Michigan Thread - all are welcome!

[HollyDuckFarmer]

Good Morning Again. Checking back in quickly before I must do what needs to be done. Opa, I'm sorry to hear your elbow is still giving you problems. The waiting is hard, but I hope that at the least you'll be able to slow down just a bit so that afterward you'll be able to enjoy. I think Tap's got the perfect perspective. So going back to when y'all were talking apples. Boy oh boy, do I have the apples this year. Meaning that last year's zero provided the tree a good rest. Let's play what kind of apples are on Holly's tree? And what's wrong with them? Some background: this is a wildly neglected, huge tree, perhaps 20' tall with a canopy spread of at least 25'. We do not spray, but we are on I think the 4th consecutive year of hard pruning, still have more to do come Feb. Lots of dead below. These apples are the smaller ones. These apples are delicious and sweet. I've never seen nor tasted an apple like these. In my area, there a was once a famous orchard that is now lost to history. Any guesses?

 

[lbrykowski2011]

Good thing I made that soup. I fly to and back from NYC the same day so that I don't miss work. Normally, I catch an evening flight home. Today, I ended up on the 1:35pm flight home. Havibg just landed at 9:20am, followed by 2 seperate cab rides which did not help, my motion sickness showed its face just before landing back in Chicago. I am completely embarrassed, but I feel bad for the 2 guys sitting in my row, since they got 'front row seats' to the show, so to speak. At least I got the bag out in time.

This is why it is extremely important to not fly twice so close together if you are even remotely nauseated.

My fresh soup is trying to settle my tummy since the 3-hour drive after the flight did not help mucj, either.

Oooo so sry, sure hope you feel better.

 

[lbrykowski2011]

Seems I only come on here with my problems, but my girls are not laying again, and since you all are in MI with the same kind of weather and lighting, are your hens stopping for the darkness yet? I asked a chicken group on facebook and they are saying w/o a doubt hens need 14 hours of light a day to lay eggs.

My pullets started laying like crazy last Feb and I never gave them artificial light?

I am so confused, I have 28 layers right now, a whole bunch of variety and they are almost all a year old, I got 1 egg today, 1 yesterday. They seem to scare so easy and then stop laying, sensitive hens I guess, can anyone help me?

My khaki campbell ducks are still laying every day, thank goodness, but my hens have really slowed. My RIR's are laying 4-5 days a wk-they were 7 days a wk. I'm getting only 1-2 a wk from my ee and my RIW. 0 from my buff-not sure what breed she is though. lol C'mon Spring!!!!

 

[mara1]

Hi, everybody have been peeking in and reading

Hope everybody's good. Only had a couple soft eggs so maybe soon?
My DD picked up 2 new Muscovy's Sun. He had them BOGO$5

and her new harlinquin buck

R side L side

Kinda cool

 

[SillyChicken]

welcome Mara, cute critters!

Egg laying depends on lots of factors. The type of bird, age, environment.. physical condition (parasites) and feed. I do think light affects them somewhat. Birds like Faverolles, take a bit longer to mature so a two yr old hen is still laying nice sized eggs. I had them for probably 5 years before processing them (this year).

Right now most of my birds are molting.. it'll take about 2 months for this to work it's self out.

If they free range - it could be they are hiding eggs... they can be sneaky that way!

Getting quotes for the survey so far have $2000 for one side and $1900 for the whole thing with drawings etc... (no contest there) ... either way, if the neighbors puts up a fuss, which I would understand if they did, I would too.. This could get interesting.

 

[snowflake]

the clicker is just to tell them that they've done something good. so if a car was coming and you called the dog and it came back, you would click and treat. And you don't *have* to use a clicker, just a consistent reinforcer......it can be a word, you can click a pen, or any distinctive sound that is easy to replicate. she also has a website (dogmanitcs) that will link all of her youtube videos and I think that's a big easier to navigate than browsing all of her videos. it's just one approach, but I have found that my dogs and foster dogs catch on pretty quickly for basic manners, and you can work it all the way up to really advanced stuff.

thanks I was watching her last night, tried a couple sessions, works well but I will have to wear cloves to stop the biting, he is mouthy and has very sharp puppy teeth, plus I have very old easy tear skin

Seems I only come on here with my problems, but my girls are not laying again, and since you all are in MI with the same kind of weather and lighting, are your hens stopping for the darkness yet? I asked a chicken group on facebook and they are saying w/o a doubt hens need 14 hours of light a day to lay eggs.

My pullets started laying like crazy last Feb and I never gave them artificial light?

I am so confused, I have 28 layers right now, a whole bunch of variety and they are almost all a year old, I got 1 egg today, 1 yesterday. They seem to scare so easy and then stop laying, sensitive hens I guess, can anyone help me?

it is that time of yr, I have 45 birds, some to young some to old some molting, 2 to 4 eggs a day, in the spring I got a dozen a day or more

welcome Mara, cute critters!

Getting quotes for the survey so far have $2000 for one side and $1900 for the whole thing with drawings etc... (no contest there) ... either way, if the neighbors puts up a fuss, which I would understand if they did, I would too.. This could get interesting.

MOLT wonderful thing, got a Delaware that has lost so many feathers I didn't recognize her

let us know how the survey turns out, very interesting, think we had ours done when we bought, big white 4x4's mark the property line, thanks to the previous owners

 

[greenmimama]

Well, thank you all for your replies, I know a couple of them are molting for sure, they look awful But almost all of August they didn't lay at all, it was so strange then they finally ramped up production again and now it went form normal to 1 in just a few days.

The majority are 1 year old with about 8 of them being 6mo. I am hoping they start laying again.

I knew from doing so much research on here that the light thing wasn't true, but she seemed so sure of herself, made me doubt myself, I'm silly that way.


I did think about de worming them while they are not laying anyways, would that be a good idea? I have food grade DE to use. Just as a precaution, not because I have seen any signs

 

[lbrykowski2011]

I'm still putting a scoop of food grade DE in their feed( I do 1c to 40lbs of pellets) and I sprinkle it in the coop and around the outside of the run and a lil in the dust bath once a wk. Is this still necessary as it is getting cold and bugs, parasites and worms should be gone soon? I also put ACV in their water dishes twice a wk with a lil garlic for stopping worms, don't want to do all this if the cold weather kills everything off anyways. Thanks for any help

 

[SillyChicken]

If you want to de- worm with chemicals this would be a good time to do it. I'm having to treat my birds for respiratory issues but it's good timing since I'm not getting many eggs now either.
You can also feed pumpkin/guts/seeds as a natural de-wormer and still eat any eggs.

 

[mara1]

I have sand down and every time I rake all the scattered hay ect.. and add de and stall dry. I have to vacate for the dust tornado they create its like a chain reaction.
I wish I had had my phone when we brought the little buck home I let him loose in the run while I made temp quarters for him. All the chicks and ducks surrounded him commando style tilting their heads edging closer. I stood there thinking they were gonna maul him the he popped up like popcorn and everybody scattered.

They followed him around like the pied piper for a hour.