California - Northern

[Audio51]

Yay! Under my broody, I have a chocolate orp chick - hatched & fluffed! And the rest (4) are pipped & peeping!
Nothing in the incubator yet: c'mon, little ones, catch up!

Yahoo!!!

 

[Audio51]

Here's a Fibro but with white feathers, my favorite! They're called--Royal Phuphan--



And the pure black fibro also a Royal Phuphan

Very cool looking birds!

 

[chrissyr]

Yay! Under my broody, I have a chocolate orp chick - hatched & fluffed! And the rest (4) are pipped & peeping!
Nothing in the incubator yet: c'mon, little ones, catch up!

I LOVE the chocolates!! Yay babies!!

 

[chrissyr]

Yes, I just learned that Corrid and Amporlium (SP) is the same thing! What I was referring to with my comment is that I didn't know what the medication was or what for. I've never used medicated feed because it goes against my standards. Saying that sounds like I'm a bit snobbish. The opposite is true. I'm idealistic and it's been a long hard road learning that chickens don't always cooperate with my ideals. Idealistically I would build a flock (organically) that had really strong immune systems and the weak ones would die out while young. While that might sound good, letting a chick die is harder than it sounds. Then once an investment of time and money has been added, protecting their health becomes about more than the chicken itself.

Since we've had such a hard run with me not being the primary chicken care giver, we've had to deal with more illness in the flock.

I've learned a lot.

A. Chickens have to have probiotics ALL the time.
B. Same as above
C. Keep Oxine on hand and learn to use it in the right situations. It's okay for an organic operation and has a lot of uses.
D. It's okay to occasionally make NON-organic decisions based on the greater good.
E. Avoid buying adult birds. If at ALL possible don't buy chicks either. Start with eggs so that the chick begins life with our method instead of being switched as an adult. (This doesn't always work because sometimes an adult bird is needed).
F. Keep antibiotics on hand for emergencies but pre-empt as many illnesses as possible with -
a. Uber clean living. Spray regularly for mites and don't use straw which harbors mold.
b. same as above (it's so much work!)
c. Don't assume using DE will stop mites. Check even the beautiful, shiny chickens.
d. Regular vitamins, minerals and probiotics in the water.
e. during the winter when egg laying is low anyway, treat for worms and do all the other non-organic stuff.
f. Increase their protein sources from plants - for example - grow wheat grass and feed them chunks of fodder. Also, sprout the bird seed before feeding it as treats.

Keeping a healthy flock using organic methods requires constant vigilance. Just feeding, watering, and cleaning bedding won't do the trick. I don't know why that is exactly. My theory is that antibiotics have been so heavily used that the average breeding stock doesn't start with a strong immune system. It's just my opinion but I really think that it will take a lot of time and effort to build a flock that has a greater immune system - more time and effort than it should, due to decades of prevalent antibiotic use.

That said, we are leaning towards more of the ancient land breeds and I think they should respond really well to our type of system.

Thank you CackeJoy, those are great points! I will be taking notes. Interesting about probiotics, didn't know they were that helpful

Most have just amprolium, but some also have bacitracin, which is supposed to help prevent necrotic enteritis, I think. Swanson chick starter has both, but their turkey starters have no medications...

-Kathy

Thank you Kathy

 

[chrissyr]

Quick pick of some babies! Olive egger (blue cm x AM) and a blue copper Marans

I'll be on more next week, busy busy!!

 

[caychris]

Very Cute.

 

[ronott1]

Quick pick of some babies! Olive egger (blue cm x AM) and a blue copper Marans


I'll be on more next week, busy busy!!

Very Nice!

 

[TheKeeper]

More daily squee:

I snuck Peeper #1 out from under mama for a quick photo shoot:

Chocolate Orpington (eggs from PapaBrooder)


Camera shy! No, just chilly.


1 more almost out of shell, other 3 pipped, pecking, & peeping away...

 

[lawatt]

the more i think about this, the more i realize i have a question: right now in the chick department, i have

-- five 7-week-olds living outdoors in a pen of their own
-- six 3-week-olds in the indoor brooder, along with
-- four 1-week-olds, and
-- twelve 2-day olds.
-- and there are 17 eggs in the incubator, hatching in a little over two weeks (although who knows how many will hatch)

so far, the three age groups in the brooder have all blended together into a happy flock without any drama -- hooray for that!

but the 3-week-olds will soon be grown enough to go outside, and i wonder whether i'll be able to merge them with the 7-week-olds? or, i could keep them separate -- but by the time the littler ones are ready to join them outdoors, i'll have the same problem.

so the question is, what's the oldest you've been able to merge groups of chicks without the older/larger group rejecting the others? at least they are are sizable groups, so no risk of a single chick being picked on -- but when do the pecking orders become cemented enough that newcomers really get rougher treatment?

 

[Audio51]

Quick pick of some babies! Olive egger (blue cm x AM) and a blue copper Marans


I'll be on more next week, busy busy!!

Cute!