Hen and Rooster Pair as Yard Ornaments

[ChicKat]

This is fascinating centrarchid.

You have me wondering:
1. What breed are your chickens?
2. What age were the chicks able to get up in the tree, and did the hen and chicks stay in that barn prior to their ability to fly?
3. What method do you use to get them back 'in' to a cage or carrier once they are free ranging at a new site? Like the picture of them at the Ag Lab.
4. (unrelated to chickens) is that golden-colored flower near their roosting tree the wildflower that has a common name 'black-eyed Susan'?

Nice article about chickens in their freer environment. For fear of predators, I keep mine penned -- well that and rooster fence-fighting. I have a broody with two chicks that are 20-days old. When I let her out for supervised free-ranging - sometimes I have to herd her back to her pen. Probably she thinks it's time she set up housekeeping on her own...but I suspect in about 10-days she will be chasing the babies off just like she did with her last brood.

ETA - and you kids are sure cute.

 

[centrarchid]

He is able to mate. I have another with even bigger issues that can cover one hen just fine where hatch rate better than 90%. They can learn to balance without grabbing nape feathers with bill. The real interesting impacts are on feeding methods and grooming. Their is a lot more to bills than pecking.

 

[centrarchid]

@ChicKat

1. What breed are your chickens?
American Games (fighting chickens). Hen not of my blood. Others been in my family for multiple generations.

2. What age were the chicks able to get up in the tree, and did the hen and chicks stay in that barn prior to their ability to fly?
Physically, they can fly into tree by 10 to 14 days. Mentally they are usually at least 21 days but still need to roost under hen if night time temperatures low (<70 F). These guys were roosting 5' up in barn on cage by 3 weeks. They did not stay in barn prior to fligth capacity. They came out to forage first day of leaving nest although radius was tight for first couple days. By a week post-hatch they would go about 200 feet from barn.

3. What method do you use to get them back 'in' to a cage or carrier once they are free ranging at a new site? Like the picture of them at the Ag Lab.
Almost all my hens trained to come when offered treats and called. The offering is major behavior modification placed on me that birds can read. Helps greatly with managing multiple broods with each led by a hen. This morning I called the juveniles into cage for transport back to barn as do with hen. A stray had to follow on foot.


4. (unrelated to chickens) is that golden-colored flower near their roosting tree the wildflower that has a common name 'black-eyed Susan'?

Black-eyed Susan.

 

[centrarchid]

Blanca the hen suddenly went aggressive yesterday when I released her to dust bath. She put a whooping on juveniles from her previous brood. I policed her up and took her to house where she could forage for bugs and greens. No apparent interest in dust bathing. I let her roost in tree overnight and resume foraging this morning. As of yesterday she had seven eggs in clutch. She is not clucking yet but packing attitude. She and I went at May Beetles for a bit where she loaded up quickly. I can see or at least react to the beetles in flight at least twice as far away as she can. She puts a lot of effort into actual capture while hawking.

 

[ChickenCanoe]

I wish I knew you were going to be at the Science Center on the 24th. I was very close to there and would have come by to meet. I usually go to Soulard Market for produce and meat on Saturday afternoons.
The Science Center is very close to the main Humane Society location and corporate office on Macklind Ave.. Our chicken meetup group has held several chicken related classes there including a chicken clicker training session.

 

[centrarchid]

I was at the Science Center yesterday. In part helping with their aquaponics setup. I am working them hard to use some chickens I train for display purposes. The birds would be suitable for taking out into crowd and being handled by novices. Plus be good doing doing little food choice experiments where importance of experimental protocol can be demonstrated.

Chicks would be pullets out of clutch being reported on in this thread. I can start training at hatch on females only because of sex-linked marker that shows up in down.

Maddie is the person I work with the most although starting engage others at the Science Center.

 

[centrarchid]

Blanca walked slowly back with me all the way to barn where she ultimately went back into her coop. She whooped only one of her offspring in the process and did not put much effort into it.

Very interesting discovery during the process. Short-horned grasshoppers coming up in mass. They were very easy to catch as sunning themselves in grass where I could easily see them. They were so abundant Blanca shifted her interest to eating greens.

 

[centrarchid]

Last night Blanca was locked out of coop she is nesting in. Shortly after dawn I went to barn to find her flying from pen top to pen top always above my head. She was trying to find a way into coop. I opened door and started tapping on coop. She immediately started making her way to where I was tapping. She showed a little interest in food but after about 5 minutes went into coop and after a drink, she slipped into nest. Not clucking so I assume she is just going to lay an egg. She no longer solicits males to cover her so she is close none-the-less. Eight eggs where present prior to her going in this morning. She is also running hot so metabolism I guess still up for egg production.

Her first brood barely leaves barn to forage. Does not have to if insects are target. Insect abundance is not being suppressed by 8 juveniles and one hen that also have access to spilled feed.

 

[centrarchid]

Blanca's brood 2 is hatching; four have hatched so far. Tomorrow morning she and brood will be moved to a rabbit cage for repeat of an experiment where photographs are needed. I am hoping for a dozen chicks at time of move so brood can be split into two.

Immediately after brood comes off, another hen will be placed in same coop where she will also be bred to Edgar. That will be a repeat of mating in thread https://www.backyardchickens.com/threads/messing-w-hen-nesting.1178908/ where brood failed. Hopefully that hen is conditioned better this go around. High heat likely contributed to failure of that brood. No more attempting to hen-hatch chicks in the store bought coop which does not have enough ventilation.

 

[centrarchid]

Looks like I will be able to sex all chicks based on down color. Males will be gray / very light yellow almost like a wheaten while females will be peanut butter or wild-type.