Arizona Chickens

[MaddBaggins]

Oh, and a question for all you gardeners... Now that the dogs are gone, my wife wants her garden even more. What is a good size to start with? It'll be a raised bed, along the pool fence. That'll allow me to easily put in a trellis for vine plants. I was thinking 2'x6'?

I have appx 10'x16' raised bed. I usually just do tomatoes and various peppers/chilis. I have the best luck with those.

 

[countrygirl74]

CountryGirl, that is horrible news having that many roos. I would definitely call them and complain. If they truly do refuse to pay and your order confirmation shows you were supposed to get females, I would also file a claim with the bank. Depending on how long ago the order was, the bank may take care of the issue for you. And, of course, there is always the Better Business Bureau. Of course, the results from that are as hit-or-miss as sexing the fuzzy butts...

Since you're in Northern Arizona, it won't help you much, but The Stock Shop here in Glendale will buy your roosters for $8.00 each. You might try the local shops up there and see if they'll do the same. As a last resort, before Camp Freezer, you might try putting them on Craig's List. I'm sure you won't get out what you put in to them costwise, but maybe it'll help a little.

When I went to learn how to process a chicken, she sent me home with the rooster than she did that day. He was fairly young and there just wasn't a lot of meat to him. I'm sure it depends a lot on breed, but I just don't want you to get your hopes too high about getting a good chunk of meat out of him. I will say, though, it was some of the best darn chicken I've ever had!

If we do decide to cull most or all of the roosters ourselves... so sad...

, at what age would be best to do that. I will also check into selling, etc., although I am pretty certain that they would all meet the same fate around here. Would it be bad to keep one roo (we're pretty close to the EE roo) and still have the 2 silkie roos if I add some more hens? Would I need to add more silkie hens as well since there are 2 silkie roos and only 1 silkie hen right now?

 

[LadyKotaDoria]

I also love bats and the thing is its not true about all bats carrying rabies. The vampire bat is mostly the culprit.

True, and vampire bats are not native to this continent.

When I was in the hospital with my first child, they kept taking veils of blood. Barns Hospital in St. Louis, is a teaching and research hospital. I made a comment, "now is all this blood going to feed the vampire bats?". The young nurse turned white, got really up set, stamered, something to the affect of... I assure you your blood is for tests, the students are donating blood and they used out of date blood to feed them. a Hah hah moment. One wing was all research, they did happen to have a large number of bats. I was not to know about that. My 'student' nurse was one of the few people to be working on the project.

 

[flower]

If we do decide to cull most or all of the roosters ourselves... so sad...

, at what age would be best to do that. I will also check into selling, etc., although I am pretty certain that they would all meet the same fate around here. Would it be bad to keep one roo (we're pretty close to the EE roo) and still have the 2 silkie roos if I add some more hens? Would I need to add more silkie hens as well since there are 2 silkie roos and only 1 silkie hen right now?

I have found that when chicks grow up together, including silkie roosters they are rather tolerant of other males. As far as hens for the silkies, roosters do not discriminate on who they mate. Now if you are planning on keeping them in seperate areas with free ranging that changes the picture.
Are you near Olsen's Feed Store or any other big feed store. They will have silkies just in case.

 

[flower]

True, and vampire bats are not native to this continent.

When I was in the hospital with my first child, they kept taking veils of blood. Barns Hospital in St. Louis, is a teaching and research hospital. I made a comment, "now is all this blood going to feed the vampire bats?". The young nurse turned white, got really up set, stamered, something to the affect of... I assure you your blood is for tests, the students are donating blood and they used out of date blood to feed them.

a Hah hah moment. One wing was all research, they did happen to have a large number of bats. I was not to know about that. My 'student' nurse was one of the few people to be working on the project.

I don't believe you !

 

[notinoz2007]

mahonri - credit is due and i want to thank you for the easter hatch that you created. i had so much fun last year and i appreciate the work you put into it. BYC may not agree, but i think you were instrumental in raising member numbers - many lurkers probably joined full force just to be part of these hatches.

squeeky and gallo, that bat is hideous, and looks very much like dracula who got smacked with a pot of boiling water. awful...
as for that blob fish, he looks like a sad man, lol

 

[notinoz2007]

azkat, reading about your tree was even funnier than you telling me in person. sorry for your trouble and i hope that you are able to enjoy the deceptive fruit

 

[City farm]

Okay, for everyone who is following this... here are the pictures of my 12 chickens. In a quick re-cap... I ordered 11 chickens from Ideal. I specifically asked for NO males except for what I might receive with the silkies as they were straight run. They sent me 12 chickens and it seems like I have a LOT of roos. So disappointed... I will start with all the silkie photos and see what you guys think. These photos were taken today and they are all almost 16 weeks old. These first 2 photos are Snuffleupagus, our red silkie. I think he is a roo, but no crowing yet. But he fights a lot with our blue silkie. These two are of Cloud, the white silkie... I think she is a hen - smaller, very mellow. Here is the blue silkie Disco - think he is a roo too. No crowing yet, but fights with the red silkie. The Rhode Island Red - a sweet hen (Esther) I have 2 of these Barred Plymouth Rocks - both are hens! (Pocahontas & Mayflower) This is one of the EE's of the two that I ordered - pretty sure this one is a hen. (Chipmunk) The only speckled sussex female I ordered (Cookie) and it's not a girl! He is crowing as of today! The other EE female I ordered who is now crowing regularly as well. (Chubby) The funny thing about this one is we thought she was just the sweetest little girl ever... She/He was bullied for a while and we worked very hard to get her/him back into the flock. At one point this chicken was so scared of the rest of the flock that it would run and hide in the house all the time and run and hide under us when possible - even jumping up into our lap and burying its head into our jackets to hide... Now he is fine but still very personable. Now, the next few pics are tricky - can't quite tell if these australorps are roos or hens... no crowing from this one. (Shimmer) Also, no crowing from this one... (Ninja) This one, however, was the extra they sent and he is definitely crowing! (Falcon) Okay, so, if the other 2 australorps are not roos, my total is 3 roos and 6 hens (not counting the silkies as I knew they were straight run). That is not the 90% accuracy rate that they claim. If the australorps are not hens, then the rate is worse. What are all your thoughts on this?

I like your EE.. She is beautiful.. But also your EE roo..lovely I think our 2 australorps are hens.. But what do I know... Not much... Just still want to guess... If I am right than Yeehaa

 

[City farm]

Well, I had a very productive day today!  With the current sale prices at Sprouts, I was able to make two batches of salsa and I'm finishing up a batch of mild Ro-Tel.  There will be a batch of medium Ro-Tel tomorrow morning.  For salsa, I ended up with 27 pints that I processed, 2 pints that were not processed, and a 60 ounce container for immediate use.  The two pints are going over to a friend's house tomorrow night and the container is for us to eat this week.  There ended up a total of 15 half-pints of Ro-Tel.  All in all, I spent about 72c a pint on salsa and the RoTel came out to about 72c each.  The RoTel came out more expensive than what I buy it for on sale, but only by about 3c.  The salsa, well, you can't touch a pint of salsa for that cheap if you stole it off of a bumm streetwalking down central...

And the best part is that it all tastes far, far better than store-bought!

The Recipes:
Belle Adorn Salsa

Home Canned Ro-Tel

Happy canning!!!

You crack us up...

 

[City farm]

Oh, and a question for all you gardeners... Now that the dogs are gone, my wife wants her garden even more. What is a good size to start with? It'll be a raised bed, along the pool fence. That'll allow me to easily put in a trellis for vine plants. I was thinking 2'x6'?

I think if you are going to go for it... Really GO 4 it... Once you get started it is hard to stop.. Just like with chickens.. Remember when you only has a few??