Hi, my name is Kate. We started raising chickens as a homeschool project last fall. We started with 4 bluffs. We added a barred rock, it wasn't long before they were all laying everyday. We did lose one chicken in November, we think a neighbors dog got to her. Overall our winter was still very good with about an 85% laying rate. Right before Christmas we went to buy a second coop in case we decided to get a rooster & wound up coming home with a4 month old beautiful Americauna Roo. We created a separate run for his coop. January brought hawks and we lost 2 of our bluffs, literally out of thin air! Now the girls no longer free range and we are still getting a pretty high laying rate even with just 3 bluffs and the Barred Rock. Last week we decided to put one of the bluffs and the barred rock in with our Roo, well it proved very successful not only our the eggs fertile within 2 days but he is extremely gentle with them and has started running up to us when we approach the coop area. We have not allowed him access to the other 2 girls so we only have a few fertile eggs. We are planning to start incubating as soon as we have a dozen. Tomorrow my chicken connection... Hahaha our friend is brining us 3 more bluffs in different colors. We will see how successful our first hatch is then maybe have a go at another. We are absolutely in love with our chickens and although we are newbies we are doing pretty well so far. I'm sure I will have a million questions now that we are getting into breeding so be patient with us! Currently our girls are in a homemade coop that locks down at night and has 3 nesting boxes, their run is 1/2 covered by a barn carport/ overhang and the other half is about 20x20 with a 6 foot ceiling of bird netting. I use chain link fence sections for the exterior of the run. Their coop has hardware cloth on the ground level and chicken wire doors on the upper level. I guess I'll post some pics when I figure out how. We are pretty proud of our homemade coop. I kept looking at them online and had such sticker shock we decided to make it a family project & used 80% of our materials by upcycling materials around the farm. Well enough from me for now. I have enjoyed this site and glad to finally take a moment to join! Kate Rockett Jorasoli Farm
Greetings from Kansas, Kate, and ! Great to have you in our flock! Sounds like you had your trials and tribulations with your poultry! Sounds like you are on the right track! Good luck to you and have fun!
Hello and welcome to BYC Here's an article that will tell you all you need to know about incubating eggs: https://www.backyardchickens.com/a/hatching-eggs-101 For the pic upload, here's a how-to: https://www.backyardchickens.com/a/inserting-pics-in-on-the-new-byc Enjoy the site!
