar that they could scramble into to hide. Your pit bull may keep hawks away, he may not. The presence of my 2 dogs, my husband and myself was not enough to prevent the loss of two of our young chickens. It takes a split second for a hawk to swoop, catch, and fly off. They will take the chicken somewhere high if they have to. Then what do you do? Once they've got it, they've got it. Don't make it easy for a hawk to fly away. You don't need to fill every gap, because if they see they can't fly back through, they will likely not try it.

 

[a2ms4chickens]

Quote:
Welcome to BYC!!

We got our first chicks from OK Feeds on Fort Lowell. They were about 8 weeks old. That was about 1-1/2 yrs ago. They are still doing well and great layers.
I have Rhode Island Reds, a Buff orpington, a Barred Rock and lots of red sex-links. Both bantams and standards.

So far, they are surviving the heat. We are putting the mister in their pen today, since it is supposed to be 104 today. We just make sure they have lots and lots of water.

We did lose our very first rooster, today. He has been doing poorly for about a week. We thought it was from the heat as he got pale and started losing weight. We also wormed him thinking it could be an internal parasite as the symptoms are similar.
He was a silver duckwing old english bantam and was about 2 yrs old. My DS entered him in several poultry shows and fairs for 4-H. He won lots of ribbons.
We were able to hatch 3 females from him, but unfortunatley, no males. Now we will be looking for a breeder so he can get another one.

We have been very fortunate as we have only lost 4 chickens in the 2 years that we have been raising them. Which is good, because we become attached to them.

Good luck in picking out your chickens. You will enjoy them as they are fun to watch, and their personalities are so different. You'll luv 'em!

 

[Mahonri]

Heelers&Chickens_OhMy :

Predators I need to be wary of in the Phoenix area? I'm building my coop and I'm unsure of what predators to prep for. I'm near Mesa.

It depends upon how close to preserves you are.

I'm in East Central Phoenix and I've seen coyotes running down my street.

Predators: Stray dogs/cats, coyotes, ringtail foxes, HAWKS (year round) and owls (I see owls more often in the cooler months).

I watched a hawk come out of seemingly nowhere last month and get a dove who was eating near our run!​

 

[Struebelchicks]

When I went to the Maricopa County Fair they were the two breeds that I liked the best. I liked the looks of them and when I read about them they were listed as dual purpose chickens although the Buff Orpingtons are larger and some places list the Austrolorps as better layers. Even though the Austrolorps are usually listed as Black Austrolorps I think that is the only color they come in and yes, the chicks are adorable.

The chicks are neat because each one tends to look different whereas the older birds look more alike. (We have some that are 12 weeks old and we put leg bands on them to tell them apart.) The Buff chicks all look alike. The Austrolorps seem to be more curious than the Buffs. They are related since the Black Orpington was used to produce the Austrolorp. I don't remember what it was crossed with.

One of these days I hope to get some pictures posted.

 

[BellLisamo]

Quote:
oh you brat!!!!! i need a male royal palm turkey.

 

[H2OKarensa]

Quote:
oh you brat!!!!! i need a male royal palm turkey.

There were some folks there who had a royal palm tom for sale for something like $25. I don't know if it is still available but they gave me their business card. Here's the info.
[email protected]
MaryAnn was her name. I also see their ads on craigslist. They're located in McNeal.

 

[Eggs4Sale]

Struebelchicks, I asked because the site showed black, and blue. How do they get blue, does anyone know?

HippieChickens, we have two White Faced Black Spanish that are sleek and black, but they are nowhere as fanciful as the sumatra. The rooster is a rooster, he's not cuddling up with orphans and baking gingerbread cookies for the homeless. He's not aggressive to us, though. He tolerates being in his enclosure well. The hen, on the other hand, flies the coop every day, hopping straight up to get out through a 5-inch gap, forages nearby during the day, and flies up into a low-hanging branch for the evening. If we had the pen taller than 3 feet, this would not be a problem. (They're in a chicken-wired trampoline). Both handle the heat extraordinarily well. Neither are what I would call friendly, but they're not unfriendly.

But with them, you get the white face, and if you're looking for sumatra-like qualities, a white face may not qualify!