California - Northern

[chiqita]

I wanted to post a quick update on the King Brand Feed Non soy Natural. I have been using it for a month now and the chickens are doing great with it!

If you live near a Feed Store that carries it you might want to give it a try.

Ron

Ya, I love Kings. Local, affordable and the chickens and quail love it. And they do a fair bi of reuse as soem of their feeds have spent brewing grains too. NO organic, but I weighed my options and decided natural, local reuse was better.

 

[mycutekitties]

I have been using King feed since October and LOVE it!

 

[Meg2000000]

Look what our granddaughter spotted this morning near our front door    We get a Rattle snake up at the house at least once a year. If they aren't aggressive we relocate them across our creek in a location on our 44 acres that people don't frequent. They are beautiful and I love seeing them but not at my front door!   This one was sluggish from the temps cooling down today so was easily coaxed into a bucket and released. 

I have eggs hatching tonight and look at this blue egg up front. This is its FIRST pip! It practically broke right out

Eeeek! Snakes scare me. You're so brave! That pipping picture is awesome. Thanks for sharing!!

Megan: The blue stuff in the picture is what I am talking about in the tip sheet to put over the wires. Also, The eggs are in foam. I am using plastic trays I bought online. The foam ones likely keep the humidity up so may be better than cardboard egg cartons.

Ron

Oh oook I see what you mean! Is it necessary to put them in trays? I'm glad you're teaching me now because I have no idea! Haha

X2.  Thanks a lot.  Great first experience gathering with other chicken crazies!  Josiah had a blast as well and came home talking all about his brahma eggs that he's gonna hatch.    We will see how their round trip to the party goes.  Great food, great advice, great location, great people, great prizes!!

Thanks all who helped make it happen.
Ha, ha, ha.  Watch out Meg.  I can already see the chickens multiplying over the next few months.  An incubator is a dangerous thing.  I had planned 3-4 hatches this year... well, I think that I am on my 9-10th hatch.  I can't actually remember turning the incubator off since Feb!

Hatched out 96 chicks in the last 3-4 days.   Have about 175 in the incubator right now.  I swear, i swear, i swear I am going to turn off the incubator for at least a few weeks after this upcoming hatch at the beginning of August. 

Josiah was so adorable! Those were HIS eggs! Lol

Wow that's a lot of chicks!! Sounds like you may have a problem. Haha I can't wait to experience my first hatch.. I hope it's not too addicting

Chilly outside! All the chickens are doing well. We all took turns hanging out with them yesterday and we plied them melon, salad, little shreds of pork, oats, apricots and strawberries allll day. I don't think the big pullets had ever had treats or dirt to scratch on before (breeder says she keeps them on wire I think). They didn't know what to do with the treats at first. They watched my 6/7 week olds and their behavior a lot. By the end of the day they were pecking the ground, scratching like it was the most awesome thing ever and looking forward to the new person coming down because they had already figured out we're the treat source. Haha! Sweet pullets though! So soft and pretty!
We set a mister up on the coop. Spoiled chickens. Hehe. Won't have to use it today though.
Excuse my typos. Sent from my iPhone.

Misters are so nice on a hot day.. Mine just love them! And as an added bonus, since I'm out there with them all the time, it cools me off too!

my new pullets (all four of them) are good scratchers, and while they're all still shy of any hands that come too close (even those holding treats), hopefully they'll learn soon enough.  interestingly, their new favorite things besides ants (which they are going wild with) are the just-cut leafy oak branches i put in their run, to give them something to hide in if needed -- they've all been pecking happily at the bark, lichens/moss, baby acorns, even the leaves, and making those lovely happy trilling noises.  

i took advantage of the damp mistiness this morning to plant a bunch of sages & lavender near their coop, trying to screen it a bit from my grumpy neighbor, but also to get the plants established before the girls start making small forays into the world beyond their coop.  it's going to be a lovely place to hang out!

A branch like that is a great idea! I'll have to try that. Congrats on planting! We hope to do something similar as covering for our pen. Lavender would be great!

I only wanted 8 hens in the beginning but because we do plan on free ranging once they are larger I felt like having a few more couldn't (chicken math anyone? lmbo) hurt just in case. Their coop i covered in hardware cloth and so is the bottom of the coop. So night time should be pretty darn safe. I think my biggest concern is them hopping the fence since their coop is less than 20 feet from the neighbors fence. Before I stop free ranging I think I'd like to try some other method to keep them from hopping the fence. Keeping them fenced cooped/runned 24/7 would be my last resort. Visions of my chickens pecking under the fruit trees and coming up to the steps of my back porch are in my head and I would love to see that happen. But what I cannot afford to do is replace my flock if something happens to most of them. But I know there are things I can try before I get to the stage where I stop free ranging. 

I am still in the beginning so I am reading and I love reading here what other Nor Cal people do too. It all helps me formulate our next step. LOL

Lol! How many do you have? The image of chickens free ranging up to the back porch is such a dream for me! Hopefully one day we'll be able to get a place with land.

P.S. I'm so glad we got in to chickens at the same time! All of your book knowledge and great questions are really helping me!

 

[Meg2000000]

I hope everyone enjoyed the chilly-ish day today! The kids I nanny and I had a super lazy movie watching day. It was perfect It only drizzled a little bit but definitely got the alfalfa hay wet in their pen. Is it still going to be ok or do I need to worry about mold now?

The Basques and Rocks are doing amazing together! There's still some minor regulating going on but everyone seems happy. We're spoiling them with treats.. Speaking of, have you seen the price for a 16 oz bag of freeze dried mealworms? Ouch. We're going to start a little worm factory just for the chickens to save money.

I received my final necropsy report on the barnevelder chick that died last week. Since it took so long to get rerouted back to UC Davis they couldn't tell me exactly what happened, but they did say it was some sort of bacterial infection. I still have this two Barnevelder youngsters in my sunroom (since I was too "chicken" to cull them.) Don't know what to do about that yet but there's always tomorrow to figure it out (procrastination anyone?) haha

My new incubator is setup and running great (thanks to Jounny who finished wiring the fan when I gave up!) I put 26 quail eggs in their earlier. Can't wait to see what happens! Here's a pic of the eggs nestling in and getting warm. Look at those cute little speckles!:

 

[Hangtown Farms]

I like it..

I hope everyone enjoyed the chilly-ish day today! The kids I nanny and I had a super lazy movie watching day. It was perfect It only drizzled a little bit but definitely got the alfalfa hay wet in their pen. Is it still going to be ok or do I need to worry about mold now?
The Basques and Rocks are doing amazing together! There's still some minor regulating going on but everyone seems happy. We're spoiling them with treats.. Speaking of, have you seen the price for a 16 oz bag of freeze dried mealworms? Ouch. We're going to start a little worm factory just for the chickens to save money.
I received my final necropsy report on the barnevelder chick that died last week. Since it took so long to get rerouted back to UC Davis they couldn't tell me exactly what happened, but they did say it was some sort of bacterial infection. I still have this two Barnevelder youngsters in my sunroom (since I was too "chicken" to cull them.) Don't know what to do about that yet but there's always tomorrow to figure it out (procrastination anyone?) haha
My new incubator is setup and running great (thanks to Jounny who finished wiring the fan when I gave up!) I put 26 quail eggs in their earlier. Can't wait to see what happens! Here's a pic of the eggs nestling in and getting warm. Look at those cute little speckles!:

 

[ronott1]

Quote:
Gotta love multi qouote!

Setting them up is supposed to help with shipped eggs. I have done it both ways. If you put down the sponge shelf liner with the hole in in, you can put them on their sides. Look for instructions--big end slightly up with the larges part of the air cell towards the top.

The mat helps to keep the one that hatch first from playing hockey with the eggs that have not hatched yet.

I am glad to hear the Basque and the Rocks are getting along well.

ron

 

[ronott1]

Quote:

I have been using King feed since October and LOVE it!

I am really excited!

King Feed just moved into the Western Pet and Feed stores in the Sacramento area. I got mine in Carmichael. It's a bit far but not as far a Vacaville where I went to pick up the cascade feed. This is $10.00 cheaper per bag than the Cascade grower and layer.

Ron

 

[Hangtown Farms]

I am still trying to rehome a campine pair and a
Crele Hamburg project if anyone is wanting them..
My Campine Rooster is a great protector against predators if you are in the hills or a free range situation
the hen lays a egg a day

 

[Hangtown Farms]

also does anyone in Norcal have Mille Fleur Leghorn hatching eggs?
Wanting some for my next project..

 

[lawatt]

just went down to my coop, just after the sun went down, to check on everyone -- and the two newcomer chicks (7 week old Delaware & slightly younger australorp) were both totally distressed, making loud sharp insistent peeping noises and taking turns trying to duck under each other's breast, the way they would as a chick with a hen -- they've got lots of food and water, so not sure why they seemed so upset? i at least got them both into the henhouse, which should be a little warmer, and the marans chicks (same age but much bossier) stayed out in the run... but goodness, so upsetting to not know what might be freaking them out so!

poor little girls...