California - Northern

[PetRock]

Hi All,

I have some infromation about King Feed. I have been trying to get some to try--they have a non-soy natural line that is sold in other parts of the State. Those that can get it like it. I tried Western Feed in Vacaville, but they kept saying they would call me when it was in but they did not call. The third time I called the person blamed King Feed. I contacted King Feed and got this reply:
>>>>>>>>>>>

[FONT=Default Sans Serif,Verdana,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif]Ron,
Our poultry feeds are available at Novato Horse and Pet, and we will be in Western Feed and Pet in five locations in
the greater Sacramento area and coming to Davis some time this summer.
Western should have their first order in stores by the end of next week.
Please call me with any questions or other help.

Hal Denton
King Feed
Northern California Rep.
831-809-8594[/FONT]

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
I will contact Hal to find out if the Vacaville Store will now carry the feed. I will also find out what store in Davis will have it.

Bye,

Ron

Hey, Ron. Do you know if King's natural feed is non-GMO? I know that the organic has to be but was wondering about the natural feed.

 

[zooweemama]

Well, I got my final results from UC Davis myself today, and it is Infectious Laryngotracheitis. I've begun culling almost my entire flock; I'm keeping eight bantams that live in separate housing and aren't infected, although I"ve ordered the vaccine for them. And then begins an enormous disinfection effort, and at least the summer's worth of letting the yard lay fallow except for my ducks.
I sure hope some of you guys have hatching eggs available in the spring. I'd like to raise the same breeds that I had, Silver Laced and Blue Laced Red Wyandottes, Ameraucanas, and Blue Andalusians.
This breaks my heart.
http://www.cowgirljules.com/2012/05/24/biosecurity/

Oh my goodness I am so very sorry.

 

[Meg2000000]

I received my preliminary report from UC Davis today. I hope the final results have a real answer. It looks like the Doctor couldn't find any signs of anything. The report said they are doing more tests on the chicks lung, liver and intestinal tissues. They also are doing something called a Oropharyngeal Swab. I hope it isn't "user error" and I killed the chicks somehow on accident!
Here it is, minus my personal info!

Specimen Details
Chicken
Age- 2.00 Weeks
Laboratory Findings/Diagnosis
Interim report #1, Gross observations:
-
No significant gross findings/unable to evaluate. See comments.
-
Further tests pending.

Case Summary
5/29/2012:
There are no significant gross pathologic findings noted. Tissues in this bird are markedly autolyzed, making assessment of
possible macroscopic lesions difficult. Some diagnostic tests have been requested to try to better characterize the problem ,
however given the degree of autolysis I am not optimistic that specific results related to the cause for death will be obtained from
the histological examination or bacterial aerobic cultures. An updated report will follow when additional tests results are
available.

Clinical History
Duration of Illness: A couple of hours.
I purchased five Barnevelder chicks last Tuesday, 5-15-12. They were hatched 5-6-12. These are my first and only
chickens for my backyard flock. So far three have died. The sample I am sending you is the chick that died last night. All
chicks act normal and healthy until about 3-5 hours before they die. The other chickens seem to start ignoring the sick
chicken right before it starts showing signs of sickness. The dying chick just lies down and gets really tired and dies .
Right before it died, it started having trouble lifting its neck and couldn 't keep it upright. This particular dead chick had
spasms for about 10 minutes before it died. I let it die naturally. I am feeding them regular flock raiser crumbles and they
are still in a brooder.

Gross Observations
Necropsy of a 2-week-old chick is performed on May 29th, 2012. The carcass is identified with a green plastic ring on the
right leg. Tissues are in advanced state of postmortem decomposition. The crop contains pasty yellow feed material and
is grossly unremarkable. The brain is soft. The oral cavity, proventriculus, gizzard, trachea, syrinx, sciatic nerves, lungs
and select skeletal muscles are unremarkable. The bursa of Fabricius, spleen and intestinal tract are markedly autolyzed.


P.S. The reason it says the tissues were in an advanced state of postmortem decomposition is because I overnighted the chick via the Postal Service on Thursday. Although the chick got there on Friday early a.m. it was delivered to the main UC Davis building (only FedEx and UPS get sent directly to the lab apparently.) The lab people only go to the main building on Tuesday and Thursday to do animal mail pickups so my poor little guy sat unrefrigerated the whole 3 day weekend. :-( Next time I will be using FedEx! By the way the lady at the lab gave me their public FedEx account and said anyone can use it. If we use their account number we get almost 70% off shipping and UC Davis will bill us for the shipping charges once the report is sent. I'll post the info when I get home and find the piece of paper I scribbled it on!

 

[ronott1]

I will check into the GMO or not ingredients for you. I am concerned about GMO, but not as much as soy. Soy is something that chickens really should not eat much of.

Bye for now,

Ron

Quote:

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
I will contact Hal to find out if the Vacaville Store will now carry the feed. I will also find out what store in Davis will have it.

Bye,

Ron

Hey, Ron. Do you know if King's natural feed is non-GMO? I know that the organic has to be but was wondering about the natural feed.

 

[zooweemama]

Oh goodness. So far we are only raising ducks but next year should be adding on a few hens and a roo to our little 'stead. With all this mites and virus talk I am terrified of working with chickens. My husbands uncle has chickens (where were currently buy our eggs for eating) and he's already had to deal with mites. The thought just exhausts me after reading how much work it is to eradicate these problems. And poor Jules having to cull her whole flock. I would be a mess.

Since I have a year or so to get ready- should be decide to move forward with chickens (no more than 6: 4-5 hens and 1 roo) for egg laying in far Northern Cali (Redding. our climate is funkier than down more southern)- any breed suggestions that might be less prone to disease. Also any recommendations on housing, or tips to possibly help prevent 'issues'. Although I totally get that sometimes this stuff happens. I am always paranoid when I get new hay for the ducks (mold), checking their feed (mold), making sure the plants they have access to are ok...but I know that sometimes things will happen. So I'd love to hear what breeds tend to do especially well in our area not requiring a lot of special tlc during our wet chilly winters. I simply adore the look of the breed of red hens/roos. I don't know much about chicken breeds yet but it's the typical breed you see in farm 'pictures'. I'd love to have a breed that is totally different in color to my ducks so I can easily spot them roaming around. But not necessary. I will likely just select one breed. When the chickens are done laying it's quite possible we will eat them- so if they are a decent meat bird that could be a plus (not worried about how clean the 'carcass' is). We started out thinking we'd eat duck (hence the Pekins in our flock) but have all agreed as a family we couldn't. LOL So the same might end up happening with the chickens. But we'll see!

We will build a fresh coop (there is an old existing one on our property but I think we should just rip it down? the outer shell although ugly still seems quite serviceable but the pay boxes def need to be redone). If anyone thinks the shell could safely be salvageable I would happily post pictures. It's been unused for more than 2-3 years at the least. We'd like to free range them during the day ideally but house them at night. How in the heck do you get chickens to go to their house at night though? I know with the ducks I managed to train them through routine and peas.

Thanks in advance. Sorry for all the questions. I have a friend who will be lending me all her chicken books so I will have some reading over the next year too.

 

[PetRock]

I've been feeding my chooks Modesto Milling's organic non-soy feed. They are not very fond of it, though. They love King's Calexico rooster mix. It has whole grains and pellets in it. They eat the pellets last.

 

[ronott1]

Thanks for the report and the suggestion to not ship USPS. UCD has lots of problems with USPS. We only get mail delivery to my Dept. on Mon, Wed and Friday, so deliveries take longer.

When you post the information on shipping, I will add that to my files. I am not the thread starter of this thread, so I can't do what Wolf Tracks does and add stuff to the first post. That would be a great place to put stuff like the UCD Necropsy information.

My guess is kidney or other organ failure. Who knows what caused it. With Kidney failure, they seem fine until the toxins build up. Birds are that way--they hide illness to look less inviting to predators. On the plus side, it looks like you don't have any illness there. We can figure out when to meet in Vacaville. I am going there next Monday evening to pick up my Azure Standard order. I will be there about 5:00 pm.

Bye,

Ron
>>>>>>>

I received my preliminary report from UC Davis today. I hope the final results have a real answer. It looks like the Doctor couldn't find any signs of anything. The report said they are doing more tests on the chicks lung, liver and intestinal tissues. They also are doing something called a Oropharyngeal Swab. I hope it isn't "user error" and I killed the chicks somehow on accident!
Here it is, minus my personal info!

Specimen Details
Chicken
Age- 2.00 Weeks
Laboratory Findings/Diagnosis
Interim report #1, Gross observations:
-
No significant gross findings/unable to evaluate. See comments.
-
Further tests pending.

Case Summary
5/29/2012:
There are no significant gross pathologic findings noted. Tissues in this bird are markedly autolyzed, making assessment of
possible macroscopic lesions difficult. Some diagnostic tests have been requested to try to better characterize the problem ,
however given the degree of autolysis I am not optimistic that specific results related to the cause for death will be obtained from
the histological examination or bacterial aerobic cultures. An updated report will follow when additional tests results are
available.

Clinical History
Duration of Illness: A couple of hours.
I purchased five Barnevelder chicks last Tuesday, 5-15-12. They were hatched 5-6-12. These are my first and only
chickens for my backyard flock. So far three have died. The sample I am sending you is the chick that died last night. All
chicks act normal and healthy until about 3-5 hours before they die. The other chickens seem to start ignoring the sick
chicken right before it starts showing signs of sickness. The dying chick just lies down and gets really tired and dies .
Right before it died, it started having trouble lifting its neck and couldn 't keep it upright. This particular dead chick had
spasms for about 10 minutes before it died. I let it die naturally. I am feeding them regular flock raiser crumbles and they
are still in a brooder.

Gross Observations
Necropsy of a 2-week-old chick is performed on May 29th, 2012. The carcass is identified with a green plastic ring on the
right leg. Tissues are in advanced state of postmortem decomposition. The crop contains pasty yellow feed material and
is grossly unremarkable. The brain is soft. The oral cavity, proventriculus, gizzard, trachea, syrinx, sciatic nerves, lungs
and select skeletal muscles are unremarkable. The bursa of Fabricius, spleen and intestinal tract are markedly autolyzed.


P.S. The reason it says the tissues were in an advanced state of postmortem decomposition is because I overnighted the chick via the Postal Service on Thursday. Although the chick got there on Friday early a.m. it was delivered to the main UC Davis building (only FedEx and UPS get sent directly to the lab apparently.) The lab people only go to the main building on Tuesday and Thursday to do animal mail pickups so my poor little guy sat unrefrigerated the whole 3 day weekend. :-( Next time I will be using FedEx! By the way the lady at the lab gave me their public FedEx account and said anyone can use it. If we use their account number we get almost 70% off shipping and UC Davis will bill us for the shipping charges once the report is sent. I'll post the info when I get home and find the piece of paper I scribbled it on!

 

[ronott1]

I've been feeding my chooks Modesto Milling's organic non-soy feed. They are not very fond of it, though. They love King's Calexico rooster mix. It has whole grains and pellets in it. They eat the pellets last.

Mine did not like the Modesto Mills non-soy either. I am using Magill Ranch Cascade feed and they love it. They also use less of it. If they like the King Feed non-soy, I will alternate it with the Cascade feed. I am also alternating with grains(Winter Wheat from Azure and scratch grains) and Ultra Kibble.

I feel like a mad scientist sometimes, but the chickens look so good. The Barred Rocks really feathered out from their little molt so nicely and the Australorps are very black and sleek. The combs and wattles are very red. This is a great time of year for them.

Ron

 

[PetRock]

Mine did not like the Modesto Mills non-soy either. I am using Magill Ranch Cascade feed and they love it. They also use less of it. If they like the King Feed non-soy, I will alternate it with the Cascade feed. I am also alternating with grains(Winter Wheat from Azure and scratch grains) and Ultra Kibble.

I feel like a mad scientist sometimes, but the chickens look so good. The Barred Rocks really feathered out from their little molt so nicely and the Australorps are very black and sleek. The combs and wattles are very red. This is a great time of year for them.

Ron

Do you get the Cascade feed from Azure or at a feed store? My birds look really good but they free range my 1/3 acre yard all day and I've been growing a chicken forage for them to eat. I also spoil them with plain yogurt every day and a few cups of the Calexico mix.

I have been thinking about placing an order with Azure. Are you happy with their products and service? I would love to mix my own grains for my birds. My degree is in biology and I worked in cancer research pre-kids so the mad scientist thing is right down my alley!

 

[ronott1]

Chickens are supposed to be less work than Ducks. If you keep the coops clean and use DE, you can keep them from getting mites. The Die Mite strips will also keep them from getting them. The big amount of work happens if the mites infest the coop and the chickens. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.

For the coop design, make sure you use a California Coop design. Do not build one with four walls and very little ventilation. The one we had growing up was completely open on one wall and had vents at the top. Chicken Coops for Dummies has a very simple design that has no odd measurements and no angles to cut. I am going to use that design and cut a big vent opening in one wall. It will be covered with the small wire screen to allow more ventilation. The design already has vents up at the roof.

The heat is why I am getting the EO Marraduna Basque chickens. They should do well here and in Redding because they are from a place just like here. Most of the Mediterranean breeds are flighty and lay smallish white eggs. I am so excited to get a friendly layer of large eggs that should do well in our heat.

The important thing is to give them shade, ventilation and lots of water. A misting station can help too.

Bye,

Ron
>>>

Oh goodness. So far we are only raising ducks but next year should be adding on a few hens and a roo to our little 'stead. With all this mites and virus talk I am terrified of working with chickens. My husbands uncle has chickens (where were currently buy our eggs for eating) and he's already had to deal with mites. The thought just exhausts me after reading how much work it is to eradicate these problems. And poor Jules having to cull her whole flock. I would be a mess.

Since I have a year or so to get ready- should be decide to move forward with chickens (no more than 6: 4-5 hens and 1 roo) for egg laying in far Northern Cali (Redding. our climate is funkier than down more southern)- any breed suggestions that might be less prone to disease. Also any recommendations on housing, or tips to possibly help prevent 'issues'. Although I totally get that sometimes this stuff happens. I am always paranoid when I get new hay for the ducks (mold), checking their feed (mold), making sure the plants they have access to are ok...but I know that sometimes things will happen. So I'd love to hear what breeds tend to do especially well in our area not requiring a lot of special tlc during our wet chilly winters. I simply adore the look of the breed of red hens/roos. I don't know much about chicken breeds yet but it's the typical breed you see in farm 'pictures'. I'd love to have a breed that is totally different in color to my ducks so I can easily spot them roaming around. But not necessary. I will likely just select one breed. When the chickens are done laying it's quite possible we will eat them- so if they are a decent meat bird that could be a plus (not worried about how clean the 'carcass' is). We started out thinking we'd eat duck (hence the Pekins in our flock) but have all agreed as a family we couldn't. LOL So the same might end up happening with the chickens. But we'll see!

We will build a fresh coop (there is an old existing one on our property but I think we should just rip it down? the outer shell although ugly still seems quite serviceable but the pay boxes def need to be redone). If anyone thinks the shell could safely be salvageable I would happily post pictures. It's been unused for more than 2-3 years at the least. We'd like to free range them during the day ideally but house them at night. How in the heck do you get chickens to go to their house at night though? I know with the ducks I managed to train them through routine and peas.

Thanks in advance. Sorry for all the questions. I have a friend who will be lending me all her chicken books so I will have some reading over the next year too.