Buckeye Breed Thread

[Metella]

My first buckeye is here now - a fuzz ball with a favorelle fuzz ball who are both little spit fires in with the older babies.

Little buckeye is doing all the things the bigger ones do - and something is just really pulling me toward them.... I think next year I will want a decent amount of Buckeye pullets.

Anyone here have experience with them being mousers ? I would love to have fewer - as most farms would.

thanks

 

[ocap]

My first buckeye is here now - a fuzz ball with a favorelle fuzz ball who are both little spit fires in with the older babies.

Little buckeye is doing all the things the bigger ones do - and something is just really pulling me toward them.... I think next year I will want a decent amount of Buckeye pullets.

Anyone here have experience with them being mousers ? I would love to have fewer - as most farms would.

thanks

I have three breeds in my fenced run; Wyandotte, buckeye, and australorp. Yesterday I found a dead mole in the run, illness or death by chicken?

 

[Metella]

Oh yes, I forgot about the moles ...Our lush rural area just has sooo many

I'd like to hear more anecdotes and then I may buy a passel of Buckeyes next year. I'll try to get a pick of my little girl up here.

 

[007medic]

Matella,

Our Buckeyes are on pasture during the day and cooped at night. During the day they forage both in and out of the coop (which definitely saves $$$ on feed). I've seen our girls eat snakes, lizards, bugs (of course), scorpions, moles, and even chipmunks (no lie!) but their favorite warm blooded treat is a field mouse. Should any hen actually catch one since they're quick and usually never far from the bolt holes they dig near food sources like feeders, that hen will take off running to be sure she's the only one who gets the morsel. Very comical.

At night I take up the feeders to keep the little nuisances from getting too much of a free meal ticket. I hate trying to pick tiny mouse pills out of the feed. There's enough spilled feed on the coop floor (dirt with a deep litter system of mulched oak leaves) that I know I'll never really be rid of the lil' varmints, but the girls really do keep us from being over-run. We rarely use artificial light on our girls so as to let them cycle through rests in laying naturally, but I have heard stories from folks in northern latitudes that use artificial light on timers and their girls have accustomed themselves that when the lights go on so does the hunt- on goes the light, mice freeze in surprise, girls swoop down from the roost for a treat!

I will add this last observation. Foraging is an instinct. All Buckeyes are hatched with it. But, like many other things, foraging is a skill. Some birds will be better than others at learning to forage for themselves. Fortunately, other birds are able to learn these honed skills by the example of other good foragers. If you want your girls to get as independent in foraging as possible, raise them under a hen. Experience has instructed us that hen raised chicks are more active and independent foragers AND these skills are magnified in each successive generation! Hen teaches chick her skills. Chick adds new experience to these skills and passes them on to the flock and to future chicks. Example: our pasture raised chicks learned two years ago to follow the cattle for bugs they scare up, to scratch out the dung pats and to hunt the horse flies that plague the cattle. These were skills that were not present in the flock in previous generations but were added and preserved through experience passed hen to chick.

 

[Metella]

Oh - now I'm getting excited. And I think that is why my little fuzz balls are so spunky - the older peeps had only themselves .... they are doing fine and finding worms and bugs ... but the fuzz balls watched the older ones and now they are twice as energetic in the yard as the others were at their size.

I can't wait to start turning loose on the yard - but they are still too little for actual free range without an adult rooster yet. I do have hawks and fox and neighbor's cat - which ticks me off.

I've had a small flock before - fire struck the barn their coop was built against. Horses ran out, but chickens were fast asleep at 3 am and had no chance.

So now - the barn is going up and I have a new coop which is mobile and not made of wood - it was too heartbreaking to have happen again.
It was convenient to have everything in one place, but I'll never do that again.

Anyway - thanks for that - I really want some more buckeyes now !!! I know other chickens may learn from them, but the buckeyes can sure get the others started.

 

[Pathfinders]

I just want to let folks know there is someone passing around photos of Buckeyes that they are claiming are from my line. The person from whom they are saying they got these birds (who bought birds from me several years ago) tells me they did not sell birds to this person.

The pictures show birds that are not good examples of Buckeyes at all. I cannot say where the birds in question came from, but what I can say is, if someone didn't buy birds directly from me, then they cannot say they have my birds. Especially if they are using examples of bad birds, and using them to sully my reputation.


Edited by Staff

 

[DarkRedBird]

Hello all you buckeye nuts.

 

[Metella]

Anyone know of breeders in the North East ? I"m in Vermont. I want to start planning for next year.

Thanks.

 

[PA Farmer24]

There are numerous breeders around the country that would help you add Buckeyes to your flock.

I have added two links for you to review. Both are from the 2 Buckeye groups some names are the same across both lists but some are not so that is why I am posting both for you. Good luck and hop you find what you are looking for.

http://www.americanbuckeyeclub.blogspot.com/p/breeders-directory.html from the American Buckeye Club

http://www.americanbuckeyepoultryclub.com/Breeders.html from the The American Buckeye Poultry Club

 

[Metella]

Thanks ! There are 3 breeders close enough for me to make a nice day drive out of it.

Below is my little fuzzy ball of Buckeye right in the middle of all the teens .... scrappy little girl.