Kentucky people

if you want I can look up their number and you can get some prices and see if it would be woth the trip.......have you asked around at the swap to see where everyone else buys their feed?
Off to bed......I must be getting older, 8:30 and I am ready for bed.
 
Well, I guess I put all of this on Facebook and forgot to put it here
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One of our new calves died on us - it got sick VERY fast and died the next day (today) in spite of everything we tried. (it's not one of the twins, they are fine)

Well, the guy doesn't want to replace him, but we did cut a deal with him to buy calves at 30% cheaper than what we were paying. I truly believe that he did not know the calf was sick, and I have other calves from him who are just fine. His calves are usually HUGE babies and very healthy - not sure what went wrong with this one - he seemed to just get sick and die within 24 hours - it happens like that sometimes. Yes, the calf must have been sick when we got it, but it didn't look or act sick. It wasn't here long enough to contract anything from our farm. All I can figure is that it had the cocci and it was perhaps not the strongest to begin with, so it just couldn't fight it off even with medications.

The poor baby literally went from eating, pooping and running around fine in the morning to pooping blood clots that evening to being dead the next noon. I was amazed how it happened so fast. We have had other calves get cocci and we treated them and they came out of it just fine - and it never hit them so hard or fast as this one did.

Anyway, I dosed all of the others because they were in adjacent stalls (and they all suck on each other's faces and noses after eating
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) so I am hoping they will not get the cocci, also.

All I can figure on this calf is that the mother had mastitis, so they left him on her for a full week - and perhaps the medicines she had been given messed up his gut flora or intestinal lining so he couldn't fight off the cocci and it just hit him really hard.

It sucks, but that's the risk you take with bottle babies, I guess.

meri
 
Meri -- so sorry about the calf.... A pygmy buckling we got did something similar -- was fine in the morning and by midnight was dead.... We even took him to the vet and he said he had Pnumonia but I didn't really believe that... even with meds he didn't turn around... it is sad when one passes.... If you only had the little guy a couple of days, I can't see why the guy wouldn't provide you with a new one.... That would just seem the right thing to do....


Mrs. Turbo -- Please - Please provide the name and phone #.... I really need to cut my costs down and even if it means a bit of a drive, if the prices are that much better it would be worth the gas....

Thanks ever so much!!
 
Yesterday the dark Cornish hen who had gone broody was off her nest and out of the cardboard box, so I went over to investigate. She wasn't happy with me getting close to her cage, growled at me, halfway stood up and started waddleing away. I then could see five then six then a seventh chick fell from benieth her wing as she moved away.

Seven chicks is the best any broody hen has done for me and such a young one this late in the year causes me to think this hen might be special. I don't really have anyplace to let her and the chicks run around in as all my spaces are currently taken. For now they will just have to stay in the three foot square brooder cage I had made for her.

Sorry about your calf Meri.
 
Ok, either I'm getting old and senile, or I have a HUGE mystery on my hands.

I seperated the chickens a couple of weeks ago or so. I was sure everyone was head counted and was where they ought to be.

Today I noticed I hadn't seen my blue cochin pullet (the LF) in awhile - so I looked high and low for her. They are locked up in two coops with two runs that connect and are open to each other (for now).

There is absolutely no sign of this chicken anywhere - no sign of distress or being taken by a pred, and I've been so darn busy I have no idea when she dissapeared.

She isn't the type to sneak out the door when I open it to feed. There are no holes in or under the chicken runs, and no preds that got inside, unless a rat may have gotten in and eaten her entirely feathers and all with no sign of blood or feathers left.

It is possible that she wasn't there when I seperated everyone - in which case she was taken by an outdoor pred before I locked them up. I was sure she was there, though.

Then again, it is also possible that I looked right at her 20 times this morning and didn't see her there
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I'll have to look again tonight when they go to roost.

weird.

eta - this girl was POL so not a baby pullet

meri
 
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I love mama hens with babies
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One of my BO girls is trying to be a first time mama - hers are due Thanksgiving day. She's been very good about sitting on the eggs, hasn't really messed up except for a half a day on like day 2 - so I'm not overly worried. She switched nests on day two so I took the two eggs in that nest and put her back on her other nest - she hasn't switched since. I only have 6 eggs under her.

meri
 
My hen would get off the nest to eat drink and poop and then with eight other hens and only three nests usually another hen would get on her nest and try laying an egg. Well the poor thing wanted to set so badly she would take the first nest available with eggs and set on that one. After finding her switching nests about three times I had to throw away about two dozen eggs of unknown quality. So I built her this three by three cage and put a cardboard box in it with her own water and feed and the few eggs that she was currently setting on plus a few extra from that day. Well they all hatched except for one a couple of days ago that pipped and died that she culled. Over all I think she sat on eggs for at least four weeks.

Well now I have a brooder cage that I can seperate any hen who shows broody tendancies.
 
Explain to me this mystery.... How do hens steal eggs from other nests?? I have 8 nesting boxes 4 on bottom and 4 on top. One of my girls always uses the same box and then Sunshine started to go broody and I'd notice an egg in the other nesting box in the morning and by evening Sunshine was sitting on it....

These are two of the top boxes with a box inbetween them and no way to go from box to box except out the front to the ground..... It's about 14 inches up to the upper nesting box... how'd she do it??

I've seen Turkeys steal eggs from nest to nest by using their beaks and wings.....but these were nests on the ground....
 
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