INDIANA BYC'ers HERE!

[raisinemright]

Finally got all our chickens to our new home. Painted the new coop last night, it rained and washed a little area away. No big deal will touch up later. Built a roost lastnight may build a second one today. They need it. Just set the temp run up for them and they love to be outside. I'll have to put the nesting box in today! But here is a couple pics

Still need to paint trim also

 

[PeacefulWalls]

excuse the messy countertop. ..it's a norm around here!! But this is the harvested Ambrosia. .mmm mmm good!

looks wonderful!! ours isn't going to amount to much this year

 

[PeacefulWalls]

Still waiting on ours.

the couple I've picked weren't quite done yet. Although I tried planting an heirloom variety which doesn't quite look like the picture from the catalog so that might be part of the problem

Is it bad I'm planning next years garden already?

I'm with you on planning for next year -- there were a number of things that occurred to me yesterday out in the garcen that I'm going to do differently. I just wish we wouldn't have to wait for an entire year to start over again!!

 

[iamfivewire]

@Thriftymom6 : Great deal on the GMO-free id have to stock up on a truckload tho for the fuel cost to get there & back if i went to buy some

 

[Thriftymom6]

@Thriftymom6
  : Great deal on the GMO-free   id have to stock up on a truckload tho for the fuel cost to get there & back if i went to buy some 

I hear you! If I was still transporting kids to camp up in Michigan I could have brought u some it's not far from the state line. If coming down through three rivers or sturgis. Maybe half hour from Lagrange or maybe a tad longer from middlebury. It's in the country on the north side of Topeka. It's worth it to me I worry about the health of the environment and my family. Plus, I was paying $17 for regular at TSC! It is a crumble. And they have regular for $9 a bag. It has corn, kelp and other products. Plant protein and I do not believe there is soy but I will ask next time. They mix their own.

 

[goatluver20]

Whew! Fair stuff is finally over for us after a pretty intense 3 weeks. I've feel like I've been gone away from home & from here forever! There's a lot of stuff piled up to do, weeds are all over the garden again and...yes...a couple of RED tomatoes!!! After a few days to catch our breath after county fair we headed down to state fair this past weekend. Chloe gave her rabbit illustrated talk on Food for Freedom -- How Rabbits helped to Win the War (WWII). She was able to do a power point with it (at least half the kids are using technology now instead of posters) and the WWII poster images we had found looked great for the presentation. A lot of people mentioned that they never knew the government had such a program to encourage people to raise their own meat rabbits and chickens. Oh -- and she took Champion in her age division which also earned her a 4-H achievement award trip to Washington DC in October!! She placed 5th in the Rabbit Ambassador contest. She's kicking herself after looking at the scores of the top 5 people. 3rd, 4th & 5th place all had the same score (not sure how they decided to place them). The champion & reserve spots were only a couple points higher. She realized if she had answered 1 particular question on Breed ID differently she could have placed Champion! She's still very happy with how she did. I wore my BYC t-shirt on Sunday, but no one came up to say Hi! Guess that means either none of you were there or you didn't see me or you saw me & I scared you away!!

Now we're getting ready for school to start on Thursday (waaaayyyy too early), but maybe I'll be able to finally focus on my stuff instead of all the kids' things for a change, although....I told Chloe she couldn't start driver's ed until all her fair projects were done....Yikes! it's here now!!

Wow that is awesome! I got to learn some about the achievement award trip at one of the things I did at purdue. It sounds really neat. Tell me how it goes for her My two projects that went to state got blue.

 

[pginsber]

Here is one of my favorite guys we hatched that is a mix of NHR and Easter egger. I call him Elvis.

Is Elvis THIS GUY? He looks just like this picture! I found it somewhere--probably on this website--and have kept it as a computer desktop background because it makes me smile.

 

[pginsber]

I believe Cher was sold as a sizzle because there are some pretty obvious Silkie traits there. Sizzles are, from my understanding, silkied or silkie split frizzles and usually a cross between a Silkie and a frizzled Cochin. The fifth toe and feathered legs are traits of Silkies, but the crest that this bird has is more like one of a Polish. So my guess would be that this bird is a cross between a frizzled Polish and a Silkie. I don't know if that is still considered a Sizzle, but if it's a first-generation cross, all offspring would be split to silkie feathering.

I'm also actually somewhat surprised this hasn't been pointed out yet, but Cher is a boy. His red shoulder patches and pointed saddle feathers are masculine traits. Generally, the only females that have red shoulders are reddish overall. Females tend to have even patterns overall, while boys are patchy, especially early on.


ETA 2 things, here. I really don't know anything about sizzles and frizzles as a breed, just the genetics behind them, so sorry if I'm mistaken about what makes a sizzle a sizzle. Also, the stuff about masculine and feminine traits are not limited to sizzles or frizzles, and a lot of that I picked up from sexing Easter-eggers, but it holds true for most if not all breeds.

Just wanted to clarify there.

SHHHHHHH!!! We're not telling Cher she's a boy. We're going to let her lay eggs instead of crow!

You're exactly right. The parents are a frizzled cochin and a silkie with a very puffy top hat and beard. You're awesome with the bird genetics!

 

[pipdzipdnreadytogo]

Anyone else have a molting flock already? My girls are losing feathers left and right and are moody as all get out as a result! I'm having to break up squabbles all over the place! Luckily, for the most part, they're just looking scruffy. My Fayoumi, Marama, is about bare, though. I'm just glad she's doing this now instead of later on!

Since I'm here, here's some of the rest of the flock. Betty looking scruffy:

Debra Jo with her evil eye:

Poggy, my Speckled Sussex. She and her sister are so loud when they're in the nest!

Red sexlink, Skua. She always looks so surprised when I take her picture.

Exchequer Leghorn, Roha! She's not doing anything suspicious!

My Dorking twins, Kit-Kit and Elda! They're waiting for cuddles.

Violet the Bielefelder. This is probably as close as I've gotten to capturing her colors in a picture. She's so pretty!

Louise the dainty Black Copper Marans and her pretty eyes

Welsummer Mabel standing in the new pop door. I now have a more permanent chick yard that's against the fence for the big girl yard, and this pop door leads from the little yard into the coop via the addition we built last year.

Here's the new pop door from the outside. Avert your eyes if you don't like messy painting.

And the other project mom and I got done in the past few weeks, the new nests!

Next project is the duck coop. Speaking of, I don't know if I mentioned it here or not, but I've got 5 quitters and only one viable embryo out of my 18 call duck eggs. :/ Looks like I'll be shopping for more ducks in the future.

 

[pipdzipdnreadytogo]

SHHHHHHH!!!   We're not telling Cher she's a boy.  We're going to let her lay eggs instead of crow! 

Oops! Don't let Cher read my posts!!