Dixie Chicks

[bamadude]

Do you make pepper sauce?

Yep. Good stuff

 

[Mahen100]

omgosh omgosh lookit my first colored egg today I was giving the ladies some scratch and happen to look down by the gate and there it was!!!!!!!!!!!!! finally my first layer started laying!! two eggs today!! violets sitting on the nest box serving up my other egg!

YAY! Nice shape too. I had hoped the blue egg I set at the same time as my new hatching was fertile...but no.

I have a respite from alarm cheeping....ah, silence. I went to Tractor and they had a six chick limit...didn't know that...so I got one (straight run) Australop( probably roo since females were probably cherry picked since they arrived tuesday and were put in the tub). He/it is keeping my newly hatched baby company, as is a new plush chicken. Lovely! The others I hope do well for my helper. They wouldn't tell me what hatchery those were from, what their designation was...looked red sex/link/star/something hatchery and man said he "thought" they were a cross between buff orphingtons and RIR. Argg.. and that Tractor was only calling them "red pullets."....nice looking mutts though. I worry about cross contamination and will be holding my breath nothing crops up, but I got them home and set the pullets in a separate brooder to give the entire setup to my helper, who really wants me to bring them to him today he says. I put the Austro. in with my black orp hatchling, and hope it doesn't have anything contagious.

 

[Mahen100]

@bamachhicks8, well, I thank you.....I am hoping everything is female...lol, I am pushing it with the one grown roo I have, and he will be all the manly chicken I can keep. I do suspect that mine will end up being a hatchling roo, as all the eggs from grandpa that I purchased hatched male, bu one blue hen (Bonnie Blue) which I kept with OrpB that I kept. I rehomed five roosters in the fall. No easy feat.

 

[JulesChicks]

I planted some of each of those today and last night... Plus some other peps, a bunch of toms, tomatillos and ground cherries... And a salad bin...
Awesome
not sure where the quote went...
I started with a chicken tractor, then a large old out house we moved from a friends farms, now the outhouse ( redone for chickens ) and a temporary coop I slapped together, this spring I'm having one big one built and I'm sure I'll still have a use for the original... The temp coop I may or may not take down... Not sure, the tractor I still use for various things...

That's what I'm trying to decide - save our resources to build the bigger coop right away, or spend a bit on a smaller coop for the pullets I have on hold. The breeder said he could hold them, of course the price will go up. I am waiting on chicks from 2 different breeders - early April I think and we will be gone for a week in the middle of March - so now I'm wondering about starting with a small coop or just having the breeder hold onto the pullets until we get back (and hopefully between now and the end of March build the main coop). The chicks would be started in brooders of course, probably in our garage here at the rental and then introduced to the pullets slowly somehow. On the plus side, I think we've decided to put the main coop in a gently sloping grassy area (southeast facing) where there are no brambles to clear. I think the area that we cleared last weekend would be best used for a garden due to it's proximity to neighbor and narrow widths in some areas.

@Amberjem lovely egg! And the feed store was Valley Farm something in Mt Vernon. Went to Coastal Farm and Ranch too - my they have a HUGE setup for chicks - so many bins set up and ready for chicks- wonder when they get them? Valley Farm/Feed is much smaller and had I think 4 bins set up. They have a list of all the dates they receive chicks and what breeds they will be getting -in store and online. At Coastal I didn't see any organic feed, not to mention the grass seed I was looking for. Valley had a nice grass seed blend, but not organic, which we would prefer. They did however carry the Scratch and Peck brand, so I will have to compare prices between them and Island Farm and Pet (in Anacortes, where we buy our dog and cat food). Do you know of any feed stores in Oak Harbor that sell organic feed or grass seed? I didn't look at the Country Store last time I was there. They will probably have chicks soon too.

 

[tntchix]

I told hubs we would be getting some chicks to replace the ones we culled and lost. His reaction: I guess we need to add on, huh? Yup. Come on spring!

 

[Mahen100]

Ok, I have so many that I want to respond to but I think it would take all day! Don't know why I am not getting all the posts in my email - I'll get a bunch, then it's quiet and I wonder what's going on here, then I sign in and I'm 250 posts behind!

So, I will say, welcome to the thread @jldward !!! Sounds like you have a lovely farm! Love the beautiful svart hona! @minihorse927 (I hope I remembered that right


@RavynFallen Cracking up on Jim's "resistance"

We went to the feed store yesterday and my son desperately wanted to bring home a couple of black sexlinks they had there (all that was left from that batch). I explained that we aren't ready yet and are already on the waiting list for some other breeds.

So, that brings me to a question for all of you adding to your flock with hatching eggs or new chicks - do you keep adding coops, do you have a gigantic coop? How do you manage this? I'm sure it's different for everyone. I'm trying to figure out how to manage chicks from a couple different breeders and even one of the breeders may have 2 breeds space apart by a few weeks - so I may be looking at dividing a gigantic box (thank to our business we have some of these) or setting up multiple brooders. We have a friend that I think will help me build a coop, DH may be able to help on the weekends but he is really busy with work. He worked all day yesterday and is now "gone fishing" for a few days. Then he'll play catch up at work and the whole thing starts again.

Anyhow, it's a lovely day here...bought some flowers for my daughter to plant, some for us and some for my mom. She had to put down her 9 year old shih tzu on Friday after a lost battle with Cushing's. I thought a little planter with some daffodils, hyacinths and primroses would be nice for her. The bulbs coming up again next year will be a sweet reminder of her friend. At least he is not in any discomfort any more.

Have a great day everyone! I'll try to get caught up when I can...

I've tried really hard here to figure out chicken math. I don't think I still get a passing grade, but I tried to "overbuild" the coop a couple of years ago, and have just now reached "shouldn't have more." I figure 15, and am currently with 12 grown hens, one roo, and one hatchling I will keep if it is female, and four hatchlings due to arrive April 8-9. So, I hoard roadside finds of good, non-termite dog kennels...stash them around the back near a bamboo stand that chickens use as protection from hawks as they free range. I guess I will have to modify one of those to separate the Orp Roo and his hen so he won't breed all the others as well. I have a modified TV cabinet and netted run that works great for an outdoor brood house, and so far I have good luck integrating two or three hens into the main flock a year. Chicken math...so hard.

 

[Amberjem]

That's what I'm trying to decide - save our resources to build the bigger coop right away, or spend a bit on a smaller coop for the pullets I have on hold. The breeder said he could hold them, of course the price will go up. I am waiting on chicks from 2 different breeders - early April I think and we will be gone for a week in the middle of March - so now I'm wondering about starting with a small coop or just having the breeder hold onto the pullets until we get back (and hopefully between now and the end of March build the main coop). The chicks would be started in brooders of course, probably in our garage here at the rental and then introduced to the pullets slowly somehow. On the plus side, I think we've decided to put the main coop in a gently sloping grassy area (southeast facing) where there are no brambles to clear. I think the area that we cleared last weekend would be best used for a garden due to it's proximity to neighbor and narrow widths in some areas.

@Amberjem lovely egg! And the feed store was Valley Farm something in Mt Vernon. Went to Coastal Farm and Ranch too - my they have a HUGE setup for chicks - so many bins set up and ready for chicks- wonder when they get them? Valley Farm/Feed is much smaller and had I think 4 bins set up. They have a list of all the dates they receive chicks and what breeds they will be getting -in store and online. At Coastal I didn't see any organic feed, not to mention the grass seed I was looking for. Valley had a nice grass seed blend, but not organic, which we would prefer. They did however carry the Scratch and Peck brand, so I will have to compare prices between them and Island Farm and Pet (in Anacortes, where we buy our dog and cat food). Do you know of any feed stores in Oak Harbor that sell organic feed or grass seed? I didn't look at the Country Store last time I was there. They will probably have chicks soon too.

yeah chicks soon there and yest they have organic chick food and I know they have grass seed....as for the small coop it isnt a bad thing can be used for isolation coop or grow out coop ofr to keep a hen or roo who isnt injured or sick...which is part of why I did the chicken tractor, or even to seperate a hen and rooster trio together for pure eggs of a specific kind

 

[JulesChicks]

yeah chicks soon there and yest they have organic chick food and I know they have grass seed....as for the small coop it isnt a bad thing can be used for isolation coop or grow out coop ofr to keep a hen or roo who isnt injured or sick...which is part of why I did the chicken tractor, or even to seperate a hen and rooster trio together for pure eggs of a specific kind

That's what I was thinking, I'm just not finding one I want at the right price or that is close enough. I'll keep looking I guess and see what comes up - not confident in my building skills to whip one up alone...

 

[hennible]

The new coop will be about 400 ft.² which is enough for 100 birds they say but I never want to have 100 birds besides legally I can't own 100 birds... 99 yes, 100 no... Parts of the coop will be dedicated to feed storage, I'm going to build a duck pen two adult chicken pens and a nursery pen inside it and still maintain my original coupe for emergency care, or use a Bachelor/grow out coop... Here's how my chicken math went, two years ago I started with two chickens now I have 40 some birds, that's chicken math...

 

[minihorse927]

The new coop will be about 400 ft.² which is enough for 100 birds they say but I never want to have 100 birds besides legally I can't own 100 birds... 99 yes, 100 no... Parts of the coop will be dedicated to feed storage, I'm going to build a duck pen two adult chicken pens and a nursery pen inside it and still maintain my original coupe for emergency care, or use a Bachelor/grow out coop... Here's how my chicken math went, two years ago I started with two chickens now I have 40 some birds, that's chicken math...

why can't you legally have 100 birds?