Well Mojo and Shelleyd, I see you two have been hijacking this thread so I thought I would stop lurking and interject a little about the life of my chickens as well.
Well my bator is full with about 20 eggs and 5 bantam eggs. I will candle in about a week to pull the DNDs. (Did not Develope) I don't expect any of the bantams to be fertile as they have been apart for a week because of the State Fair.
Yesterday I took my 18 four week olds out and put them in my old tractor for the evening. That tractor needs a lot of work, it is falling apart. I had to use the rubber tarp that I protect the lawn mower just to cover the top of the thing. Any critter that would want to get to the chicks, could have just walked on it and it would have fallen in. That evening I went to take them in and I saw a small young possum run behind the main coop. Got to get it fixed.
In the main coop I have two older roos that are on crock pot alert. I need to alert my crock pot and move them out so that I can put these four week olds in there by themselves. I have about 20 one week olds that are in the small brooder. In about one week they will need to be moved to the large brooder where the four week olds are now.
My Bantam roo and hen are making too much noise to stay in the house anymore. He crows loudly and she goes around trilling all the time. Kind of like a 13 year old girl going through menarche.
I got another small egg from her yesterday. Bantam eggs and the bantams themselves are both too small to eat. I find them too much of a bother to raise for food. I guess that is why they have ended up more as pets than anything.
Before taking him to the State Fair I thought he was a perfect little guy. But now I see that "fault" on the side of his comb all the time. His feathers are fine, soft and silkie smooth. Silkie chickens have fuzzy silkie where as his are smooth and silkie.
Well I found out why the little hen was trilling so much... the roo was in one of her hidey boxes. I have no idea why but when I got him out they were fine and went outside together.
I got some poison ivy on my arm the other day. Just a couple of small drops the size of mosquito bites. They are just big enough to be irritating, but not a problem big enough to get any medication.
My Dark Cornish are 22 weeks of age and I have at least one hen who lays an egg about every third or so day. I know because their eggs are a dull flat white in color. All my other hens lay brown eggs. The Cornish are a flighty bunch; I dont care to get in amongst them as they panic and run around trying to hurt them selves. But I need to feed and water them and check for eggs, so I guess they need the exercise.
I am somewhat disappointed in how slowly they are growing. I think I am doing something wrong. Lets see the Cornish-Xs take eight weeks. The Colored rangers take about 12 weeks. And a normal fryer chicken should take about 16 weeks. So at 22 weeks these girls should be prime grilling material if they dont start laying. But they look small.
Ive been told that Cornish have tight fitting feathers and weight more than they look. Perhaps I should try to catch some and weigh them. ( I look around for the source of a low groan and realize that it came from myself)
My Delcorns are doing well and I have been hatching out many of their eggs lately. Delcorns are a cross between a Cornish roo and Delaware hens. About one in 4 of the roo cross turns out to be a large Delaware roo with a small Cornish comb and a pleasant personality. I dont like the Delaware roo Personality (too aggressive) and I dont care for the Cornish roos personality very much either. (too skittish).
Also about a fourth of the hens turn out to be fairly large and have good personalities so I thought that I would breed them to see what I get. Most likely they will be just mutts. But at 4 weeks I can tell the difference in some of them. If I cull hard I may end up with a good chicken for eating that has a good personality. (Might as well enjoy your meal before you eat it)
My Jerseys are
well there. The Cornish are in with them so they run when I come by. Ive been hatching out some F-3s and hope that they will have some nice red feathering in them. Right now they all seem to be black with some hint of brown and are mostly roos.
The Jersey Roo that I have needs to go. He is LOUD with a capital L.
Well folks
this has been my update from Lexington. I hope to get off work for Shelleyds chickenstock. If I get to come, I will be the one curled up sleeping as I will be working all night the night before. Hope to see youall there.
then I thought --- Mail, dummy!! Well, hatch them out and maybe at Chickenstock someone will buy some to raise up since they'll be tasting that delicious quail I'll be grilling up.
