I'm out of control

I mean I'd always liked chickens as much as any other animal but it's grown into more of an obsession over the past decade LOL.
I've been lurking around for a few weeks and finally decided I need to join in on the discussions.

hello, my name is Devery (you can call me Dev). I'm from south Texas and graduated from LSU (geaux tigers) last year, with a BS in animal science. This summer I will begin the process of applying to vet schools, which has been my lifelong goal.

Anyway (here's the long history for those who care), I had my first flock while I was in middle school, after my family moved to our current home out in the country...it was a really great assortment of chickens, some ducks, and guineafowl. Once I started high school I joined the FFA and showed turkeys, but unfortunately the original free-ranging flock was gradually killed off by predators and our dogs, so other than yearly raising a new batch of show turkeys we went without poultry for several years. While in college I took several poultry science courses as part of my degree and competed on the poultry judging team, so I became further interested in the field. FINALLY we were able to get chicks to start anew last spring, just a few months after I graduated and returned home. Unfortunately many chickens were killed by a raccoon last month, before we moved them to the bigger and better new coop. the current flock includes a few red stars, one cuckoo marans, a white silkie, dark cornish, white frizzle cochin, couple of black bantams, and a giant white rooster that's probably jsut a leghorn, along with my brother's turkeys from this year. when spring comes we'll be getting more chicks, ducks, and guineas again. for now my dad has ordered a batch of bantams which will arrive soon, I'm very excited!

along with the poultry I also have dogs, cats, a mare, donkey, mini horse, cockatiel, guinea pig, and 2 goats (which became 4 after the girl kidded last week!) My mini-aussie Axl and munchkin cat Mimi are my babies.

Here are a couple of my favorite pics of the flock: the d'uccle which was lost, the black bantam, marans, and the white frizzle.

 

Thank you so much for the welcome everyone! And for the compliments on my avatar, lol, I love guinea pigs and this has gotta be one of my favorite pics. I'm looking forward to getting involved here, and learning a thing or two.

@Yorkshire coop oh, I really love polish, topknot chicken breeds are my favorites! A frizzled one is doubly cute! I had a couple Polish in the original flock and we'll hopefully be getting some among the new chicks this spring.

@drumstick diva thank you, luckily my parents and I have been hard at work setting up the new coop over the past couple months, it's located in the front yard a bit closer to the house/lights and is much bigger, better and more predator-proof than the old building. It's still a work in progress but since the move the flock has been safe and happy with their new pen and nest boxes, and there are an additional 2 separate sections/stalls of the building which will be used for multi-purpose like brooding chicks or separating birds (right now the goat and her kids are in one). I'll try to get some nice pics eventually!

The first flock from years ago were free-ranging, so the ones not taken by predators were killed for fun by my dad's old lab, Hawk, and occasionally a sneaky neighbor dog. but poor old Hawk passed away a couple years ago, he was the only one of our pets so inclined to kill chickens so we decided it was appropriate to get small poultry again. My mini aussie and my dad's full-size aussie do occasionally chase bantams if we don't keep an eye on them, which we're working to control, but the black bantam rooster really knows how to keep them in line LOL.

Here's a pic of the goat kids, they were born on the 4th! mom is a boer cross and their dad is a fainting goat. They are little cuties and already look like they've grown.