Consolidated Kansas

[HEChicken]

Welcome to Consolidated Kansas Ron Rose. To answer your questions, the way I find the thread is to click on where it says "new posts" and that will open up a drop down and then I click on "where I've posted". That will bring up a list of threads where you have ever posted and it will show you whether there are any new replies on that thread as well.

Regarding keeping the water cool, I don't even try. Back when I had just a handful of birds I did as you are doing: froze gallon water containers and put one in each afternoon around 1pm. However now that I have about a hundred birds, it isn't cost effective to keep freezing water, just to have it become really warm before I put it back in the freezer. The birds really don't seem to care - the main thing is that they have water available. I keep several waterers in different areas of my chicken yard so there is always one that is in shade. That probably doesn't change the temperature of the water itself that much, but it does mean they don't have to stand in the sun while they're drinking.

You probably do have a couple of roosters more than you need. Butchering isn't fun but after you've done a few you realize it isn't that bad either. With the numbers you have, it is inevitable you will end up with more, as hens will go broody and hatch out chicks and….some of them will be roosters.

 

[Ron Rose]

Thanks HEChicken for the response. I do plan on adding another water on the north side of the house. I won't have any problems with the butchering I am actually planning to start hatching next year for meat in the freezer. I am hoping to build a plucking barrel this fall. I keep telling my son we need to get rid of one of the rosters. I would like to add 3-5 hens to make it 16-18 hens for 2 roosters. Right now it is 1 step at a time and waiting on eggs.

1 more question for the future. When I have a hen go broody how many eggs can she sit on to hatch? When the chicks are hatched do I need to separate them from the flock or will they be fine mixed with the flock?

Thanks

 

[Trish44]

Hey everyone I'm new to BYC. My 14 year old son Dustin and I started our first ever flock of chickens late April with 16 chicks. I just found this thread and hope to learn from your experience since we also live in KS. So far our flock seems to be doing great. I am having trouble keeping the water cool in these hot days of summer. Yesterday I started putting frozen gallons of water in our water buckets. We use 5 gallon buckets with water nipples, 1 in the run and 1 in the yard. We let them free range all day. Does the lid on the bucket kept the heat in and make the water warm? Should I take the lid off the bucket? We also started freezing fruit and vestibules and cool afternoon treats.

We have (8) RIR 6 hens and 2 roosters, (2) Buff Orpington 1 hen 1 rooster, (2) BPR both hens, (2) Black Sex Lynks both hens, and (2) Americana's both hens. Total of (13) hens and (3) roosters.

We are enjoying our flock a and love the entertainment they give us. The roosters are chasing the hens and we are keeping an eye on them to make sure they are not missing neck feathers and no blood. So far we don't see any difference in the neck feathers even though we know they pull some out when they pin them down. Do I need to isolate the roosters at all or just continue to let nature take place. Since I'm new to this not really sure what is normal and what is to much. Again so far no signs of any trouble from the hens. They do squeal and run from the rooster that is chasing them.

I believe I have 1 to many roosters but my son doesn't want me to put it into the freezer and my wife doesn't want us to get any more chickens. Lol. I'm hoping to start getting some eggs in August and hope all are laying by end of October.

One more question what is the easiest way to refer back to this thread. Do I click on the subscription?

Thanks for reading looking forward to learning from fellow kansasans.

Welcome to BYC & the Kansas thread! Generally you will want one rooster per 10 hens or so. If the roosters don't fight & you don't mind them all crowing then I would say keep them, but if they start to fight over the hens then you may have to make a hard decision. The RIRs usually are the bossiest & some of the meanest roosters I have ever had. I re-homed two of them for attacking me. You will just have to see how it goes. If I were to keep only one rooster I would be inclined to keep the Buff Orpington because they're generally laid back & calm.

There is also a check box right under the reply box on here where it says "Get notified when others reply" & it has a dropdown box. If you set it to immediately you will get updates when new posts are made. I like to get updates so I can keep up, but it's whatever your preference is.

I also used to freeze water bottles & put it in the waterers, but I too have over 100 birds now & it's not feasible, so I just make sure there is fresh water different places for the birds. The most important thing is that they have shady spots to get in when it's really hot. Mine have lots of shady places to get under with all of the trees we have & a bush they love to hang out under. When we had those two horrible summers I did use misters some in some of the pens, but only for short periods because eventually the hose heats up & you're spraying hot water at them.

Feel free to join in any time, we talk about a little of everything here, don't be shy.

 

[HEChicken]

A large fowl hen can easily sit on a dozen to fifteen eggs. How you handle chicks really depends on your set up. I have a coop they sleep in at night and by day the birds free-range. I let my hens raise their chicks in the flock and I've never had any issues doing that. The mother hen protects the chicks from the rest of the flock and the flock accepts them far more easily than if I were to add strange birds to the coop. I love having broodies do the work for me as I don't have to run a heat lamp, and the chicks are part of the flock from day one.

 

[cherwill]

Well not a good day here. I was walking down the back steps. DH had a rope over the garage hooked to the tractor on one side and a big tree limb he was pulling out of the tree on the other. Instead of watching my step I was looking at the limb and missed the step which turned my foot sideways and I fell. I couldn't get up and there was so much pain I was instantly sick to my stomach. I crawled up the back steps and laid on the floor in the house until he got me the walker so I could get to the bedroom. I got to feeling sick on the way and spent 15 minutes in the bathroom, then went to lay down.

I'm sorry about your injury; try to take it easy enough to let it heal. Sprains like that can just hang on for years sometimes. I see there was a discussion on crutches later in the thread. Just thinking about crutches makes my shoulders hurt. I wonder who invented them.

I will have to take a look. They seem like cute little critters. We were thinking sheep but they seem too flighty for my liking and neither of us cares to eat mutton so....

My niece is in Northern Ireland right now visiting the Ulster Project girl she hosted last summer. She sent some pictures of sheep, but they look like a cross between small cows and sheep; they have no wool and a more cow-like face. Funny looking critters. I'm jealous of all the lamb she might be eating, though!

DH saw my computer open yesterday and said he was glad I was keeping in touch with my "chicken friends" in Kansas. I said me too!

It has been gorgeous here, highs in the low 70s and dry. I love it! I forgot how awesome summer time is here. A few muggy days in the 90s but that is just a good excuse to go to the beach!

Chicken friends. I like it! We've been having a lovely, mild summer here, but I wouldn't mind a walk on the beach now and then. I'm glad you're getting settled in and enjoying yourself.

I haven't gone anywhere. I'm still trying to keep on the reading and stuff. I've just been crazy busy this summer. I'm working on a more stressful than usual project at work and have been putting in extra hours. This week, I've also been helping a friend move. I've also been doctoring my injured horse. We think he has tendonitis so it is taking him a while to heal. In the meantime, it is extra work for me. This spring, I started working on making some curtains for our sunroom. The windows are abnormally sized, so it is WAY cheaper for me to make them than to buy them from the store. Plus, this way I get exactly what I want. However, my little one has decided that sewing isn't much fun so I only get to work on them when his daddy is home to help watch him or when he is sleeping. That means that I haven't gotten much time to work on them and haven't even gotten the first curtain finished enough to hang. With the heat we've been having recently, I have had to relocate (the sunroom is also my office) to a different room to stay cool enough to keep working...

The last weekend in May, I went to visit my sister and we went garage sale-ing together. The next morning, I got all of my stuff packed into the car and then couldn't find my keys. My DH ended up having to drive 2 1/2 hours to bring me his set of car keys. Until today, I hadn't been able to find my car keys... I thought I'd lost them at one of the garage sales we went to or something (I was riding with my sister and so hadn't used my keys at all that day). Well, I found my keys this morning, 6 weeks after I lost them. They were in the little zippered pocket on the side of my purse. I have NO IDEA how they got there, but I'm glad I found them! It was kind of expensive to lose the keys... I had to pay for an etra set of keys with the extra clicker AND we had to pay for my husband to make a special trip to my sister's house in a not-so-good-gas-mileage vehicle.

Oh, and an obligatory "cute" picture for all of you!

That certainly IS a cute picture! He's really growing up fast.

I've "lost" my keys for days at a time, too. Fortunately, it never cost me anything because I try not to have go anywhere as much as possible. You also just reminded me that I haven't been to a garage sale in far too long.

We got a new duck!!!

Her name is Merida and she is a Silver Appleyard!


She is a double ribbon winning duck! We picked her up at our local fair!

She's really pretty; congratulations!

Well I hope it doesn't take 3 years to heal this bone in my leg, I'll be stark raving mad by then. Yeah it sure does put a lot of pressure on your other leg. I know mine has taken a big hit with me having pain in the broken one & the way I have to walk sometimes. My other knee isn't good anyway due to the arthritis & it hasn't been happy having to take up the slack.

I sure didn't have a good night with the darned leg last night, it hurt all night long despite the pain medication.

I hope tonight's a better night for you. Yeah, you'll probably have a whole other set of problems with the unbroken leg because of the way you've been using it compensate for the broken one. It's hard to break those habits, too. If you go to a physical therapist, they'll probably help with that as well. I sure hope it doesn't take years to heal.

I believe I have 1 to many roosters but my son doesn't want me to put it into the freezer

Welcome! We love pictures, so feel free to post plenty of them if you can.

I know how your son feels. My husband tells everyone I can't kill ours because I know them all by name.

Welcome to BYC & the Kansas thread! Generally you will want one rooster per 10 hens or so. If the roosters don't fight & you don't mind them all crowing then I would say keep them, but if they start to fight over the hens then you may have to make a hard decision. The RIRs usually are the bossiest & some of the meanest roosters I have ever had. I re-homed two of them for attacking me. You will just have to see how it goes. If I were to keep only one rooster I would be inclined to keep the Buff Orpington because they're generally laid back & calm.

I can't keep any roos because my town has an ordinance against them. My first roo, the one who started out as the nicest, friendliest bird in the flock, was a RIR and he was the one who started attacking everyone when he got older. The others have been various breeds, but we had to get rid of them before they were fully grown, so I don't know how they would have been.

 

[chicken danz]

Hey everyone I'm new to BYC. My 14 year old son Dustin and I started our first ever flock of chickens late April with 16 chicks. I just found this thread and hope to learn from your experience since we also live in KS. So far our flock seems to be doing great. I am having trouble keeping the water cool in these hot days of summer. Yesterday I started putting frozen gallons of water in our water buckets. We use 5 gallon buckets with water nipples, 1 in the run and 1 in the yard. We let them free range all day. Does the lid on the bucket kept the heat in and make the water warm? Should I take the lid off the bucket? We also started freezing fruit and vestibules and cool afternoon treats.

We have (8) RIR 6 hens and 2 roosters, (2) Buff Orpington 1 hen 1 rooster, (2) BPR both hens, (2) Black Sex Lynks both hens, and (2) Americana's both hens. Total of (13) hens and (3) roosters.

We are enjoying our flock a and love the entertainment they give us. The roosters are chasing the hens and we are keeping an eye on them to make sure they are not missing neck feathers and no blood. So far we don't see any difference in the neck feathers even though we know they pull some out when they pin them down. Do I need to isolate the roosters at all or just continue to let nature take place. Since I'm new to this not really sure what is normal and what is to much. Again so far no signs of any trouble from the hens. They do squeal and run from the rooster that is chasing them.

I believe I have 1 to many roosters but my son doesn't want me to put it into the freezer and my wife doesn't want us to get any more chickens. Lol. I'm hoping to start getting some eggs in August and hope all are laying by end of October.

One more question what is the easiest way to refer back to this thread. Do I click on the subscription?

Thanks for reading looking forward to learning from fellow kansasans.

Thanks HEChicken for the response. I do plan on adding another water on the north side of the house. I won't have any problems with the butchering I am actually planning to start hatching next year for meat in the freezer. I am hoping to build a plucking barrel this fall. I keep telling my son we need to get rid of one of the rosters. I would like to add 3-5 hens to make it 16-18 hens for 2 roosters. Right now it is 1 step at a time and waiting on eggs.

1 more question for the future. When I have a hen go broody how many eggs can she sit on to hatch? When the chicks are hatched do I need to separate them from the flock or will they be fine mixed with the flock?

Thanks

Welcome Ron Rose. You can subscribe to the thread so you get notifications when someone posts. Click the check box below the reply area that says "Get notified when others reply." As far as the bucket waterers go I keep the lid on. It shades the water and that seems to keep the temperature more stable. I recommend putting a couple of low pans out in the yard with water in them for the chickens to stand in. They cool themselves by cooling their feet in them. I have used what ever I can find including plastic lids off 35 gallon trash cans. Shade is a big thing for them too. Nipple waterers are okay but they really don't give the birds a place to cool down. Some professional chicken producers simply wet the ground by spraying a hose in the area, particularly in the shade. Cooling the ground helps cool the birds.
Actually with your watering system the frozen jugs are ideal. In pens where my birds have bucket waterers they will all stand around the waterer with cool water to keep cool. Adding ice really helps. I usually used 2 liter bottles in mine because it doesn't displace as much of the actual water.
Your birds are young but with that many roosters you will eventually end up with bare backs and some cock fights going on. You may be fine until spring when breeding season hits it's high but you should be watching your roosters in the meantime. The minute you turn your back and one flogs you that is when you have to decide to cull that rascal. It will only get worse. I've only had two mean roosters ever but that's not the norm. I chose my breeds by how docile they are.
I like having broodies raise their own babies but I have had other hens pick the babies and kill them. I have found if they free range or have a large area to roam they raise their babies without any problems. However if they are enclosed in a small pen you will often have problems. It does work well to raise them all together because you don't have integration problems that way. Just a word of warning far in advance, If you are going to have broodies raising babies you'll need to provide waterers that work for the babies. That seems to be a big mistake people make, not stopping to think how the babies will get their water.
Cherwill I had nightmares last night about my garden being destroyed. I haven't been able to check it and I could just imagine the pests taking over and destroying all my work!!! My DH knows nothing about gardening and has no interest in it at all. He wouldn't know one thing from another. In fact a while back he was surprised when he noticed rows of tall plants out there....like he didn't even realize that anything had been planted. Of course he can't identify plants either. He just won't take an interest. And being a picky eater a lot of it he could care less about as well.
I am sure if we don't get some rain soon I am going to have to find a way to water out there. I usually just drain the duck pond to it and clean it and refill but I can't do that right now.

 

[Trish44]

cherwill, I went to physical therapy for several weeks after my fall & that was all my Dr. ordered at that point. I still do some exercises if I feel like they will help, but my problem now is the bone not healing & the pain associated with it.

danz, I know it's killing you not being able to get out there & do what you want to, but if you go out there & hurt yourself worse what did you gain? I had to just give it up to other people for 8 weeks & that was really hard for me, but I was so afraid to go back out there before I was ready in fear that I would do more damage. I still have to be really careful & with the leg not healing right, I could injure it again.

There comes a point with mean roosters that you have to decide what their real value is & how much you are willing to put up with. I have one right now that is going to the stew pot soon because he is the absolute meanest rooster I have ever had. I can't go into his pen without a weapon to defend myself. He even tries to come after me through the fence. I have beat that rooster silly & he doesn't care what I do to him, he just hates me & has from the beginning. He's a huge monster too, so that makes it even worse. I can never turn my back on him, ever. I'm trying to get some chicks hatched to replace him & get some more pullets. I had two die in a freak thunderstorm that came up one night, so I'm starting over again. Sometimes it makes you wonder if it's all worth it at times.

 

[Ralph Moyer]

Ron Rose, I just save this page to my favorites( I have windows 7). It will always bring up the page I selected, then I click on the most recent entry. I delete and resave the current page about every 10 pages. I move it from the bottom of my favorites to where I want it near the top. Anyway, that is what I do.

 

[Trish44]

Ron Rose, I just save this page to my favorites( I have windows 7). It will always bring up the page I selected, then I click on the most recent entry. I delete and resave the current page about every 10 pages. I move it from the bottom of my favorites to where I want it near the top. Anyway, that is what I do.

I do have mine bookmarked as well & then just go to the last page I read, but I also get updates.

 

[Ron Rose]

Thanks for all the replays everything had been helpfull. I do have a 1 gallon waterer we used with the chicks I can use again when we have more. I will have to try the water in a pan to let them cool there feet. I will just have to make sure to change it often to avoid masqueto problems. I'm happy to hear all the great reviews on letting the hen raise the chicks. I can't wait to start getting eggs and start hatching. I really want to grow my own chickens for the freezer. Keep sending me info I'm loving it. It's been along day so I better get to bed.