Consolidated Kansas

[JosieChick]

Cherwill- What an awesome garden and a beautiful fence!! What year was your house built? It is a really neat house, I love old houses.

Glad to hear Ivy is doing well!!

Trish/hawkeye- Don't you just love silkies and how they can morph back and forth between boys/girls. I am getting better at it but it is still tough!! I bought four silkie chicks that were five months old a while back and attempted to sex them at purchase and was right on all four!!! What luck huh? Sometimes the crest shape and the comb can give you a lot of clues. Sometimes the boys will have a hint more wattles than the girls but I had a silkie hen with a big comb and everyone on the silkie thread thought she was a "henny feathered" rooster until she laid an egg!!

So DH worked on my breeding coop for my cochins in the driveway all weekend and I didn't realize until Sunday evening how much he was interacting with Molly. So now she wants to hang up by the house where he was working and be his pal. Ugh. So I have been penning her back with the chickens at night and letting her out during the day while I am gone and she seems to understand that she is supposed to stay back there a bit better. A couple times I have found her sleeping up front in the yard so I take her back to the pen and haven't been paying any attention to her when she is in the front yard but make a big fuss over her when I find her laying back by the goats/geese pens. I have been taking her a biscuit in the morning and evening when she is back by the pens too in hopes that she will learn that when she is back by the pens she will get a goody. She LOVES milkbones, cracks me up. Dances and prances all around for that silly biscuit. Hope that will help. Anyone feel free to chime in and let me know if there is something else I should be doing. I did buy a book on training and taking care of LGDs so hopefully that will come soon. I know she comes up sometimes to the front yard because there are deer and coyotes in the woods across the street but I think she is sleeping up here because she and DH were being buddies. He got a firm scolding too for being too friendly!!! I don't think it occurred to him that if she was hanging with him that she was not watching the pens out back very well!

She has overall been wonderful though, barks at stuff but not constantly and seems to be patrolling "our" property lines. Not sure how she knows what is ours but she sure seems to! Very smart girl and gonna get a haircut the end of this week cause she is full, full of cockle burrs. I keep picking them out and she just gets more. I have mixed feeling about clipping her because she is so pretty but it is impossible to keep her clean so I think I will cut her down to a bit less than 1/2 inch of hair, that should still provide some protection from bugs and thorns but keep her cool and clean.

 

[tntblake]

Karen, Sophia is a BO that just strayed into our neighbor's yard. She's several months younger than the other BOs. Here she is when she went broody last summer:




You can see from her back that we still had our roo at that time.

She's interesting because she's half again as big as our original two BOs. Her eggs are also darker brown and larger than their eggs, and lately they're an odd, oblong shape. Is there something else that looks just like a BO but larger?!

She is definitely a mix. Her comb is not right for a BO. What color are her legs? Clean legged or feathered?

 

[Trish44]

Hawkeye, I'll forward your info to Keena since she doesn't get on BYC. I just didn't have a clue since I have never had Silkies. She has caught the chickens addiction bad, chicken math has hit her on the first try.

Danz, don't worry about it, we all have our messes at times, my house is now a disaster because we had to move everything to get the furniture out & the livingroom is really a mess now. That is my project for this afternoon, trying to clean things out & figure out where I want all the new furniture & if things need to go out of there or what will fit & what won't. You sure have a lot of pens at your place though, I don't know how you keep track of all of that. DH said that he figured with all you have that it's about an all day job taking care of them all. He was somewhat upset with me over getting to KC so late that night, we had to be creative finding somewhere open to eat. Then he was upset with me on Monday because he said all of my arrangements took over the whole trip & he was mad at me for that. I told him that if he didn't want to pick up animals or birds on our travels then I would just drive where I wanted to & get them by myself, then he didn't like that either. There is no way to make him happy. At any rate we got home with the rabbit & the rooster late last night & got them settled in. The rooster is in a crate in the run to get used to everyone & them all to him. He is still young enough maybe there won't be such a big ruckus over integrating him in, I hope anyway. He caused a little bit of a problem at Keena's the week he was there, but it may have been because there were two of them from the same farm together & they may have been ganging up on the other chickens. It may be better since he is gone. He has huge feet already for as young as he is, so I think he's going to be a big boy when he's grown.

Cherwill, I love your house & your yard is just beautiful. I had pretty flower beds before chickens, now they have just about destroyed them all, between them & the pups.

My chickens were so very glad to get out today since I left them in the run & coop while we were out of town. They really don't like being shut in at all, they want to be out scratching around. I had lots of eggs waiting for me to gather today, they really got busy while I was gone, I guess they didn't have anything else to do.

We're starting to get used to all of the things the new car does, it's pretty amazing what they can do these days with electronic stuff. It has a lot of bells & whistles, but they're nice to have, just a lot to get used to. Here is a pic of it:



I hope IVY is still doing well & things are progressing as they're supposed to. We'll look forward to hearing from her again.

 

[checoukan]

Up date on Ivy.

Danz, she is at St. Fransis.

When I talked to her just a few minutes ago, she was very sleepy, from all the meds. She has got up to use the restroom, and walk the hall with PT. She was expecting to go to PT any time now for therapy. She said she could lift her leg a little, and bend her knee just a little. Ivy is happy with the pain control that she has had. Sounds just like her but just really groggy. Told me she has had some nausea, and upsets to meds, but that just happens. So I believe she will do good, she always does, once she sets her mind to do it . Can't wait to see her. We always have a wonderful time. Ivy and I spent a lot of time together, I was closer to her than our older sister. We as kids always called her momma duck, cause we always had to follow in line behind her, and if you got out of step, she would let you have it. And you better do what she said, or else. Gee Whiz somedays it was really bad. Ugh.....

 

[chicken danz]

You know Trish, your husband is right. It does pretty much take me all day to feed and water and then do it a second time around. That is one major reason for wanting to get that trailer done for the chickens and the new building done for the game birds. Can you imagine how many houses I would have if I had a separate one for every breed?
I got my wood all sorted and stacked so I can work on the trailer. DH doesn't want me drilling the post holes for the new building and pens so to keep my anxiety down I am going to attempt to work on the trailer some.
I spent the morning cleaning in the basement. No matter how often we changed the cat boxes it stunk in here. I went down and poured bleach on the floor and used the carpet shampooer to clean up the water and bleach. Now the whole house smells like bleach. But as unhealthy as that is it smells better than it did. I also took everything out of the hatcher to give it a major cleaning. I have another bunch of eggs to go in on Thursday so I wanted to start fresh.
I need to get out and sort some guineas and build another cage for my geese today too. Also trying to catch up on laundry. It's no wonder I never get caught up.
At least if I sell all those guineas that is one less pen to mess with for now. And maybe some of the smell will go away! They really do wreak!

 

[Trish44]

Danz, since you're the expert hatcher here, my first batch of eggs will go into the other incubator for hatching tomorrow. What temp & humidity do I need to get the other incubator stabilized at for the last 3 days before hatch date? I haven't used this incubator either, it's new & it's the foam kind with circulated air, a Hovabator 1588. Do I just lay the eggs in there or should I use egg cartons to sit them in or what? I know you don't use the turner after lockdown, that much I know. I'm going to be like a mother hen here with watching these eggs the next 3 days, I hope it goes well because I have people waiting on chicks. I keep getting emails from people wanting Ameraucana chicks, I told DH if I had a 100 of them I could sell them right now. I will have a few EE chicks also hopefully, I just put some of those eggs in to fill space in the incubator since I only have two Ameraucana hens. Now I'm really starting to get more nervous the closer it gets to hatch date, ack! Yes, you definitely do have your work cut out for you. That will be really nice once you get that trailer done. I was not envisioning it to be quite that long when you were talking about a trailer, wow that is a monster, but it sure will be nice once it's done. It should save you quite a bit of work having them separated for one thing so you can have pure bred chicks & for another to have them closer together. Those seramas are cute little things, but I just prefer the large fowl myself, especially since my main focus right now is egg laying. I hope to also start on my breeder coop soon. DH said that we have to get the tags & all taken care of on the new car & get the state taxes paid & then maybe I can start buying wood to start building. I can't wait, I'm so excited about that! I still don't think he gets what I'm trying to do here, but maybe he will eventually.

Well I've got a new egg customer coming & then I have to take my little carpet cleaner out & clean up the old couch & loveseat so I can take pics & hopefully get that sold. That money, whatever it ends up being will also go for the new coop materials. My son also decided he didn't want to take the humoungous TV that has been sitting in my garage forever with him, so I have to try to sell that too. I wish he had decided that about 4 years ago, it has been taking up a lot of room out there all of this time for nothing. He finally got through all of his junk in the garage too & our trash cart is now overflowing & stuff sitting all on the ground around it. DH just looked at that when we got home last night & shook his head & I said, well at least it's out of the garage.

 

[chicken danz]

Okay here is what I recommend for hatching. Keep the temp at 99.5, and see if you can get humidity up to about 65 -70%. In those smaller incubators for lack of space I have used wet sponges or wet hand towels to raise the humidity. If using a towel I just soak it down in very warm water and wring it out just enough so it doesn't drip every where and then lay it right on screen where the eggs are. I don't bother unwadding it either. If I use sponges I try to set them upright rather than laying flat.
Just lay the eggs flat, and not in carton, just like they would lay if you set them down on a counter or something.
Yeah that trailer is 70 feet long. I plan to leave the far South end without runs so I can store supplies and stuff there. I have it pretty full of stuff already.
I plan to put in an auto watering system that is going to be my big time saver. I will only have to fill the supply barrel once a week or so. Just not having to drag a hose all around will be great.
I haven't figured out what to do about a water system for my other building. I may just run electrical outlets for each pen so I can plug in heated dog bowls in winter.
So Trish you should show us a picture of your new furniture too.
I never get anything new unless I buy it myself.

 

[Trish44]

Danz, Yeah I would definitely put in electric outlets for the other building. That's what I used this winter too for the Ameraucanas was a heated dog bowl, it worked fine for the 3 of them. I know all about dragging hose around, I have about 200 feet of hose both in the front yard & back yard here to get to everything I have to get water to. Yeah, I definitely will take pics of the furniture when it gets here, it's not coming until Friday some time, so until then we have to sit on hard wood kitchen chairs in the livingroom. The oldest cat is really upset with us for taking her couch! Well as I said we haven't had any new furniture since we have been married, I bought this in 1997 that we have been using, so it's getting pretty used up by now, still in good enough shape for someone, but the couch weighs a ton because it has a sleeper mattress in it & the loveseat had two recliners, so neither was fun to get out of the house. The guys had to disassemble the couch from the sleeper part & take the loveseat apart into two pieces to get it all out of here, what fun. We still don't have the interior door back up on the entry because they figured it would be good to leave it out until the new furniture gets in here. Now if only I can convince him I need a new washer & dryer, they are 20 years old. Most everything in this house was bought by me Danz because when I came here this house was almost empty. My DH's ex took almost everything in the house & left it empty when she left & he had not replaced anything. The first thing I did was throw away what he did have because she left the crappiest stuff she could for him & I had a whole house of furniture, so all of my stuff came in & what he had left went. That's why I'm so thrilled to be getting new furniture because we have never bought any together to this point. He has bought TV's & other electronic things, but not furniture or appliances other than the used dishwasher I talked him into getting a couple months ago because mine was 20 years old. So I guess miracles do happen sometimes when you least expect them.

 

[JosieChick]

I have lost the dog!

I have looked everywhere for her and no luck. I saw her out the window at about 1:00 and I went out around 1:45 to check on everyone and she was nowhere to be found. Drove around to all the neighbors and the couple just up the street had just seen her out their window about 30 minutes before that but their dogs barked at her and she left. I have been everywhere and walked and called for the last 2 hours with no luck. Do you think she can find her way back home?

 

[HEChicken]

Oh no, Josie! I hope she is just going for a wander and will come back when she's ready. You don't suppose she will try to find her way back to where she used to live? Perhaps you should call and tell them to be on the lookout for her?