BDutch's bantam flock & natural breeding projects #5 🪺 🪺 and #6

[BDutch]

Not much news on the horizon. The routines are about the same everyday. They go a bit later to the nestboxes to rest in the evening and they grow tail, wings and other feathering. Some combs are getting more clear .

Biggest change in the flock is that Ini mini gave up being broody but Katrientje didn’t. Only Kraai is laying eggs nog.

A few more photo’s from last week.

The differences in combs already start to show.
guessing
Vorwerk: 2 1
Red Sussex: 1 1
Dutch: 1 3

3 weeks now and I think I was too optimistic. My guess now:
Vorwerk: 2 1
Red Sussex: 2
Dutch: 2 2

 

[RoyalChick]

View attachment 3520800Not much news on the horizon. The routines are about the same everyday. They go a bit later to the nestboxes to rest in the evening and they grow tail, wings and other feathering. Some combs are getting more clear .

Biggest change in the flock is that Ini mini gave up being broody but Katrientje didn’t. Only Kraai is laying eggs nog.

A few more photo’s from last week.
View attachment 3520803
View attachment 3520806


3 weeks now and I think I was too optimistic. My guess now:
Vorwerk: 2 1
Red Sussex: 2
Dutch: 2 2

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That third picture is lovely and really unusual - you should submit to POW and the competition on broodies and babies.
It is a great photo.

 

[BDutch]

Probably the only girl of the ‘bigger’ bantams. This is a bantam Vorwerk chick. 3 weeks old now.

The wind was cold today.

The mama’s stay in the run(s) whole day. And even on a cold, windy bu sunny day like today I didn’t see any chicks warming itself under mama’s wings.

Kraai must have thought is safe to take on her old habit and laid an egg in the nest box ,next to where the mamas and chicks sleep.

But the mamas decided the nest box with the egg had to be occupied over night.

So glad I bought a big bag with 25 kg chick feed. The chicks are eating more and more. And because they all mingle I can’t give layer feed to the not-mama’s.
The hay keeps disappearing in the nest-boxes.

 

[NanaK]

Love this picture! They look like they all posed for the camera.

 

[RoyalChick]

View attachment 3522157
Probably the only girl of the ‘bigger’ bantams. This is a bantam Vorwerk chick. 3 weeks old now.

View attachment 3522155
The wind was cold today.

The mama’s stay in the run(s) whole day. And even on a cold, windy bu sunny day like today I didn’t see any chicks warming itself under mama’s wings.

Kraai must have thought is safe to take on her old habit and laid an egg in the nest box ,next to where the mamas and chicks sleep.

But the mamas decided the nest box with the egg had to be occupied over night.

View attachment 3522174

So glad I bought a big bag with 25 kg chick feed. The chicks are eating more and more. And because they all mingle I can’t give layer feed to the not-mama’s.
The hay keeps disappearing in the nest-boxes.

I just love the pictures of them all together - it is just the cutest thing ever to see them all cuddling up together!

 

[BDutch]

4 weeks now.

MDH and I considered and discussed to let the mama’s and chicks free range if we are in the garden as wel. But the bantam chicks, especially the Dutch are still so tiny that we are afraid that the cats, jays and magpies that all live here are too big a threat. My bantams probably would chase away the magpies and blue jays if they come near but not fierce enough to chase away cats. They were always too afraid to step into the run when a cat was inside.
On the other hand, it would be healthy for them and a way to learn how to be careful while they free range.
It still is a dilemma from my point of view. Give the bunch a natural surrounding and being very sad if a chick gets killed? Or protect them and keep the chicks confined for another 6 weeks in a run. MDH chooses the last option. But maybe I can convince him to try around 6 pm. That way they stay outside an hour before bedtime and they will return by themself.

Advice, especially from people who had bantam chicks with free ranging bantam broodies is welcome. If you know anyone who has. Please tag.

 

[RoyalChick]

View attachment 3528376View attachment 3528375

4 weeks now.

MDH and I considered and discussed to let the mama’s and chicks free range if we are in the garden as wel. But the bantam chicks, especially the Dutch are still so tiny that we are afraid that the cats, jays and magpies that all live here are too big a threat. My bantams probably would chase away the magpies and blue jays if they come near but not fierce enough to chase away cats. They were always too afraid to step into the run when a cat was inside.
On the other hand, it would be healthy for them and a way to learn how to be careful while they free range.
It still is a dilemma from my point of view. Give the bunch a natural surrounding and being very sad if a chick gets killed? Or protect them and keep the chicks confined for another 6 weeks in a run. MDH chooses the last option. But maybe I can convince him to try around 6 pm. That way they stay outside an hour before bedtime and they will return by themself.

Advice, especially from people who had bantam chicks with free ranging bantam broodies is welcome. If you know anyone who has. Please tag.

I understand your dilemma. How about you start small. Pick an hour when you can sit right nearby and let them out. Have a plan to shoo or entice them all back in when you have to leave.
My guess is you can keep the cats away and it will probably build your confidence and theirs!

 

[BDutch]

Thanks Royalchick, I did as you suggested.
Also because I needed to trim the Portuguese laurel. It was growing through the net ‘roof’

The main run has no door but a silly entrance with cat netting and bamboo sticks. I dont need to be there often so its no problem to remove it and attach it again when I’m done.

But today it was an opportunity to let the chicks on the grass near the entrance while I was around. I used the old rabbit fences around the opening, this way the chicks could explore a few m2 with grass. 2 mama’s + all the chicks loved it for 20 minutes and went back again on their own.

Cutting the laurel was interesting too.
I really had to be carefull not to step on the little gnomes

I removed the separate nestbox to the second run because Kraai en Ini mini lay in the old nest boxes again. Katrientje is still in her after broody - don’t lay yet- period. But she was scratching in the new bedding under the roost to explore if she could lay an egg there.

And I made a slope to the adult roosts. Its getting very warm this week and I think it might be getting too warm in the crowded nest-boxes. Now they can train roosting and have an alternative.

No pics today.

 

[BDutch]

Opening the run a bit again yesterday.

My heroes after 1 , 3 and 5 minutes

After 20 minutes and two chick break outs , they started to return by themselves. Janice got angry to me again saving her chicks. She maybe didn’t miss the chicks but when she saw me holding one (to put back in) she attacked me. The black Dutch never do that.

The chicks probably escaped trough a small opening at the bottom where the rabbit fences were not properly connected.

 

[Adorae]

That light colored chick, what is it?