Arizona Chickens

[btrent94]

I love varied flocks

heres my plan:

1 BO
1 BR
1 RIR
1 EE
1 Barnevleder
1 BCM
1 SLW
1 BLRW
1 GLW
1 White silkie
1 Australorp
1 White Leghorn (ideal 236)

That way i have lots of colors and lots of different eggs

 

[ArizonaDesertChicks]

I had purchased eggs from 2 sellers - 1 on e-bay, 1 from BYC. Both lived in MO and both packed very well - none broken, but I think the eggs from the BYC seller got shaken too badly in transit. Not one of those hatched or even started to develop. Six out of the eight eggs from the other e-bay seller developed and hatched.

Here's momma hen looking fierce - she looks mean, but I'm able to take eggs & chicks out from under her without being pecked.

Three of the black australorps that I'm letting her raise. We're raising the other 3 chicks separately along with the chick we hatched 2 weeks ago and the two buddies we purchased for that chick.

The lone light brahma that hatched:

 

[ArizonaDesertChicks]

Quote:
I love varied flocks too. We bought 2 of each breed, so that if one turned out to be a roo, we'd still have one of that breed. Well.. no roos, so we have a lot of pairs.

The original flock:
2 barred rocks
2 barnevelders
2 white leghorns
3 easter eggers (we wanted at least 2, ended up with 3)
1 production red (the other one was a cannabalistic chick, so we returned it to the feed store)

Recently added:
3 black sexlinks - all look different

Soon to replace a few of our least favorite hens (these are all from our new batch of chicks):
1 light brahma (if pullet)
1 black australorp
1 splash orpington (if pullet - I hope, I hope)
2 more easter eggers (my kids favorites)

We added another 6' x 10' dog run onto our original run, so I do have room now for these new ones.

 

[LavenderAndRoses]

Congrats on the new babies!

They are adorable!

My sister-in-law just hatched 9 bbs orps in our incubator for us in the last couple of days. She is going to be brooding them for a short time before we rehome them here.

After reading purple chicken's post, we'll make sure to quarantine for 30 days before flock introduction.

I have a couple of questions though:

1. I am looking into vaccinating the new chickies for Marek's. Has anyone done this here in AZ? Do you think it is worthwhile? Would you recommend vaccinating for pox or anything else? I did not do this with our current little flock since we are truly chicken newbies, I didn't realize it was available.

2. We live on the far east side of the valley (almost to A.J.). Does anyone know of a good supplier of poultry needs (i.e. feeds and medications) on our side? I'm trying to start a chicken first aid kit and wanted to have some supplies on hand in case of emergency.

Thanks!

 

[btrent94]

Quote:
once all of ours get bigger then it should look amazing .. where did you get your barnevelders from .. ive been looking everywere

But i think i found a feed store ( The feedlot ??) that i will be able to order special breed pullets aslong as i put a deposit down

 

[ArizonaDesertChicks]

The feedlot is where I found my barnevelders, but I don't know if they were from a hatchery or local breeder. It was kind of strange - they had about 15-20 four week old barnevelder pullets at that time, but no other chicks in the store. Usually when a feed store has baby chicks they have several kinds at once. I thought mabye a local seller might have sold them to the feed store. The feedlot had some more a few weeks ago - you might call them up.

I do think mine are hatchery quality because the legs on aren't a very dark yellow. One has the correct coloring, the other has a lot of red in her chest - both pretty, but different. Their eggs are definitely darker than the other brown egg layers we have, but not that dark (the two darkest on the bottom row of my avatar pic are theirs).

You can click here to see pics of them:
https://www.backyardchickens.com/web/viewblog.php?id=19548-from-chicks-to-pullets-to-hens

I think you might have missed my answer to one of your threads - I answered after you had thanked everyone for their help. I listed all the places in the valley that I know of that sell the chicks you were looking for:
https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=184933

 

[ArizonaDesertChicks]

Quote:
I don't think you have to quarantine newborn chicks as long as your sister doesn't let them near her flock and washes her hands before handling them ? But... you will need to keep them in a separate pen from your other chickens until they are about 3 months because the other hens will be brutal when you integrate the two bunches together.

Sorry, I don't know the answers to your 2 questions.

 

[btrent94]

lol omg i forgot all about that post

ahahah .. well i did find the feedlot i went there a few weeks ago when they said they had barnevelders and i got there and none left

i was kinda frustrated but the guy was super nice and we had a conversation and he said i could request a few breeds

so im going to see wat theyll do .. and if they cant do them all at once then i hopppe theyll do it seperate like 3 of the breeds this month 4 next month or however they wanna do it but my list is pretty set on those breeds and my limit is 12

ahahahah ...

 

[LavenderAndRoses]

Quote:
I don't think you have to quarantine newborn chicks as long as your sister doesn't let them near her flock and washes her hands before handling them ? But... you will need to keep them in a separate pen from your other chickens until they are about 3 months because the other hens will be brutal when you integrate the two bunches together.

Sorry, I don't know the answers to your 2 questions.

Thanks for the input! I could be wrong, but I thought purple chicken said MG could even be passed on through eggs?? I'll have to watch his videos again and do some research.

My sis is actually in Gilbert in a subdivision. She hatched the eggs as a "science" experiment for herself and her kids. But, she is not able to keep them and doesn't have chickies of her own, so no problems there.

Like you said, the big issue will be integration! Our little coop isn't big enough to house all the new ones anyway, so we are looking at building another one. Not too sure what we'll do yet. Want something inexpensive, but safe! Of course, the heat is of concern as well. Our bantam cochins seem to struggle with the heat at times (at least when it was 105 recently) so my dh has his portable swamp cooler blowing in to the coop for now.

Enough of my rambling...

, sorry, I tend to go on too long sometimes.

I'm looking forward to see if anyone has recommendations for supplies and vaccinating.

Thanks again for your reply!

 

[ArizonaDesertChicks]

Quote:
Maybe it can get passed on through the eggs - I have no idea. But, at least with your sister brooding them for you, maybe that can count for the incubation period.

We bought a 6' x 6' (4' high) chainlink dog run (chainlink roof too) on craigslist for our babies to grow up in - should work much better than last time when we tried to integrate our 3 sexlink chicks with the big meanies. We put them in early (with some places they could run to), because we had no extra pen for them.