Eastern Washington

[chickengarden]

Oh, cool! Hello up there My grandparents live in Oroville so we drive through there often. How many chickens do you have now? Do you have pictures of your Black Orpingtons? (I will check on your profile page.)
We have two Rhode Island Reds (Peach and Mandolin), an Ameraucana (which I'm realizing is prob an Easter Egger; her name is Zartan), a Plymouth Barred Rock (Roxie), two Australorps (Alaska and Georgia) and two Buff Orpingtons (Sunny and Delta).

 

[4cats3kids1hubby2many]

Oh, cool! Hello up there My grandparents live in Oroville so we drive through there often. How many chickens do you have now? Do you have pictures of your Black Orpingtons? (I will check on your profile page.)
We have two Rhode Island Reds (Peach and Mandolin), an Ameraucana (which I'm realizing is prob an Easter Egger; her name is Zartan), a Plymouth Barred Rock (Roxie), two Australorps (Alaska and Georgia) and two Buff Orpingtons (Sunny and Delta).

Yes do. Would love to meet you. I have:
3 orpingtons
2 cochin bantam hens
1 cross bantam hen
12 (I think) seramas of various ages and gender (more in the incubator andunder a broody)
and my misc layer pen: 8.
Not sure what that total is and I gotta leave for work. Wouild rather stay on here. LOL.

 

[Worn]

Just wanted to say Hi. I am from Central Washington (Wenatchee). We had chickens when I was a kid but this is our first foray into keeping our own chickens.
I am a mom to two boys (6 & 8) and we have a dog and now 8 chickens. I laugh because that is twice as many as I started out thinking we would get. AND I was in Coastal Farm and Ranch today and it took all my willpower not to buy another chicken, two ducks and a goose! Oh, and also, the baby Banties are SO CUTE!!!!
Anybody else from Wenatchee?

I'm in Chelan. Welcome to the thread. I started it, but haven't been on in a while! I'm looking to order from a hatchery. I like Big R's, (much better than their new name), but want variety. If anyone's looking to share an order let me know.

 

[chickengarden]

Yes do. Would love to meet you. I have:
3 orpingtons
2 cochin bantam hens
1 cross bantam hen
12 (I think) seramas of various ages and gender (more in the incubator andunder a broody)
and my misc layer pen: 8.
Not sure what that total is and I gotta leave for work. Wouild rather stay on here. LOL.

That's an awesome flock. It would be neat to stop by and say hi next time we go through there! How long have you been keeping chickens? Also, on another topic, I've been wanting to ask someone local if they insulate their chicken coops?

 

[chickengarden]

I'm in Chelan. Welcome to the thread. I started it, but haven't been on in a while!
I'm looking to order from a hatchery. I like Big R's, (much better than their new name), but want variety. If anyone's looking to share an order let me know.

Thank you! and hello up in Chelan.
How many chickens do you have? Also, feel free to chime in on the coop insulating question too. We are in the designing phase of building ours still.

 

[4cats3kids1hubby2many]

Quote:

Thank you....it is continuously growing. You can add 2 new baby seramas to the list above that hatched yesterday (very cute if I do say so myself) and looks like I am adding midget white turkeys around the end of April. I think I have crazy acrross my forehead.

I have had birds off and on all my life. But there was a 10 year gap before I started this flock and I have had it for 3 years now. Over 10 years ago we had a layer flock (nothing fancy) out on my parent's property in an old chicken coop. unfortunately, I did not know as much as I do now. But dogs got in and anialated (sp?) murdered everything. Ever see a 230 lb 6' man come in the back door with tears in his eyes? It was heart breaking. They were ALL his pets. Even the HUGE turkey. He staked out the turkey carcass and the pack of dogs came back. he went outback....the dogs stood their ground and showed teeth. He shot 4 dogs in 1 shot. Later we found out that this pack had been harrasing the entire area. Attacking and almost killing a dog - tied up in its own yard. Another incident: Old lady went to let her foo-foo dog out to pee...they forced the lady and dog back into their house. We have no animal control here...we are on our own. Even the local sherrif believe in Shoot- Shovel-Shut up. So that turned us off of birds for awhile. Now birds are in MY yard, chain link fence and then in their own runs at night.

I am going out today to look at the old pen as I need something for the turkeys and my "retired hens" (remember my daughter's contract?). Now I know more so it will be doubly fenced and be built much better.

oh and YES, I insulate. Maybe I am soft....but it is cold out there. Also, my seramas are more a delicate bird and need it to be a bit warmer. When it got into the negative numbers I did put a heat lamp in too. We had some nasty winds for about a week that made the wind chill around -20 this past winter....I know you get similar.

 

[chickengarden]

Wow. That's a heartbreaking story and scary too. SO GLAD your hubby was able to "take care" of a good number of the nasty dogs who did it!
Thanks for the info on how you build your coops now. I think the wild animals I need to worry about are raccoons. I've seen them around here in East Wenatchee but I didn't have them when I lived across the river in Wenatchee. I'm also thinking I might as well insulate at least some of the coop. The roof especially. I am building it in a sheltered location but I've read that insulation will really help with our summer heat as well.
Have fun with your new babies!

 

[Oregon Blues]

East of the Cascades in Oregon, here. I probably have more in common with you Eastern Washingtonians than I do with the Portlanders. So i think I'll hang out with you.

 

[chickengarden]

Welcome! What a beautiful goose you have as your avatar. What kind is it?

 

[Oregon Blues]

She's a Gray Saddleback Pomeranian.

I'm quite fond of her. In fact, I liked her so much, I bought a couple more and I will be driving down to California in May to pick up 5 goslings.