Fluffy Butt Acres: Stories of our flock

[Ribh]

I built a treadle feeder a long time ago. The rats climbed in while the chickens held it open.

Your chickens are serious nutters. Mine eat mice. Not sure how they'd go with a rat. Oh,& the mouse was a Kirby reject

 

[LozzyR]

I keep a treadle feeder in the coop. It keeps the rats & mice out but not bandicoots. They are heavy enough to operate it. My girls also prefer the open tubs. Easier access but they really like to toss their food round on occasion!

I got a treadle feeder to keep the small birds out. It worked really well until I got Bessie and Charlie who, being twice the size of the Isas, could reach the feeder without standing on the lever so didn’t work out the mechanism. So now I have a brick sitting on the treadle. And all the small birds are back.

 

[RoyalChick]

I don't want to freak you out or anything, but your coop is predator proof, isn't it? Not only will foxes dig under, they will climb over & I've seen them squeeze through some very small gaps. Their reputation for cunning is well earned.

Oh you can't freak me out any more than I am already freaked! I think the coop is reasonably secure. It is definitely dig proof and I have good latches that require multiple steps and two hands to open. A weasel could definitely get in through various gaps (it was built by the teenage son of a friend of mine for a school project) but I haven't seen any yet. And of course the chicken palace will be completely secure if I have any chickens left by the time it is finished! I definitely need cameras @BY Bob, what is your camera set-up? I would love to have cameras in the palace and at least one outside so I can see what critters come to visit. And I am now thinking I need an electric wire too (though I have no idea how to do that).

 

[BY Bob]

I think the food in coop is dependent on keeping arrangements.
If you have a secure coop and run (I'm thinking rats and mice) then leaving food 24/7 is probably fine.
I can't do that here. I can't even leave food down during the day. The coops are open during the day and everything here it seems will eat chicken food.
Another aspect to this is being hungry in the morning isn't necessarily bad, or abnormal for any creature. I'm hungry in the mornings.
My view is if the chickens go to roost with a full crop then that is good enough.
The pullets here metabolize their food fastest which is to be expected; they're growing.
The senior hens tend not to show being particularly hungry most mornings.
Then these is also a marked difference between what is considered underweight in the US for example and what is considered underweight here.
Another aspect to this is that if you feed free range chickens they tend not to forage as much. There is a balance when free ranging. My view and the view of most free range keepers here is that assuming forage is decent the chicken is healthier eating what it finds foraging than it is eating the commercial feed. I think Centrarchid has a similar view with his flocks.
The down side is a foraging chicken is often more obvious to predators.
In the Spring and some of the summer I only feed commercial feed twice a day. In the winter months I feed three times a day.

As I have said before, I frequently see different behavior. In this case with feeding.

I always have commercial feed available for them. In my observation, the more they free range the less commercial feed they eat. They were able to free range so much in the fall I did not buy feed for at least 3 months. In fact I threw a bunch of feed out because it got too old.

All of this without my yard being stripped bare. It appears that I have the perfect amount of yard for 4-5 ladies.

Now that it is winter, even with almost 2 weeks of constant free range, I am blazing through commercial feed. Despite working hard all day, there just isn't that much for them to eat. Therefore they attack their food dishes multiple times each day.

 

[BY Bob]

I built a treadle feeder a long time ago. The rats climbed in while the chickens held it open.

Rats are too resourceful. Wow!

 

[BY Bob]

Oh you can't freak me out any more than I am already freaked! I think the coop is reasonably secure. It is definitely dig proof and I have good latches that require multiple steps and two hands to open. A weasel could definitely get in through various gaps (it was built by the teenage son of a friend of mine for a school project) but I haven't seen any yet. And of course the chicken palace will be completely secure if I have any chickens left by the time it is finished! I definitely need cameras @BY Bob, what is your camera set-up? I would love to have cameras in the palace and at least one outside so I can see what critters come to visit. And I am now thinking I need an electric wire too (though I have no idea how to do that).

For cameras I use an Arlo wireless internet security camera system. It has a base station that attaches to your router in your house and about a 100 foot range. Does your internet reach your coop? The range of my wireless router seems to match the range of the Arlo base station.

If you have power in your coop they also have wired cameras so you don't go through batteries. Or you can do rechargeable batteries. I don't go through a lot because I have mine set to only turn on when I am accessing them. However they are motion sensing security cameras. In your instance you could set them to alert you when motion is detected. That would work awesome when monitoring the perimeter for threats and really how they are designed to be used.

Set up is extremely easy as there are no wires, etc. Just synch the camera with the base station and hang it where you want it. Do get as many cameras as you might need with the initial purchase as they are more expensive as add ons.

 

[Shadrach]

Your chickens are serious nutters. Mine eat mice. Not sure how they'd go with a rat. Oh,& the mouse was a Kirby reject

They will eat mice here. I've only seen two hens that will kill and eat mice; both were complete nutters.
Major, the rooster in my avatar killed a few rats in his day.
When I wrote the chickens held the treadle feeder open, I didn't mean they did it so the rats could eat; the rats used to jump in while the feeder was open and the chickens feeding. That isn't great but the worst bit is the rats would get trapped in the feeder when the chickens got off the treadle. That meant all the feed in the feeder had to be thrown out. I got sick of the waste and having to constantly clean the feeder.

 

[Shadrach]

As I have said before, I frequently see different behavior. In this case with feeding.

I always have commercial feed available for them. In my observation, the more they free range the less commercial feed they eat. They were able to free range so much in the fall I did not buy feed for at least 3 months. In fact I threw a bunch of feed out because it got too old.

All of this without my yard being stripped bare. It appears that I have the perfect amount of yard for 4-5 ladies.

Now that it is winter, even with almost 2 weeks of constant free range, I am blazing through commercial feed. Despite working hard all day, there just isn't that much for them to eat. Therefore they attack their food dishes multiple times each day.

That's pretty much the same as here then Bob.
Very roughly each tribe here makes use of an acre of land. The tribes move between territories depending on what they are after. Mostly this goes pretty smoothly. There are the occasional scraps between the males but in general, if the senior rooster and hen are in their own territory the invading tribe will back off after a bit of bickering.
I wish I could say as much for humans.

 

[CrazyChookChookLady]

Here’s a frightening perspective. This is a professional crew, not volunteers. This is south of Nowra, which is an hour south of us.

I worked the volunteer forestry fire crew in my area for many years. Nothing here has even come close to what you guys are dealing with.

 

[RoyalChick]

For cameras I use an Arlo wireless internet security camera system. It has a base station that attaches to your router in your house and about a 100 foot range. Does your internet reach your coop? The range of my wireless router seems to match the range of the Arlo base station.

If you have power in your coop they also have wired cameras so you don't go through batteries. Or you can do rechargeable batteries. I don't go through a lot because I have mine set to only turn on when I am accessing them. However they are motion sensing security cameras. In your instance you could set them to alert you when motion is detected. That would work awesome when monitoring the perimeter for threats and really how they are designed to be used.

Set up is extremely easy as there are no wires, etc. Just synch the camera with the base station and hang it where you want it. Do get as many cameras as you might need with the initial purchase as they are more expensive as add ons.

@BY Bob thank you so much for that information - I will look into those. I am busy shoring up chicken run today but will hopefully order cameras by the weekend. I will have electricity in the chicken palace but don't have any yet and I am pretty sure my home wi-fi extends to the coop and run - I will check next time I am out there.
The fox came back 'for dessert' this morning but the guys helping me with the chicken palace shot at it with a paint gun so it ran off (with a blue tail). The chickens are confined to the coop today until a better run is in place. It was my RIR (Scary) that the fox took and the only evidence is a lone feather which I have saved as a keepsake. Poor Scary, she was always too adventurous for her own good.