California - Northern

[OR4-hmom]

Oh Boy, chicken chores in the rain, my favorite! They are forecasting 20's as overnight temperatures for the next week, looks like winter has arrived.

Waiting on a reply from Horstman on what he may have for the NYD hatch.

Is anyone willing to share favorite sites for hatching eggs, I know of so few, I'm sure I'm missing a bunch of them.

 

[chicksnthestiks]

Good rainy morning!

 

[ronott1]

Oh Boy, chicken chores in the rain, my favorite! They are forecasting 20's as overnight temperatures for the next week, looks like winter has arrived.

Waiting on a reply from Horstman on what he may have for the NYD hatch.

Is anyone willing to share favorite sites for hatching eggs, I know of so few, I'm sure I'm missing a bunch of them.

Ask Dick to pack in Foam for you.

I bet his Rocks are laying.

 

[ronott1]

Yes, it is a rainy day!

The first rainy day in a long time. The roads will be very slick as the oils and muck wash up so watch the curves!

Also, Dust on power lines can knock out the power so make sure the battery backups are running on your incubators.

 

[capayvalleychick]

Regarding hens with bare spots ... other than molting and having too many roosters, feather quality may be a cause.

Some individual hens may have feathers which are not as strong and break easily. These hens will be the ones that stand out as looking ragged when all others look fine.

I've culled all the hens in my flock that showed excessive wear from poor feather quality, and I no longer see bare backs (except during molt).

I also feed fish meal as a source of animal protein. I wonder if those hens that are on the no soy, vegetarian diets can even get enough protein to grow strong feathers? Those with a number of excessively bare backs or scraggly birds in their flock might consider that.

I only allow one male in each group of mature hens. Anytime you allow more than one male in a group, there is going to be excessive mating because they seem to compete and may keep re-breeding hens in order to assert them selves as alpha.

As was mentioned, trimming spurs is a good idea. I've been told that a rooster can accidentally kill a hen if his spurs are too long. We just twist them off on a yearly basis.

 

[OR4-hmom]

Ask Dick to pack in Foam for you.

I bet his Rocks are laying.

Hoping I can get Partridge and SP's. The kids probably not to interested in that big of a bird, guess they would have to stay here. I still miss my little dark Brahma when I go into my wide body bantam coop, so that would be good also. My luck it will be the Polish that are laying.

 

[liz9910]

It's not raining in Modesto yet but of course I forgot to move the feeders inside the coop lol. Guess I'll be heading home at lunch.

 

[ronott1]

It's not raining in Modesto yet but of course I forgot to move the feeders inside the coop lol. Guess I'll be heading home at lunch.

I spent time last night getting the coop feeders filled and the outside feeders moved inside out of the rain.

I hate it when the feeders get wet!

 

[CackleJoy]

Oh Boy, chicken chores in the rain, my favorite! They are forecasting 20's as overnight temperatures for the next week, looks like winter has arrived.

Waiting on a reply from Horstman on what he may have for the NYD hatch.

Is anyone willing to share favorite sites for hatching eggs, I know of so few, I'm sure I'm missing a bunch of them.

Hatching eggs are so fun!

My husband just ordered a Hovabator 1588 -- Happy Birthday to me!

The new model has an LCD screen reader so that makes him happy too.

I might be a little excited about this.

I want to know about hatching eggs too, we want to do a NYD hatch if we can!

My chickens are almost all running loose. I don't have enough breeders separated to fill an incubator. Umm... really. 2 eggs. Yep that's all I'd have. The other girls are laying fine but I don't want to hatch out a bunch of mutts. Following this to see other people's ideas! Don't want to break the bank on eggs right before Christmas.

Did contact Papa with Papaspoultry in Redding. Put out feelers to see who I know that might be heading towards SAC from Redding around Dec 10. I don't trust the post office. They're clueless around here. I'm about to start chasing down postal workers to educate them on the proper handling of eggs.

Gotta run but looking forward to hearing who your favorite egg suppliers are.

 

[CackleJoy]

I spent time last night getting the coop feeders filled and the outside feeders moved inside out of the rain.

I hate it when the feeders get wet!

aargh! I have one that is in critical danger then - Modesto rain hasn't hit. I better get a move on!