Ribh's D'Coopage

[CrazyChookChookLady]

That's so funny. Mine love napping on anything I'm making. Anna probably has strange cat hair somewhere on hers. I did check but my cats are super sneaky.

Rex was HIGHLY interested in the rug. I'm sure he smelled a bunch of different smells!!

 

[Shadrach]

I would say the Four main problems and put the whole “chickens are bred to not live very long and pump out eggs at a highly unnatural rate” as the #1 reason.

This is true to a certain extent. But, the Catalan, Black Minorcans, the Marans I've had here, Blue Spot (mixed bantam) were/are all 150 eggs a year plus. Blue Spot laid 220 in her prime, so there are other factors. I agree that for the high production breeds, 250 to 300 eggs a year are more likely to succomb to reproductive issues but, the "my hens dying and she's only two years old" is a breeding issue I beleive. The same with many so called heritage breeds; it's breeding to a visible standard and ignoring what that may mean regarding their lifespan that is more of a problem.

 

[Ribh]

Chickens are not at all fragile. The problem is that for many, the chickens they get are not going to live very long because of how they were bred. A healthy chicken with good genes will live 10 to 12 years.
The three main problems many people on BYC have with chickens are:
1) the chicken isn't an indigenous creature and the regulations and the cost discourage the breeders from improving their stock. This is particularly true of the backyard type breeds now.
2) people buy chickens like they are buying groceries.
3) how people keep their chickens. Chickens are not meant to live in coops, or in flocks, the are not meant to eat a vegetarian diet and they don't fare well in confinement.
Bear in mind that BYC is an American site and a set of attitudes prevails. Step outside BYC and the backyard chicken ideal and things are rather different.

We all have to work with what's available. I do my best to choose healthy chickens from good stock & provide a good environment but the sad truth is I'm lucky my death count isn't a lot higher due to environmental factors.

If I had the space I would run a free range closed flock & breed for hardiness & longevity, not egg laying or meat. I don't have that luxury. Given the nature of the chicken outlets around here my choices are:

1.buy dubious quality unvaccinated birds from backyard breeders
2.Buy a hodgepodge of vaccinated heritage birds because none of them are available in large numbers
3. Buy hybrids in large quantities to have a single breed flock knowing they will have short lives & possibly very nasty ends.

I've gone with number 2.
We then run the gamut of council regulations which tell me how many birds I may keep, & under what conditions. [ Here that means they must have access to a coop & be contained in a run]

Trying to change any of this is a head banging exercise because chickens are seen as livestock with no inherent worth of their own.

In this country @ least, I think backyard practises are improving. As chickens are seen as both pets & egg producers owners are attempting to give them a higher quality of life, unlike when I was a kid & most families on a 1/4 acre block kept chickens in a run down the back in pretty awful circumstances.
Improving the breed quality is out of my hands.
​

 

[MaryJanet]

Get your next chickens there!
That is what I would look for. Someone with a proven record of long lived breeds.
I don't bother much what breeds, if they are a particular breed at all.
Keep in touch with her and should she have some fertile eggs you could try that route if one of yours goes broody.

I hear you Shad but she's not a breeder. But I'll ask her where she got her chooks.

 

[Ribh]

It's quite the contrast...our little oasis!


The clouds were so cool, I was so happy that the picture turned out!

It is amazing what you can do, my husband had great forethought! We put the tree lines in first, for wind protection. We included a lot of shrubs that would also provide food and shelter for birds and any animals that would like to call it home...we have quite a few cottontails, they are so cute! We also have quail and pheasant...though we don't see pheasant as often!

Your yard is lovely!

 

[Shadrach]

I hear you Shad but she's not a breeder. But I'll ask her where she got her chooks.

The fact she's not a breeder may be a good thing. I'm not a breeder but I will give what I think are suitable candidates a male and female. I think I've given away ten pairs over the years. I would have to check.

A story.
A women who used to live in the main house a few years ago who was about the best thing to happen here regarding people had a friend who wanted to start a flock. Laia, the women who lived here, told her friend to get a coop and a large run sorted out and she would bring me up to see if it met with my approval. Laia knew me well.
I went with Laia to this womens farm. She has scrubbed out a small outhouse. Meshed the windows, installed roosts and feeders and fenced an area about 15 metres by 15 metres with wood and mesh. She left all the shrubs and a tree I don't know the name of. The women was nice and had other animals, all looked well cared for and healthy. She did keep them to eat but they had a good life while they lived as far as I could tell. Mini Minx had hatched six a few weeks earlier and I was out of space so I said she could take two pairs.
The tree in the run. I looked at that tree and said to the women "they'll be up that tree at the first opportunity, I hope you can tree climb.
A few days later Laia came to see me and told me the pullets and cockerels spent just one night in the coop. The next day they were up the tree and launching themselves over the run fence into the yard. They went everywhere, including into the house. They were complete hooligans. At night they would fly over the fence and go back up the tree to roost. The tree was perfect for roosting. There was no way an owl or dusk hunting hawk could get them in there and due to the fence ground predators had a more difficult life.
I got called a couple of times to go and get them out of the tree for health checks.
The women who had the farm got tree retreival sorted eventuallly and as far as I know they are still there and living in the tree. I know one hen went broody but Laia moved on and I haven't been up that way in a long time.

 

[drstratton]

Your yard is lovely!

Thank you...it's usually a very peaceful retreat!

 

[Shadrach]

There are some near-feral chicken flocks and feral turkeys in the town area of our island. Some bantam barred chickens, and the turkeys quickly reverted to a more wild body type without the breeding focusing on the butterball standards!

There are feral groups here. One hears about them but those who know where they are keep quiet because of the idiot hunters here.

 

[Ribh]

I could weep.
Lavender spent last night in a nesting box.
I wasn't too fazed. She's moulting pretty badly & I just figured she's having a hard time roosting, as she does @ the peak of her moult. She's continued to lay & I've been keeping a proprietary eye on her but she's one of my older hens & knows what she's doing.
What she's done, the rotten girl! is gone broody on me!

She didn't come out this morning. When I checked she raised her hackles, pancaked & gobbled @ me!!! She's never gone broody before!
What is this obsession my chickens have?! Even my supposedly non~broody breeds go broody on me! ​

 

[Shadrach]

We all have to work with what's available. I do my best to choose healthy chickens from good stock & provide a good environment but the sad truth is I'm lucky my death count isn't a lot higher due to environmental factors.

If I had the space I would run a free range closed flock & breed for hardiness & longevity, not egg laying or meat. I don't have that luxury. Given the nature of the chicken outlets around here my choices are:

1.buy dubious quality unvaccinated birds from backyard breeders
2.Buy a hodgepodge of vaccinated heritage birds because none of them are available in large numbers
3. Buy hybrids in large quantities to have a single breed flock knowing they will have short lives & possibly very nasty ends.

I've gone with number 2.
We then run the gamut of council regulations which tell me how many birds I may keep, & under what conditions. [ Here that means they must have access to a coop & be contained in a run]

Trying to change any of this is a head banging exercise because chickens are seen as livestock with no inherent worth of their own.

In this country @ least, I think backyard practises are improving. As chickens are seen as both pets & egg producers owners are attempting to give them a higher quality of life, unlike when I was a kid & most families on a 1/4 acre block kept chickens in a run down the back in pretty awful circumstances.
Improving the breed quality is out of my hands.
​

Australia has a similar problem to the USA. It costs a lot of money and it's very difficult to import other animals; trying to get in as a human isn't easy!
There are black market imports; there is a thread here on BYC about BCM's which I suspect are such imports.
As you write, we do the best with what we've got. It doesn't later the facts though. The breeding stock isn't adequate in any form to cater for demand. A handful of a particular breed are probably being bred generation after generation without new blood. The outcome is inevitable if they are being bred to a standard and one assumes, to make a profit.
Fortunately here in Europe and in Asia, China and many other countries importing is a lot easier. It was possible before Covid to drive to say Egypt, check around the farms and bring back some chickens. I can go to France, or Germany for examples and bring up to five chickens without doing any paperwork, or paying any "duties".