Pennsylvania!! Unite!!

[Lelanae]

I have a black Ameraucana from Dennis too. Not only is she friendly --especially for a chicken I got when she was a bit older, but she is the funniest and most determined to escape the run and eat my hosta, roost in the trees and in general, stand out from the flock. Beautiful eggs too. I adore her and she makes me smile every day. (Think "Ginger" from the movie "Chicken Run"!

 

[TillyPeeps]

Our chickens suddenly figured out how to be chickens yesterday. They started dust bath the very first time. Also start eating strawberries and roost outside the first time.

 

[fisherlady]

We installed metal roof for coop and run the first time. It's actually very easy. All we did is screw them in place. No leakage so far. But for such a large barn, I guess a contractor is necessary.

The barn size was a factor, but my work schedule was the primary one. I work 48 to 72 hrs a week, normally... and we are just starting to develop the barn property (no livable house there at present), it is an hour and twenty minutes away from where we live now. It was my mother and step-dad's property for almost 30 years and she still lives on the adjoining property. They wanted to downsize their property upkeep so I took the barn and 12 acres.
Funny thing is that the size of the barn actually helped me decide for an odd reason. The barn is 45ftx70ft, roof area is just shy of 4,000 sq feet. For me, as a regular person, I would have to pay full prices to buy material for the job. A contractor gets about a 10-15% discount through most suppliers because of their volume business. When dealing with this amount of supplies the contractor was able to bid the job at only a bit more than what I would have paid just for the material and haul away of the old roofing material, and he was removing and hauling away the old roof covering also. If it would have been a couple of thousand+ dollar difference I would have bit the bullet and learned how to do it myself, but it wasn't and I was glad to have it done in 2 days instead of the 2 weeks+ it would have taken me.
Now I have time to dig out and replace the old culvert pipe under the driveway there.

 

[HeartoftheMatterFarm]

HELP!!! A friend sent me this. What can I tell her to do? She said something got in the coop last night. What could it have been.

 

[BullChick]

Make sure it stays warm (it’s getting cold this weekend) because it needs all of its energy to heal. Tell her to use an antibiotic ointment or spray (without pain reliever), and keep it inside if she can. Scrambled eggs and vitamins are good too.

 

[dheltzel]

How big are your ameraucanas and how old? If I can't find seabrights by end of next week I will definitely reach back out

They would be newly hatched. I can't sex them at all, but the roos are very nice and should be highly desirable for anyone wanting a flock rooster.

 

[HeartoftheMatterFarm]

She just sent this picture. Gruesome warning

 

[dheltzel]

Hatch Day today, our first!! 4 chicks so far! All look to be Danny’s (the Easter Egger roo), none of Hero’s yet. They are all reddish, 3 have the Easter Egger head stripe. Anybody know if red color dominates black?

Black is completely dominant over red. But it is possible for a black chicken to only have 1 gene for black and so not every chicks from a black parent will be black.

 

[dheltzel]

15 hatched so far! I don’t know how this is possible, but I have 3 blues! They have clean black legs and clearly Jersey Giant features. I think blue is recessive in Jersey Giants, so either they were all laid by the same hen (Mary, my only blue) or Hero was also 1/2 blue and showed black. I don’t think my other roo Danny has any blue in him, he’s a wheaten Easter Egger, I think first generation Araucana/SL Wyandotte. One of the chicks is this gorgeous silvery blue color with an almost metallic shine, never seen anything like it. What fun! ❤ ✝

The little black seems a little weak/tired, but is trying and the umbilicus swelling is going down. It’s protecting it from the other chicks by lying on its tummy. Keeping a close eye on it.❤

Lavender (aka self-blue) is recessive. Regular blue (usually has lacing of a darker color, unlike lavender) is an incomplete dominant. A blue hen, crossed to a black roo, should produce about half blue and half black. Of course with small numbers the statistics don't often work out exactly.
If you cross 2 blue birds, half should be blue, 25% black, and 25% splash. Splash is when the bird has 2 copies of the blue gene. If you cross black and splash, all the chicks will be blue. This is what hatcheries do to produce blue chicks reliably.

 

[VictoriaTemple]

Lavender (aka self-blue) is recessive. Regular blue (usually has lacing of a darker color, unlike lavender) is an incomplete dominant. A blue hen, crossed to a black roo, should produce about half blue and half black. Of course with small numbers the statistics don't often work out exactly.
If you cross 2 blue birds, half should be blue, 25% black, and 25% splash. Splash is when the bird has 2 copies of the blue gene. If you cross black and splash, all the chicks will be blue. This is what hatcheries do to produce blue chicks reliably.

Thank you! I should have known that, since Mary (my blue JG) had a black father. I just wasn’t thinking.

I think several of my chicks were part Brahma, either light or buff. They came out an odd brownish gray color, with feathered feet and big heavy “bumblebee” butts. I’ll edit back later with a picture. I wonder what they will look like?