Chickens for 10-20 years or more? Pull up a rockin' chair and lay some wisdom on us!

[NanaKat]

Grandsons are coming today to "feed the chickens", pick pears and help daddy set out the deer feeder.
Trying to get the boys started early on their chickening skills. They stil want to "pick eggs". They are 3 and 5 so still have some years to go.

 

[Beekissed]

silkies are aliens...not chickens

Hey, hey!!!

Silkies make the best TP in the world for all those good layers we have in our flocks...very gentle on those hard working vents and the wiping thereof. They have their uses and it's important to provide a service to the real layers in the flock. When everyone is an executive, the janitor rules....or so I hear.

Grandsons are coming today to "feed the chickens", pick pears and help daddy set out the deer feeder.
Trying to get the boys started early on their chickening skills. They stil want to "pick eggs". They are 3 and 5 so still have some years to go.

Best age for it! I remember going out to Grandma's house and lifting up the tail of a hen to watch the egg coming out when she laid it. Must have been the most tolerant chickens in the world because we were always bothering them like that. "Grandma, can we feed the chickens? Can we gather the eggs? Can we see the chicks? Can we hold the chicks?" I bet Grandma was real glad she had chickens to get us out of her hair for awhile.....

We were most interested when she killed a hen and we watched, enthralled, as she opened the gizzard and we got to see what was inside...like a gross little treasure box.

I guess that is where I first developed a love of farming and everything that went along with it...none of it was gross to me and I always pictured myself farming instead of being a princess or Miss America, a teacher or any other womanly profession or goal. I wanted to be just like Grandma! I wanted to have rollercoaster floors(I didn't know it was caused by rotten floor joists) and odd smells in a strange old house, a creepy dark cellar house and all sorts of places to hide and explore.

 

[Kansas Prairie]

No offense to anyone, but around these parts, folks aren't even sure a Silkie IS a chicken, if you know what I mean. LOL

Ain't ever gonna happen.

 

[Kansas Prairie]

Grandsons are coming today to "feed the chickens", pick pears and help daddy set out the deer feeder.
Trying to get the boys started early on their chickening skills. They stil want to "pick eggs". They are 3 and 5 so still have some years to go.

Congrats on having grandchildren! I'm excited about having grandchildren someday, hopefully. Your post brings back many good memories of my childhood, and my grandparents.

 

[NikkiMiChickie]

http://instagr.am/p/RAlcXBRDzZ/

Hope that works... Pic of new peep, left, while mama and 1 week old peep eat their breakfast. One of the 3 remaining eggs is pipped & peeping from inside, so hopefully we'll have another chick sometime today.

My question: all of my chicks that have hatched so far (4 total, one murdered in the coop, hence the trough brooder they're in now, another dead in the shell, plus these 2) have been black. Two have had a white spot on their head like the new one today. Does this always mean sex-linked cockerels, or could the coloring just happen? Mama, a Cochin, laid only 1/11 eggs in her clutch. The other 10 eggs were from the rest of my mixed flock, and I honestly don't know whose eggs belong to whom, except for a select few. I do have a BR hen, and one black rooster, which I've read can lead to SL chicks. I just don't know whether non-SL chicks could have that white spot?

Thanks!
-Nikki

 

[Pozees]

Although the ISA is a 4 way cross, terminating in a sex link, and ongoing breeding them is a curious activity. Of course, they do not breed true. However, with patience and selection, why not breed them to produce more layers? After 3 or 4 generations, you can make a white bird that pretty clean in appearance, vigorous, and the genetics still produce a very prolific layer. Or, you can "fork" the project and put a Red cock over them and make production reds. Is there a market for production layers?

The ISA is still a chicken and can be used to make more chickens. We haven't done the Silkie cross yet, however.

So backbreeding means breeding offspring back to parent, is that correct? And because multiple breeds comprise the genetics they will not produce offspring that look like the parents, at least not 100%, for the first generation and probably the second, but if you select from each generation birds who look alike (and presumably produce well if the goal is clean, vigorous, and prolific) and breed to one another and/or to the look-alike parent, you can ultimately produce your white hen and also a white roo which, when bred together, can produce entire clutches of white chicks. If I did not understand your meaning PLEASE correct me.

On the topic of selective breeding, what characteristics are the most difficult to stamp?

 

[Mskayladog]

I have searched this thread and can't find the answer, I have not figured out the search function here at BYC.
Can the chickens go out to range if its cold and raining?

 

[galanie]

Absolutely they can.

 

[Pozees]

I have searched this thread and can't find the answer, I have not figured out the search function here at BYC.
Can the chickens go out to range if its cold and raining?

My hens always seem to laugh at me when I think it's too cold for them, so I just open the gate and let them decide. I figure as long as they have access to return to the coop if they want, they should be fine.

 

[Beekissed]

Yes, they can and will. They will even go out when the snow is deep if you pack it down into trails for them...they like going outdoors for the sun and on the offchance that they can forage or dust.