JJeffrey
In the Brooder
I'm just starting out this summer with poultry on our rural Manitoba acreage. Years ago it was an Ukrainian homestead family farm in the usual little-of-everything mode; the former owner told us that back then every single quarter-section (160 ac.) had a farmhouse on it. Now almost all those houses are gone; the few remaining farmers try to make a go of it grain farming 5 or 6 sections of land, or else take their chances on the vagaries of the beef cattle industry and market, in either case in hock to the bank right over their heads, struggling to survive. Fewer and fewer actually live on their land. It is sad to see real family farming dying out as a way of life. I'm 75 and semi-retired. I can't afford the massive farm equipment they use now, so I rent out the arable portion for whatever paltry return it will bring.
For years and years I was doing conservation breeding of an historical sleddog bloodline -- for fourteen years in Yukon Territory and then a few more years here after the Yukon economics became impossible. Our last serious Seppala lineage breeding was in 2008 and since then my wife Susan and I confine ourselves to caretaking our remaining senior stock, now mostly 14 years old, the eldest at the moment 15 1/2; we've had then survive to as much as 17 years.
So we're now just seeing old canine friends into the grave one by one. It got so grim I personally felt I had to have some form of animal husbandry ongoing to keep any interest in the future, so, chickens. I had bantams as a kid, also raised bobwhite quail. Then in the 1990s living in Catalunya I had bantams again, and a few chukar partridge. Now for the first time I'm having a go at standard fowl. I just bought some straight-run Buckeye chicks from Berg's Hatchery in Russell MB, along with some of their "Berg's Browns" hybrid layer chicks to have a few eggs whilst waiting for the Buckeyes to mature, the cockerels can go into the freezer in due time. But the whole crew of 20 are just eleven days old at the moment, just starting to look like growing birdies instead of impossibly-cute fluff balls.
On the principle of "in for a penny, in for a pound" I succumbed to the temptation of a Brinsea Maxi II Advance incubator -- light-years ahead of the rudimentary styrofoam el-cheapo I used in Catalunya (but I managed to get quite a few good chicks out of that primitive affair). To christen the Brinsea, with my heart in my mouth I ordered a dozen expensive hatching eggs from the closest heritage-breed outfit in Manitoba, Breezy Bird Farm in Rosenort. I set the eggs two days ago: half White Bresse and half Croad Langshan. If I'm very, very lucky I might manage to hatch and raise a trio of each breed -- or perhaps only win a bit more experience and the will to try again. You have to start somewhere. The incubator's a wonder, a dream; but it all depends on how the eggs fared in their trip through Canada Post. (Rosenort was a bit too distant for my ancient Dodge truck and its equally ancient driver to consider a farm-gate pickupThey arrived in good time, even a day ahead of expected ETD, their package in immaculate condition, so I'm guardedly hopeful.
What worries me most is my lack of experience in keeping chickens happy, healthy and safe through the long prairie winter. It's winter for about seven months of the year hereabouts. I can recall an experience from 1975 outside Saskatoon SK with a bunch of broilers from Early's Feed & Seed that got badly frostbitten from their reckless drinking and eating habits in our barn back then. And in our present location we've got every predator in the book: red-tailed hawks, marsh hawks, bald eagles, coyotes, red foxes, lynx, black bear, weasels, raccoons -- and probably a few others to boot. Also extensive sloughs with hordes of disease-carrying mosquitoes; unbelievable numbers of wood ticks every spring that make me wonder about the populations of other similar pests -- lice, mites, etc. The temps go down to minus thirty Celsius regularly each winter; we get bitter winds year-round. We have a lot of snow every winter, though never any 30+cm eastern-style snow-dumps. Let's just say that it's a challenging environment for trying to keep poultry year-round.
I'm hoping that Backyard Chickens will help us draw on others folks' experience to avoid any total disaster scenario.
And by the way, just to conclude with an effort to increase my street cred a little -- I knew Dr. Roy Crawford around 1974 in Saskatoon when he was head of the University of Saskatchewan/Western College of Veterinary Medicine Department of Poultry Science. I understand the great man is still alive at something like 87 and still doing farming chores! He probably wouldn't remember me, I didn't know him well and we moved in disparate circles -- I was involved in dogs even then. Maybe in a year or two if all goes well I might manage to talk Matthew Nelson out of a few of those magnificent Hungarian Yellows that Roy rescued from impending extinction. We'll just have to see how it all pans out.
For years and years I was doing conservation breeding of an historical sleddog bloodline -- for fourteen years in Yukon Territory and then a few more years here after the Yukon economics became impossible. Our last serious Seppala lineage breeding was in 2008 and since then my wife Susan and I confine ourselves to caretaking our remaining senior stock, now mostly 14 years old, the eldest at the moment 15 1/2; we've had then survive to as much as 17 years.
So we're now just seeing old canine friends into the grave one by one. It got so grim I personally felt I had to have some form of animal husbandry ongoing to keep any interest in the future, so, chickens. I had bantams as a kid, also raised bobwhite quail. Then in the 1990s living in Catalunya I had bantams again, and a few chukar partridge. Now for the first time I'm having a go at standard fowl. I just bought some straight-run Buckeye chicks from Berg's Hatchery in Russell MB, along with some of their "Berg's Browns" hybrid layer chicks to have a few eggs whilst waiting for the Buckeyes to mature, the cockerels can go into the freezer in due time. But the whole crew of 20 are just eleven days old at the moment, just starting to look like growing birdies instead of impossibly-cute fluff balls.
On the principle of "in for a penny, in for a pound" I succumbed to the temptation of a Brinsea Maxi II Advance incubator -- light-years ahead of the rudimentary styrofoam el-cheapo I used in Catalunya (but I managed to get quite a few good chicks out of that primitive affair). To christen the Brinsea, with my heart in my mouth I ordered a dozen expensive hatching eggs from the closest heritage-breed outfit in Manitoba, Breezy Bird Farm in Rosenort. I set the eggs two days ago: half White Bresse and half Croad Langshan. If I'm very, very lucky I might manage to hatch and raise a trio of each breed -- or perhaps only win a bit more experience and the will to try again. You have to start somewhere. The incubator's a wonder, a dream; but it all depends on how the eggs fared in their trip through Canada Post. (Rosenort was a bit too distant for my ancient Dodge truck and its equally ancient driver to consider a farm-gate pickupThey arrived in good time, even a day ahead of expected ETD, their package in immaculate condition, so I'm guardedly hopeful.
What worries me most is my lack of experience in keeping chickens happy, healthy and safe through the long prairie winter. It's winter for about seven months of the year hereabouts. I can recall an experience from 1975 outside Saskatoon SK with a bunch of broilers from Early's Feed & Seed that got badly frostbitten from their reckless drinking and eating habits in our barn back then. And in our present location we've got every predator in the book: red-tailed hawks, marsh hawks, bald eagles, coyotes, red foxes, lynx, black bear, weasels, raccoons -- and probably a few others to boot. Also extensive sloughs with hordes of disease-carrying mosquitoes; unbelievable numbers of wood ticks every spring that make me wonder about the populations of other similar pests -- lice, mites, etc. The temps go down to minus thirty Celsius regularly each winter; we get bitter winds year-round. We have a lot of snow every winter, though never any 30+cm eastern-style snow-dumps. Let's just say that it's a challenging environment for trying to keep poultry year-round.
I'm hoping that Backyard Chickens will help us draw on others folks' experience to avoid any total disaster scenario.
And by the way, just to conclude with an effort to increase my street cred a little -- I knew Dr. Roy Crawford around 1974 in Saskatoon when he was head of the University of Saskatchewan/Western College of Veterinary Medicine Department of Poultry Science. I understand the great man is still alive at something like 87 and still doing farming chores! He probably wouldn't remember me, I didn't know him well and we moved in disparate circles -- I was involved in dogs even then. Maybe in a year or two if all goes well I might manage to talk Matthew Nelson out of a few of those magnificent Hungarian Yellows that Roy rescued from impending extinction. We'll just have to see how it all pans out.
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Glad you joined.
