Minnesota!

[duluthralphie]

Is anyone within reasonable driving distance of the South Metro (I'm in Hastings) planning on hatching any Easter Eggers or Ameraucanas this Spring? I normally get mine from Minniechickmama (she's great, if you're looking for chicks) but I want to mix up my genetics. I was going to just suck it up and get some hatchery EE's, but I heard they're having issues with them this year and I do NOT want to introduce issues into my flock.

I have a dozen or so EE eggs in the incubator now to hatch on Good Friday. I just put them in to keep my Creamette's eggs company. They come from hatchery stock last year. I am not a "show" person and my birds are just pampered barnyard birds.

I will be candling them on Friday to see how they are doing. I am going for a second incubator today, my wife thinks we are going furniture shopping! Silly Woman!


I need one incubator to use as a hatcher and the turner out of it to turn the pre-incubation eggs, I forget to turn them otherwise..

 

[Bogtown Chick]

I just put them in to keep my Creamette's eggs company.

I will be candling them on Friday to see how they are doing. I am going for a second incubator today, my wife thinks we are going furniture shopping! Silly Woman!

 

[brandislee]

jbjenson - get your BFF onto BYC!

I've been watching the skunk interchange with great interest, it's like a tennis match!! LOL

We have all kinds of stuff around us, skunk included. But the only losses, besides that one fox getting a guinea I had not realized was outside, have been to my dogs as they learned NOT to eat the chickens.

I could drive myself batty trying to kill off all the predators on my land!! But then the bunnies and ground squirrels, who I know are also around, would not have anything to check their population.

My rule of thumb is, leave it alone until it bothers the chickens (or kids, or goats, or bees, or whatever). But I'm a relative noob compared to others on this thread. I do think taking up residence in one of the outbuildings sorta counts as bothering the homestead. But I think I would try to drive it away first, if it hasn't caused any other problems.

I certainly have no problem dispatching a pest, though, when other means have proven futile.

I hope the flour thing can confirm whether your little skunk has found another home, if for no other reason than it would be a much less smelly job for you, Lalaland!!

I am not so much of a noob, but I share the same rule. Kind of a live and let live kind of thing. I don't even grudge the Eagles a few birds in the fall (I always loose a bird or two during Eagle migration... the only time it bothers me is when it's a proven broody or something). I mean, I do my best to provide protection for my birds, but you can only do so much, ya know? And it's not like I'm going to go all crazy shooting Eagles just to protect my chickens. We have all sorts of things around- foxes, coyotes, skunks, possoms, probably weasels too, although I don't have confirmation (just a tightly shut up turkey I found one morning with it's throat chewed open). I do what I can to shut my birds up securely at night and provide them with lots of cover during the day. And yeah, if something was coming back again and again or taking up residence, I would do something.

 

[Dandelioness]

Is anyone within reasonable driving distance of the South Metro (I'm in Hastings) planning on hatching any Easter Eggers or Ameraucanas this Spring? I normally get mine from Minniechickmama (she's great, if you're looking for chicks) but I want to mix up my genetics. I was going to just suck it up and get some hatchery EE's, but I heard they're having issues with them this year and I do NOT want to introduce issues into my flock.

I'm separating my breeders this week, so in 4 weeks I'll be collecting hatching eggs. Also just a backyarder, with EE stock from Cackle Hatchery two years back. The parent stock are very healthy, cold-hardy birds, who are very good layers. The only time I didn't get an egg a day was when they hid them from me (!) or they were molting/recovering from the molt. How many are you looking for? I only have three hens to collect from, but I'm only going to collect and hatch out 12-18 for myself. Maybe 24. You know, chicken math.

I'm north of the metro a ways, but my husband drives in every day to work in the metro. It sounds like Ralphie would have some available sooner than me, but if he doesn't have enough and/or you're still looking in a month, feel free to pm me.

 

[Bogtown Chick]

I'd rather not have to deal with wild life issues. I have no pleasure in doing that whatsoever. But I understand...for me...that it comes with the territory of poultry keeping if I'm going to have anything at all. A dog & a saavy rooster helps big time and I think I've been fortunate than most to keep things down to one predatory loss in 3 years. Believe it or not I think also free ranging has been key to our success too. The birds know how to take care and cover for themselves and use our deck, cars, camper trailers, boats.

 

[brandislee]

I have a dozen or so EE eggs in the incubator now to hatch on Good Friday. I just put them in to keep my Creamette's eggs company. They come from hatchery stock last year. I am not a "show" person and my birds are just pampered barnyard birds.

I will be candling them on Friday to see how they are doing. I am going for a second incubator today, my wife thinks we are going furniture shopping! Silly Woman!


I need one incubator to use as a hatcher and the turner out of it to turn the pre-incubation eggs, I forget to turn them otherwise..

I'm not a show person, either, I just want good, healthy barnyard birds that lay well and range well and all that good nonsense. I'm really only looking for 6-10. Hatchery descendants are fine... most of mine are at least descended from Hoovers birds, other than the ones I got from Minniechickmama (I think most of hers are Urch descended, but I may be mixing up the breeds). It would be nice to at the very least introduce genetics from a different hatchery. Let me know! I'm going to try to hatch some, too, but I don't do incubators (other than the type that have two legs and do all the work for me

) I think I have a bird going broody as we speak (crap, I shouldn't have said that out loud...). I've always had at least 3 go broody with the exception of last summer (last spring/summer was just weird for me). Anyway, my point being if you wanted to trade to introduce some new blood let me know and I'll throw a few more eggs under them when and if they are ready to make some chickie babies. Otherwise, let me know what you want me to pay.

 

[brandislee]

And also, glad to see the MN thread is more active- a year or so ago no one ever posted on it and I had to post on the WI thread to get any responses.

 

[ejb3810]

Predators are just that, and around me they are living on borrowed time. I have to be careful as urban encroachment has resulted in walkers on the road that I live on, and many of them are of the tree hugger variety.
I have had birds killed by Weasels, Coyotes, Bears, Cats and Hawks for sure. I have also seen on my property Fisher, Mink,Otter,Badger, Great Grey Wolf, Cougar, Skunk, and Raccoon. I consider Eagles, Turkey Vultures, Ravens and Crows to be Hawk deterrents and encourage them to stay around.

 

[lalaland]

skunks, ......Ralphie, there were only 7 reported cases of skunks with rabies in 2013 in Minnesota. I think there were 30 or 40, can't remember the numbers right, that were from bats.

Now, they only get counted if they are reported to the MN Board of Animal Health, so I would agree that the numbers are undercounted. The list I referred to earlier was just the first three months of this year, and heck, you won't find many skunks in Jan or Feb in Minnesota.

If I can resolve it without resorting to killing it, I will. RIght now I think...crossing my fingers...they have moved on.

Re backyard flock biosecurity: http://www.extension.umn.edu/agricu...ics-for-urban-and-backyard-poultry-owners.pdf

Interesting, it suggests that if you show chickens you quarantine them for 30 days after each show!! Also seems to think you can exclude wild birds from your chicken's runs....my run has 5 or 6 mature pine trees that are probably 75 feet tall or something....no way can I keep wild birds out.

loving this weather. But this is the driest spring I've seen up here since I moved in 7 springs ago...makes me wonder how the growing season will be.

 

[Minniechickmama]

Well first off I think Skunks like it easy. My aunt had one licking the milk bowl with her big furry white kitties on her farm many years back and it didn't register until she was back in the house that she had an extra "cat" run out from the barn. They like easy food. The chicken feed, eggs laying in a nest, small chicks. If their ambitious/hungry I would say they would try for a bird.

But first & foremost, I wouldn't take the chance of being sprayed because I'm trying to co-exist with that vermin. I like being welcomed at my job each day.

Heeewwwww doggies their strong smellin'

I think why we don't tolerate them is they are pests of a high degree.

I will say though, that I've had them move through the yard a few nights taking care of my lawn rooting out grubs. For that they are beneficial and these particular individual skunks seemed to move on after their middle of the night yard work was done. But that's about it. If they're casing my coop...adios.

This reminded me of my sister feeding the barn cats, and starting to pet one of the "kitties" noticed the odorousness of the one she was petting and realized, it was indeed Pepe Le Pew's cousin!

I do want to point out, when shooting a skunk, although I agree with using a lead pill, I don't recommend it in the head. Reason being, the rabies virus is harbored in the brain of skunks, by blowing their brains out, you take the risk of exposing the virus to later critters crossing that spot. I shoot through the heart on the skunks.