California - Northern

[CackleJoy]

It is hard to decide who stays and who goes. The barnies are awesome, but Trisha (TLS Ranch) does such a great job with them I would rather send people to her. I did not feel like I was doing the breed justice.

I am really still learning what it takes to breed good birds so I think I am better off focusing on just a couple of breeds. I am also reducing the number of birds per breed.

At the Cream Legbar event in May, Walt helped me pick my best 3 Cream Legbar hens and best rooster. I am going to take each hen and put her in her own pen and give the rooster conjugal visitation rights and then keep track of which hens produces the best chicks. It will be fun and hopefully rewarding to try to improve my lines.

I am planning to do the same process with my other birds/ breeds but need to make room first.

I did have a weak moment this week tho, and somehow won an auction for silkies. Urg... I lost my 5 year old Silkie hen last week and was surprised by how upset I was. I decided the best way to feel better was to hatch chicks.

I'd love to learn more about the CLB. Hopefully at the next event, I can. Maybe some day I'll be in a position to host one.

You are so right, hatching chicks is the sure antidote

Every time!

I think we are going to have it narrowed to 5 breeds (6 if you count my mother's Brabanters) and be able to stick to that. I'm not totally sure though, my husband has recently fell in love with our Light Sussex

So funny because he isn't the chicken person and yet we get birds because he likes them.

Oh well, I love being married to an enabler.

15-18 pea eggs under broodies pipping in the next 48 hours if all goes well!

-Kathy

MUST.SEE.PHOTOS.

Heebie Jeebies galore.... My son just found a tick in his eyebrow. Guess it's official.... it's tick season. Run for the hills!... oh wait.. don't do that!

Okay. That is yucky!

Flash back. I forgot all about bot flies.

Where did all the bot flies go? When we were kids we used to scrape the botfly eggs off the horses legs with a razor blade. Now thinking about it, I have not seen a bot fly or egg in years. I guess worming horses every 8 weeks instead of tube worming twice a year has really wiped out the population. Thank goodness.

What are bot flies?

Yuk!

Radom fact: Bluebelly lizards blood carries an enzyme that actually kills the Lyme germ in ticks that feed on the lizards when they are little. Studies are showing in areas with Bluebellys the percentage of ticks carring Lyme is about 5 % of the population; vs. 50%+ in areas without the lizards.

Love facts like this!

Oh and here is Stella her "whiskers" are growing in

Stella is lovely!

 

[BCollie]

 
3 Welsummers hatched, still waiting on all 4 Trader Joe's eggs and one Marans. Any ideas as to why the TJ's all haven't so much as pipped? 

It could be the age of the eggs. Age adds time to the hatch, something like 1 hour per day.

Interesting!! That would probably explain it, the eggs were almost 2 weeks old so I consider myself lucky even having 4 make it to lockdown! Hoping they hatch.

 

[chrissyr]

Okay, so this is weird...I was going to see if I could catch my dad before work to help me with the baby. I cut a small piece of cardboard and took her out of the brooder to trace the shape of her foot, when I set her down I realized her foot was no longer messed up! Has this ever happened to anyone before? Her leg turns in towards her body so she does step on her own feet a bit, but the toes are no longer all messed up...picture coming in just a second. Just to jog your memory, this was last night...

I've found to not judge until they are on their feet good. When their resting in their hocks, the feet often don't look right. Once they're up standing it usually falls into place. Could have just needed time to with cramped space.

 

[chiqita]

Is this 2 female cream legbars or a pair?

 

[chrissyr]

Flash back.  I forgot all about bot flies.  

Where did all the bot flies go?  When we were kids we used to scrape the botfly eggs off the horses legs with a razor blade.  Now thinking about it,  I have not seen a bot fly or egg in years.  I guess worming horses every 8 weeks instead of tube worming twice a year has really wiped out the population.   Thank goodness.  

We've never had them on our horses but they always sounded disgusting . I don't recall anyone mentioning them in quite a while

I was sitting in bed one night and was absentmindedly scratching at a tickle on my shoulder and then realized I was scratching a bump.  I got up and looked in the mirror and realized there was a tick on my back, attached of course but not yet engorged.

I flipped on every light in the room, grabbed a pair of tweezers and started poking my husband in the arm to wake up, yelling "there's a tick on me, there's a tick on me, get it OFF!!!"

I think he freaked out so much about me saying to make sure to get it all, he actually grabbed skin with the tweezers and pulled out a divot of ME along with the tick.  It was in fact a deer tick, so my doctor put me on a course of antibiotics the next day (I saved the tick and brought it in to be looked at).  Lyme disease is pretty rampant up here, too bad we can't be vaccinated like dogs.

I do a lot of traveling, including many tropical locations.  If I ever came home with a bot fly, I think they'd have to put me under,

kids had ticks twice years ago. Very high on the Heebie Jeebie scale.
Is there a place that tests the ticks for Lyme disease?

 

[caychris]

Is this 2 female cream legbars or a pair?

Looks like 2 females. If they have definite eye liner and no head spot they are female. Even females can have a small headspot. Females are very chipmunk like but sometimes a little lighter but eye liner and no headspot are very indicitive of female. From what I have read the females can often be lighter in their markings and "disquised" as males but I don't think it works the other way.

 

[chrissyr]

Is this 2 female cream legbars or a pair?

Unprofessional opinion: 2 pullets. My boy had a white dot on the head and not so much chipmunk stripe. I've heard of some being more iffy and harder to tell.

 

[chiqita]

Unprofessional opinion: 2 pullets. My boy had a white dot on the head and not so much chipmunk stripe. I've heard of some being more iffy and harder to tell.

Im just dubious because my other autosexing chicks hatched 6 girls 1 boy.. what is going on??

 

[chrissyr]

Im just dubious because my other autosexing chicks hatched 6 girls 1 boy.. what is going on??

Too many pullets????
That's like rich people complaining about rich problems.

 

[chiqita]

It just seems so improble I must be wrong... im not ron you know!!