Our introduction to keeping chickens, the high's, the lows and pics of our journey.

[vehve]

The sun is about to pop up from behind the mountain here . It's 7 am. Almost winter.

I think we're at about 19h days right now, and we still have no curtains...

 

[Fancychooklady]

I think we're at about 19h days right now, and we still have no curtains...

When we first moved to Tasmania I found it hard to get used to the ' arctic summer '. We went to bed with the sun up 10 pm and it would be light again by 4am. When my kids were little they rarely ever saw ' dicky dark '. As we approach winter solstice sun up is 7am and it's dark again at 5.30.
Confuses the hell out of the chooks.

 

[Bens-Hens]

Ben, there's only about 15cm of space above the divider, I'm not that worried about them roosting there. Wouldn't be very comfortable at least.

I'm not sure if you would have much of an added benefit of insulating, but it might be an idea to look into it. I can help you with putting together a design, those freezer panels you've got would be excellent, or if you can find an old freezer crate somewhere for free, even better. Here you have to insulate a compost if you want it to work during winter.

Here you're considered a egg snob if you mention that you only buy organic eggs versus the 70 cents per dozen "free-range" chickens. Battery-hen-keeping has been outlawed since 2011, so now most of the eggs sold here are free range, which people get a positive mental image about. I wonder what they would think seeing the enormous warehouse with hundreds of birds cramped into tiny sections. At least with organic eggs the hens have to be given an opportunity to go outside, and a certain amount of wall space needs to be windows, so they get natural light. I don't really care if they're fed organic feed, I would want a standard for happy chickens.

15 cm might be enough to deter them, I would not do anything else until it becomes an issue.

So free range over there is more 'barn laid' than actual free range? Here the laws seem a bit murky, how they can label eggs seems quite different to what people expect. At least the cages are gone over there, not quite there yet here but there are some people working hard to change it.

A bunch of comedians got together and made these 'ain't no way to treat a lady' commercials.

Just had to share this video.

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=782804648419650

I love that vid!

Hey y'all.... (lol)

I have started steaming my eggs rather than boiling. For hard boiled I put them in the steamer basket and when the water starts boiling I let them steam poo r about 18-20 minutes. Then I pull them off the heat and let them sit still over the water for another 5 minutes away so. Run them under cold water until they are cool enough to peel. I have so much better luck getting eggs rather than a mess doing it this way. Even if I use eggs laid that day.

The steam method is the only one I did not try, glad it works for you.

I feel like I've hijacked Ben's thread lately, you really need to post more actively Ben to keep this from becoming the Cooking and Carpentry with Felix Show. Or I could just shut up, but that's not very likely... my better half keeps reminding me during conversations "Honey, others might want to talk too..."

Nah, you are contributing. Things have been quiet down here Felix so an injection of enthusiasm is great, and right in time for our first 'full broody' project. In the past we have only used one broody as a surrogate to raise our two barred rocks, so this time Sal is going the whole hog. Well hopefully she can, I will be watching her like a Goss Hawk to make sure she is doing a good job.

So, post away, ask questions, give pointers, share pic's it all generates conversation and helps me learn more.

Such a sleepy head. He should of kept the roosters to wake him up. Well, it's nearing midnight here, the sun has finally set so maybe I can get some sleep. All of the cluckers went to bed by themselves tonight, and the space between the newer additions and the original occupants has magically disappeared on the roost. Probably helps that we went from +27C to +7C overnight. Ben, when I wake up I'm expecting loads of posts from you to balance out my ramblings. And do tell me to shut up when I meet my daily quota.

Hahahaha, always the way, West Australia stands for Wait Awhile....always the last to know over here. WInter is nearly here, but we rarely drop below 0C here, might be a few mornings below during the middle of winter, but by my experiences of cold....we are quite warm through winter. Summer on the other hand.....well lets just say we get some warm ones!

I think we're at about 19h days right now, and we still have no curtains...

I shudder at the thought.....how do you sleep with NO CURTAINS??????? I can handle the open visibility, I could handle the noise, a draft would not faze me but the sun beaming in at me for 19 FREAKING hours a day would turn me into some sort of staggering zombie.

I have a beam of light make it through my slatted curtains and it hits me in the face while sleeping (yes Fancy.....I am usually in bed after the sun gets up in the warmer months!) Drives me crazy, I have to get up, it's like the sun is a distant ninja poking me in the eye balls.

When we first moved to Tasmania I found it hard to get used to the ' arctic summer '. We went to bed with the sun up 10 pm and it would be light again by 4am. When my kids were little they rarely ever saw ' dicky dark '. As we approach winter solstice sun up is 7am and it's dark again at 5.30.
Confuses the hell out of the chooks.

Yep...can keep those days long term too!

 

[Fancychooklady]

Welcome home sleepy head.
Check this one out, I warn you , you might need a tissue. Hopefully your eggs will arrive today, don't know about the time difference though.

http://q13fox.com/2014/05/26/goat-r...-burro-bestie-must-watch-video/#axzz32xtNJ2t3

 

[cwrite]

Lol, I got a free dog kennel with no floor in it. Popped it in the pony shelter, lined the ground with hay and they prefer that to their proper nest boxes. My husband is not impressed after the grief I gave him about getting them finished.

Lol Fancy! What would they do with all their time without us? That's perfect! I already have a small dog kennel in their run for when it pours. It will do for egg emergencies until the end of June. They have a tarp for shade, but it's only good for light rain. We will put corrugated roofing over, but it's getting done little by little.

Vehve - I love the flavours of other countries you add and I'm scratching Turkey off my list of places to visit.
I had a friend who used to tell her kids that it was time for bed when it got dark. Then she moved to the UK where it stays light until 10pm in Summer. They were quite resistant to change surprisingly enough. I had my kids in the UK a few years after hers & NEVER referenced dark as having anything to do with bed time because of that. Personally I prefer it getting dark earlier because growing up that was adults time, & now I really appreciate my small amount of adult time.

About your Wyandotte Ben, I read somewhere about a hen that never laid & was at the bottom of the pecking order. The same day a low status nest was introduced, the hen laid. She had not been allowed to use the existing nest boxes so simply never started laying. I wish I could remember where I saw that, but it might be worth a try.

 

[Bens-Hens]

I could give it a go cwrite. I have seen her in the nests though. She looks fit for it, all the red bits are bright red, she has not dropped a feather for a few weeks now so I assume she has finished her moult. Rosie has not laid again since she went broody and had a moult, so many they are just holding off for the nicer weather?!

Well, speaking of eggs....I JUST got a delivery.



Beautiful delivery box


A lovely touch with the card, thank you very much Lisa.


Well wrapped, but one carton looked a little damp.


I thought we lost 6


But, 3 of the 6 Coro eggs made it through just fine! We safely received 3 Coro's, 3 BLRW and 3 SIlkies! Loosing 3 to Australia Post. They were packaged really well but I don't think bubble wrap can compete with postage numpties Best result yet, and better than expected for a 4,000km trip in two days.


So then plan, is to rest them until tonight, set Sal up in the rooster box and some fresh hay after dark. If she stays there we will and slip them under her late in the night. Then it's a watch and wait game.

 

[Fancychooklady]

A guy that works for Aus post told me not to write ' fragile ' on the box cause it's like waving a red flag at a bull to some of those meat axes. Oh well let's hope you get 3 pullets. The silkie eggs are tough as bullets. When we went away at the weekend my jacket was thrown in the back, tossed from side to side and when I put it on and put my hand in the pocket , there was a silkie egg! Which worked well as we were having bacon and eggs for brekky .

 

[vehve]

In Nuorgam (way up north) the sun sets Nov 25th and rises Jan 17th. And in the summer, you have the nightless night there, the sun got up the 15th of this month, and will set on July 29th. Here in Southern Finland it's a bit better, we get 19h of day in the summer and 5h days around Xmas.

@cwrite to be fair, I've never been to Turkey. Cyprus is quite similar though and has a large turkish population, they had pretty icky toilets.

Ben, ramble on I shall then. I would of thought your soldiering days would of taught you the ability eat quick and sleep whenever possible, no matter what the circumstances. Took me 2 years to learn to eat slowly again after my service...

Good luck with the eggs, maybe you should find a pregnant cat just in case...

 

[Bens-Hens]

Indeed, eat as much as you can as often as you can as you can never be sure when the next opportunity comes. I also learned, why stand when you can sit, why sit when you can be laying and why just be laying when you can be asleep. Of course, there would always be someone else to contradict such opportunities, but always best to make the most of them when they are there.

Just setting up the box under the patio and move Sal a little later to test if she will move as easily as Rosie did.

Fancy, you did everything humanly possible to get them here safely, thank you.

 

[Fancychooklady]

No worries Ben. Can I make a suggestion? Dust Sal early in her broodiness to prevent her getting lice . My last broody got a bad case of the crawlies and it was too late in the piece for me to dust her. I usually dust them in the first week cause they don't spend much time in the dust bath and that in itself makes them vulnerable . Result is the chicks have lice from mum, so now I have to wait it out and dust them when they are about a month old.