Bob Blosl's Heritage Large Fowl Thread

[thedragonlady]

Can you speak to this more. I don't currently use sand.

I use sand in my covered runs. Actually I live in the sand belt in S.C.. I use the sand as I can screen it every day, and get the large poops out.This keeps flies from breeding, and the few that do get snapped up by my resident wrens.My clever husband put a 1/4 " hardware cloth bottom on one of those deep dustpans on a stick, available at Wal-Mart. I rake up feathers and poop into the pan, and the sand falls through.The poop goes on my flowers. It doesn't burn them due to having no shavings in it. My hydrangeas are loving it.

All those hydrangeas have grown up through bird netting , which gives the birds another level of protection under the monofilament lines covering the orchard.





There is NO chicken coop smell here either. The sleeping coop/ roosts are bedded in wheat straw. That gets shaken up everyday, and changed every 2 weeks.Poop boards make cleaning easy too.

 

[aveca]

Egg laying capacity, as well as your type, can be fixed with time. That's the great thing about breeding. Gradually, as long as you do the research and attend shows, you'll learn where you need to go to select for stronger and stronger qualities.

I'd suggest beginning with the ALBC website education resources for breeding heritage poultry for production. You can see improvement in egg production relatively quickly with proper selection.

You know Yellow house farm, my big flaw is I never joined APA..I would probably have some nice things from them..Every year I say Im going to join..have boxes full of awards..every year I dont..Not sure why really..Im kind of a ribbon hound..so thats what go for..Have an entire wall covered in blue ribbons and scattered special awards. I like to frame and use them like a quilt like wall design ..when we build the new barn, they all get moved in there..If you guys get on me..I might get around to Joining the APa. Thanks for the ALBA website link..going to go check that out..I will probably get lost in it for hours..THANKS!

Last year I had a crop of blk orp females that I was thrilled with..in a 1 night weasle rampage..lost them all..in almost 30 years Ive never seen a weasle until that night..the neighbor dis assembled a rock wall and disbanded them..all of that is fixed now..I wont bore you with ribbons..I just love them..I keep the cage cards too

 

[fowlman01]

I use sand in my covered runs. Actually I live in the sand belt in S.C.. I use the sand as I can screen it every day, and get the large poops out.This keeps flies from breeding, and the few that do get snapped up by my resident wrens.My clever husband put a 1/4 " hardware cloth bottom on one of those deep dustpans on a stick, available at Wal-Mart. I rake up feathers and poop into the pan, and the sand falls through.The poop goes on my flowers. It doesn't burn them due to having no shavings in it. My hydrangeas are loving it.

All those hydrangeas have grown up through bird netting , which gives the birds another level of protection under the monofilament lines covering the orchard.





There is NO chicken coop smell here either. The sleeping coop/ roosts are bedded in wheat straw. That gets shaken up everyday, and changed every 2 weeks.Poop boards make cleaning easy too.

Why raise chickens if you can't enjoy the coop smell? The poop here ends up as a fine dust on the TV. The birds keep it ground up...no piles.

w.

 

[Yellow House Farm]

Aveca, enjoy the reading! I think you'll really like it. I certainly enjoy selecting for production.

ooooo....minks! Give me coyotes any day! Even bears, sure they rip the door off and splinter it in two....but minks! Entire coops of death in a night.

 

[Yellow House Farm]

Awesome ribbons, by the by!

 

[catdaddyfro]

Why raise chickens if you can't enjoy the coop smell? The poop here ends up as a fine dust on the TV. The birds keep it ground up...no piles.

w.

LOL yeah here I use it on my gardens and corn fields its is expensive fertilizer too make( but a by product non the less of the feed and the hobby) and takes some what of an effort to get it out of the coops/barn and into the rows but I gaurontee you everybody that sees my fields and gardens always have the best things to say about them(and want to know right away what proportion/percentages ie. (13-13-13 for example) I tell them mine is the 100% pure stuff and my yields are generally good too, which this is more due to Mother Nature supplying the needed moisture, of course without that all the poops in the world wouldn't make a "hill of beans" <pun intended.


Jeff

 

[Yellow House Farm]

How wonderfully bucolic!

 

[aveca]

Awesome ribbons, by the by!

Thank you...It was devestating to say the least..heartbreaking..amazing how a couple small animlas can wipe you out in one evening..lesson learned everything except outdoor day pens and runs covered with weasle proof wire..

Loving that web site! I get so caught up in the old time books..this site you gave me is really wonderful ..lots of good reading..I think the blacks need a good outcross ..trying to not use English but find robust standards..I think they are amazing,and important birds ..If I do use english..iy would be like sticking your toe in the water, wont dwell on it..hopefully I wont have to..I think lot of the standard might be inbred little too much ...but a freind bought some in midwest..so seeing what we can do with it.. I do have 2 very large females this year..so shall see what happens..colors good combs good , so time will tell..

here is one baby that I gave a freind ..we have been trying to keep the width and depth its a focus..I think hes maybe short back but its one of those wait and see..he is a chunk and no english added..I just keep watching for those..Now I need to train myself to watch the females for egg laying as important part..maybe the midwest cross will help it..its not bad thou. always work to be done..

 

[Yellow House Farm]

Aveca are you going to be at the APA National at the North Eastern Poultry Congress this coming January?

PS: Join that APA ;-)

 

[colburg]

Quote:
YHF, I realize that not every comment here can apply to everyone all the time, and would like to take exception to your comments above about breeding to the SOP and not showing.

These are my thoughts and since I'm new to this world(only have hatchery stock at this time because that's all I knew to exist when we wanted to get started), someone please correct me if I'm wrong. And please don't take offense. My wife often tells me that I act like a jacka$$ to people, even though that completely wasn't my intention.

Would your Dorkings retain their meat quality if you didn't breed toward the SOP? Would your Anconas lay like they do if you didn't breed toward the SOP? It's often stated here that if you're not breeding towards a goal, then the quality of your stock is diminishing. We could probably wing it and breed chickens to do what we wanted: Bigger breast meat, bigger eggs, more eggs...whatever we wanted to do, we could do it blind. However, doesn't that come at the detriment of the chicken? If we wanted to raise Dorkings for meat, what would happen to the quality of the meat if we didn't have a goal? Would it retain its fine grain that they're famous for? Or would it deteriorate if we bred them for size or faster grow rates and ignored the head, comb, wings, feathers, shape, tails, etc.?

From what I've gathered here, the SOP is the goal that gives the Dorkings their meat quality and the Anconas their egg production year after year without their bodies failing after 2 years like hatchery chickens. Without that goal, I could get the best of any breed, and turn it into hatchery stock(or worse) in a year or 2.

Even though my wife and I have talked about letting our daughters show if they want to when they're old enough, we currently have no intentions of showing. We ordered our SOP and look through it when we have conversations to try to pick a breed to start with. Which, BTW, is the hardest part of our whole chicken experience to date. From reading Bob, fowlman, Fred, YHF, Kathy, 3rivers, catdaddy, and many more, it has been hammered into me that this is the direction to go, even if I don't want to show.

Please correct my thoughts or argue with me if I'm wrong. A fella that I work with has a saying taped up on his wall. "I never learned anything from anyone that didn't disagree with me." Author Unknown. So argue with me so that I may learn.

Happily(not jacka$$ly), colburg