INDIANA BYC'ers HERE!

[Faraday40]

You could come up with a family version and offer chicken classes for $20 a family wanting to start out in chickens.

I teach home school science classes in my house & also offer Park District classes. I've done a lot with poultry in my science classes & it's also a good way to sell off any extra eggs at the end of the week. With the park district, it's hit or miss. I either get a lot of interest or my class gets cancelled. I target kids but always welcome parents to stay for the fun. In fact, I think the parents sometimes get more excited to see a chick hatch than the kids. My daughter has become the chicken expert at her school. Now she's getting some invitations to appear with chickens at misc. events around town. Our hen was even asked to be in a high school play! LOL When I go to a preschool or do a classroom presentation at her school, I try to bring her as my assistant. It's nice to have an extra set of hands to carry in all the boxes & her quick reflexes if needed.

 

[SallyinIndiana]

Just placed my order with Ideal! Decided to go with their red broilers. Anyone ever try these over cornish cross?

I wanted too but not 25. Then I'll hatch enough rooster to keep my freezer full so the need for any broilers goes away. And I can't tell you how many times I looked at the special over the past few weeks.

 

[bradselig]

I wanted too but not 25.  Then I'll hatch enough rooster to keep my freezer full so the need for any broilers goes away.  And I can't tell you how many times I looked at the special over the past few weeks.

I ordered 25 broilers (15 for brother and 10 for me), 20 bantam cochins (should get at least 2-4 decent pullets right? We will see!), 10 production reds for my brother, and a couple lf cochins for a neighbor. I'm excited to try the broilers and might keep a couple to see how they breed.

 

[Chaneys Ranch]

I got an Excalibur for Christmas... Yay! (Dehydrator for the un-initiated.)

Thought just struck me... Wonder if you could use it as an incubator?

OOOOOoooOOO congrats! We use ours a lot. DH makes tons of beef jerky, I have dried fruits and used to make fruit roll ups when my kids were little.
If its got precise control of temps, I bet so!

morning everyone...hope everyone had a good weekend...

id say on the frostbite issue...let nature do its thing...if you put oils on petroleum jelly on the birds then it invites dust and dirt and such to stick to the bird....so a lot of time is does more harm then good...birds like to take dirt baths....when there throwing the dirt, sand, or snow...it will stick to the bird where the oils were applied...not to mention you have to reapply the oils every like three days....so I just let my birds do there own thing..mother nature didn't give the birds oils back in the day....and they did perfectly fine...yes some breeds like the leghorns are more apt to get it....but as long as your humidity is down and you have good ventilation then it should be minimal on how much frostbite a bird get...

Good post! I tried the prevention, it did more harm than good. I have 2 boys, a leghorn roo who fights nonstop thats got a badly frostbitten comb, and is a tree dweller. Bruce my BA roo I noticed has some on the tips of his comb too, but its a huge comb. Bruce was confined in a plastic dog crate for 2 weeks (again) and that may be the reason. None of my other guys, even my SLW Gus with a HUGE comb, and his son Cricket II whose is as big has any problem at all. Waddles, Bruce has just the outer curl showing some signs. All my hens and the rest of the roosters look great!
My 2 oldest muscovy drakes are showing possible frostbite on the knobs. Expected, they dunk nonstop to keep nasal passages clear and groom. My Lavender was lightly frostbit last year too, and my chocolate drake, they healed fine. I feel thats the key, provide the best possible conditions we can, and let nature manage the rest.

 

[Chaneys Ranch]

Quote: Yes, I love them! Bakers creek has so many interesting things I can look for hours.

the gardening bug has hit here i've ordered and received my seeds next step is figuring out dates to start indoor germination on some as my garden outline was figured out in the fall. this year on tomatoes most of them are yellow variety as we felt out of the ones we had last year the yellows made the best sauce. my experimental seed this year i'm trying to grow is artichokes. i'm also hoping the fruit trees i planted this fall survive. i could go on and on about all of my gardening plans but it's safe to say i'm looking forward to spring lol i'm a little jealous that i can't join the sharing when everyone mentions new chicks and their plans. because where i live i can't have new chicks as we are allowed only 6 hens in my city but there is no restrictions on my garden and i can change it every year

I will absolutely do more corn, we have about 30 ears left. OH my, Dad loves it! I told DH figure 2x the plot for this season. I plan to garden about an acre this year.

Totally forgot I tucked an egg in my sweatshirt pocket! Geez!

UGH sometimes I just cry! I forget I have them in a pocket too. I put a LO egg in the washer since my coveralls were muddy and smelly. Remembered sometime after the rinse cycle

I've caught the Spring Bug as well. I'm putting the finishing touches on my coop blueprints and am going to figure out what I want to put in my small garden plot my dad might give me.

Hope to have some Grape and Cherry tomatoes and Bell peppers and a bunch of other good things.

I've been asked to take a few of my chickens to a friend's preschool/daycare. I've never done a show and tell sort of thing before however, I am excited to be able to. I just want to see what you seasoned chicken herders have to say? I'm currently trying to make a few chicken diapers for the young rooster and hen I plan to take. I don't want them pooping on the little kids.

Does anyone have any tips or dotted lines I should follow? Most all my birds are friendly though sometimes they get a bit flighty they don't peck hard or attack; I am going to have diapers on them and well, I can't think of anything I might need to know other than these precautions.

Choose your sweetest lovey bird. Spoil her rotten the next few days, carry her around. She will do fine.

 

[Chaneys Ranch]

Okay...couldn't find any photos from that particular gal, but here is another lady that took chickens out in public. She has 2 different names on the forum because she had a problem w/her computer and ended up making a second name because she couldn't get the first to work!

It's a great story of how she found John the Red abandoned at the fair and rescued and trained him to do the reenactments with her. Later in his story, she got him some ladies and began raising chickens again.

Her forum names are @Mumsy and @MumsyII

This thread shows some photos of her out with one of her chickens: https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/720483/new-from-the-puget-sound#post_9876869

I'm hoping she'll notice that I tagged her and stop in and tell us about how to do some kind of a chicken harness. You could also search through some of her posts to see if there are any other photos.

Here are a couple of her photos copied from that thread and a note about the harness:


Quote: https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/720483/new-from-the-puget-sound#post_9876869

@FlockMaster-614

Amazing smile she had! You cant tell she cared very much about that fella. I bet she was a wonderful person to know.

night everyone...had a bad day one of my favorite chickens is sick ...shes inside and I have been tube feeding her....grr..I hope she pulls thru

@birdman55 hope she pulls through, I am so sorry to hear it.

 

[Chaneys Ranch]

Just placed my order with Ideal! Decided to go with their red broilers. Anyone ever try these over cornish cross?

No, but I have met another keeper that only buys them. Had like 8 tractors full, 25 birds each so they must be something to look at. I do have a CX hen (LilX) that will be 3 in July! And yes, her eggs hatch and are flat huge. She lays a double yolker often so I rarely hatch her eggs anymore. I have bred mixed cross birds from her with my GLW, the offspring grew slower but the size was impressive in the roos by 4 months.

Quote:

Awesome! I used to get involved in 4H and scouts to help teach farming and animal care. I did classes on predators as well, with live skunks, opossum and raccoons. The parents are truly sometimes more interested than the kids! Hands on experiences will correct so many common beliefs. Also wakes the parent to the reality of daily care.

 

[Chaneys Ranch]

So here we go with another cold snap! -0- degrees for Tomorrow. I did extra bedding in all my coops, we did another water change an hour before dark. Stay warm and safe. In our area they are predicting black ice. is expected to be -0-
off to bed, nite everyone

 

[Faraday40]

UGH sometimes I just cry! I forget I have them in a pocket too. I put a LO egg in the washer since my coveralls were muddy and smelly. Remembered sometime after the rinse cycle

oh my! That's a new one. Here it's DH that puts all kinds of things in his pockets. So many post it notes from work, flash drives, and of course the dreaded tissue - always shredded to pieces in a load of darks!

 

[PeacefulWalls]

Yes, I'm getting the SPRING bug, too! Right now, my bug is not for chickens, but for gardening.

Depending upon what we do with the tomatoes (canning, sun drying, sauce, paste, salsa, fresh eating, etc) we find that we prefer different kinds for different uses.


I tried a few new varieties last year but we still haven't found the perfect the paste/sauce tomato or cherry tomato for us yet. I have a few books on heirloom varieties, and I've settled on about a dozen new varieties to try.

We really like the taste of the 'purple' tomato Paul Robeson, but last years' yield was a little low. This year, I want to try Eva Purple Ball and a few different beefsteaks for fresh eating.

I can't resist trying to grow at least one huge tomato variety. Last year we had several large tomatoes from our Gold Medal plant. They were really yummy, and most of them were about 1 1/2 pounds. The largest was a little over 2 pounds. I'm still planning to grow the Gold Medal this year, but I also plant to try Omar's Lebanese this year.

"Gold Medal" variety tomatoes


We like the red Riesentraube cherry tomatoes, and they do great in Indiana summers. I want to try something a bit different, smaller, more sweet tasting. Ironically, I settled on a tomato from Indiana, and turns out it's one of the hardest varieties to find. It is from an area called Broad Ripple. I looked high and low for seeds for the Broad Ripple Currant tomato. I FINALLY found it yesterday.
They are very small yellow cherry tomatoes. Here's what it will look like:

We're also going to try Black Cherry variety. Those seeds were easier to find. This is what it will look like:


Anybody else find themselves browsing the SeedSavers or Baker's Creek Seeds catalogue? It's almost time to order seeds!

Love the Paul Robesons also -- any purple/black tomato actually! I've grown the black cherries a number of years now and love them. They are very sweet -- a totally different taste when you eat one right after eating a red cherry. I've found you need to pick them as soon as they start to turn or they crack as they fully ripen on the vine. I hadn't heard of the Gold Medal variety, but it looks a lot like the pineapple variety -- similar color and size -- it was great to get those huge tomatoes! Always Baker Creek for me -- I've lost track how many years I've been ordering from them.

Hi everyone! Starting to look forward to Spring!

I am going to start adding light and get the flocks divided again this week. So I could potentially start collecting Bielie eggs in a few weeks if anyone is interested. I figure we should start getting stretches of decent weather around then! PM me for pricing if you are interested. I will also have green/olive egger eggs available if anyone is interested in a colorful egg basket. They will be Isbar/Bielie mix so should be a decent size bird. Right now I am just looking at hatching eggs but I may hatch some chicks as we get closer to Spring.

Information on Bielefelders. Bielefelders are a very large dual purpose bird. Roosters get up to 13 lbs and hens reach 8 lbs. They are an autosexing breed and a very good layer of jumbo brown eggs. My Bielies lay a darker brown egg with brown speckles, very similar in color to my hatchery welsummer hen. They are said to lay around 220 eggs a year and are known for being great winter layers (I've been getting about 10 eggs a week out of the two mature Bielie hens and have two pullets that should start laying any day). They are also very docile and inquisitive, known to be gentle giants.






Isbar egg

I'd love to have some chicks, but have no incubator at this point. Will you be hatching & selling chicks too?

Yes. We're definitely longing for spring & getting back outside.

Does anyone have info on "winter sowing" ? I read about it last year on one of the BYC threads. Basically, you start putting soil & seeds in all kinds of plastic containers like milk jugs. Put them outside & let snow fall, melt, etc. Because the seeds are in mini greenhouses they sprout sooner & there's no need to harden. I'd like to try it for my tomatoes. (We get so many wild ones that if this experiment grew nothing, we'd still be OK.)

I've read about this, too, but don't remember where. Haven't tried it, but would assume it would work -- can't be different than the volunteers that come up on their own each year.

Totally forgot I tucked an egg in my sweatshirt pocket! Geez!

Yep -- of course my husband smooshed his in his barn coat pocket right after I just washed his coat. Better that, though, than having the whole egg go through the wash cycle!

I ordered 25 broilers (15 for brother and 10 for me), 20 bantam cochins (should get at least 2-4 decent pullets right? We will see!), 10 production reds for my brother, and a couple lf cochins for a neighbor. I'm excited to try the broilers and might keep a couple to see how they breed.

I keep wanting to do broilers and every year think that this will be the year -- just haven't figured out how to house them. I'd like to order Freedom Rangers from Pennsylvania (Freedom Ranger Hatchery). There supposed to grow a bit slower, but do really well free ranging instead of being glued to a feeder. They're supposed to hit their peak weight of 5 - 6 pounds in 9 - 11 weeks. I just need to make it happen this summer. It's been a long time since we've eaten chicken because I refuse to buy it from the grocery store!