Hello Everyone!
I am back! Not sure if anyone remembers me, but I joined BYC around 2003 (give or take) right around when I was starting middle school. My username was Pocketpooch6. Unfortunately I lost my password and email, so I had to make a new username. I joined BYC back then because I was next to clueless about chickens, and I wanted to soak up as much information as I could from the experienced members so that I could one day be prepared to raise my own. Of course, I was obsessed with chickens, and stayed up every night in "Chicken Chat" asking questions.
Several Christmas Eves went by where I had just one item on my list for Santa: Black Breasted Red Modern Game Fowl. After that was unsuccessful for the first few years, I decided to write at the bottom, "If you don't bring me chickens this year, don't bother bringing me any other presents." LOL. That year I got a Playstation 2 instead. I was so angry that I vowed never to play with it, so it sat for years collecting dust before we moved it to the attic.
Finally I did end up getting chickens from the fair one year. For my mom, it was one of those 'awwwe, how cute!' moments that cloud your better judgement, but for me it was the best decision ever! Three Buff Cochin Bantam pullets. They were nice (especially since we didn't have a farm and I think the neighbors would have called animal control, the police, AND the fire department if they heard a rooster crowing in my backyard), but they still weren't comparable Modern Games. They were calm, fluffy, dumpy, and would let you do anything to them. I remember I made them clothing out of socks, and dressed them up. They kept falling over because they couldn't keep their balance with the socks on. At the time, I could only find Modern Game fowl for sale as Straight Run, so we couldn't take the risk of ending up with a rooster. The roosters were my favorite anyway because of their colors, so I just accepted my Cochins for the time being. They fit comfortably in my old rabbit hutch, and I would let them out every day to peck and scratch in the backyard when the neighbors weren't looking.
In 2005, my dreams came true when we bought a huge farm in Pennsylvania. It wasn't until 2010 when I finally ordered my Modern Games, and ever since then they and the other breeds I bought have been laying up a storm. With my 2010 order I hoped to get Wyandottes, but unfortunately by that time they were sold out. I settled with some Leghorns and the Rarest of the Rare Assortment, which was much fun for me. I wanted Wyandottes in particular because I spent hours researching every breed imagineable, and came to the conclusion that they are the 'perfect' breed. They are great layers, great meat producers, cold weather hardy, make great pets, and come in the most beautiful colors and patterns of all the chickens. They are exceptional across the board. I loved the Blue Laced Red, Golden Laced, and Silver Laced varieties and I was especially fond of the fact that they all naturally had a rosecomb.
In late 2011, I called the hatchery and placed an order for March of 2012 (yes, I was very determined to get first dibs on my favorite breeds and colors). Now I have the following: Blue Laced Red Wyandottes, Golden Laced Wyandottes, Silver Laced Wyandottes, Easter Eggers, and Cuckoo Marans (just can't resist those colorful eggs). I also ordered some Egyptian Fayoumis and Golden Campines, because I let my curiosity get the best of me and wanted to know exactly what made the two breeds different. I'm planning on breeding the Fayoumi roo to the Campine hen, and the Campine roo to the Fayoumi hen, and seeing what I get out of that. Should be interesting. I also ordered a Houdan, because my mom loves the explosion of plumage on top of their heads and I vowed never to order any more Polish. I received 5 Polish roos in my 2010 Rarest of the Rare order, and they were by far the stupidest birds I ever owned. They would stand around in a circle and peck at eachother's head feathers until they dripped blood. All of the other roosters left them alone, and they left all the other roosters alone- they were doing it to themselves!! As soon as one of their heads would start to heal, one of them would peck it open again. Needless to say, they all ended up in the pot eventually because of this (every time we slaughtered one my mom would get upset, so it was easier said than done).
I also ordered Cornish x Rock pullets (a.k.a. "Baby Hueys" like my mom calls them) in my 2012 order. They were originally just to bring the order up to 25, but somehow the order turned into 50 (still not sure how that happened). It has been an interesting experience raising the Baby Hueys so far. They just turned 7 weeks old, and they are such brutes! They peck my fingernails and toes (can't wear flip flops around them), and it sounds like someone is throwing sacks of potatoes when they fly in the air and land on the gound. They run up to me, fly into me, fall on me, and chase me when they're hungry. They EAT like you never saw in your life! None of them have any leg problems, and they all are quite active with good stamina so I'm assuming that they don't have any heart problems. They are easily 4x the size of the rest of the birds, and that's without feeding them their special broiler diet. When they were a few weeks old they had the most beautiful lake blue eyes.
Anyway, I know most of us are guilty of getting chicks before building the coop. We have the one coop (it's actually an old short school bus converted into a chicken coop), but that won't be sufficient for all of these birds when they're full grown! I have some excellent ideas as far as coop design. I came to BYC to study other peoples coop designs, and I came up with something completely different and I think it will work better than most of the designs out there. Now here's the tricky part- BUILDING IT! LOL. I already made a scale model out of index cards and clear plastic. It took me 2 days to finish, but it was worth it because it helped me work out some bugs and angles before going to the final building stage. When the coops are done, they will be joinable so that you can choose from a maximum capacity of 4, 8, or 16. Though it all looks great on paper, I think it will actually work TOO well in reality. We don't need 50+ eggs a day (who is going to collect all those eggs every day? where would we put them?). We already have a surplus of eggs with 16 laying hens, getting an average of 4 eggs per day. It would be nice to sell them, but there's probably one car that drives down our road every day, so I doubt they would sell. There is also another egg supplier right down the road from us who raises all organic hens as well. The neighbors are already getting our free eggs because we don't have any more space in the three refrigerators. And if our dogs eat any more eggs they might turn into eggs.
I do like having so many eggs available when I'm cooking, though. I make a chicken soup that's out of this world using 12 eggs. It feeds 4 people, so each person is eating 3 eggs in every serving. Yummy! We also bought that special no-stick pan that they advertise as cooking an omlette that you can just 'blow off the pan and on to your plate'. Making eggs sunny side up on that thing is so easy that you couldn't POSSIBLY mess it up. Of course I try hard to mess it up, because I get to eat the mess ups. By the time I'm done cooking, I've eaten about half the food LOL.
I checked out the "New Member Introduction Template", and it seems that I've answered all the questions except two:
'What are some of your other hobbies?' and 'Tell us about your family, your other pets, your occupation, or anything else you'd like to share.'
Well, my favorite hobby is breeding Golden Retrievers. This takes up most of my time, especially when we have puppies to raise and socialize. You can see our dogs on our website: www.CynazarGoldens.com
I also love horseback riding. My horse is named "Bell" and she is a Quarter Morgan cross. She's dark brown in the winter and black in the summer (try to figure that one out) with white anklets and a star and snip. She doesn't like anyone except me, she has an attitude, and I love her to death! I have a special bond with her that I can't find with any other horse. When I'm riding her, we both seem to have the same enthusiasm. She goes anywhere and does anything for me (but not for anyone else). She's also one of the few rare horses that don't need to be warmed up, retrained, or given time to 'settle in' after being trailered. She's the only horse I feel safe riding without lunging first.
Our other pets include a few rescue dogs from the shelter, a Cockatoo that we also rescued from the shelter, and a few more horses. At this moment, though, the chickens by far outnumber all of our other pets!! LOL
I am back! Not sure if anyone remembers me, but I joined BYC around 2003 (give or take) right around when I was starting middle school. My username was Pocketpooch6. Unfortunately I lost my password and email, so I had to make a new username. I joined BYC back then because I was next to clueless about chickens, and I wanted to soak up as much information as I could from the experienced members so that I could one day be prepared to raise my own. Of course, I was obsessed with chickens, and stayed up every night in "Chicken Chat" asking questions.
Several Christmas Eves went by where I had just one item on my list for Santa: Black Breasted Red Modern Game Fowl. After that was unsuccessful for the first few years, I decided to write at the bottom, "If you don't bring me chickens this year, don't bother bringing me any other presents." LOL. That year I got a Playstation 2 instead. I was so angry that I vowed never to play with it, so it sat for years collecting dust before we moved it to the attic.
Finally I did end up getting chickens from the fair one year. For my mom, it was one of those 'awwwe, how cute!' moments that cloud your better judgement, but for me it was the best decision ever! Three Buff Cochin Bantam pullets. They were nice (especially since we didn't have a farm and I think the neighbors would have called animal control, the police, AND the fire department if they heard a rooster crowing in my backyard), but they still weren't comparable Modern Games. They were calm, fluffy, dumpy, and would let you do anything to them. I remember I made them clothing out of socks, and dressed them up. They kept falling over because they couldn't keep their balance with the socks on. At the time, I could only find Modern Game fowl for sale as Straight Run, so we couldn't take the risk of ending up with a rooster. The roosters were my favorite anyway because of their colors, so I just accepted my Cochins for the time being. They fit comfortably in my old rabbit hutch, and I would let them out every day to peck and scratch in the backyard when the neighbors weren't looking.
In 2005, my dreams came true when we bought a huge farm in Pennsylvania. It wasn't until 2010 when I finally ordered my Modern Games, and ever since then they and the other breeds I bought have been laying up a storm. With my 2010 order I hoped to get Wyandottes, but unfortunately by that time they were sold out. I settled with some Leghorns and the Rarest of the Rare Assortment, which was much fun for me. I wanted Wyandottes in particular because I spent hours researching every breed imagineable, and came to the conclusion that they are the 'perfect' breed. They are great layers, great meat producers, cold weather hardy, make great pets, and come in the most beautiful colors and patterns of all the chickens. They are exceptional across the board. I loved the Blue Laced Red, Golden Laced, and Silver Laced varieties and I was especially fond of the fact that they all naturally had a rosecomb.
In late 2011, I called the hatchery and placed an order for March of 2012 (yes, I was very determined to get first dibs on my favorite breeds and colors). Now I have the following: Blue Laced Red Wyandottes, Golden Laced Wyandottes, Silver Laced Wyandottes, Easter Eggers, and Cuckoo Marans (just can't resist those colorful eggs). I also ordered some Egyptian Fayoumis and Golden Campines, because I let my curiosity get the best of me and wanted to know exactly what made the two breeds different. I'm planning on breeding the Fayoumi roo to the Campine hen, and the Campine roo to the Fayoumi hen, and seeing what I get out of that. Should be interesting. I also ordered a Houdan, because my mom loves the explosion of plumage on top of their heads and I vowed never to order any more Polish. I received 5 Polish roos in my 2010 Rarest of the Rare order, and they were by far the stupidest birds I ever owned. They would stand around in a circle and peck at eachother's head feathers until they dripped blood. All of the other roosters left them alone, and they left all the other roosters alone- they were doing it to themselves!! As soon as one of their heads would start to heal, one of them would peck it open again. Needless to say, they all ended up in the pot eventually because of this (every time we slaughtered one my mom would get upset, so it was easier said than done).
I also ordered Cornish x Rock pullets (a.k.a. "Baby Hueys" like my mom calls them) in my 2012 order. They were originally just to bring the order up to 25, but somehow the order turned into 50 (still not sure how that happened). It has been an interesting experience raising the Baby Hueys so far. They just turned 7 weeks old, and they are such brutes! They peck my fingernails and toes (can't wear flip flops around them), and it sounds like someone is throwing sacks of potatoes when they fly in the air and land on the gound. They run up to me, fly into me, fall on me, and chase me when they're hungry. They EAT like you never saw in your life! None of them have any leg problems, and they all are quite active with good stamina so I'm assuming that they don't have any heart problems. They are easily 4x the size of the rest of the birds, and that's without feeding them their special broiler diet. When they were a few weeks old they had the most beautiful lake blue eyes.
Anyway, I know most of us are guilty of getting chicks before building the coop. We have the one coop (it's actually an old short school bus converted into a chicken coop), but that won't be sufficient for all of these birds when they're full grown! I have some excellent ideas as far as coop design. I came to BYC to study other peoples coop designs, and I came up with something completely different and I think it will work better than most of the designs out there. Now here's the tricky part- BUILDING IT! LOL. I already made a scale model out of index cards and clear plastic. It took me 2 days to finish, but it was worth it because it helped me work out some bugs and angles before going to the final building stage. When the coops are done, they will be joinable so that you can choose from a maximum capacity of 4, 8, or 16. Though it all looks great on paper, I think it will actually work TOO well in reality. We don't need 50+ eggs a day (who is going to collect all those eggs every day? where would we put them?). We already have a surplus of eggs with 16 laying hens, getting an average of 4 eggs per day. It would be nice to sell them, but there's probably one car that drives down our road every day, so I doubt they would sell. There is also another egg supplier right down the road from us who raises all organic hens as well. The neighbors are already getting our free eggs because we don't have any more space in the three refrigerators. And if our dogs eat any more eggs they might turn into eggs.
I do like having so many eggs available when I'm cooking, though. I make a chicken soup that's out of this world using 12 eggs. It feeds 4 people, so each person is eating 3 eggs in every serving. Yummy! We also bought that special no-stick pan that they advertise as cooking an omlette that you can just 'blow off the pan and on to your plate'. Making eggs sunny side up on that thing is so easy that you couldn't POSSIBLY mess it up. Of course I try hard to mess it up, because I get to eat the mess ups. By the time I'm done cooking, I've eaten about half the food LOL.
I checked out the "New Member Introduction Template", and it seems that I've answered all the questions except two:
'What are some of your other hobbies?' and 'Tell us about your family, your other pets, your occupation, or anything else you'd like to share.'
Well, my favorite hobby is breeding Golden Retrievers. This takes up most of my time, especially when we have puppies to raise and socialize. You can see our dogs on our website: www.CynazarGoldens.com
I also love horseback riding. My horse is named "Bell" and she is a Quarter Morgan cross. She's dark brown in the winter and black in the summer (try to figure that one out) with white anklets and a star and snip. She doesn't like anyone except me, she has an attitude, and I love her to death! I have a special bond with her that I can't find with any other horse. When I'm riding her, we both seem to have the same enthusiasm. She goes anywhere and does anything for me (but not for anyone else). She's also one of the few rare horses that don't need to be warmed up, retrained, or given time to 'settle in' after being trailered. She's the only horse I feel safe riding without lunging first.
Our other pets include a few rescue dogs from the shelter, a Cockatoo that we also rescued from the shelter, and a few more horses. At this moment, though, the chickens by far outnumber all of our other pets!! LOL
back from Ohio. So glad you are posting again.Good luck. 
