California - Northern

[sol2go]

Belated Happy Holidays, hope your New Year is off to a warm and cozy start!
"Thank you" to everyone for sharing your pictures, I enjoy them all.

Here's my New Year's eggs, including one that will be hard for the rest of my girls to top, thanks to Peaches =)


And here's a couple of my new feathered friends, an olive egger and a Cream Legbar. Hoping this hatch sets a new trend; finally better than 50% pullets instead of 75% cockerels...


As an aside, the power company scheduled a day-long electrical outage during Christmas week. Atleast they let us know in advance. So we were home and used old-fashioned hot water bottles and towels to keep the temp up with the help of an infra-red thermal gun. Everyone hatched on time and pretty efficiently.

 

[SpringPeeper]

Last year we talked about placing an Urch order but it sort of fizzled. I think I want to order Houdan from them but not 25 of them: They charge 7:00 a chick plus shipping and here is their pricelist saying what else they offer

I remember last year a show back East where Urch Turnland birds were very successful but welcome input. I can pick up Houdan from Ideal at a local feed store but ick...No one else seems to have them though people at University of Arkansas are working with them.

If anyone has ordered from them in the past can you share your experiences please.

Hmmmm I can't get the pricelist to paste or attach...

PM me your email and I think I can get it to you that way if you want me to.

They have a nice variety LF and Bantam

He has rose comb Rhode Island Whites listed as available on his website! I don't know if the offer was to someone specific, but if you'd be willing to send me the price list I'd appreciate it.

Yay! I'm getting pullet eggs from my BCMarans that I got from @One Chick Two . It is the egg in the center at the top of the bunch (12 o'clock position).
Clockwise from the dark spotted BCM egg are a UofA blue, my older very mossy BCM, bantam modern game (I think), & my mystery orpington (pink eggs with white spots)

They are very solid, hefty BCM girls with gorgeous, glossy feathers.
I'm not well-versed in the Marans SOP but I do know these are amazing, healthy, strong birds and would make great additions to anyone's laying flock - even culls like mine.

#2


#1
This is also the one with "whiskers" on her thighs.
They are silvery, hair-thin feathers - very cool.

Pretty eggs! I swear my Marans are taking forever to lay.

Yesterday one of my Oliver Eggers ended her winter break, then today there's 2 black copper maran pullet eggs. Yay!
One with spots, one without. Happy dance!

Yay! More Marans laying, maybe it is catching.

My NyD Hatch!

6 BBS Australorps(Blue)





And 15 Trader Joes chicks!

So cute! The BBS Australorps must look gorgeous as adults! I kinda regret deciding not to do the New Year's HAL now.

I got 2 Marans eggs today for the first time. proof that both of my Birchen Marans girls from @lawatt are laying...they are solid black which is fine but The came from Birchen parents. Their hatchmate a Blue Ibar x Black Marans has been laying wonderful little olive eggs for about a month. Their brothers fed my family....Re the thigh whiskers...lol never heard anyone extolling their virtues before

More Marans laying! It is a sign. I hope my girls are listening.

Does anyone have success returning their breeding males back into the bachelor pen? Or into a larger mixed gender group?

I know some have mentioned they have a winter-vacation group of laying hens with more than one rooster. Even if the roosters get along, in my experience the non-dominant roosters just hang around the nesting boxes attacking the hens, which causes complete chaos.

I can separate for breeding pens, but I need somewhere to "house" the roosters most of the year, and wish I could do that in groups, not individually. I was creating what I thought would be permanent groups/breeding pens, but yikes, it didn't take long and I was wishing for more flexible housing options.

Wish I could help you there, but I just had a non-dominant rooster rejected by the dominant rooster after about a year together, and trying to put him into a bachelor pen went miserably for me.

 

[lawatt]

I got 2 Marans eggs today for the first time. proof that both of my Birchen Marans girls from @lawatt are laying...they are solid black which is fine but The came from Birchen parents. Their hatchmate a Blue Ibar x Black Marans has been laying wonderful little olive eggs for about a month. Their brothers fed my family....Re the thigh whiskers...lol never heard anyone extolling their virtues before

hurrah! glad to hear that they are laying! and yes, my birchens seem to produce both birchen and all-black chicks (and an occasional wheaten-esque white one!), but they are all lovely.

and hello! and happy new year! i haven't been on BYC in ages -- school got wayyyyy too busy last fall to keep up with the site, i can barely keep up with my own facebook and email these days. but my flock is doing well -- after having some trouble with mystery illnesses the first year i had chickens, they have really settled down and now are mostly a happy, healthy bunch. i haven't hatched any eggs since spring/summer, but will have to start considering it, at least, now that the days are slowly getting longer again!

hope everyone is doing well, and that 2015 is a splendid year for you!

p.s. i love seeing that Amelias are still called by that name! the original Amelia would be pleased!

 

[ronott1]

hurrah! glad to hear that they are laying! and yes, my birchens seem to produce both birchen and all-black chicks (and an occasional wheaten-esque white one!), but they are all lovely.

and hello! and happy new year! i haven't been on BYC in ages -- school got wayyyyy too busy last fall to keep up with the site, i can barely keep up with my own facebook and email these days. but my flock is doing well -- after having some trouble with mystery illnesses the first year i had chickens, they have really settled down and now are mostly a happy, healthy bunch. i haven't hatched any eggs since spring/summer, but will have to start considering it, at least, now that the days are slowly getting longer again!

hope everyone is doing well, and that 2015 is a splendid year for you!

p.s. i love seeing that Amelias are still called by that name! the original Amelia would be pleased!

It is great to hear from You!

 

[HighStreetCoop]

I have returned to the 21st Century! I don't think I mentioned it, but I woke up to a flooded kitchen Christmas morning and I've been without running water in my kitchen ever since (my plumber was out of town, I didn't want to deal with a stranger, and then my BFF's sister said she'd come fix it, but kept getting delayed). So Carrie finally made it over yesterday and had everything fixed in under 15 minutes.

I also no longer have chickens in my house! This is a major event after the past three months of fighting with the custom coop bozo who never did deliver anything. The Chicken Gardener gys showed up with a coop on Sunday and had it fully installed in about an hour. I'm certain I'll make some alterations down the road (adding more ventilation and external next boxes), but I'm just SOOOOOO happy my chooks are now scratching in the dirt.

First night I had to put them up into the house by hand. Second night they had the idea, but no the execution, LOL! The first one up the ramp planted herself in the doorway and all the others lined up on the ramp and just settled in. Made it easy to put them away. Hopefully tonight they'll go the whole distance.

Happy to report that my dog has almost no interest in them. He sniffed, they eyeballed him, then he went and took a nap. Sadly, his sister who spends most of her days with us is VERY EXCITED BY THEM!!! She spent all day whining and shaking. So she's staying home the rest of the week and we'll work on getting her to chill out this weekend.

 

[Honora]

Lovely coop. where did you get it?

 

[HighStreetCoop]

Lovely coop. where did you get it?

From THE CHICKEN GARDENER in Portland. They do a delivery run down to the Bay Area pretty frequently (seems like every 4-6 weeks). It's all cedar and really solid. Inside it has a slide out pan for the bedding and passively ventilates from the bottom out the top. I'm going to make a big screen window to put into the doorway for summer and add external nesting boxes to maximize space.

http://chickengardener.com/shop/

 

[ronott1]

I have returned to the 21st Century! I don't think I mentioned it, but I woke up to a flooded kitchen Christmas morning and I've been without running water in my kitchen ever since (my plumber was out of town, I didn't want to deal with a stranger, and then my BFF's sister said she'd come fix it, but kept getting delayed). So Carrie finally made it over yesterday and had everything fixed in under 15 minutes.

I also no longer have chickens in my house! This is a major event after the past three months of fighting with the custom coop bozo who never did deliver anything. The Chicken Gardener gys showed up with a coop on Sunday and had it fully installed in about an hour. I'm certain I'll make some alterations down the road (adding more ventilation and external next boxes), but I'm just SOOOOOO happy my chooks are now scratching in the dirt.

First night I had to put them up into the house by hand. Second night they had the idea, but no the execution, LOL! The first one up the ramp planted herself in the doorway and all the others lined up on the ramp and just settled in. Made it easy to put them away. Hopefully tonight they'll go the whole distance.

Happy to report that my dog has almost no interest in them. He sniffed, they eyeballed him, then he went and took a nap. Sadly, his sister who spends most of her days with us is VERY EXCITED BY THEM!!! She spent all day whining and shaking. So she's staying home the rest of the week and we'll work on getting her to chill out this weekend.

It is nice to get them out of the house!

I have some(21) that are several days old in the Bedroom. I have to admit that I like hearing them making their happy chirps as they ear.

The TJ's chicks are amazing. I think they will pick up the spring nipple water fountain very quickly.

 

[HighStreetCoop]

It is nice to get them out of the house!

I have some(21) that are several days old in the Bedroom. I have to admit that I like hearing them making their happy chirps as they ear.

I loved having the little peepers in the house, but they're 12-14 weeks old as of yesterday and already enormous! Sylvester attempted his first crow Sunday morning (sounded like a child blowing a French Horn, LOL!).

 

[ronott1]

I loved having the little peepers in the house, but they're 12-14 weeks old as of yesterday and already enormous! Sylvester attempted his first crow Sunday morning (sounded like a child blowing a French Horn, LOL!).

I get them out of the house by 4 weeks or so. They do get noisy and even with daily cleaning the brooder seems to keep an odor....

I hope you get some eggs soon from them(I know orpingtons take more time...)