Consolidated Kansas

[Trish44]

Oh, I remember that. Short memory lapse

Does anybody here have Blue Ameraucanas or like the breed? If so, please visit my Blue Ameraucana thread! Or show off your roosters here!

I have other colors of Ameraucanas besides blue. I raise Wheaten/Blue Wheaten, Blacks, & have been working on Lavenders for two years. I'm now getting my first true lavender chicks this year. I know it's not a recognized color, yet anyway, but people have been trying to get it accepted. I just love that color of chicks.

It's really warm here today, I was actually sweating out there when I went out to do morning chores. I hope you all enjoy the weather, we're supposed to have 3 really warm days & I hope to take advantage of them & get some things done outside I've been needing to do.

 

[TheCrazyClucker]

It's really warm here, too. I hope it stays this way!!

Trish44-- I breed Blue Ameraucanas, and I'm working on getting some Lavenders. Those Blue boys are really nice, uh? You should join my thread

I'd love to see some pics of your Blues and all your other Ameraucanas!

 

[Frizzled Pink]

Oh, I remember that. Short memory lapse

Does anybody here have Blue Ameraucanas or like the breed? If so, please visit my Blue Ameraucana thread! Or show off your roosters here!

Our mama blue at Spooncreek Organics--Have a quad of blue hens in breeding pen now and also have 2 lavender hens

 

[chicken danz]

So I got in the truck and took a shopping trip. I spent $800 on fencing wire. I decided to go with goat fence because it seems to be the safest and sturdiest. And should stay in place regardless of weather and conditions. I think it will look fairly nice as well.
After I got back home I fed and watered. My d'uccles have been sitting on a pile of eggs and I found the first baby today. Of course they are nesting in the top row of nest boxes and the baby had fallen to the floor. He was just fine though. So I brought him in and put him with some I just hatched.
I checked the sussex that is sitting in the trash barrel on old shavings and she has a huge pile of eggs but no babies. She should have hatched some by now. I'm afraid they'll get rotten and start breaking. Eew!
I've got a few more eggs in the hatcher that haven't hatched yet. I am assuming they probably won't. I'll leave them one more day then it's time to clean the hatcher before another bit batch goes in the 1st.
I had no time to work on my other projects today. Maybe tomorrow I can get a few more things done.

 

[sharol]

I had a good productive day, too. Cleaned the coop (not the empty it out fall cleaning) and took out the Sweeter Heaters for the summer and got the fan installed in the window. I also put up the second half of the shade cloth over the corner of the run. I took it down last fall so it wouldn't collapse if we got snow -- turned out to be a good decision. I put up the trellis stuff for the peas in one pair of rows. The other pair is in the middle of the garden, and it was just too wet to go slogging around in there today. I only got halfway through my list, but it looks like we have a couple of dry days, so maybe I'll finish the list tomorrow.

 

[AigamoGeek]

I am new to poultry collecting this year. In the last 2 months I have gotten 8 hens, 4 roosters, and 4 ducks. The chickens were all mature so I butchered 3 of the roosters after 6 weeks and lost 2 hens (to sickness and a bird dog). After figuring out how to corral my chickens in the the coop everything has gone splendidly! Next, I am looking to purchase a couple of Toulouse Geese. With so many breeders sold out already I might just have to wait for next year.

The best part of my experience is that I have received most of my poultry for free from families who purchase hatchlings from a breeder's display at Bluestem Farm&Ranch and have quickly realized that they couldn't handle them once they grew past 4in tall.

Our 35 acre hobby farm has turned into quite the poultry hub lately! (all newcomer advice is welcome)

 

[sharol]

One more from the Emporia area. Welcome to the thread.

Sharol

I am new to poultry collecting this year. In the last 2 months I have gotten 8 hens, 4 roosters, and 4 ducks. The chickens were all mature so I butchered 3 of the roosters after 6 weeks and lost 2 hens (to sickness and a bird dog). After figuring out how to corral my chickens in the the coop everything has gone splendidly! Next, I am looking to purchase a couple of Toulouse Geese. With so many breeders sold out already I might just have to wait for next year.

The best part of my experience is that I have received most of my poultry for free from families who purchase hatchlings from a breeder's display at Bluestem Farm&Ranch and have quickly realized that they couldn't handle them once they grew past 4in tall.

Our 35 acre hobby farm has turned into quite the poultry hub lately! (all newcomer advice is welcome)

 

[Hawkeye95]

HeChicken, I'm so sorry about the poult that died, and terrible it was the one that you had first saved. Still, when I was reading the story, I thought it was going to be much worse than that--- so glad that it wasn't a tragic all around with them all dead.

I am 266 posts behind, long week! Miss Amelia surprised us by coming a bit early last weekend!!! She was born at 1:14 AM on Sunday, April 21 weighing 6 lbs 13 oz and 20 inches long. Forty eight hours of labor but she was well worth the wait!

Congrats Josie!! She is beautiful! I hope the diapers are working out well for you now! It seems like a lot of work at first, but once you get into the groove of it, it gets easier, I promise!

I am SOOOOOOO happy! King showed back up early this evening. I was on the phone. It was pouring down rain and there he was. In the driveway just like he used to be. I tried giving him a couple of special treats but he didn't seem interested. Later I checked and he was back in the hen house like he used to be but rather than sitting on the roost he was sitting in the corner by himself. I guess my Brahma rooster must have convinced him he was the lead rooster. He looks awful. He was soaking wet and looks pretty beaten up but otherwise appears healthy. I really wish I had a place to put him and his two girls so he could just rule his little kingdom. I may have to see if I can find him some more ladies some where. Gold laced cochins of good quality are extremely hard to find.
It rained all day long today. I finally got out and fed the birds about 6:00 when we had a temporary lull. I had to dump all their feed pans because they were full of water.
I am so ready for some nice weather. It's pretty bad when the fencing guys can't even drill holes and get around with their heavy equipment in the mud.
Is the drought over or is this just a false sense of it before the rain stops and 100 degree temps return?

That is definitely good news there, Danz! YAY! I hope he heals up and will be strutting around soon again. I'm sure he found some hidey-hole that you just did not see. It really would be easy to even check an area and still miss him. Seems like I can check places a few times and see something new. I'm personally hoping the drought is over. We've had enough of that. I started in on cleaning out my garden yesterday. It's not that big, but I need to finish it. Going to put in some seeds and replace a couple of strawberries that died last year.

I'm sorry to hear about the fence issues. I have been dealing with those and also am still not done. I have two lines of barbed wire I need to line with something else, one of which is entirely grown up with trees, and a ravine filled creek which has some of my land on the other side so it really isn't usable, yet I am responsible if some dimwit gets themself hurt because it wasn't marked off and fenced off as mine.

If you get mutts, I would take a mutt pullet off your hands. Given my fears for how many bantam roos I may have ended up with from my bin-o-chicks, I could use a good mutt hen or two in the future.

So glad to hear King came home. Was he maybe hiding up a tree?

I have a mutt pullet. I might have two, actually. One I can't tell yet if it's a boy or girl.. Maybe I can post a pic and get everyone's opinion on it. I'm in the Wichita area, and I'm not going to do any driving to get her anywhere-- just because I'm moving and sooooo incredibly busy right now.


Okay-- finally took pics of the new Reese Rocks yesterday.
This is a pullet below. I got 3 of them-- this is one of the largest ones.




A pullet and cockerel (below) Look at that zebra barring!! What is amazing is that his comb is exactly how it should be-- standing straight up, and not falling over and nice defined points. Just fantastic! I'm LOVING those boys! The cockerels haven't crowed yet. I'm guessing they are still too young-- which is insane-- because they are HUGE!!



(BELOW) This one is funny-- the bird in front is my hatchery-quality barred rock. LOOK at that difference!! Isn't that insane!? She looks "messy" compared to the real deals behind her. You can also see her washed out legs compared to the yellow next to her.



Here is my hatchery-quality barred rock again on the far right with 2 rocks behind her. (there is a SLWyandotte in there, so don't be confused on the zebra stripes and the "mottled" look back there) Look at my hatchery bird-- her comb is falling over! And see her grey legs compared to the YELLOW legs on the rocks behind her?

 

[HEChicken]

Okay-- finally took pics of the new Reese Rocks yesterday.
This is a pullet below. I got 3 of them-- this is one of the largest ones.


Here is my hatchery-quality barred rock again on the far right with 2 rocks behind her. (there is a SLWyandotte in there, so don't be confused on the zebra stripes and the "mottled" look back there) Look at my hatchery bird-- her comb is falling over! And see her grey legs compared to the YELLOW legs on the rocks behind her?

Gorgeous birds Hawkeye - I'm so glad you finally have some that you are happy with! My cockerel only started crowing within the past couple of weeks. At first I can't say I was that impressed with his efforts but he has worked on it and developed a really deep voice and decent crow now. If he was 16-17 weeks when I got him, he was probably 21-22 when he started to crow. Yours may also be getting used to your place and not ready until they feel more confident there. I wanted to warn you that the yellow legs in the pullets will fade a little when they start to lay. For some reason the yellow goes pale while they are laying but will yellow up again when they take a break from laying to molt. The males should stay pretty yellow the whole time. So don't feel disappointed if you notice the legs fading a little - they will hopefully never look gray like the hatchery birds.

 

[Hawkeye95]

Gorgeous birds Hawkeye - I'm so glad you finally have some that you are happy with! My cockerel only started crowing within the past couple of weeks. At first I can't say I was that impressed with his efforts but he has worked on it and developed a really deep voice and decent crow now. If he was 16-17 weeks when I got him, he was probably 21-22 when he started to crow. Yours may also be getting used to your place and not ready until they feel more confident there. I wanted to warn you that the yellow legs in the pullets will fade a little when they start to lay. For some reason the yellow goes pale while they are laying but will yellow up again when they take a break from laying to molt. The males should stay pretty yellow the whole time. So don't feel disappointed if you notice the legs fading a little - they will hopefully never look gray like the hatchery birds.

In the "pen of 3" for layers judging, I knew that the judges look to see how bleached out the legs are (usually the kids are showing leghorns, etc). I guess I didn't realize it would also apply for the barred rocks as well. I guess so long as I know they started out with nice bright yellow legs, I know that the birds are fine. So thank you for the reminder (I likely wouldn't have remembered and would have freaked out!)-- to expect them to bleach out. Have any of your pullets laid yet?? I wonder how much they might bleach? My new boys are younger than yours, I'm pretty sure. I got also got two large pullets and then one really small one he threw in. It was the extra one. They seem friendly enough when we catch them. They're going to be friendly if my kids have anything to say about it. Which is just as well. Can't wait to hear the boys start to crow! I have two of them, and I'm soooo glad that I decided to get two instead of one. I'm just worried something might happen to one of them. When we move, I'm wanting to build them a nice BIG run-- maybe something like what you have. It will just depend on what house/property we buy I guess. I'm really excited about these birds!