INDIANA BYC'ers HERE!

[hbrown322]

Found little Smaug, my Bourbon poult in the alley behind my house. Looked like she may have been hit in the side by a passing car, a boot, or some other relatively large object. Still alive, but she's not going to make it. She's such a sweet, friendly girl, and she loves to cuddle, so I'm holding her for the last time now, and I'm bawling my eyes out. 

*edit* At 6:30, she passed away. She was such a trooper.

So sorry!!!

 

[hbrown322]

Well my chicks have made it to 6 weeks old! Chicken Noodle (silver laced polish), Chicken n' Waffles (Speckled sussex) & Chicken Nugget (Blue Ameracuana) (My previous flock had been attacked by raccoons at 5 weeks, so from here on out it'll all be new to me! We had a party over the weekend and I made the chicks a pretty hefty salad out of scraps. They LOVED it! They are starting to come to me when I call for them, which is pretty cool.

 

[Faraday40]

Well my chicks have made it to 6 weeks old! Chicken Noodle (silver laced polish), Chicken n' Waffles (Speckled sussex) & Chicken Nugget (Blue Ameracuana) (My previous flock had been attacked by raccoons at 5 weeks, so from here on out it'll all be new to me! We had a party over the weekend and I made the chicks a pretty hefty salad out of scraps. They LOVED it! They are starting to come to me when I call for them, which is pretty cool.

Cute pics & love the names!

My fav way to begin training is to just sit in the grass with treats & let them come to me. All chickens love treats, so they'll be crawling all over you in a very short time. I call out when I have something for them, so whenever I do, I'm covered with chickens in a few seconds.

 

[pipdzipdnreadytogo]

Great news! Poison Ivy can be a horrible risk for us! I am lucky enough to not be allergic but several family members are.
Bocephus (our goat buck) is working the tree lines for us. We opened another 1/2 acre of pasture this weekend. Bo goes in first to remove the poison ivy and other plants that's risky for humans/other livestock. Goats are immune to it, and really love to eat it. He will not touch the pokeweed plants, poison to most everything but birds. I cut those out and pour salt on them before anything goes on new pasture. More info here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phytolacca_americana

I have seen my adult chickens eat the berries and not get sick, but am not risking it. I had a turkey tom eat berries off a burning bush and die last year. Removed all of them! Same with Japanese Yew we have a few more to remove. Brings up a good point, will post more on that subject.

My girls will fly up and pluck the pokeweed berries off the plant, then spit them out and walk off. I guess it's just their tastes. I've even seen a pullet fly up, pluck a berry, spit it out, and repeat once or twice before realizing they're all the same.

It's funny to me, up here we have a myriad of names for that plant. Poke berry, choke cherry, choke berry, etc. I don't know if I've ever heard of it being called pokeweed before. We see a handful of them here, but not very many. I've never bothered with removing it, but I've never had anything but birds out there where they might eat some!

Found little Smaug, my Bourbon poult in the alley behind my house. Looked like she may have been hit in the side by a passing car, a boot, or some other relatively large object. Still alive, but she's not going to make it. She's such a sweet, friendly girl, and she loves to cuddle, so I'm holding her for the last time now, and I'm bawling my eyes out. 

*edit* At 6:30, she passed away. She was such a trooper.

So sorry, Indyshent.

If anyone is interested I have one Bielefelder pair for sale, about 10 days old. I will have BBS Orp chicks by probable sex in a few weeks. I already have some cockerels identified. Dad is a massive blue English Orp and the two hens are Fancy Chick/Gisbrecht English girls. Very nice babies that I hatched for jchny2000 and myself with lots to spare! My last 5 eggs are about to hatch, more Orps, these out of Cogburn Junior and my best lavender hen. It's a genetics experiment to see whether Junior is split to lavender. I hope not, but need to know. Hoping for black and blue Orps split to lavender and no actual lavender chicks. Suspense!!

Don't tempt me with those Bieles... How's the Dorking search going?

Well my chicks have made it to 6 weeks old! Chicken Noodle (silver laced polish), Chicken n' Waffles (Speckled sussex) & Chicken Nugget (Blue Ameracuana) (My previous flock had been attacked by raccoons at 5 weeks, so from here on out it'll all be new to me! We had a party over the weekend and I made the chicks a pretty hefty salad out of scraps. They LOVED it! They are starting to come to me when I call for them, which is pretty cool.

Cuties! They're getting big! My babies are 9 weeks old now, hard to believe they were ever even as small as yours are now. Especially when they fight over my lap and claw up my legs!

 

[pipdzipdnreadytogo]

Anyone here heard of fly strike? I had a crash course in it last night with one of my red sexlink girls, Skua. I had noticed she was acting pretty glum, and last night she didn't perch so I looked her over. If you've never heard of fly strike, you may not understand the sheer disgust and horror I experienced upon finding it on her. Believe me, this is something you need to be aware of and know what to do with in an emergency! Just be aware that it's totally gross.

So Skua had a bath and we trimmed away all of the feathers around her wound and packed it with Betadine ointment (Betadine solution was suggested by one site, but we only had the ointment). This morning, she has no signs of fly strike in the wound that it caused, so now it's just a matter of healing, I hope.



I mentioned a while back that one of my Speckled Sussex, Poggy, had been ill; she's been in my room being treated but was all alone for about a week. A couple nights ago, my little Golden Sebright, Rosie, came down with the same symptom (yep, just one it's a chicken thing), so I brought her inside to be treated as well. Now Skua's up there, too, so I guess Poggy's not going to be lonely anymore! I had to have a stern talking to with her about sharing with Rosie, though, as she was looking like she was going to be aggressive.

"Sharing? What's that?"

 

[river46201]

Found little Smaug, my Bourbon poult in the alley behind my house. Looked like she may have been hit in the side by a passing car, a boot, or some other relatively large object. Still alive, but she's not going to make it. She's such a sweet, friendly girl, and she loves to cuddle, so I'm holding her for the last time now, and I'm bawling my eyes out. 

*edit* At 6:30, she passed away. She was such a trooper.

So sorry...i've seen several hens & roosters running the alley over the last few days near your house. Never sure WHO they belong to tho. Thought you'd built a run & coop for yours to keep them enclosed & safe, so thought they must be someone else's. So sorry to hear that one was yours.
Maybe you could let me know at [email protected] when you are missing any, so I can keep an eye out?

 

[Greenthumb83]

Well my chicks have made it to 6 weeks old! Chicken Noodle (silver laced polish), Chicken n' Waffles (Speckled sussex) & Chicken Nugget (Blue Ameracuana) (My previous flock had been attacked by raccoons at 5 weeks, so from here on out it'll all be new to me! We had a party over the weekend and I made the chicks a pretty hefty salad out of scraps. They LOVED it! They are starting to come to me when I call for them, which is pretty cool.

Happy milestone day! They grow too fast!

 

[Greenthumb83]

I have been without internet for almost week. Our internet antenna got struck by lightning.

This weather has been nuts!

So we are at that point where we want to start nest stalking for eggs, but I know it will be a while yet. My BRs, BOs, and EEs are 17 weeks now, but I checked several for pelvic bone width and it seems like they are nowhere close. My australorps are only 15 weeks and a couple have been red in the comb for like 2 weeks already. I checked the one that is the most matured and her pelvic bones are farther apart than the older girls, but I still bet we don't see an egg for a few more weeks at least. Anyone else check the pelvic bones? What kind of width am I looking for at close to POL? I can't help but be excited!

 

[Faraday40]

My chicks (Spitzhauben & RIR) that hatched March 13th are getting red combs but no eggs yet. Some of the ones I sold have reported back & I hear they are laying. My orps will take much longer, so I'm not holding my breath.

 

[Indyshent]

Hatching started yesterday from the four broody nests. Lots of squabbling between the ladies and much piracy of nests, eggs, and babies, so I took the surviving babies away and fired up the giant tote brooder again. Lost as many as have successfully hatched so far. I blame in part one particular broody pooping in her nest box, but mostly problems owing to the weather. With as humid as it's been, I don't understand why I'm getting so many shrink-wrapped babies. So far, most are clean-legged which makes them Breda, Marans, Welsummer, buff Orp and/or EE, with full-blooded Breda and EE possible (even likely, when one considers the overwhelming number of EE on the premises, and the fact of EEs being mutts anyway). Three so far are blue, which means the're definitely EE with the blue (cream?) light brown EE/Sumatra for their daddy.

Found a crumpled twenty while doing laundry, and I think some of you might know how tempting it was to sneak off and get two of those blue Palms from the seller in Middletown, seeing as how I just fired up the brooder anyway. Really missing Curly and Smaug. The other poults will wander off sometimes and lost call, but I think they're adapting pretty quickly, all things considered, to the sudden disappearance of two life-long buddies.

Major Tom is getting more protective of the remaining poults, I think, I'm not sure if it was due to the darkness or what, but the EE/Sumatra tried to mount Hershey the Chocolate poult, and Major ran him out of Dodge