Arizona Chickens

[a little chiken]

Desertmarcy breeds Marans. You might try her.

Thank you I just might do that. I might have to wait a few weeks or else my husband might disown me....lol. I have 35 aloha chicks waiting to get here from Phx so they will keep me busy as well.

 

[desertmarcy]

Desertmarcy breeds Marans. You might try her.

Yes, I have pullets for sale right now, Black Coppers. Young ones, but old enough I can tell their sex. They are layer quality, not for breeding because most of them I'm selling don't have enough feathers on their feet. I've hatched out more than 100 of them so far---it is a project to get show quality birds that lay dark eggs as well.

 

[pipemum]

I LOVE my cups. what I did is go push the tongue thing to let water come into them. Make sure they hear you do it and you have no other water source in your coops. Do not allow them to get to any other water. It takes putting water in the cups 3 or 4 times a day and I had a hen pick it up. in 3 days they were all on it and they are doing amazing!!!!

I am so sorry you had a bad weekend. My flower bed timer is possessed it comes on as it feels the need to even though it is scheduled time.

Let me know if you need help with waterers.......well long distance help.

Okay, I'll try the peanut butter on the tabs, and take away all the water. I'm sure they'll get it, I'm just concerned since I'll be on vacation so soon. I should have gotten the cups set up a couple of weekends ago!

I'm going to have to wrap the buckets, tubing, and pvc pipe with some sort of insulation.. The water got HOT yesterday.

 

[Gallo del Cielo]

I'm going to have to wrap the buckets, tubing, and pvc pipe with some sort of insulation.. The water got HOT yesterday.

I recommend Reflectix for this application, it works well at keeping temps inside down.

Maybe it's worth measuring how much they are consuming, it can be hard to tell by otherwise. Tonight or tomorrow morning draw a line on the outside of your bucket where the waterline is inside. At the end of the day measure how much water is needed to re-fill to that amount. Divide the volume by the number of birds to get an idea of how much is being consumed. It might help you decide what to do one way or the other.

 

[desertmarcy]

Okay, I'll try the peanut butter on the tabs, and take away all the water. I'm sure they'll get it, I'm just concerned since I'll be on vacation so soon. I should have gotten the cups set up a couple of weekends ago!

I'm going to have to wrap the buckets, tubing, and pvc pipe with some sort of insulation.. The water got HOT yesterday.

Are your buckets, tubing, and/or pvc pipe accessible to the chickens? Depending on the type of insulation you use, the birds will eat it. I carefully wrapped pipe with the rubberized, higher quality pipe insulation years back and the birds ate it. Turkeys and chickens both. They would probably eat the foam insulation, too, or at least peck at it until it is gone.

 

[pimachickens]

 

 

And to think I was actually encouraging it's growth! I was looking for something low-growing to fill in the spaces between my flagstone, and figured since it was already there and happy, why not? SOOOO glad I asked!


I have those evil little seeds everywhere in my yard, I just didn't know where they were coming from. My yard must have been infested at one point. My poor dog steps on one or two every day.


So, anyone have any thoughts on something low-growing that would look nice between flagstone? In the NW, we'd have used moss. Obviously NOT a very good choice for Tucson.

Purslane maybe?  It has the same profile of the puncture vine/goat head, drought tolerant and edible.  I don't know if it's perennial or not though.  I succeeded in eradicating every single purslane before I realized I kinda wanted them around.  Of course they never grew back like they were before.

Since I've been letting my chickens free-range I haven't had many weeds, except in the fenced-off areas. I used to have purslane.  Wish I still did.  I suspect the chickens have been eating any seedlings that have come up. 

Pimachickens, make sure you pull those goatheads out by the roots or else they will re-grow.  They are annuals but they are very persistent.  There will always be some seeds but you can improve the situation dramatically in just a few years if you are vigilant.  Don't miss any - one plant can produce a lot of seeds in a short time.

Thanks for the advice, everyone. All that I could find have been pulled, and I will make sure to keep pulling all the new ones as they sprout until I have them all. Although it's probably just quicker to walk around the yard barefoot . Purslane is a good idea, I will look into that.

 

[carnivore]

My dog has long hair, and is always tracking them into the house. I usually find them while I'm stumbling around for coffee.

 

[MagicChicken]

Quote: Since I've been letting my chickens free-range I haven't had many weeds, except in the fenced-off areas. I used to have purslane. Wish I still did. I suspect the chickens have been eating any seedlings that have come up.

Pimachickens, make sure you pull those goatheads out by the roots or else they will re-grow. They are annuals but they are very persistent. There will always be some seeds but you can improve the situation dramatically in just a few years if you are vigilant. Don't miss any - one plant can produce a lot of seeds in a short time.

Thanks for the advice, everyone. All that I could find have been pulled, and I will make sure to keep pulling all the new ones as they sprout until I have them all. Although it's probably just quicker to walk around the yard barefoot

. Purslane is a good idea, I will look into that.

As for planting something low-growing between the flagstones, can you grow Dichondra there? Dichondra doesn't like being walked on but might do well between the stones where it would be more protected. It would probably look better than purslane in that setting. Purslane is a much bigger, more sprawling plant.

 

[LadyKotaDoria]

Thanks for the info. Can you share where you get the birds from? Here locally? I'm at 59th ave & I-10.

From members of BYC, DesertMarcy in Tuscon. She has really nice chickens, wll worth the price. There are a number of members in I the meto area that have outstanding pullets. The only drawback is unless the breds self sexing you have to buy straight run. When I return permanently in 2 to 5 years I will be seeing DesertMarcy an others for sure. Flower is an other, although at this time I do no believe she is not into the pure-breed-bread breeding. Such as paying $$$.$$ for roosters and pullets. I am looking for eggs, personality, and good looking chickens, I may have 1 mut with me, I want 1 silkie for the ahhhh factor, and one Naked Neck. I am aming for 3 but might end up with 4 because I have OCD.

I have bought from Craig's list, but have breen disappointed. Most of the members are pretty responsible breeders.

 

[moms3cuties]

And to think I was actually encouraging it's growth! I was looking for something low-growing to fill in the spaces between my flagstone, and figured since it was already there and happy, why not? SOOOO glad I asked!

I have those evil little seeds everywhere in my yard, I just didn't know where they were coming from. My yard must have been infested at one point. My poor dog steps on one or two every day.

So, anyone have any thoughts on something low-growing that would look nice between flagstone? In the NW, we'd have used moss. Obviously NOT a very good choice for Tucson.

I would use dicondra seeds or chocolate mint! if I remember tomorrow I'll show you pictures of the chocolate mint growing between my flagstones an invading my backyard grass. And it smells wonderful when you trim it. on the other hand with dicondra grass, it's an old grass that you never have to mow. It fills in the space, it almost looks like a round clover but its not a clover and you just give it a sprinkle everyday in the hot summer and it should be fine.