Arizona Chickens

[rhondita55]

LOL.............

 

[desertmarcy]

The comb seems really large for an immature bird. The only SS I have personally seen were show birds. So I am not well versed in hatchery bred SS.

Well I can tell you from raising Marans, that on some breeds the male hormones will kick in early and they will develop a big comb but their bodies are still immature and are not filled out for many more months. That tends to be true of many of the heavy breeds like the Marans, Plymouth Rock, and Sussex.

 

[a little chiken]

What is Cobb?

It is Corn, Oats, and Barley and I feed the dry or without molasses

​

COB is corn oats and barley that has been steam rolled and either sprayed with molasses for wet cob or left dry.
On the feather fixer issue, I read that you should not feed scratch or corn during moult because it lowers protein levels in the overall diet.

I can tell you that feeding the mix I am feeding has improved my flocks moult time and we are almost done. Maybe this does not work for everyone but it works for me. I add in enough protein anyway by adding BOSS (black oil sunflower seeds) and feeding fresh veggies. I think if you pick 20 pages on what to feed animals each and every one will have different opinions and ideas. I just use what works for me.

My extras that I don't sell get hard boiled, chopped up and fed back to the birds. You can also freeze them for when times are lean.

Marcia, how do you freeze them? do I need to boil them or just freeze the fresh eggs? are they good for just baking then or can they be used as regular eggs? TIA

 

[MrsFitzDarcy]

So I candled my eggs about 12 hours early because I'm home a few hours from the hospital from sitting with Seamus.

I'm pretty sure:

1. All 12 of my Cream Legbar eggs are clear ... except:
2. the three extras from a different pen, definitely have veining;
3. 6 Olive Eggers (dark brown eggs), I can't tell except one that was exceptionally porous I could see the veins;
4. most of the bantams were clearly veined
5. 2 of 3 of the Silkie eggs that @AZChiknGoddess threw in for me had veins.

I'm so bummed about the Cream Legbars. I was so excited to get at least a half dozen chicks out of the 15. If anyone else has Cream Legbars from that pen at Padilla Peeps ... I think there was a rooster not doing his duty ...

 

[Gallo del Cielo]

Here is one of my keepers for next year. I think she is lovely, I love pastel colors on turkeys.

I love the depth and dimensionality of the color! So beautiful.

This afternoon I had an interesting thing happen. I stepped out onto the patio this afternoon and saw a long fluffy tail hanging down from the roof. I couldn't quite see the whole animal, but whatever it was, looked like it was laying on it's side. I was not being particularly quiet, so I thought it might be dead. I stood up on a stump, but still wasn't high enough to see it. So I went over to the side of the house to the storage room, walking right under it, and got my 3' long aluminum snake tongs. Went back and the animal was still there. I grabbed the tail with the tongs as far up as I could and yanked down in one smooth movement! I pulled down a very much alive FOX which hit the concrete WHUMP! and must have stunned it a bit, it snarled and spit as it staggered off into the dirt. I went into the house to get my pellet gun, but by the time I cocked it and got back outside, the fox was gone. It must have been sleeping up on the roof. It was on the roof right under where my overgrown olive trees are branching over the roof, so it was shady. I think this fox is getting WAY too comfortable here! I have been finding bits of pipe tape wrap chewed off from our solar hot water pipes onthe roof and wonder if the fox is doing that. I thought it was a packrat. I am going to try setting traps. With all the poultry here, I really do not want this fox hanging around, beautiful as it is. I was a bit up on caffeine at the time, but let me tell you, I was REALLY buzzed after pulling a fox off the roof! I do not know what possessed me to do that except I didn't know what it was and thought it might be dead, but I pulled it down quick and hard just in case. So far, I have not seen any evidence it is trying to get into the pens and we have seen this fox (I assume the same one) on several occasions over the past several weeks, although only quick glimpses through a window and then it disappears. This was actually quite funny after I thought about it a bit. I will post photos if I am successful in trapping it.

I just loved this story! Oh, what a surprise that must have been!

 

[Gallo del Cielo]

K9Dave if you find out anything about the Black Soldier Fly Larva let me know, im setting up some BSFL baited attractor buckets today hopefully I have some in my area if not ill order 500 to start my colony. I also work for APS lol I do armed security for them in Yuma. I love fly fishing its my favorite past time hobby.

I'm an avid fly fisher too. Do you ever fly fish for bass over there on that side of the state?

 

[Gallo del Cielo]

Hi everyone. I'm new. I live in Yuma and I'm preparing to go on my new chicken adventure. I'm getting Buff Orpingtons and some meat chickens in the mail in a bit more than a week. I've been reading everything I can get my hands on.
My brooder is up and ready to go. My coop will be finished soon and I'll keep adding to it over time. This should be fun. Wish me luck!

Greetings and welcome to our thread! Good luck and be sure to ask if you have any questions.

 

[desertmarcy]

It is Corn, Oats, and Barley and I feed the dry or without molasses

I can tell you that feeding the mix I am feeding has improved my flocks moult time and we are almost done. Maybe this does not work for everyone but it works for me. I add in enough protein anyway by adding BOSS (black oil sunflower seeds) and feeding fresh veggies. I think if you pick 20 pages on what to feed animals each and every one will have different opinions and ideas. I just use what works for me.

Marcia, how do you freeze them? do I need to boil them or just freeze the fresh eggs? are they good for just baking then or can they be used as regular eggs? TIA

We were talking about turkey eggs, but one guy said he just freezes them whole in a bag and they freeze fast enough that they tend to not leak, but turkey eggs have a much thicker inner membrane than chicken eggs, so not sure how that would work with chicken eggs. That said, I have had chicken eggs freeze unintentionally while on a camping trip when the propane refrigerator got too cold and they were still fine. You can also mix per instructions below and put in muffin tins; 2 egg amounts in a little baggie since many recipes call for 2 eggs, you can just take out what you need; or freeze in ice cubes trays, but I found when transferred to a bag after freezing, they stuck together. The information below is courtesy of April from the Rare Heritage Turkey Yahoo groups, that she posted when we were discussing freezing eggs just a week ago:

If storing egg whites alone, they don't need a stabilizer. If storing yolks alone, or whole eggs, they need a stabilizer or they become hard and pasty when thawing. To stabilize, I use 1 teaspoon honey per cup of yolks (about 12 average chicken yolks/cup) or per cup of whole eggs (about 5 average chicken eggs per cup, or 4 average turkey eggs). The yolks must be broken and the honey stirred in well with a fork. They don't have to be thoroughly whipped, as that adds too much air, which increases freezer damage to food. You can also strain the whole eggs through a strainer with large holes and then gently stir, which adds no air at all. I haven't tried this last method, as I've been happy with my current method of stirring with a fork, which adds a little air but not too much. It is easiest if the eggs are room temperature, as honey hardens when it's mixed into cold things, and becomes harder to mix. I have read that you can also use the same volume of either sugar or salt instead of honey and get the same results, but I have not tried that as I have my own bee hives. I would not recommend multiplying out the recipe and mixing large batches, especially if using honey, as honey does not mix thoroughly, and you might end up with some really sweet portions, and some really gummy portions.

After I mix up a cup, I put it in a one quart ziplock freezer bag. remove all the air from the bag, seal, and lay the bag flat on a cookie sheet. After the cookie sheet is covered, I put it in the freezer. Do not stack multiple layers. The purpose of the single, flat, thin bags on the cookie sheet is that the eggs will freeze very fast. That minimizes freezer damage, so the eggs taste better. They also freeze in a very flat, equal shape, which makes storage easier. After the bags are frozen solid, I remove them and stand them upright in a box that is the perfect height and width, kind of like 4X6" cards in an old fashioned recipe box. That stores the eggs very efficiently, taking up a minimum of space in the freezer, and allows you to easily "file" them with the oldest in front and the newest in back for appropriate rotation of food. Different sources say that eggs can be stored this way for either 6 months or 1 year, but it may be longer. I use them for omelets and cooking, where large numbers of eggs are required. I put the frozen bag in a bowl of cool water for 20 minutes to thaw, then cut the corner off the plastic bag and squeeze the contents into a bowl. Easy, and no mess.

You can also freeze the whole, stabilized, well mixed eggs in an ice cube tray. Spray the tray with Pam first to make the cubes slide out easily. After they're frozen solid, put the cubes in a plastic bag and remove as much air as possible. Each average sized cube equals approximately one egg, so that can be very handy for cooking when you don't need a large number of eggs.

One important detail -- be sure to label the bag with what type of stabilizer you use, as the extra honey, salt, or sugar could significantly affect the flavor of your food, depending on what you're cooking. I haven't tried the salt option yet, but the honey option works great for omelets -- not at all overly sweet or weird tasting.

 

[desertmarcy]

I just loved this story! Oh, what a surprise that must have been!

Ha, ha, for the fox AND for me! I bet that fox will not be sleeping on the roof any time soon, or may not even come around for a while.

 

[Papas Chickens]

I'm an avid fly fisher too.  Do you ever fly fish for bass over there on that side of the state?

Yes I sure do Sir, I also fly fish for catfish, sunfish and trout. I also tie my own flies and have a few I created myself which work very well for almost everything out here and in Idaho. Gallo I read that you breed BSFL any way you could send me some? We could trade flies for BSFL.