Consolidated Kansas

[kaitG]

Hope y'all are doing well, we moved our little flock into their coop today. They are 3-4 weeks, and were nearly escaping from the deep tub they were in. I still have a heat lamp going for them out there, looks like the lowest it's supposed to be tonight here is about 50. Their wings are pretty much feathered and are starting to get their tail feathers and lose the fluff on the back of their necks. When should I take the lamp away? They have plenty of space to get away from if if they get too warm and during the hot day I turn it off.
Also, at what age do you seasoned owners suggest I begin to give them fruit and veggies? With our first flock we waited until they were adults to do so, just curious if it should be sooner.

 

[Dani4Hedgies]

Ok new chick id and oooa aahhh time

(no feathered feet here)

(no feathered feet here)

(feathered feet)

(feathered feet)

(feathered feet)

(feathered feet)

 

[chicken danz]

The top one is a mottle,probably not a good mottle due to the amount of black it has now. The second one is a partridge. The others are brahma. I'm so happy you still got 50% after all those problems.

Hope y'all are doing well, we moved our little flock into their coop today. They are 3-4 weeks, and were nearly escaping from the deep tub they were in. I still have a heat lamp going for them out there, looks like the lowest it's supposed to be tonight here is about 50. Their wings are pretty much feathered and are starting to get their tail feathers and lose the fluff on the back of their necks. When should I take the lamp away? They have plenty of space to get away from if if they get too warm and during the hot day I turn it off.
Also, at what age do you seasoned owners suggest I begin to give them fruit and veggies?

With our first flock we waited until they were adults to do so, just curious if it should be sooner.

I'd keep the heat lamp on the chicks at least at night until they are about 6 weeks. During the day if it's mid 70s or so they should be fine without it if you choose to shut it off. If you have them in a coop where they have lots of room to move away from it and ventilation it doesn't hurt to leave it on. That's a personaly decision you need to make. It is going to be cooler this week so if it were me I'd just leave it on. They'll use it if they need it.
A lot of people take them away from heat earlier but I have lost too many chicks from getting cold and piling on each other.

We had puppies last night. I need to venture out and check the final count this morning and make sure they are all okay.

 

[kaitG]

The top one is a mottle,probably not a good mottle due to the amount of black it has now.  The second one is a partridge. The others are brahma. I'm so happy you still got 50% after all those problems.

I'd keep the heat lamp on the chicks at least at night until they are about 6 weeks. During the day if it's mid 70s or so they should be fine without it if you choose to shut it off. If you have them in a coop where they have lots of room to move away from it and ventilation  it doesn't hurt to leave it on. That's a personaly decision you need to make. It is going to be cooler this week so if it were me I'd just leave it on. They'll use it if they need it.
A lot of people take them away from heat earlier but I have lost too many chicks from getting cold and piling on each other.

We had puppies last night. I need to venture out and check the final count this morning and make sure they are all okay.

Thank you! I'll just leave it on, the coop is well ventilated and spacious. I think they are enjoying all the extra room to roam around.

 

[sharol]

The top one is a mottle,probably not a good mottle due to the amount of black it has now. The second one is a partridge. The others are brahma. I'm so happy you still got 50% after all those problems.

I'd keep the heat lamp on the chicks at least at night until they are about 6 weeks. During the day if it's mid 70s or so they should be fine without it if you choose to shut it off. If you have them in a coop where they have lots of room to move away from it and ventilation it doesn't hurt to leave it on. That's a personaly decision you need to make. It is going to be cooler this week so if it were me I'd just leave it on. They'll use it if they need it.
A lot of people take them away from heat earlier but I have lost too many chicks from getting cold and piling on each other.

We had puppies last night. I need to venture out and check the final count this morning and make sure they are all okay.

I sure agree on the heat. I'm hoping it is a well secured heat source that won't fall and start a fire, though.

Puppies!!!! How exciting. My little foster hasn't had hers yet, and she looks like she swallowed a soccer ball. I keep thinking she will go into labor, but not yet. Of course, as a rescue, we have no idea of the parentage or the date so that is a concern if the pups are too big for her (she is a chihuahua or appears to be).

 

[Trish44]

@sharol The first chicks look like Mottled to me, but I don't have splash so I don't know what the chicks look like on those. The 2nd set are Jubilees from the way they look. I'm only guessing though. You might have to wait till they get a bit more feathered out to tell.

I have another hatch due today that are getting off to a rather slow start so that means they probably will be going into tomorrow. I really don't like those slow hatches, I would rather they would just pop out & get it over with, lol.

 

[Trish44]

That's okay - thanks for looking. I put an ad on the swaps and got a good lead so I think I'll be able to make these broodies happy.

I have 8 poults hatched out with a bunch more still pipped. I finally got my brooder set up and moved the 5 oldest poults in there. They were tromping around on the unhatched eggs and pecking at pip holes so I decided it was time to move them out of there.

My mille fleur cochin has been raising 3 chicks and I guess last night she decided it was time to teach them to sleep in the coop. She got very anxious when I locked them in the pen they've been using for the past few weeks so I decided to let her out and she immediately called her chicks to follow her to the coop. It took her a number of tries to get them to go in as at first they were too scared to follow her through the door. She's a very patient hen though and just kept trying until she convinced them to go in. Yay! I still have more I need to get transitioned to sleep in the main coop and tonight will probably be chaos as I try to move the co-brooding hens and 10 chicks to the coop. They've been in the hoop coop until now but my Royal Palm turkey's hatch is due Saturday and after they hatch I'll need to move her and her poults to the hoop coop, so I need to get it vacated.

After that it will be time to teach Trish44's leghorns (and co) to sleep in the coop. That will be fun - not! However they are at least accustomed to roosting already since they have an 18" high roost in the little pen they are in and I noticed they were all lined up on it last night. It seems like if I can get them used to roosting in the nursery pen, it is easier to move them to the coop as it is only one new thing to learn rather than two new things at the same time.

Good luck on getting the Leghorns integrated into the coop! I have not had a problem getting my Leghorns into the main coop previously but haven't had any young ones of those for awhile. I only have a few left now because things have happened to them.

 

[sharol]

@sharol The first chicks look like Mottled to me, but I don't have splash so I don't know what the chicks look like on those. The 2nd set are Jubilees from the way they look. I'm only guessing though. You might have to wait till they get a bit more feathered out to tell.

I have another hatch due today that are getting off to a rather slow start so that means they probably will be going into tomorrow. I really don't like those slow hatches, I would rather they would just pop out & get it over with, lol.

When you don't have segregated colors and roosters of each, it is a bit of a crapshoot. Danz says the 2 are Jubilee and that there are 2 and maybe 3 mottles. Of course they aren't pure by color because my roo is a Jubilee. I think the mottles will be interesting to watch develop. I've listed them on the swaps, but I'm not sure I want to sell them. It is fun watching to see what you get with the orpingtons. And I know the girls will be great layers too. I may just keep them.

 

[HEChicken]

Good luck on getting the Leghorns integrated into the coop! I have not had a problem getting my Leghorns into the main coop previously but haven't had any young ones of those for awhile. I only have a few left now because things have happened to them.

Yeah, the first night is always the hardest as they want to sleep where they've always slept before and get stressed out being moved. With the last group of a dozen, I had to crawl into their little pen 4x to grab 3 chicks at a time and carry them to the coop and put them on the roost. I had to close all doors to the coop or they would just run out and run back to their pen faster than I could move them. Once I finally got them all in, they jumped off the roost to go and huddle in a corner, because the older hens were intimidating them. I picked them up out of the corner and returned them to the roost and that time they stayed. I had to stay in the coop until everyone settled down though as I didn't want them to go back and sleep in the corner again. Fortunately, since they were used to roosting already, it only took that one lesson. The next night most of them went in by themselves and the third night they'd put themselves to bed by the time I went to check on them.

The leghorns are in an even bigger group and are flightier, so climbing in the pen to grab them won't be easy. I'll just have to grit my teeth one night and get it done.

Last night I moved the hoop coop birds into the coop and that went much easier than I expected. They are with moms, so that made it easier. They had started to bed down in the hoop coop but I went in and shooed them out and once out of the hoop coop, the moms had the idea that sleeping in the coop is a better idea and they led their babies to the coop. There was a little balking and I had to get one of the hens out twice to encourage her to encourage her babies to go in but all in all it was easier than I expected and I imagine tonight they will just do it without needing my help.

Its just as well I started last night. My broody turkey's hatch isn't due until tomorrow but last night I heard her talking and when I went to check on her, a poult popped out from under her, already dry. By today she has several but I didn't want to disturb her too much so I couldn't tell exactly how many.

Inside, I had a situation I've never had before - 19 turkeys developed in 18 eggs! (They were not all live births.) I hatched 13 live chicks. One pipped but after I realized I could see its beak sticking out of the egg for hours without moving, I checked and sure enough it had died. This morning I broke open the remaining eggs. Every one of them was fully developed so I pulled the fetuses out to feed to my snakes (at least that way they don't go to waste) and to my enormous surprise discovered twins in one of the eggs. It was one of the smaller eggs - not a double yoker by any means - and I believe they were identical rather than fraternal twins. Fraternal twins typically develop from a double yoke egg and each fetus will develop separately at opposite ends of the egg. These two were curled up together and appeared to be sharing a yolk, which means they developed from one yolk so were identical. I didn't even realize there were two until I was trying to find the head to offer to the snake and there were too many appendages. They really never stood a chance of hatching I don't think. They were fully developed but about half the size of the other full-term poults so I gave both to the same snake.

Cheese, cheese, yogurt, ice-cream and more cheese. I'm exhausted.

 

[Trish44]

@HEChicken wow on the twins & turkeys at that. Yeah I have never heard of anyone that had live birds of any kind that were twins. I've never had to integrate that many young birds into the coop at once but this year I'm going to have quite a few so it should be interesting later on. I'm going to add about 15 or so new pullets to my laying flock & another flock rooster. I normally have to chase some around to get them to go in at night at first. Most usually get it fairly quickly but once in awhile I get some stubborn ones, that's always fun at dark.

It sounds like you're making a lot of cheese, let us know how that all turns out. I had a lot of eggs to use up so I made your custard recipe & we liked it & then I made two custard pies as well & we liked those too.

Hopefully my two extra ganders are leaving to go to a new home today, it will be nice to only have two ganders left. Maybe the dynamics will change when there are only two instead of 4. My GP Jasmine has kind of been breaking the gander from following her by hiding from him so he can't find her, smart dog.