Illinois...

[cavemanrich]

I did prep for winter. Placed the leaves into flower beds. Well,,,,,, come spring, and yes, a good portion of those leaves decomposed in those beds. (I don't like the word rotted, but is same as decomposed)
The bright side to all this is,,,,,,,,,,,,,, the decomposed leaves are fertilizer regardless if in grass or garden. Your lawn will benefit from extra food. On a dry day run your lawnmower on mulch position, and and little blades of grass will see sunlight with little effort.
Totally understand how with all the family activities, a 24 hour day runs out of hours. Just do your best.

 

[chickendreams24]

Stupid turkeys
I went out late to lock up. They had been so good about going to the coop. The jake is sleeping out and it's too dark for him to see to get down out of the spruce tree... Hopefully the owls will stay away.

Oh dear I hope your jake made it. I can't imagine an owl being much of a match for my boys but in the dark I suppose they're easy enough pickings.

Not easily. I found a good home for her, but getting there will take some planning. I could also eat her, but giving her away causes me far less drama from DD.

Can't wait. Sorry I haven't been in touch. I'm sick. Swollen glands and low grade fever. Essentially miserable. Tomorrow is DH2B's birthday and I'm worried I'll be a Debbie Downer.

Hello everyone. Life or rather sickness has gotten the best of me. We've been cleaning out the garden and the flock are eagerly helping. The wet weather has made a mess of everything and some parts are still drying out. The coop is getting a good cleaning but it's slow going.

I'm glad to be seeing robins again.

Sadly while we got our fox, our mink is back, and killed another 1-2 birds. Traps are set and hopefully we get the darned thing. As long as we lock the birds up as soon as they go in they're pretty well okay. Let's face it though it's been so nice they don't want to go to bed.

We may be missing a hen as well but aren't ready to call it quits on her. The other bird killed was left outside their coop and I was able to pluck his neck(which was missing a bunch of feathers already) and see the bite marks all over. So now we've lost 2 Buckeye hens and 2 Buckeye roosters this year so far along with an EE hen and possibly a legbar hen to predators. (The legbar problem is we hatched a couple more that look very similar last year so I need to see all the legbars together to know.)

 

[homeschoolin momma]

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Hello everyone. Life or rather sickness has gotten the best of me. We've been cleaning out the garden and the flock are eagerly helping. The wet weather has made a mess of everything and some parts are still drying out. The coop is getting a good cleaning but it's slow going.

I'm glad to be seeing robins again.

Sadly while we got our fox, our mink is back, and killed another 1-2 birds. Traps are set and hopefully we get the darned thing. As long as we lock the birds up as soon as they go in they're pretty well okay. Let's face it though it's been so nice they don't want to go to bed.

We may be missing a hen as well but aren't ready to call it quits on her. The other bird killed was left outside their coop and I was able to pluck his neck(which was missing a bunch of feathers already) and see the bite marks all over. So now we've lost 2 Buckeye hens and 2 Buckeye roosters this year so far along with an EE hen and possibly a legbar hen to predators. (The legbar problem is we hatched a couple more that look very similar last year so I need to see all the legbars together to know.)

So sorry to hear about your losses. Predators can be so frustrating. Weasels or minks can be some of the worst attacks since they do kill for sport. Last year one got into a temporary shelter with 18 chicks and poults and killed every single one. It was devastating. But with the help of a great friend, I'm back on my feet and things are more secure as long as I keep an close eye in the early evenings and get them locked up on time. I hope you catch the little bugger. Get to feeling better

 

[Molpet]

Oh dear I hope your jake made it. I can't imagine an owl being much of a match for my boys but in the dark I suppose they're easy enough pickings.



Can't wait. Sorry I haven't been in touch. I'm sick. Swollen glands and low grade fever. Essentially miserable. Tomorrow is DH2B's birthday and I'm worried I'll be a Debbie Downer.

Hello everyone. Life or rather sickness has gotten the best of me. We've been cleaning out the garden and the flock are eagerly helping. The wet weather has made a mess of everything and some parts are still drying out. The coop is getting a good cleaning but it's slow going.

I'm glad to be seeing robins again.

Sadly while we got our fox, our mink is back, and killed another 1-2 birds. Traps are set and hopefully we get the darned thing. As long as we lock the birds up as soon as they go in they're pretty well okay. Let's face it though it's been so nice they don't want to go to bed.

We may be missing a hen as well but aren't ready to call it quits on her. The other bird killed was left outside their coop and I was able to pluck his neck(which was missing a bunch of feathers already) and see the bite marks all over. So now we've lost 2 Buckeye hens and 2 Buckeye roosters this year so far along with an EE hen and possibly a legbar hen to predators. (The legbar problem is we hatched a couple more that look very similar last year so I need to see all the legbars together to know.)

The jake survived the night and thought he was something else for doing so. His dad put him in his place..
Sorry you have lost a bunch of birds
I have a bunch of black hens, I haven't even counted them. One coop has 14 blk or white and one barred. One night there was 13. I didn't even know if it was a white or a black. ... looked around and didn't find a body or such, figured she was in the main coop
next morning there was a black in the main coop trying to get into that coop so I figured it was her Not sure how many are in the main coop.

 

[chickendreams24]

So sorry to hear about your losses. Predators can be so frustrating. Weasels or minks can be some of the worst attacks since they do kill for sport. Last year one got into a temporary shelter with 18 chicks and poults and killed every single one. It was devastating. But with the help of a great friend, I'm back on my feet and things are more secure as long as I keep an close eye in the early evenings and get them locked up on time. I hope you catch the little bugger. Get to feeling better

Thank you. Mostly our mink hasn't been too bad but I'd better not say that out loud. LOL Usually it only kills one bird but I think it has killed two or three in a night on a couple of occasions. Considering we have over a hundred it could be much worse.(with cockerals we grow out for meat and meat birds last year we broke 200) That said we have lost many many birds to it over I think a three year period. It's frustrating. We've seen it a couple times but never gotten it. It's a smart nasty little thing. We've bought leg hold and conibear traps trying to catch if but as of yet have totally failed.

The jake survived the night and thought he was something else for doing so. His dad put him in his place..
Sorry you have lost a bunch of birds
I have a bunch of black hens, I haven't even counted them. One coop has 14 blk or white and one barred. One night there was 13. I didn't even know if it was a white or a black. ... looked around and didn't find a body or such, figured she was in the main coop
next morning there was a black in the main coop trying to get into that coop so I figured it was her Not sure how many are in the main coop.

LoL yeah so glad we're not the only ones. Thanks for making me feel better. I really do quite well at telling all of our birds apart and can tell you with a little thought the age of each bird but I do have some trouble with certain groups more than others. Black birds can be really hard. I have two black english orp hens that are almost identical one is a year older and slightly larger the other we call her imposter. Ella of course @Faraday40

After the fox attack several weeks ago the birds from that coop(which is our smaller coop but still pretty large) started bouncing around from coop to run to just roosting outside and finally several have landed up in the big main coop. That complicates things as they have some doubles in that coop.

We usually have a pretty decent idea of the number of birds we have and often have a complete list. Unfortunately winter snuck up on us last year and we didn't get all of last year's cockerals processed so I didn't keep strict track of them because they were to be processed. This year I'm hoping to keep better track of them and our chicken tractors will help tremendously with that. I love those things and wish we had a dozen more. We're planning on using them for breeding and grow outs and possibly make some taller one's for turkeys or poults and when we start rabbits this year we are planning to raise the kits on grass after weaning until processing age. Lol I told you we need more.

It's rained here a few days in the last week or so and the birds have been a wet muddy mess. They're doing great in the garden and it almost looks ready to plant but they are making a small mud bath area. Yep it's still to wet to be called dust.

 

[Molpet]

LoL yeah so glad we're not the only ones. Thanks for making me feel better. I really do quite well at telling all of our birds apart and can tell you with a little thought the age of each bird but I do have some trouble with certain groups more than others. Black birds can be really hard. I have two black english orp hens that are almost identical one is a year older and slightly larger the other we call her imposter. Ella of course @Faraday40

I keep saying I am going to start banding so I can tell them apart...last year i started banding the ones that went broody... until I had 18 at the same time.. so at least I know who goes broody first LOL,, basical all the barred cx mixed went broody though.
A couple of the blks and a couple of the whites did too.. but those didn't get banded

 

[Faraday40]

Had a strange happening today. The birds were sounding the panic alarm, so I sent DS out ahead while I grabbed my coat and slipped on boots.

As I'm walking back, DS returns panting and said there's a giant hawk. He said he got scared when a big wing dropped out of the tree.
(Did he mean the hawk's wings were big as it flew out of the tree????)

Sure enough a huge hawk (bigger than my turkey) was sitting in a nearby tree. I commented on the size & DS said wait until you see the wing. The bird flew a couple houses over but could still easily be seen. I agreed that, yes, the hawk had very large wings. DS said "no", grabs my hand, and shows me the "wing."

Yep. There was a big, bloody wing on the ground. The chickens have been locked up all day. I quickly had the kids check the coop to make sure the turkey was present. She was fine. The chickens were all present.

The wing technically fell into the neighbors' yard. They just had a baby & own a dog. The last thing they need is to have their dog start munching on dead animal meat. I had DH collect the wing. The upper wing bone (humerus) was longer than a turkey drumstick!!! My best guess is that the hawk killed a Canadian goose somewhere else and brought it up into our pine tree for snacking.

Couldn't get a good pic, but this is the big hawk. I didn't see a red tail when flying. We gave the laced orps an armed escort when walking from the chicken tractor back to the coop. (We had the dog on a leash with 2 adults & 2 kids all surrounding our precious orps.)

Spoiler: wing pics

I didn't fan out the wing. This is it closed.

DH is 6'5" holding the wing.

 

[homeschoolin momma]

Had a strange happening today. The birds were sounding the panic alarm, so I sent DS out ahead while I grabbed my coat and slipped on boots.

As I'm walking back, DS returns panting and said there's a giant hawk. He said he got scared when a big wing dropped out of the tree.
(Did he mean the hawk's wings were big as it flew out of the tree????)

Sure enough a huge hawk (bigger than my turkey) was sitting in a nearby tree. I commented on the size & DS said wait until you see the wing. The bird flew a couple houses over but could still easily be seen. I agreed that, yes, the hawk had very large wings. DS said "no", grabs my hand, and shows me the "wing."

Yep. There was a big, bloody wing on the ground. The chickens have been locked up all day. I quickly had the kids check the coop to make sure the turkey was present. She was fine. The chickens were all present.

The wing technically fell into the neighbors' yard. They just had a baby & own a dog. The last thing they need is to have their dog start munching on dead animal meat. I had DH collect the wing. The upper wing bone (humerus) was longer than a turkey drumstick!!! My best guess is that the hawk killed a Canadian goose somewhere else and brought it up into our pine tree for snacking.

Couldn't get a good pic, but this is the big hawk. I didn't see a red tail when flying. We gave the laced orps an armed escort when walking from the chicken tractor back to the coop. (We had the dog on a leash with 2 adults & 2 kids all surrounding our precious orps.)
View attachment 1720747 View attachment 1720744 View attachment 1720745

Spoiler: wing pics

I didn't fan out the wing. This is it closed.
View attachment 1720735

DH is 6'5" holding the wing.
View attachment 1720737

Ok. The goose wing is impressive. But the size of that hawk is more so. Dang, hes a big bird! No wonder he got himself a goose! Glad the orps are ok! Is it illegal to shoot a hawk?

 

[Molpet]

Had a strange happening today. The birds were sounding the panic alarm, so I sent DS out ahead while I grabbed my coat and slipped on boots.

As I'm walking back, DS returns panting and said there's a giant hawk. He said he got scared when a big wing dropped out of the tree.
(Did he mean the hawk's wings were big as it flew out of the tree????)

Sure enough a huge hawk (bigger than my turkey) was sitting in a nearby tree. I commented on the size & DS said wait until you see the wing. The bird flew a couple houses over but could still easily be seen. I agreed that, yes, the hawk had very large wings. DS said "no", grabs my hand, and shows me the "wing."

Yep. There was a big, bloody wing on the ground. The chickens have been locked up all day. I quickly had the kids check the coop to make sure the turkey was present. She was fine. The chickens were all present.

The wing technically fell into the neighbors' yard. They just had a baby & own a dog. The last thing they need is to have their dog start munching on dead animal meat. I had DH collect the wing. The upper wing bone (humerus) was longer than a turkey drumstick!!! My best guess is that the hawk killed a Canadian goose somewhere else and brought it up into our pine tree for snacking.

Couldn't get a good pic, but this is the big hawk. I didn't see a red tail when flying. We gave the laced orps an armed escort when walking from the chicken tractor back to the coop. (We had the dog on a leash with 2 adults & 2 kids all surrounding our precious orps.)
View attachment 1720747 View attachment 1720744 View attachment 1720745

Spoiler: wing pics

I didn't fan out the wing. This is it closed.
View attachment 1720735

DH is 6'5" holding the wing.
View attachment 1720737

@centrarchid what kind of hawk?

 

[Molpet]

Ok. The goose wing is impressive. But the size of that hawk is more so. Dang, hes a big bird! No wonder he got himself a goose! Glad the pros are ok! Is it illegal to shoot a hawk?

federal offense to shoot a hawk.. can involve a fine and jail time.. not worth it

Faraday, I wonder if it had found a road kill and picked up a wing?