California-Southern

[calichicken]

Some say bantams are safe in gardens or feather-footed fowl - Hey my feather-footed bantams dig as deep as my regular LF!! I have about 10 backyard holes dug to China thanks to the bantams. If I didn't let them free-range their coop would've collapsed on itself from all their digging in there!

LOL...x2! Those little Bantams can dig! And one dusting hole is not good enough...nope...they gotta dig in multiple locations! Trying to find the best dusting spot with a view or what????

 

[ozexpat]

Guinea fowls and mallard derivative ducks are better for gardens.

Neighbors may object to the guineas

 

[UrbanFarmOC]

Chickens can fly and jump pretty high so if you plan putting your chickens inside the raised garden area, they will fly into and decimate your garden beds.  We have to rabbit fence around our raised beds to keep our girls out because they dig and scratch so deep as to disturb the roots of our veggies.  The big LF tried to fly into the area a couple times but we gently guided them out of the area and they know now to respect the barrier and not go into the garden unless we "invite" them at the end of harvest.  If one of the girls accidentally flies into the garden area she is so panicked because she knows she doesn't belong there and is so relieved when we usher her out again.
 

Chickens really dig deeply when dust-bathing or scratching in dirt so not a good idea to mix veggie gardens with free-range chickens unless you don't mind - they will decimate vegetation rather promptly.  However, there is a lovely paper-back book "Free-Range Chicken Gardens" by Jessi Bloom that gives a lot of insight not only to safe plants for free-range chickens to be around and use as hiding places but also an insight into basic chicken behavior in gardens.  I use it for reference even more than my basic "Storey's Guide to Raising Chickens."

So glad to see you doing your research before plunging into getting chickens - so many people do it half-a** backwards LOL!

To put it bluntly, chickens will destroy ALL vegetation on the first day! I thought cactus & succulants were safe.....ha ha ha..NOPE

I have a potted blougainvillea that my 3 month old pullets left alone since I started letting them free-range at about 3 weeks old (with supervision when younger of course). That is, they left it alone until 2 days ago. They ate EVERY. SINGLE. LEAF. AND. FLOWER. Now it's just potted bare branches. I want happy chickens, so I've sacrificed some of my summer veggies for them (for now), but I've got to go get some fencing or chicken wire very soon or I'll end up with no plants or veggies at all.

 

[froggiesheins]

I have a potted blougainvillea that my 3 month old pullets left alone since I started letting them free-range at about 3 weeks old (with supervision when younger of course). That is, they left it alone until 2 days ago. They ate EVERY. SINGLE. LEAF. AND. FLOWER. Now it's just potted bare branches. I want happy chickens, so I've sacrificed some of my summer veggies for them (for now), but I've got to go get some fencing or chicken wire very soon or I'll end up with no plants or veggies at all.

YUP, they are eating machines!

they will reach thru fences, jump like rabbits and can balance on chicken wire to get at the goodies too!

AND, if for some insane reason, they don't eat the plant they will just scratch away all the dirt under it!

 

[Phage]

a bit off topic but...

Could anyone use a HUGE number of educational VHS videos (for free). They are sesame street, stranger danger, counting etc, barney, blues clues, telebubbies, etc etc plus disney classics.

Just hoping they could be useful for other children as they were for mine. Would need to pick up from Del mar or La Jolla area. OR I could take them with me to Pasadena tomorrow if someone was interested.

 

[Halokirbs]

I am in Rancho Cucamonga. We have our coop built but we have not added the chickens yet. We are interested in getting 1 Barred Rock, 1 Golden-Laced Wyandotte, 2 Silkies, and 1 more of undetermined breed. Would this be a good mix? Where is the best place to buy the birds? Rancho Cucamonga does not allow roosters so I have to be certain I get only hens. I have researched Chickens Galore! but I am not certain they guarantee the gender, which is a must. Any thoughts would be helpful. Thank you.

 

[Sylvester017]

I am in Rancho Cucamonga. We have our coop built but we have not added the chickens yet. We are interested in getting 1 Barred Rock, 1 Golden-Laced Wyandotte, 2 Silkies, and 1 more of undetermined breed. Would this be a good mix? Where is the best place to buy the birds? Rancho Cucamonga does not allow roosters so I have to be certain I get only hens. I have researched Chickens Galore! but I am not certain they guarantee the gender, which is a must. Any thoughts would be helpful. Thank you.

I would not mix gentle non-combative breeds like Polish, Silkies, Crevecoeurs, Ameraucanas, Easter Eggers, Araucanas with dual purpose heavy fowl like Wyandottes, BRs, RIRs, NHRs, Leghorns, Javas, Rocks, LF in general. Wyandottes, BRs and RIRs like to assume dominance to the point of meanness. They are fine with humans but bullies in the flock. Leghorns will usually mind-their-own-business but if given the opportunity will become assertive toward gentler breeds.

As chicks most breeds are compatible. It's when LF reach maturity from between 18 months to 2 years that LF will begin pushing their weight around and the non-combative gentle breeds will get picked on. We noticed our Silkie chicks get progressively picked on by the faster larger growing LF chicks to the point the Silkie chicks had to hide all day from the LF chicks. Think about this before you mix Silkies into any LF flock! The smaller the size of the flock the more opportunity for the gentle breeds to get chased, pecked, picked on, or injured. Decide on all assertive LF breeds for equal pecking order squabbles or all gentle-natured breeds for compatibility. I learned this the HARD way and had to re-home 3 aggressive LF - beautiful birds but they became progressively aggressive toward my gentle Ameraucana and Silkies to the point of near-injury if we weren't there to watch and stop it in time.

New owners want to try every breed out there without thinking about the consequences of mixing wrong temperaments together in a flock. Just something I learned the hard way.

 

[Sylvester017]

I am in Rancho Cucamonga. We have our coop built but we have not added the chickens yet. We are interested in getting 1 Barred Rock, 1 Golden-Laced Wyandotte, 2 Silkies, and 1 more of undetermined breed. Would this be a good mix? Where is the best place to buy the birds? Rancho Cucamonga does not allow roosters so I have to be certain I get only hens. I have researched Chickens Galore! but I am not certain they guarantee the gender, which is a must. Any thoughts would be helpful. Thank you.

For starters, Silkies are not sexable until about 3 or 4 months old so don't let anyone sell you a Silkie chick as a positive sexed chick. You can't tell until they are much older. Amber Waves Silkies in Norco has a wide assortment of colors in Silkies but they are quality and won't be cheap. Amber Waves has a website you can visit.

I have no idea what feed stores you have in Rancho but in El Monte at Wes's Pets and Feed you will find an excellent assortment of breeds. El Monte is a very poultry-oriented community and has an egg-packing industry so Wes carries a large variety of chicks and bantams - the bulk of which he orders from Privett Hatchery in NM. His phone is 626-442-0781. I suggest calling beforehand so he can tell you what breeds he still has available and when his next shipment is coming in. Do your homework to know what breeds you want and don't let him talk you into some other breed as not all breeds are compatible with each other. I got my Dominique pullet chick and my Silkie juvenile pullet (a private Silkie breeder brought in stock into Wes's for private sale) and Wes also has adult birds although most of them are cockerels and roosters. It's a tiny store location but chicks don't take that much room in a brooder in his store. Very nice assortment and he usually has chicks available into September but not much choice by then. He even carries hybrids/sexlink layers and broiler crosses but I only like heritage breeds.

If you want excellent layers and non-combative breeds I would suggest Easter Egger pullets (actual APA Ameraucanas are nice too but only available through private breeders and not found in online hatcheries or feed stores). Silkies are not sexable until about 3 or 4 months old which is when I bought my pullet at Wes's 2 years ago - he knows a private breeder who brings juvenile Silkies in sometimes.

Rather than BR I would suggest a smaller Dominique which will be easier on the feed bill. Wyandottes are a 50/50 chance of getting a non-dominant personality. If you want egg-layers the EEs lay as terrific and as often as White Leghorns and give you LG-XL colored eggs too and they're non-combative - a bit kooky spooky jittery types but sweet alert free-rangers and talkers. Ours crave human interraction and conversation and there's an array of feather colors. But don't mix Silkies, EEs, or Doms with LF that will weigh over 5-lbs as adults like RIR, BR, Wyan, Buff Orp, 'Lorp, NHR, White Rocks, Sussex, Chantecler, Java, Jersey Giant, Brahma, etc etc etc. Some of these LF are reported as docile or gentle but if they are around smaller breeds will still take the opportunity to bully smaller birds.

Good luck and I think you'll find Wes's a fun place to visit because of the variety of chicks - even though he's small he has variety. His chick prices range around $7 each - beats ordering from a mail order hatchery and chancing dead chicks by mail. Call ahead or visit. It's fun to see all the chicks.

 

[tacopaco]

I do like amber wave's birds and they seem like nice people but I did go once about a month and a half ago and got two white silkie chicks that they were sure were white and paid the extra to leave them there until they were off the heat lamp, I went back four weeks later, they said it turns out they are splash and gave me them saying they don't use the lamp that much anymore and I shouldn't need it that much, but I should keep it on them occasionally.
I got home took pictures and posted them here and everyone said they were definitely not 4 weeks, much younger around 2 weeks maybe less.
So bottom line I think they have nice birds but you should try and avoid paying the extra as I think they accidentally sold mine to someone else and gave me other ones hoping I wouldn't notice, it was too far for me to go back and make the claim so I decided to keep them and they are growing up nice and healthy.
It was 40 for the 2 chicks by the way.

 

[tacopaco]

Everyone in Wes's pets n feed is really nice too. I bought two Delawares from them a year ago and a Pekin duckling about three months ago and they all grew up healthy, I do visit sometimes just to see what they get in stock.
They also buy back roosters I think.
And occasionally have bunnies, pigeons, quail, ducks and turkeys. One time they also had a pair of ring neck pheasants.