Naked Neck/Turken Thread

[chickengr]

Nope...we have a pretty good size flock!

Hens...
22 Red Sex Link
1 Black Sex Link
4 Cuckoo Marans
2 Easter Eggers
2 Buff Orpington
2 Barred Rock
1 Rhode Island Red
1 Bantam Cochin
1 Light Brahma
3 Sultan
3 Cuckoo Marans/Red Sex Link cross
1 Spitzhauben/Light Brahma cross
1 Spitzhauben/Easter Egger cross

6 week old chicks...
4 Spitzhauben/Easter Egger cross (females) (Olive Eggers)
2 Cuckooo Marans/Light Brahma cross (female)
1 Cuckoo Marans/Easter Egger Cross female
1 Cuckoo Marans/Light Brahma (male)

Roosters...
1 Spitzhauben
2 Sultans
1 Spitzhauben/Easter Egger cross
1 Cuckoo Marans/Easter Egger cross

And now 3 new bantam Naked Neck cross

The sex links will be phased out by next year though if not sooner. Except for 1...Daisy! She is a sweatheart!

31 are laying hens. Several of my mixes, the buffs, and rocks should start soon though.

We do pretty good egg sales to regular customers, and a large family in our local Amish community, as well as supply our immediate family.

Above and beyond that....we enjoy our chicken therapy!

good choice! I also have 1 red sex link that is sweatheart. every evening she jumps on my hand and falls asleep. then I put her on the roost. her name is ellie. another one, sallie, kept singing last summer when she was a teenager. unfortunately she looks so old now. that's why I don't want to get more hybrids. it is too sad to see them getting old so soon.

That's what I get too. Very annoying indeed! Guess they are afraid we are going to eat the expired food ourselves and can't risk it. I try to grow fruits and veggies for ours, but that doesn't always work out. Frost got our apple, pear, peach, and plumb trees this year. I usually try to freeze some for winter treats, but probably not this year. Only a few apples on one tree and a some pears. We have a large mulberry tree in the chicken yard...frost got it too!

I sometimes buy the discounted .50 cent French and Italian breads at Wally Word for treats, but I hate going in there so it doesn't happen often.

Mine sometimes get what I call "Chicken Slumgullian" A mix of eggs, layer rations, oatmeal and milk or Kefir (if on hand)...Wow they think that's special!

my problem with fruits and veggies is opposite from yours. my mulberry tree got dried last week. I don't know if it will survive, looks dead right now.

 

[Curnow]

That's quite big flock. Did you get those production reds as your first flock or for some kind of egg business?

It was kind of accidental...but by choice. LOL!
We gave away my father in laws egg flock when he passed away. We had some major "surprises" to deal with when closing the estate in 2012. In the end we purchased the farm. We are the 4th generation to have it now. He had a pretty good customer base for eggs, mostly the local Amish community.

Some of the guys my husband worked with do Cornish cross meat birds. We decided that instead of doing mail order chicks we would just drive the few hours and pick up our chicks at Cackle Hatchery in Lebanon, MO. It was spray season for my husband (he works in agriculture) and we weren't able to plan too far ahead what day we would actually go to the hatchery, so the layers were their choice of what was available the day we went. I had called in an order for "Hungry Man Special" and got the Red Sex Links with that order along with the Cornish Cross. (Cackle was great by the way...worked with our odd schedules as much as they could) I did NOT want an all red bird flock...I wanted a colorful mixed flock, but scheduling didn't work out for that. The day we were there to pick up chicks was one of their open storefront days, so I was able to add a few others for color! Easter Eggers, Light Brahma, Cuckoo Marans and a few others.

The Spitzhauben rooster was purchased later at an auction...represented as a pullet...Hence his name is "Molly"
The Sultans were at the same auction from the same person. She was very nice too! She did well on them...hubby got into a pretty good bidding war because he knew I really wanted them!

I have learned sooooooo much about chickens in a few short years. Backyard Chickens has been a wealth of knowledge for me. It has helped with health, coops, and aided me in saving chicken lives!

Obviously we now have chicken hobby (I really mean addiction)!

 

[Curnow]

I would also like to add that chickens aide networking! Because we have added some great friends and customers in the local Amish community...they are currently building us a "shouse" at our farm. That's what they call a Shed-House (like a Morton home).

Life is funny like that I guess!

 

[Curnow]

good choice! I also have 1 red sex link that is sweatheart. every evening she jumps on my hand and falls asleep. then I put her on the roost. her name is ellie. another one, sallie, kept singing last summer when she was a teenager. unfortunately she looks so old now. that's why I don't want to get more hybrids. it is too sad to see them getting old so soon.

my problem with fruits and veggies is opposite from yours. my mulberry tree got dried last week. I don't know if it will survive, looks dead right now.

It's been so wet here! My tomato plants are even suffering from it! Not to mention we can't seem to get all our haying done! Ugh!

 

[draye]

It is so hot here! Heat index of 116 yesterday and 112 today.

It got my layers way down on production plus add to the heat I got a different feed this time around. The mill was out of my usual feed. All they had available was a layer mash. I was thinking crumble but there is a difference in crumbles and mash. They don't like the mash stuff.

I'm letting my supplier know I don't want no more of that mess.

 

[Turk Raphael]

My 7 young DC and percentage birds are on 24 percent commercial protein because of the heat, not wanting to mess with horse meat today. Holding feed from everything else today except cold vegetables and watermelon.

The youngsters got a little melon too.

 

[DesertChic]

My 7 young DC and percentage birds are on 24 percent commercial protein because of the heat, not wanting to mess with horse meat today. Holding feed from everything else today except cold vegetables and watermelon.

The youngsters got a little melon too.

Yesterday we hit 109* with 47% humidity. I'm pretty sure my hens all laid boiled eggs.

 

[draye]

Time for new pictures.

If I get everything moved around tomorrow like I want to, I'll try to get some new pictures.

Those Calico cockerels are now a bit over 15 weeks old and really prettying up.

I also have a Red Birchen cockerel with this bunch and us looking nice. I'm not sure if I'm going to hang onto him or nit. I have until September to decide what I want to do. That's when the next auction is going to be.

 

[chickengr]

It is so hot here! Heat index of 116 yesterday and 112 today.

It got my layers way down on production plus add to the heat I got a different feed this time around. The mill was out of my usual feed. All they had available was a layer mash. I was thinking crumble but there is a difference in crumbles and mash. They don't like the mash stuff.

I'm letting my supplier know I don't want no more of that mess.

Yesterday we hit 109* with 47% humidity. I'm pretty sure my hens all laid boiled eggs.

don't tell me about heat!

I have been advised to feed my chickens oats and barley only. as I read somewhere that chickens don't have enzyme to digest barley, I put like 50% oats, 25% barley and 25% wheat, all whole grains. my chickens love it, cope with heat well and started to lay like crazy.once or twice a week I give them some boiled eggs as well. at this time of year there are plenty of mosquitoes and flies so I don't worry too much about protein.

 

[Kassaundra]

I've done the bread thing, its good but really too far to drive to get it and really save on the feed. Summer time is really hard to store it also, it gets moldy too fast. No extra refridge/freezer to store it in either.

Fermenting it in plastic trash buckets would work to keep it, but it would sure be messy feeding it out.