Rebuilding my Farm

[mississippifarmboy]

Glad to hear everything is coming together for you! Hope you can get your turkeys.

 

[Katydid2011]

Reading your post brought tears to my eyes. Thank you for sharing your story, and best of luck on your new venture!

 

[HallFamilyFarm]

No offence, but I would advise my 4H members to specialize in one or two breeds. You can do more with a few breeds and quality/quanity in a single breed than several breeds.

Try narrowing them down to no more than two large fowl breeds and two bantam breeds. Then the Muscovy, Bourbon Red and the peafowl. Buy quality and build your flock with your own breeders.

The coop is looking great!

Showed Catherine the photos. she was a bit disappointed there were no photos of Ducky. She misses Ducky. A bit difficult to tell solid chocolate girls apart. Ducky just stood out amongst all others.

 

[lcw1995]

read the entire thread
sorry for ur loss
glad things r shaping up again
coop looks good
birds look good
best of luck on the turkeys and whatever else you do

 

[MSH]

I wish I could build a coop like that lol your doing great and your peacocks are beautiful ! one day I hope I can get a white one lol let me know when you have some longcrowers eggs and icelandic eggs forsale ! I def.want some lol

 

[Farmerboy16]

Quote:
No offence taken.

I appreciate your advice, and have been thinking about it, and will drop the White Face Black Spanish off the list. My main flock will be Icelandics, I will have two pens of them. My parents thinks bantam breeds are worthless, and they are useless for anything. I can only can have a few banties, and that is all, not a breeding pair too. So, I will have banties just for my army of broodies. I want to do most of my hatching and raising done by broody hens, and depend less on the incubators.

Thanks, the coop is still work in process. I got the outside of the coop finished-

The coop is behind the polebarn, where the woodpile used to be.

This was taken today after the first measurable snowfall, one inch of snow.

Only one Araucana chick hatched out of 11 shipped eggs, 4 had made it to lockdown. But I am happy that she is rumpless!

I also had an another shipment of Araucana eggs from a different breeder, but in two weeks of incubating, all the eggs were clear.

I am getting another shipment of Araucana eggs from the same place that I got the first batch of Araucana eggs from. They are being shipped tomorrow. I am also joining the NYD Hatch, and joined the 3rd Annual NYD Hatch "Designer" Egg Swap. I have some of Hillbilly Hen's eggs, they are Delaware, Delaware/EE, Delaware/Heritage Barred Rock, New Hampshires, and Black Australorps. I swapped some of HillBilly's eggs for some of my hens were not laying yet. I got 3 Olive Eggers, and 7 New Hampshire eggs from Lotsapaints, and 8 eggs banty eggs from 9Catsz. She sent me silkie eggs which also could be showgirls, and 1 or 2 pure blue splash wyandotte bantams, and 1 or 2 which are silver penciled cochin x blue splash wyandotte bantam.

Hope they all hatch!

Any pullets that hatch will go to the layer coop, and will not be for breeding, I will keep a few roos for a layer flock guardian.

My dad wants to raise some steers, so I bought 2 bull calves home form the dairy farm where I work. I had saved the first bull calf's life, for he was being born breech. He was born before Thanksgiving Day. This is him, after I brought him home-

Last Sunday, another bull calf was born, I found him in the middle of the aisle of the cow barn, and had to carry him 300 feet or so to the other barn. It was hard to keep a hold on him, for he was very wet and slippery.

Here they are now-

Calves playing in the spacious peafowl/turkey pen.

Checking out the strange feathered thingies.

Calf trying to have a nap in the sun, but the chickens were climbing all over him.

I saw an Icelandic pullet trying to ride one of the bull calfs, and the calf bucked her off!

I have been letting the Icelandics ''free ranging'' in the coop, for the roos were not getting along well in the 9x8 pen, and hope that the girls will be happier, and will lay.

It looks like that I will be getting turkeys, for I will be splitting an order with a lady, and will not have to pay for all 15 poults and shipping.

MSH- None of my hens are not laying yet, but I have seen the Tomaru and Icelandic roos breeding the hens, so I very much hope that the hens will be laying very soon! If not-

Freeloaders

I will post here as soon as I have gotten my very first egg, since I have culled the original flock.

My boss had let me bring home 121 pie pumpkins

, and I will be feeding the chickens 3 pumpkins every 3 days!

 

[Mattemma]

Wishing you well in starting over.

 

[lcw1995]

sounds like things r really commin back 2gether
great job

 

[OvertheHenHouse]

Congratulations! Seems like everything is going in the right direction for you. Love the pix - chicks, chickens and calves all look great.

 

[Farmerboy16]

I got my first Icelandics eggs last night!!!

I admit that I screamed and jumped like a child on Christmas day.

I was so giddy, that I popped them in the incubator with the other eggs for the NYH right away.
I also got my first Tomaru Longcrower egg this morning

, but I think that it was laid yesterday, for the egg was stone cold. I cracked the egg in the bowl, and it had a bull's eye!!!

All of the chickens and muscoveys have pass the required 30 days quarentine period. They are all disease free!