Colorado

[megshenhut]

Coloradogal, do ducks need, like, a wading pool of water changed daily, or will a smaller vessel do in winter? I can imagine it is not a lot of fun either way during the coldest days of winter. Do they at least lay enough eggs to supply your baking? Are turkey eggs good for baking as well? I have heard about duck eggs, but nothing about turkey eggs.

I'm going to chime in about the turkey eggs. They are great for whatever you want to use them for. They taste just like a LARGE chicken egg. They are not rich like a duck egg. However they don't lay year round. They start in about Feb and they are about done now.

 

[coloradogal]

Coloradogal, do ducks need, like, a wading pool of water changed daily, or will a smaller vessel do in winter? I can imagine it is not a lot of fun either way during the coldest days of winter. Do they at least lay enough eggs to supply your baking? Are turkey eggs good for baking as well? I have heard about duck eggs, but nothing about turkey eggs.

I'll use one of the black rubber pools from Big R in the winter. I haven't figured out quite how I'm going to do it yet. I am debating on cleaning out part of the garage to put it in there on a piece of tarp. That way, it'll at least stay cleaner than if they keep putting muddy feet in. The ducks lay consistently through winter. I'm not sure now if I have 2 or 3 hens. A couple of days, I've gotten 3 eggs, one of which is rubber. So either the runner is trying to lay 2 eggs a day, one is just going through to fast to have a shell put on or the big guy is a gal starting to lay. I'm not so sure of that as he seems to mount the gals often enough in the pool. I can't imagine a girl doing that to another girl. Just isn't natural.

turkey eggs are good for baking.

I'm going to chime in about the turkey eggs. They are great for whatever you want to use them for. They taste just like a LARGE chicken egg. They are not rich like a duck egg. However they don't lay year round. They start in about Feb and they are about done now.

I've baked with turkey eggs and they also seemed to help with the goods. I've read that turkey eggs have 20% more protein than a chicken egg... without googling it, I want to say its something like 12 grams. I do know one turkey egg is almost equivalent to 2 chicken eggs as far as calories. I also know that if you have low iron, you are suppose to eat turkey eggs instead of chicken.

I didn't know that they didn't lay year round. That really sucks. My brother has the turkeys in the family (only literally though, not figuratively).

On a completely other note: I ordered some Moringa seeds. I'm going to plant some in the house for them and also have the tree for me too. Then next Spring, I want to put some out near their run for them to nosh on. http://www.naturalnews.com/022272_Moringa_medicinal_herbs.html

My stupid dog just once again, ever so gently, took one of my duck eggs off the kitchen counter and is eating it in front of me in the living room. She irritates me sometimes.

 

[mynamesjenelle]

They now expect some sort of fresh food morning and evening and don't consume very much crumble at all, although I'm sure as the season winds down they will have to eat more crumble.  I have yet to offer them any type of scratch, and am seeking input on whether it's a good idea to offer some cracked corn and maybe oats and wheat.  I am inclined to mix something myself, or ask Sweeny's to mix it for me, but want to have something they think of as YUMMY once I don't have as much to offer in the way of fresh vegetables.

My girls are the same way! This morning I was woken up at the crack of dawn by bok bok bok and crying sounds. I went out right away thinking there was a predator about or they were out of food. Nope. They were crying to me to give them fresh bean sprouts (as I have been doing every morning this week) even though they had plenty of regular food and water. Spoiled little things.

I bought them some mixed scratch a couple months ago, but the little seeds get lost in the dirt and they don't care about them much. Oats or just cracked corn might be better since they can see them. Last weekend I bought some mung beans from Whole Foods (expensive I know) just to test out sprouting. About 2/3 cup made over 3 cups sprouted and they go CRAZY for them because of the fresh little leaves and roots. There is a thread somewhere on these forums about it, but they are super easy:

-Soak beans overnight. I don't remember the ratio of beans/water but I probably used about 5 times as much water and they soaked up all of it.
-Pour beans into a colander and cover with a plate. Keep it somewhere warmish. One lady I read keeps her house at 50-something degrees, and she just set her beans on the water heater to keep them warm. We just kept ours on the kitchen counter.
-Every 12 hours, run some water (not hot!) over the beans to rinse.
-After a few days, serve them to your girls!

My ladies turned up their beaks at them the first time I offered, but once they sprouted little leaves they loved them. I read not to give them more than a cup or two per day as it can do something to their bowels ( ) but to use it more as a supplement to regular pellets/crumbles.

That's what I plan on doing for them in the winter for greens since right now they get plenty of buckwheat and weeds. Has anyone tried growing buckwheat indoors? They love it but I think it needs more sun than we have without any south-facing windows on the house. I got some whole oats pretty cheap from Circle F that I'll try sprouting next

 

[mynamesjenelle]

Also, just ONE more time I promise - please go check out my Colorado State Fair thread if you want to go! I'm planning on heading down early on Sunday to go see the birds!

https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/695789/lets-go-to-the-colorado-state-fair

 

[Minchi]

My girls are the same way! This morning I was woken up at the crack of dawn by bok bok bok and crying sounds. I went out right away thinking there was a predator about or they were out of food. Nope. They were crying to me to give them fresh bean sprouts (as I have been doing every morning this week) even though they had plenty of regular food and water. Spoiled little things.
I bought them some mixed scratch a couple months ago, but the little seeds get lost in the dirt and they don't care about them much. Oats or just cracked corn might be better since they can see them. Last weekend I bought some mung beans from Whole Foods (expensive I know) just to test out sprouting. About 2/3 cup made over 3 cups sprouted and they go CRAZY for them because of the fresh little leaves and roots. There is a thread somewhere on these forums about it, but they are super easy:
-Soak beans overnight. I don't remember the ratio of beans/water but I probably used about 5 times as much water and they soaked up all of it.
-Pour beans into a colander and cover with a plate. Keep it somewhere warmish. One lady I read keeps her house at 50-something degrees, and she just set her beans on the water heater to keep them warm. We just kept ours on the kitchen counter.
-Every 12 hours, run some water (not hot!) over the beans to rinse.
-After a few days, serve them to your girls!
My ladies turned up their beaks at them the first time I offered, but once they sprouted little leaves they loved them. I read not to give them more than a cup or two per day as it can do something to their bowels (

) but to use it more as a supplement to regular pellets/crumbles.
That's what I plan on doing for them in the winter for greens since right now they get plenty of buckwheat and weeds. Has anyone tried growing buckwheat indoors? They love it but I think it needs more sun than we have without any south-facing windows on the house. I got some whole oats pretty cheap from Circle F that I'll try sprouting next

My girls won't touch sprouts!

You can buy a 5lb bucket of bean sprouts on amazon for like $25, so I did because I was hoping to use them as a winter treat but they just pecked at them once and then moved on. How I got suck picky little spoiled brats I will never know but they don't eat much outside there food and sometimes they will turn up there nose to foods that are there favorites.

 

[coloradogal]

Have to say I love the poop board addition to the coop.

One of my silkies hasn't had normal feces for about 3 days. It started a little soft and then went watery. So I dragged her inside last night to see what was going on. I decided to proactively treat her with ivermectin because watery poop is often a sign of worms and she's 4 months old so about the right time anyways. I just checked on her and her feces is finally starting to look normal. Yay!!! It's still way too soft but starting to firm up. I'll keep her inside another day or so just to make sure she is back to her normal self.

The poop board just helps so much in figuring out things like that out.

 

[wsmith]

Also, just ONE more time I promise - please go check out my Colorado State Fair thread if you want to go! I'm planning on heading down early on Sunday to go see the birds!
https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/695789/lets-go-to-the-colorado-state-fair

Can't go this year. Too many other obligataions. Let me know if you see any Dominiques though would you? Photos of any that are there would be nice too.

 

[wsmith]

Mixed #50 cracked corn with #50 whole wheat. You'd have thought we went in there with a bag of free candy handing them out to a bunch of kindergarteners!

WOW

They went nuts over it! The wheat kernals are big enough for them to see and they actually like them, as opposed to the milo, which they would waste.

 

[gardendufus]

gardendufus (lol love the moniker!) I discovered that my girls have a fondness for almost anything I harvest and don't want to take the time to cook or preserve.

LOL, my girls love the fact that my garden is so overgrown that they are always getting weeds, oversized squash, bird bit tomatoes, overripe strawberries, ad infinitum. The trouble with a harvestable garden is that since I'm single, I either give most of it away, or just don't get around to harvesting/canning every day, so there is LOTS of waste for chicken treats. I haven't found anything they won't eat yet, except they only seem to play with squash plant leaves. I don't blame them as I come out of the garden so itchy from walking around in it I have to think the same thing that irritates my skin might irritate theirs too.

 

[pichuris]

Ordered chicks from Ideal this week. Was expecting them this morning and they didnt arrive. OMG. Am at work see a voicemail at 6pm. Its my chicks they ended up in Alamosa which is the opposite direction of where I live six hours away and that they are back in Denver and asking if I wanted to pick them up. Hubby on his way to pick them up now in Denver. I know one of them for sure has gone to the rainbow bridge bless her little heart. See how many are still alive when I get home.