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

[Tracydr]

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Yikes! At least build a small grow-out coop next to the big coop so that they can get out of the house and acclimated, not to mention start getting to know each other. Otherwise, you'll be changing chicken diapers before you know it.

 

[FuzzyButtsFarm]

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DE is wonderful to have around the garden if you garden organically and also around the chicken yard. Kills those wicked little desert fire ants that I get all summer so that I don't have to resort to poison bait. It's also good for aphids, squash bugs ( need to get them before they are an epidemic), other soft bodied bugs, cucumber and Colorado potato beetles.
It won't kill pollinators and other beneficial bugs, which to me, is very important. Other than the lacewing and ladybug larva. I won't apply it when I see them crawling around. But most of the beneficials fly over the top of the plants, unaffected by the DE. Unlike sevin dust, which kills everything and which bees and other good guys are particularly susceptible to.
Have you ever had an aquarium? You know how you have to wait for all the good bugs to establish? How your fish will die if you put them in a brand new tank before the good bacteria have a chance to establish? This is sort of how organic gardening and organic chicken farming works. When you start wiping out the good bugs with sevin dust, dewormer and antibiotics, you're back to that sterile aquarium. All the bad bugs have a chance to restablish fast. This is why the chicken often gets a respiratory infection right after being dewormed or gets sick with something else right after a round of antibiotics. You must restablish that system of good bugs which time and probiotics. During that time, the chickens are at risk and vulnerable.



Excellent explanation! I agree whole-heartedly.

x2 I raised tropical fish for years so it makes sense.

 

[Tracydr]

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same here, I still don't knw what it looks like.. I wouldn't know where to buy some..

a few other thing I never encountered until I came onto byc are: bumblefoot, prolapse uterus, impacted crop, worms, stuck egg and a few others that escape my senile mind at the moment..,

I have never done any kind of "surgery" either.. I do not feel that I have the knowledge to diagnose, or the skill to cut on a live animal..

I have had thousands of birds in my lifetime.. never had the trouble that some of these backyard 6 chicken flocks have.. I personnally think it is a sort of imposed hyperchondriac disorder..

and I don't have time to daily check 120 birds" pooh so see what color it is.. wouldn't do any good anyhow,, I am color blind..

None of my birds have ever shown any human type emotions.. ie,:mourning, sorrow, ecstacy, loneliness,bravado.. my roosters do not guard the flock.. they run like h--L when the spot a hawk of fox... It is more like,, come on ladies, follow me and let's get out of here....If I get there first, he will get you and not me..

Seriously? You mean your chicken step-mommy doesn't peck her baby step-son because she realizes he's a different breed? And then, he feels all lonely and misunderstood? And, all the other baby chickies don't like him because he's different and an outcast?

Just kidding! I feel the same way. In twenty five years I've never had 99% of the problems these chicken owners with 5-6 chickens have in 1 year. And I have raised lots of chickens, plus peafowl, guineas, ducks and a few quail. But, maybe it's just because I didn't ask them how they felt, guess.

 

[jvls1942]

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don't judge your wife's judgement too closely, she married you, didn't she ?? LOL If a man is all alone in the middle of a forest, miles from his wife, and he says anything,, is he still wrong ?

btw,, 13 weeks is old enough.. but I am just a man..

 

[thebirdguy]

I've had chickens off & on for 35+ years... had just about everything else at one time or another... Now we have 10 acres and the barn is almost complete... probably have more by Spring... LOL

I saw most of the advice I would have given already stated but will at the risk of repetition, add a couple of things..

1) Reduce, Reuse, Recycle

2) Air conditioning is for people

3) Keep it simple

4) There's no such thing as too much room

5) Use your common sense (if you don't have any, then that could be a problem)

6) Don't re-invent the wheel

7) Mother nature knows more than you do

8) There is always more than one "right way" to do it

9) Just because someone does something different doesn't make it wrong

10) Smile, life's too short to get upset

 

[perchie.girl]

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x2 I especially like number five.

 

[featherz]

As a relative chicken newbie, this thread makes me feel MUCH better about the decisions I have made regarding my chickens. I don't use heat lamps for anything that has feathers, I don't routinely worm or dust (although I do use DE in my deep litter - it does dry things out), I don't sanitize my waterers with bleach (just rinse em with a hose) and most of my chickens hate me unless I have food. None of em sit on my lap or wear diapers. I do admit to having a few homemade chicken saddles and I have done a few bumblefoot surgeries, but I now leave them alone and generally they heal without any intervention at all. I do give them pumpkin seeds when I have pumpkin as well as cayenne pepper (it's cheap, why not?). 'treats' are a handful of cracked corn or BOSS, generally to get them together for a head count or to put them in the runs.

I let my broodies stay with the flock along with their chicks and for the most part nothing bad happened - and the chicks were outside when it was 30F with no ill effects. I mix in litter from the outside chickens into the chick brooder and haven't had a single case of cocci, so I don't use medicated feed.

That said, I still think baby chicks are cute (sorry, can't take that away from me)

and I'll still fix a spraddle leg or blue-kote a peck injury.




Question for the OT folks - is there any thing or any method that wasn't around 40 years ago that you feel is a vast improvement over the way 'grandma' did it? Such as better feed, DE, automatic doors, electric fencing, etc? There are things I use for MY convenience like my automatic pop doors and heated dog bowls for winter that save ME a lot of time with three coops.

 

[Tracydr]

While I'm very common sense and down to earth and am strongly against heating the coop, there is a place for AC and swamp coolers. If you live in AZ and don't have a lot of shade or need to keep your chickens in an enclosed type of coop, cooling with a swamp cooler or AC when it's 115 or above will keep your chickens alive. It's hard for those in other states to imagine chicken coops getting so hot as to literally roast chickens alive but here in AZ, if you're not blessed with trees and irrigation ( I am) you may need to resort to a cooling system. Many do and it saves chicken lives.
Chciken's die from heat, not cold.

 

[Beekissed]

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See? There is knowledge here that not available ANYWHERE ELSE!!

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Let's call it "Veterinary Munchausen's by Proxy".

Love this!!

 

[bobbi-j]

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I live in MN, so we don't even get CLOSE to what you deal with there, but I do agree that there are places where fans, AC, or coolers of some sort are beneficial if not necessary to keep your chickens alive. My chickens free range, so they have access to shade when it gets too hot.