I bit the bullet and bought chicks

[Hummingbird Hollow]

I'm just rotating several out, as there are escape artists already lol. I am trying to keep 10 in 1 box, 16 in the other. And who is in which box switches, as to who escapes and those with full tummies falling asleep get picked up and moved into the smaller box, while others scamper around.

So pecking orders are all messed up atm. It's just way too small to put them in 1 place. I have to do a head count every time I check on them, as up to 6 at a time are getting out.

Coffee is my fuel. My bf says these have to be "gone" by the time the chicks I get this weekend from my friends flock and another breed from another byc'er & bresse from another are ready to go outside to the new coop/run being started Friday.

I guess I'm not going to do the traditional meatie route any longer than these little chicks I have in the barn. Which I guess makes them dp? Idk if they will be "done" by the time the cemani, svart honas and bresse are ready to go outside to the new coop.

How long does it take to go from day old chick to ready to go outside in regular chickens (bresse, etc?) In the fall/winter time if I get them now? 9 weeks? 8 weeks?

These itty bitties were kinda piling on each other to sleep. And they should be outside I think. Fast little critters.

I think the time it takes for them to go outside depends partly on the conditions outside. The rule of thumb is that chicks need to have access to 95 degree heat their first week, decreasing the temperature by 5 degrees each week. They don't have to be at that temperature every minute, but they need a draft free place that is the correct temperature available so that they can warm up if necessary. So, at 8 weeks of age, they need a place where they can go that is draft free and around 55 degrees. That is very do-able with a well made coop and a heat lamp. 8 weeks from now we'll be well into October, and here in Colorado we could have snow by that time, so it would probably be best for your little ones that part of their run is covered, so that they have the ability to go out of the coop and scratch around for part of the day, but be able to get back in where it is warm if necessary.

The little DP roosters I raised this summer were aroudn 8 week of age when I picked them up. That was right before Mother's Day when we had that big snow storm, leaving almost 2 feet of snow in my grow-out run, which does not have hardly any covered space. However, with a heat lamp in their coop, they did fine.

 

[Double Kindness]

Hummingbird- ty for your answers.

Roseyred- no picking on issues yet, as they get rotated out.

Today is cleaning day. Gotta bust my hump in the back & side yards to get stuff done to prep for my crew of awesomeness to get here in the am to bust out more work, go get the 2nd big coop for the cemani, bresse and svart honas.

These itty bitties at 5 weeks old are growing so fast!! Tail feathers, wing feathers, their curiosity getting the best of me lol.

Last night while dinner was cooking and after my big chickens (my laying flock & rooster) were all locked up in their coop I brought out the 26 ityy bitties and took them out to the enclosed run for 45 minutes. They kept close by the brooder box, but played leapfrog and tested out their wings. Oh no, I'm getting attached!

I'm referring to the 26 chicks as peep peeps and itty bitties. 3 barred rock. 7 white leghorns. 16 silver laced Wyandotte. I'm going to try to see if on 26% protein gamebird feed if they will be on any decent size to eat in 6 weeks.

I'll be setting up my master bathroom as brooder central as my chicks get in from various other places.

Kierstens is where my ayum cemani are coming from. DCchicken is where svart honas are coming from, but kierstens and I went in on our order of svart honas. Corancher is where my bresse are coming from, who might be able to locate a couple of french bcm at their pol to add to my laying flock.

My cup runneth over with chickens, and yeah, I still want more. Lol.

 

[Double Kindness]

I still have 26 baby chicks and boy are they growing fast!

Today we cleared a bunch of wood off the raised garden bed in the backyard.

And we got their coop and it's been leveled in the raised garden bed. This weekend I'm going to make progress on getting the raised bed enclosed to get ready for baby chicks.

These chicks are growing surprisingly fast. They are 1.5 x their size I got them on Sunday. Their feathers are all coming in wonderfully.

I caught a cricket and switched putting it in each brooder box for 10 minutes, then took the cricket out. Some of them were frightened, but most of them huddled around pecking at it and trilling.

It's been a very wet summer, especially in my area of the world, a mile high in the rocky mountains of Colorado where it's normally a high mountain desert. I saw slugs in one of my gardens. That's not a normal sight here.

I'm munching on a slice of my first ever attempt at gluten-free angel food cake and it uses 1.5 cups of egg whites and it turned out fantastic!

@ the rate these itty bitty peep peeps are eating, I will have to get a couple more 40 lb bags of this 26% gamebird feed and another bag of layer feed for my current laying flock. And mealworms. Can't forget about them. At 56% protein dried. There's some tender grass, dandelions, lambs ear weeds for the itty bitty peep peeps to munch on.

A bigger waterer/feeder is needed after I set up the garden to be enclosed for them.

I think I'm going to move the coop one more time before then though.

I have 3 ppl lined up with experience to help with the processing, in hopefully within 8-10 weeks. It should go quickly between 5 adults handling 26 chickens.

I'm getting the white bresse, ayum cemani, svart honas to do another meat project over the next couple of weeks. Idk if I'm going to bother with rangers/cornish atm, since I have plenty of chickens and projects and my winter greenhouse garden seeds have poked their heads up.

These 26 itty bitty peep peeps are going to get a lot of work done. Maybe when freezer camp time comes I can find others who have chickens ready to process to add to these, so the plucker rental will be worth it.

honeybee hives are coming next week. I'm excited.

 

[Double Kindness]

I had to move my chicks b/c we needed the chicken wire to build the temporary enclosed run.

Now if the staple gun would quit jamming, we might be getting things done faster.

I plan on shoveling some soil from the garden into the temporary run so they can dust bathe. My bf said not to get attached when I said it was so cute how they are trying to dustbathe in the fishtank.

 

[Double Kindness]

New chicken yard and coop done for today. Itty bitty peep peeps are in the coop with water and food. They enjoyed flying around and scampering today.

They are growing fast! I'm trying to get them onto the roosting poles tonight finally at 5 weeks old. They have gotten so big!

Tomorrow we're enclosing it better. They are locked up safe in their new coop for the night.

Laying flock also locked up. My bf said he built a better coop than this new one I got. Well, I guess he's going to be put to the test on the next coop/run.

These chicks will be 'done' within 8-12 more weeks I hope. New chicks in 3 weeks about... they will be inside in the brooder boxes while these ones get big enough for freezer camp.

Which leaves me with about enough time for the next coop/run build out. To do my fancy meat birds. Then after October and I tear down all my current gardens there's a spot for me to do cornish x or rangers in the spring. Chicken math taken over.

 

[Double Kindness]

I seem to be having issues posting pictures again. What the cluck.

The new coop has a drawbridge door, and I put it on the corner of the beans of the raised garden bed in the backyard. I put up a temporary fencing of bamboo poles held together with zip ties.

We framed out several spaces and put chicken wire with bird blocking netting inside the chicken wire. Tomorrow we are reinforcing it with more solid wood beams and whatnots we have and chain link fencing with yep, more chicken wire and bird blocking.

It's a bit of a process. I'd like to build a tractor for the cornish x or rangers in the spring on the other side of the barn & indoor greenhouse.

I should be getting 2 beehives set up next week by the detached 2 car garage. 30% of the honey they produce is better than paying for honey, for someone to come set up the hives, do maintenance and collect the honey.

My bf wants to buy the hives, but it's not in the budget atm. So like I said, 30% of 2 beehives of honey is better than buying it.

I'm new to all this, and idk what I'm doing exactly. My goal is to source, raise, grow all my own food locally and organically. It's going to be more expensive initially setting things up than what I currently pay for chicken meat & eggs. It's far better for me health wise though, and I want to connect to my food again.

I grew up in Alaska, and we hunted, fished, and grew several large gardens every year to supplement the limited and expensive food in the middle of nowhere. I don't like the way food is raised these days. So this is my feeble, amateur first time I've ever tried doing this type of humbling experience.

 

[Double Kindness]

Night one in the coop went well, but I had to use a stick to usher the peep peeps outside into the run.

Last night they munched on dandelion leaves and some tender grass shoots. I'm starting their feed to ferment now in a 5 gal home depot bucket. Their waterer seems adequate for the moment. Next week they will need bigger feeders and waterers I think.

Much dustbathing was going on in the chicken run last night, as well as a lot of running and flapping around, some getting pretty good lift off. Good thing it's, about 9' tall in the temporary run.

I'm hoping to be processing these chicks to go to freezer camp with 10 weeks, which would put these at 15 weeks old or so (before any possible crowing gets out of hand I hope). That's the maximum amount of time my wonderful bf will let me do these dp meatie experience. As I'm expecting new chicks over the next 2-3 weeks of my 'fancy' meat chickens. The white bresse, cemani, svart honas, and I'm looking hard for french bcm to raise with my new chicks and will house it with my laying flock along with the bresse pullets.

I was also pondering trying my hand at caponizing with these chickens to get my technique down before trying it on the bresse, as these were .80 a chick, the bresse are $10 a chick.

I'm aiming for a sustainable meat flock with black meat chickens as well as the bresse and to raise the bresse on as close to the french way as possible and caponizing to get that great marbling in the breast meat of the males.

I guess I need to find that thread about caponizing bresse chickens on byc again.

It's time to go walk the dogs and pick apples, grasses and dandelions, marigolds, and herbs for my laying flock of chickens.

It's funny how I noticed the much paler yolk from my ee Bessie, and it's b/c she isn't brazen and willing to jostle her way for playing chicken savings and loan. Which is where dandelion leaves are fed through the front of the chicken run (or sprouted boss seeds) and they gobble them up like a dollar bill acceptor at the bank/grocery store/atm.

I sprinkled a handful of dried mealworms in the itty bitty peep peeps run this morning.

Last night one found an earthworm and ran it around the run cheeping lookit me I got it I got it.

Then it got grabbed, dropped, and the chick picked up a piece of bark and ran around the run making the same noise with a gang of other chicks chasing it. The injured gray br chick (who is doing great btw, I put no pick on the injured wing area last night) found the dropped earthworm and tan around with it trilling, then a tug of war with earthworm with a slw chick which resulted in the worm breaking and the gray br ate it after running around with it a bit and after 5 minutes of running around being chased so did the slw.

Chicken tv is awesome!

Ahhh egg song and chicken lamaze for the day has started. Yummy yummy eggs! And soon, yummy yummy chickers.

I'm still giving them 26% protein gamebird feed. And scrambled eggs too. And grass and dandelions and herbs. Yes, I think these will grow up to be very tasty chickens.

 

[roseyred]

Can you adopt me? Lol I totaly support and agree with everything you say. I want to produce my own food so I know what's in it and how it was raised and that it was happy while alive. I have some chickens but when I get my own property I want rabbits quail bison goats alpacas and turkeys. And huge gardens and outdoor stoves an ****. Ahhhhh I can see it in my mind I swear. My bf is not big on "slaughtering" animals no matter how many time I explain that it's the same crap you buy from the store but if we raise it it can live a wonderful life and be happy as free. I know he'll come around. How old is tooo old to eat a chicken? Like when they stop layin are they tough and gross? I'd like to raise met chckens but let them live as long as possible. I also want meat ducks....yummmmm. Bison is my main goal. They are ******* incredibly awesome! Disease resistant, you can seriously eat there meat raw and never get sick, there hardy as hell, they thrive on grass and hay and there so bad *** looking. Alpacas for fur obviously. Rabbits for meat cause there delicious. I think I'll have to hire someone to butcher my animals....as much as I know I could do it I'd rather not. I can just cook it up say grace and thank the animal for its nourishment.

 

[Double Kindness]

Yay!! My friend hatched out some eggs, surprise! Not purebred cemani, the suspect is an orpington got with her cemanis, whoops!!

She knows I'm doing meat chickens, and since she was going to cull these 5 orpington cemanis I figured what the hay, I'll raise them and spoil them and then they should be ready about Thanksgiving time, and I'm kinda hoping for black/gray meat organic non gmo pasture raised chicken for me and my friends and family to have for thanksgiving, which will then have even more meaning as I would have raised these birds from days old chicks and be along for their entire process. So it looks like it's going to be a while before the pure bred cemani will be hatching.

Which means the svart honas and bresse will be here probably before the cemani by 2 weeks or so.

I just threw some tender grasses and dandelion leaves into the itty bitties run and cooked 4 of my hens eggs and gave it to them.

I just keep thinking, yes, these are going to be so delicious this winter and spring.

And now, well I'm already looking forward to thanksgiving.

 

[Double Kindness]

It's cold this morning! I'm worried about the 26 itty bitty peep peeps being as it's so cold and wet. Even my big girls and roo are kinda pufed up this chilly wet morning.

I'm saving my hen's eggs for these teensy weensies I picked up yesterday. 1 has a bandaid splint, and I feel bad for it. I guess it came out of the shell like that, I hope it resolves itself soon... but I'm keeping a worried eye on everything. My bf keeps saying no more chickens, and I had to remind him that I still have more chicks otw here ahh hemmm, and he did get his motorcycle back on the road b/c I'm such an awesome gf, and well, I still need the raised garden bed enclosed, and decided that after we get that done, we'll make another door in this big coop and put up a partition and separate it, so these days old chicks can go outside in a month or so. Some have decent coloring/black saturation, but I do realize these aren't purebred ayam cemani chicks from her hens and roos, as it seems one or 2 amourous black/white paint orpington roos got in with her cemani ladies, resulting in these chicks. which re adorable and I am already oohh so in loove with these babies.

Back to the itty bitty peep peeps, I had to take the slide off cover to their galvanized feeders off b/c their heads won't stick far enough into them to clean them out like they had been able to a few days ago. whoops! Tonight my bf and I will be going to pick up more pine bedding for my teensie weensies, the itty bitties will now be moved onto straw that I have for my laying flock, as I have about 1.5 bales worth still. and I need to go move more soil into the itty bitties run, as they do love to dust bathe lol. I am still needing to gather them up at night time and sticking them into the coop and they kinda pile onto each other like puppies, even though there are roosting poles/bars in the coop and they are just a few inches off the ground. This morning I only had to take out one or two of them out of the coop and remove their food and water from inside (untouched, they were all huddled against the pop door/drawbridge) before they all came piling out after the 2. Then I went out after checking on my teensy weensies and they were all huddled under the coop where it's wet, after I saw that there were divots in the feeders but they had plenty of food still and water, I took off the tops and they all came rushing out from under the coop to eat except 2 or 3 itty bitties to start devouring food.

There's a rush seated wooden chair inside the run to watch chicken tv of course, and it seems that they are big enough to fly up on it and poop on it. Just like my big girls do! Ok, now I'm going to put on some warmer clothes and go play chickers!