INDIANA BYC'ers HERE!

[Mommahiggy]

Did Rosie survive? @LocosHuevos

 

[LocosHuevos]

@Mommahiggy. Sadly no, my sweet Rosie ended up passing in the midnight of the night due to her injuries. Thank you for asking though . Hope all is well on your end.

 

[iamfivewire]

Last year we used some of the heated water bowls & I put a gallon jug of water in the center - it worked out pretty good.
Would look like this :

 

[iamfivewire]

One of the Big Dela-Felder boys :

 

[tmarsh83]

One of the Big Dela-Felder boys :

He's a dandy. I'm getting infatuated with my delawares.

 

[Leahs Mom]

Last year we used some of the heated water bowls & I put a gallon jug of water in the center - it worked out pretty good.
Would look like this :

That's another great way to keep the opening restricted down. I tried doing it that way for awhile too.

 

[Faraday40]

@Faraday40

Do you put our your horizontal nipples year-round? I have mine available year round but find the birds like to drink from the regular waterer better than the horiz...though they can all use it.


Can you discuss for the thread how you trained your birds to use the HN's? What was your process and what kind of time involved for the "slower to get it" birds?

I have mine available in the run year round, but in the spring-summer-fall I also have the standard chicken fountains available throughout the yard. (for free range time) Most chickens will prefer the foutains, but Dec-Feb I really can't risk the frostbite. (My roos get water on their wattles, so when daytime temps avg in the mid 30s, I put them away for a few months.)

As chicks, I use the nipples in the brooder. Keeps water clean & bedding dry. Mine had no problem transitioning from vertical to horiz. Curosity hit as soon as they saw them & then all learned in a matter of 2-5 min.

Funny story: On a hot summer day, I actually had the opposite problem with one group of chicks. They had always used nipples, but I put them into the chicken tractor where I had set up a traditional chick drinker. I checked on them a little while later & all looked overheated..... but none were drinking. At 2.5 weeks old, none had even attempted to take a drink. I actually had to dip their beaks like newly hatched chicks. Poor thirsty, little chicks! It was only that one group. Most of the time, chicks are curious & explore by pecking around.

 

[tmarsh83]

It was bound to happen, the molt has finally shut the two BR down. No eggs from either in over a week. On the bright side, the one has feathers on her rump again, but the other still looks like Tina Turner after a bad nap. Neck and hackle feathers all disheveled. The leghorn though REFUSES TO STOP LAYING EGGS. She's a champ. Can't ever see not having a few leghorns in the bunch. So efficient and dependable.

The rest of the girls haven't found a gear I was hoping they would for laying. I'm getting 6-9 eggs a day, but the last week has been more of the 6. They've been confined to run while our septic system gets replaced, and they seem to be protesting with lowered egg production and sometimes laying in the back corner of the coop rather than the next boxes. Spiteful little dinosaurs...

Starting to think about what I want to add to the group next year. I think I want to get some colored egg layers in the mix, EE, OE, or maybe even some Whiting True Blues if my neighbor wants to split another hatchery order. I'll have three birds going into their third spring next year, and the bulk of my flock going through their first molt, so I need to flatten out the flock structure a bit so i'm not so second-year heavy.

Already planning on adding some (thinking 4) ducks next year as well, so I'll need to sweet talk the wife a little bit for another flock expansion...lol

 

[Mommahiggy]

Sorry to hear that. @LocosHuevos
We have had some tragic things happen with animals over the years too, so I feel for you.

 

[flyladyrocks]

My question is: how're they going to keep track of who has what? My neighbors don't care, and they're all excited at the prospect of eggs. This new law is throwing a wrench in my gears

So, @jchny2000 mentioned me in regard to a post in this string from several weeks ago. Keep meaning to comment.


So here is what I discovered. Okay maybe I should say this is what I believe? The city government made a big show of pretending they actually cared what us, the normal citizens of Indy think about Indy Rezone. The reality is when the city gets a multi million dollar grant from HUD to rezone things, they are going to do whatever the **** they want to do. They really don't care what we think - whether it be about livestock or other crazy nutso things in the rezoning. I guarantee that not one person of the city council even read the whole thing, it is over 700 pages long! It all was a giant political game. Even those who really didn't like big parts of it still voted for it to be passed. I spent a year feeling like we (my hubby and me) were alone in trying to fight it fromt he poultry angle. We just came late to the table. Most of the chicken people had already come to the conclusion that the city really did not care what they thought and it wasn't worth all the time, energy and emotional drama to fight it.

We are grandfathered in. You are lucky to have nice neighbors - but will you always have nice neighbors? We have dream neighbors on one side and a nightmare crazy neighbor on the other. She really is the definition of a bully to us and other neighbors- most who rent and just move. It is an on going battle whether it be over our birds or something else. At least since April 1, they have a guy who actually knows something about poultry who they send out. Nice guy, has chickens and Turkeys. But now we are the unfriendly neighbors with no trespassing signs all over all 4 side of our property - we want to chance that they come on our property without us home. How will they enforce it? The only way they enforce is when there is a complaint. So the guy we drive past almost daily on a main road that has twice as many chickens/ducks/turkeys as we do, and at least half have been added since April 1 (and Turkeys are not even allowed anymore- he has 10 poults), if no-one complains nothing will be done.

Technically if a citizen in Indy was not Grandfathered in, they can get a livestock license. still only a Draft at the bottom of the page: http://www.indy.gov/egov/City/DMD/Current/Pages/ordinance.aspx
We are supposed to be on the committee to help draft this. Not sure if they are just sick of us and stopped inviting us to the meetings or if the fight they have undertaken is way more than they expected, by I think it is the later. Last meeting we were invited to was March 24, but the draft has not changed since then. There was barely a chicken presence there, but the rabbit people were in full force. No-one was happy. I know some of those active in the chicken community were not even invited. There are so many problems with the draft that I do not know even where to begin.

So I feel like we already lost the battle - Rezone went in effect April 1 without our citizens having any clue what it was really about.

Now I'm depressed, I think I will go spend some time with my birdies!