Fluffy Butt Acres: Stories of our flock

[Ponypoor]

Rats & mice always leave droppings trails. Emptying your feed bowls & standing them along the wall may have alerted the rodents to change... they are suspicious of change & may have changed paths. Keep things undisturbed if you want to catch rodents.

Always fresh bait nightly. Fresh soft chedder cheese cubelet alongside purchased peanut butter-filled or creamy cheese-filled crackers gives our rodents a menu choice. Grapes or raisins hasn't worked for us. Maybe different rodent species like specific food choices? & there are so many different Rat dweller species... some are roof rats, some are sewer rats, some ground tunnelers, some garbage dwellers, some woodpile dwellers, etc etc. I never knew they had rats w/ diifferent species-related preferences.

We can go a couple weeks w/ no activity... then suddenly get 1 to 3 trapped in one week. Not sure if it's due to neighborhood cat activity dwindling the rat population or why.

Edit: Rodents have super-hearing... maybe your rats don't like the low energy hum of your zapper or battery. Try the humane cage trap, leave it always in the same place (close trap's door in the mornings from curious chickens, & open trap adding fresh food after roost). Drown the rat while still in cage before opening trap door. Drowning takes the same amount of time to kill as zappers do. There's no humane way to kill ~ both zappers & drowning are the same time. Clamp traps or sticky traps seem to make our rodents avoid them

So far this has worked for our rodent species.

My feed and water bowls get emptied and cleaned nightly and stacked like that. The big black tubs I cover they are too big to haul into the feedroom all the time.

It's just something I have done for 40 yrs with the horses and now do with the chooks. All I do is clean poop and feed bowls, and sweep floors. Call me Cinderella.

It's going to be chilly tonight - and soon we will have this evil white stuff...

 

[kattabelly]

Are you like me...? count - 29, count again 32 (should be 31), try again... 19 - Whaaa? ok stay still! 1, 2, 3... 30. grrrrr...

And so it goes hahaha.

I don't do a daily headcount but when I am, I find it easier to count them in groups. That way the most I need to be able to count up to is six or seven (Shetlands and I sometimes include the Norfolk Grey since she's a similar colour and often with them).

 

[rural mouse]

Are you like me...? count - 29, count again 32 (should be 31), try again... 19 - Whaaa? ok stay still! 1, 2, 3... 30. grrrrr...

And so it goes hahaha.

Count smarter, not harder. Wait until they're pretty much settled, then count. Less moving that way.

 

[Ponypoor]

I don't do a daily headcount but when I am, I find it easier to count them in groups. That way the most I need to be able to count up to is six or seven (Shetlands and I sometimes include the Norfolk Grey since she's a similar colour and often with them).

Yes I used to do this also. But now I have 31 in the main group and 10 (plus 7 chicks) in the summer house group with Mr P.

I don't even bother to include the 2 Polish chicks, I don't want to enclude them until I am 100% sure they are pullets. As it is I am almost sure the the one Silkie is a boy, I was going to call him/her I-see-you, but he has this spot on his back so I have been calling him/her Spotty. He/she likes to snuggle, it's getting chilly here!

 

[rural mouse]

I don't do a daily headcount but when I am, I find it easier to count them in groups. That way the most I need to be able to count up to is six or seven (Shetlands and I sometimes include the Norfolk Grey since she's a similar colour and often with them).

Mine mix it up on which roost where. I gave up on groups and simply count them all....then go hunting when I keep coming up short....only to have that one in the coop the next morning....How do they manage to hide INSIDE the coop with a count repeated 4 times?

 

[rural mouse]

My feed and water bowls get emptied and cleaned nightly and stacked like that. The big black tubs I cover they are too big to haul into the feedroom all the time.

It's just something I have done for 40 yrs with the horses and now do with the chooks. All I do is clean poop and feed bowls, and sweep floors. Call me Cinderella.

It's going to be chilly tonight - and soon we will have this evil white stuff...
View attachment 4233334

If you've been doing all that clean up a day's end for that long, changing the routine is more likely to spook the rats.

 

[Ponypoor]

Count smarter, not harder. Wait until they're pretty much settled, then count. Less moving that way.

Yep I do that - in the summer I throw down scratch grain and they peck away at that while I count. But now it's getting darker so the older ladies don't want the grain and just head to bed. The youngsters have a bit of grain and then wander off, so I have to be quick about it.

Now that I have been forcing them to roost early (and not wall sit), I put them up on the Hen Houses and then go finish chores with the horses and the Summer House to let them settle a bit.

But of course there are always a couple (Cayenne esp) that will want to fly up on me when I go in to count. Now I grab her and snuggle her so that she doesn't clobber me flying up on me. I forgot tonight and she flew up and wacked me in the side of the head - brat! The downside of human raising chicks is that they are very human oriented and think they are still tiny! ouch!

I had a bit of a listen with Patches too, tonight, she sounds ok, I am about to head out and check them all now. I closed up the barn leaving just some flow through ventilation through the aisleway - going below freezing tonight - this will do in my tomatoes for good. boohoo. But I also wanted to keep it a bit warmer for the chicks and also anyone who is not still feeling well. Not to mention my half dozen bald ladies! What a time to moult sheesh!

 

[Ponypoor]

Mine mix it up on which roost where. I gave up on groups and simply count them all....then go hunting when I keep coming up short....only to have that one in the coop the next morning....How do they manage to hide INSIDE the coop with a count repeated 4 times?

I know right??!! what the heck! I think they just follow behind me laughing 'hahaha she doesn't see me, what dumb Hooman...'...

If you've been doing all that clean up a day's end for that long, changing the routine is more likely to spook the rats.

I don't change the routine - it would spook me!! hahaha - heaven forbid if I changed anything I would forget something! Last week with all the medications I was doing I was exhausted because I was doing different things that I would normally do and would forget something... Then having to haul my butt to the barn at midnight to check on sick chooks, and medicate them. Any change in my routine is brutal (esp with my RLS).


OK all have a lovely evening, I am off to do an final head count (hahaha), and do evening chores. Have a lovely evening/night/day!

BFTP
June 2022

 

[featherhead007]

On a much lighter note, wattle Wednesday pic (if you please)

 

[RoyalChick]

Roosting tonight was chaos
Pure, unmitigated chaos!
I tried not to watch but I could hear Cookie's distress calls from inside the house so out I went. I think I can safely say that Cookie is 'directionally challenged'. She can see just fine since I took the scissors to her - and all day she has been fluttering around up at the top of the butterfly bush and having attacks of the zoomies. She can see, she can jump, she can run and she can fly and land in a sensible place.
What she cannot do is remember where the door to the Chicken Palace is located. So while everyone else was milling around in the run and coop and considering roosting - she was 'stuck' outside. Tassels came out twice to call her in, but she couldn't figure out how to get to Tassels. In the end I herded her in with a broom.
But that was simply the start of the night's fun.
Cookie managed to find the blue stairs and go into the coop just fine once I had 'swept' her into the run. There she proceeded to roost on the main roost. Geronimo joined her. Then so did the other two.
Tassels came in and took her favorite spot and for a while it looked like the little family would all roost together on the main roost.
But then Calypso arrived and all hell broke out.
The end result is Tassels in her favorite spot without her babies.
Calypso in the number two spot - she tried to unseat Tassels but that didn't go so well.
Pooh and Sylvie have retreated to another, more peaceful roost.
Piglet is next to Calypso on the main roost.
Where are the babies? Why, in the cardboard box of course! Tassels did not encourage it - in fact she was very happy having them roost next to her. I think it was Mr. Chips or maybe Geronimo who led the little group into the box after Calypso attacked them.
And no, I did not remove the box. I couldn't think why I would do so if they like it. I am sure they will roost eventually. I did remove the half of it that the big girls were using to lay eggs, but I left the part that the Littles sleep in.

I am emotionally drained by all the drama, but in the middle of it all I was told a name.
Meet Nutmeg. I have no idea why she is called Nutmeg, but she assures me that is her name. Like Mr. Chips she is accomplished with the rat proof feeder.