Minnesota!

[Coffee 1st]

Rhett that duckling is so cute,,,

and every ones chickens are sooo cute i cant wait till im all set up to get some. at the rate im going it will prob be next spring.

and I still don't understand if you don't want a hen Broody why don't you just take the eggs away from her so she has nothing to sit on???

and OMG Minnie you must have ALLOT of chickens...

 

[scandiafowl]

Duckling pictures:

What a cutie pie! Congrats!

 

[scandiafowl]

Tomorrow I'm off to DC for a week of training.

Please be prepared to keep me entertained as I suffer through hour-long power point briefings on military regulations.


Really, I'm begging .. Please.

This PITA won a week's reprieve because I got home so late there was no time.

As I watched him yet again attack two Jerseys I almost changed my mind.

 

[Cluckies]

i know there has been talk about winter water freezing and Ive read all the threads and Ive been looking on line about * waterers * ..is that a word??? anyways i really don't want to freeze my back side off 3 times a day to bring them thawed water. who uses heated water dishes and what is recommend...Thanks All....

I used 2 types of waterers for last winter:

1 - a 2 gallon pail with horizontal nipples, I heat it with a bird bath deicer and I have a submersible pump in there. This one never froze all winter.

2- a rubber dog dish inside of a metal heated dog dish. I put a 1 gallon vinegar bottle filled with sand inside of the dish so the chickens don't walk or fall in it and get frost bit toes. On extremely cold nights I would bring the gallon jug and rubber waterer inside, so the bowl and sand would warm up to keep the water unfrozen for longer. This one would freeze here and there.









This year I will probably only use the pail. I was scared the nipples would freeze last year, but they didn't.

 

[Rhetts]

Rhett I have that chick as a chicken!

Do you have any pictures? I would love to see what she might look like!

 

[Cluckies]

Tomorrow I'm off to DC for a week of training.

Please be prepared to keep me entertained as I suffer through hour-long power point briefings on military regulations.


Really, I'm begging .. Please.


This PITA won a week's reprieve because I got home so late there was no time.

As I watched him yet again attack two Jerseys I almost changed my mind.

Can you pen this guy up separately till you get back?


@Rhetts , congrats on the duckling, so cute!

 

[Coffee 1st]

I used 2 types of waterers for last winter:

1 - a 2 gallon pail with horizontal nipples, I heat it with a bird bath deicer and I have a submersible pump in there. This one never froze all winter.

2- a rubber dog dish inside of a metal heated dog dish. I put a 1 gallon vinegar bottle filled with sand inside of the dish so the chickens don't walk or fall in it and get frost bit toes. On extremely cold nights I would bring the gallon jug and rubber waterer inside, so the bowl and sand would warm up to keep the water unfrozen for longer. This one would freeze here and there.









This year I will probably only use the pail. I was scared the nipples would freeze last year, but they didn't.

what kind of submersible heater? like one that goes in a aquarium or a farm type heater?? Thanks...

 

[Minniechickmama]

Rhett that duckling is so cute,,,

and every ones chickens are sooo cute i cant wait till im all set up to get some. at the rate im going it will prob be next spring.

and I still don't understand if you don't want a hen Broody why don't you just take the eggs away from her so she has nothing to sit on???

and OMG Minnie you must have ALLOT of chickens...

i've had a few

I am known in some circles as an poultry enabler

 

[Cluckies]

what kind of submersible heater? like one that goes in a aquarium or a farm type heater?? Thanks...

At the beginning of the winter I used an aquarium heater, but switched to a bird bath deicer half way through as the water didn't need to be that warm I think.

I bought the bird bath deicer at fleet farm.

the submersible pump I got from Harbor Freight

 

[lalaland]

coffee1, the thing about broodies is that while they would prefer to sit on eggs, they will also sit on wooden eggs, unfertile eggs, imaginary eggs.....You don't want this to happen because for one, the broody won't lay eggs while she is brooding, and for two, hormones can make her a raging looney, and three, she generally will eat just once a day and gets out of condition, and four, she might keep this up long enough to seriously endanger her health.

So, with a broody, either you interrupt her brooding so she goes back to normal, or you let her sit on eggs that are fertile. WHich means, you will have chicks, and not always at a reasonable time of the year, and not always when you have the space for her to be broody in peace (without other hens climbing on the nest, etc.

But, broodies are so much fun. Easiest way to raise chicks, and I think the chicks hare healthier and better foragers than ones we brood. Last spring I had a broody whose sisters wanted to be broody too....and when she hatched the chicks, and I finally allowed the sisters access to mom and chicks, the sisters helped raise the babies.


This is a pic of the three sisters and their chicks. ALl three mamas would call the chicks, feed the chicks, let the chicks hide in their feathers (there are at least 4 chicks in this picture that you can see, but 11 chicks were there) but the mama that hatched them outranked the other two.