North Carolina

[moomoodiddy]

I went to TSC yesterday, was sooo hard to leave without chicks. Freaking cute...but I don't have a coop yet, and Ashley is growing pullets for me....
But, I need a shopping list for what I need to start when I get my girls in a few weeks.
Also, I am still undecided on coop style. I have a swingset, 12ft long, unused, was considering a-frame vs. the Purina square coop. What do youk?

ikr!!!! tsc is killing me we went last night and there were a ton of adorable babies but my heart dropped when i saw that some of hem were sick and starting to die so i panicked and left immmediatly and made everyone wash their hands i dont want my babies at home to get sick! worked to hard for my flock to get sick and die

 

[rbaker0345]

This sounds like a great idea!! Is the blast of water aimed toward the "intruder?" Or does it just start up and go around and around when it is activated?

It is pointed right at the intruder, gives them something to remember. It works for squirrels and cats and dogs, but it doesn't seem to work on muscovies. They just stand there and say " hmmm, water" .

 

[rbaker0345]

caught my first snake of the year in the hen house. Young rat snake, who I put in a bucket just to find out a few minutes later that I didn't weight the top down enough

I had one in the coop last year, I only found this out because I went to get eggs and I didn't bother turning on the light. I came up with a coil of snake which, thankfully, had a mouthfull of egg. I don't know who was more startled, me or this gorgeous green garter snake. It was a big garter snake too, about 6ft long! I put it out in the woods and I guess it was the snake that was more startled, because I stopped having my eggs go mysteriously missing. I guess I know how that snake got that big.

 

[rbaker0345]

Don't forget, as it warms up and the snakes start moving, that I will take any non-venomous snake you don't want, if it's within any reasonable driving distance.

As soon as I moved that snake, the mouse population in my coop exploded. Its almost worth an egg a week to have that kind of mouse control. On a positive note, I found a red corn snake in the coop this fall and I left it. Now I keep finding dead baby mice which makes me kind of sad, but it means that the snake is probably eating their parents. I will move a venemous snake, but I leave non-venemous snakes alone, I get enough eggs to share. I hate to have to set mouse traps with my kids playing all around the place.

 

[nursebecky99]

I had one in the coop last year, I only found this out because I went to get eggs and I didn't bother turning on the light.  I came up with a coil of snake which, thankfully, had a mouthfull of egg.  I don't know who was more startled, me or this gorgeous green garter snake.  It was a big garter snake too, about 6ft long! I put it out in the woods and I guess it was the snake that was more startled, because I stopped having my eggs go mysteriously missing.  I guess I know how that snake got that big.  

I would have DIED! I do NOT like snakes.

 

[rbaker0345]

Who is actually going to WCA this weekend ????

What is WCA, what am I missing?

 

[BHep]

What is WCA, what am I missing?

Wicked Chicken Auction
in Wilson Mills

 

[rbaker0345]

That gets me so upset. My local feedstore gets at least 150 babies a couple times a year and I never see sick babies. Plus, they only charge $1.69 per chick and I get the best EE's there, they lay huge eggs.

 

[rbaker0345]

I would have DIED! I do NOT like snakes.

You don't have to like them, you just have to appreciate their place on the food chain. Read "Prodigal Summer" by Barbara Kingsolver. Besides, you have chemicals in your brain that allow you to overcome your fears. I used to be terrified of spiders, but I hate to be dominated by anything, let alone an irrational fear, so I started picking up wood spiders (they're like brown orb weaver spiders, we had them in NY). They take up the palm of your hand. I figured that if I could teach myself to control that fear, I could do anything. I can now pick up any spider you put in front of me and that includes black widows (on a piece of paper, I'm brave,but not stupid).

Funny story about black widow spiders (my chickens eat them). I happened to look out my window last summer and noticed a black widow in the window between the screen and the glass. This window was right behind my couch. I like to be able to open the windows when the weather is nice, but even though I am not terrified of black widows, I do respect their ability to deliver a world of hurt. I felt it necessary to remove the black widow from the window. Every time I opened the window she retreated up into the window sash (aluminum windows). I finally broke down and told my husband to hose her down hoping the water would just wash her out of there without killing her.

He sprayed so much water up that window sash, I thought she must be dead and gone. But there she was the next day, hunting bugs and doing a respectable job of keeping the beatles out of my windows. I just kept that window closed all summer until an anole moved in and ate her. I guess that's the world we live in and we gotta try to get along with all of our neighbors.

I did remove every one of her egg sacs from the window so that we wouldn't have a million little black widows in the window. But that put me in a quandry. I didn't want to toss them near my house and I didn't want kill them to remove so many mosquito-eating machines from the ecosystem (I have a degree in biology and I'm a Buddhist, killing a predator would be, for me, like burning a flag or urinating on the Mona Lisa would be for most other people). So I kept them in mason jars and fed them mosquitoes that I caught while they (the mosquitoes) were trying to bite me (for some reason, my respect for all life ends with mosquitoes and ticks- I know I am also a hypocrite). I actually got a lot of satisfaction from putting those mosquitoes inside that jar of baby black widow spiders.

Finally, they got so big that my husband started to complain about having so many black widow spiders as pets and he was really starting to question my sanity (as was I, I was completely aware of how alarming this would sound to an outside observer). So I took my jars of black widows to the Croatan, opened the tops and left them there to their own resources.


Crazy, I know.

 

[rbaker0345]

What time does WCA start and can you bring birds for auction?