Cochin Thread!!!

[Jharper]

I have  never counted until now. 2 Barred,5 Black, 5 Buff Columbian, 2 Birchen, 12 Columbians, 3 Gold Laced,1 Mottled, 3 Silver Laced, 8 Silver Penciled, 6 Partridge, 3 Smooth whites, 2 Frizzled Whites, and several Improvement project birds. All of  those are breeders or saved to be for next year. Over 200 chicks from 1 day to 6-7 weeks in brooders. 3 more weeks of hatching and I am done for the year.

All are recognized ABA varieties. I do raise to show and also some for preservation of the rarer varieties.

Wow! Are they standard and bantam or just one of the other?

 

[Black Cochin Bantams]

Wow! Are they standard and bantam or just one of the other?

I have never counted until now. 2 Barred,5 Black, 5 Buff Columbian, 2 Birchen, 12 Columbians, 3 Gold Laced,1 Mottled, 3 Silver Laced, 8 Silver Penciled, 6 Partridge, 3 Smooth whites, 2 Frizzled Whites, and several Improvement project birds. All of those are breeders or saved to be for next year. Over 200 chicks from 1 day to 6-7 weeks in brooders. 3 more weeks of hatching and I am done for the year.

All are recognized ABA varieties. I do raise to show and also some for preservation of the rarer varieties.

Wow! Are they standard and bantam or just one of the other?

All Bantams.

 

[Jharper]

Wow! I bet you have a lot of broodies.

 

[sbucciarel]

I have my low pressure waterers installed and working. Gravity fed with max of 5 ft above waterers. 1 They work well after fine tuning. Several leaked-dripped and needed to get parts swapped out. 2. Do not over tighten. I read the instructions and knew not to over tighten but still broke 2 cage brackets that caused leaks. No fixing that so consider them fragile while installing. No bird will damage them after installation. 3. Trying to figure out best way to keep algae growth down in the tank. 4. Birds picked up how to use it very quickly 5. Made all tubing go down hill so will be easy to drain for winter. 6. I used a 35 gallon tank I had for water. I only keep 10 gallons in it max until I know I will be gone for a while. Then I will fill it. Want to keep water fresh. So far no birds have crapped in the water cups so it is much more sanitary than my old waterers. Cups come off easily for cleaning. I ran all waterers off of one trunk line. Quite easy to do but is not a fast process. 1 waterer would be enough for any pen. I chose to put 2 in each pen so that there would always be 1 working. Easiest way to insure no deaths in heat due to no water source working was to install a redundant system.

That's quite a setup. Really nice.

 

[Tinybabes]

I have two small coops for sheltering chicks and or their moms and one larger coop for the mature flock. Right now I have my 5 11 week old cochin babes in one; 3 mixed 9 week olds and the 11 week sultan in the other small coop, Now I have a tiny hen and her one chick ,and a full sized blue with one cochin babe she just hatched; all the big hens seem bent on killing the babes.At what age can I safely put pullets in with grown hens? Am trying to find the sultan a new home and We will eventually eat the mixed chicks but right now I can not stand to see any of them in fear or injured. Any way any hints on the ages for mixing them would help. By summers end I hope to have all but cochins given away or in the deep freeze so to avoid this mess in the future.

 

[Black Cochin Bantams]

Wow! I bet you have a lot of broodies.

3 incubators. 1 for incubating . 1 for hatching and 1 as a spare. No Broody hens used to hatch. I find they attempt to hatch more than they can cover and most eggs end up not viable eventually.

 

[Jharper]

3 incubators. 1 for incubating . 1 for hatching and 1 as a spare. No Broody hens used to hatch. I find they attempt to hatch more than they can cover and most eggs end up not viable eventually.

That's what my Cochin bantam does. Her last hatch she started out with 12 then she rolled 6 eggs up under her from the other nest then I took those away. Then 4 of the 12 were no good so she ended up with 8 and 8 hatched and I gave her one. One chick hatched with a deformity and died, so I believe she has a good hatch rate.

 

[PsycoPeep]

I'd be interested in the reds, too. I have the ability to get some at a reasonable price and am debating it. However - I don't have the means to keep every single color of every single breed seperated. So I'd like to get colors that are compatable if they DO breed together. What colors would you guys recomment that would breed better with each other? I was thinking getting a black rooster and he'd be ok to breed to pullets that are most any color, black, blue, splash, gold & silver laced, partridge, white, barred. The buff & red I'm not sure of. Can you breed buff, red, and white together? Can I keep those 3 colors together and then the other colors together? What's everyone's opinions on whch colors mix okay and which would screw it up to much? I also really like the penciled. Like I said, I don't "have to" have all of these colors, but what I WOULD like is a small variety of colors that will be compatible w/each other. Someone at a swap a few weeks back had made the comment you can breed black or white to nearly everything.

 

[lemmerich]

I going Cochin crazy here love these birds so much! And my silkies think I am going to go. Cochin, Silkie, Mille,guinea crazy

 

[suncatcher]

I have my low pressure waterers installed and working. Gravity fed with max of 5 ft above waterers.

1 They work well after fine tuning. Several leaked-dripped and needed to get parts swapped out.

2. Do not over tighten. I read the instructions and knew not to over tighten but still broke 2 cage brackets that caused leaks. No fixing that so consider them fragile while installing. No bird will damage them after installation.

3. Trying to figure out best way to keep algae growth down in the tank.

4. Birds picked up how to use it very quickly

5. Made all tubing go down hill so will be easy to drain for winter.

6. I used a 35 gallon tank I had for water. I only keep 10 gallons in it max until I know I will be gone for a while. Then I will fill it. Want to keep water fresh. So far no birds have crapped in the water cups so it is much more sanitary than my old waterers. Cups come off easily for cleaning.

I ran all waterers off of one trunk line. Quite easy to do but is not a fast process.

1 waterer would be enough for any pen. I chose to put 2 in each pen so that there would always be 1 working. Easiest way to insure no deaths in heat due to no water source working was to install a redundant system.

Very nice! I too had been looking at the cups, was not sure of the drip system. Hmmm, I wonder if you could put one of those all natural Barley straw (I think that is whats in them) they sell them to keep ponds clean from algae. They may make one small enough for your water tank??????