Shadrach's Ex Battery and Rescued chickens thread.

[Shadrach]

Humid, muggy and heading to hot at 27C. Fortunately there was a pleasant breeze.
I left the floor bare overnight so I could do a better poop check today. This is what I found that is of concern. I'm pretty sure tha mess is from Lima. However, Lima is more active than she was after the last lash egg and apart from her scruffy appearance is acting normally.

We all got out. Four hours today with the skies threatening rain but not delivering. There have been storms in the area but not here. I was a bit slow with the camera but in the tree in the distance you can see three of the nine there were originally...storm crows.

Fret is recovering from her sit and the mites. Her comb is getting some colour back and as you can see from her excavations, fancies a holiday in Australia. If she digs it I'll follow her down.

She rests more than usual either by my chair or in plain sight of me. If I move she moves closer to where I've gone. Henry looks after the others.

Talking about the man! He had a lovely dust bath in a moist patch of soil he found. All the hens, except Fret had a go at making him look presentable. It's an impossible task. He always looks like he smokes too many cigars because his feathers go nicotine yellow and doesn't own an iron. He rolled around in that hole for at least twenty minutes gurgling and muttering away to himself while the hens fussed over him. I almost got in there with him.

I left the coop floor bare again to check what gets delivered overnight.

 

[Shadrach]

Gonna poke in here with a question, been reading this thread a bit (was actually a goal before I even joined BYC to read this whole thread, don't remember how far I got...).
How much space do you plan for if the chickens are out all day? Almost every one of my chickens is out from 9ish in the morning to 5-7 in the evening. I have things I don't really call "coops" they're more like runs/pens, and I don't feel their over-crowded but am always conscious to keep the numbers low. But if I let the chickens decide which pens to sleep in (leave them out till dark and just go close doors) they sometimes cram as many can fit on the perches.

Because I can't find my picture of them crammed on the perch on my phone here's a random one
View attachment 3537026

There is no one number that fits all circumstances. Not helpful I know but true non the less.
The coop you can see in the picture below I would be happy keeping eight birds of a similar size in. I have had 20 in that coop but I'm not recommending that. As you've mentioned, they'll pack into wherever they feel comfortable and I'm happy to let them do that provided, they have another coop to use if they wish and that they get let out early in the morning every morning and stay out until roost time apart from egg laying.
This applies for all nightime temperatures up to around 25C. For nightime temperatures above that 6 would be my limit.

More important than space is whether the ventilation system one has works. Again, it's not about square footage; it's about air flow.

There is a way if you have a coop that allows one to do this to check if overcrowding is likely to give health issues. If condensation can be seen on the walls or roof you have either too many hens or poor ventilation. If the walls remain dry then it's probably okay.

The recycled coop you can see in the pictures in this thread with the current ventialtion breaks down with ten to twelve chickens in it. Condensation appears on the wall/roof.
I haven't finished with the ventilation on my coop yet. Currently it's adequate but not good. I may go for floor vents to bring cool air from the sheltered spac under the coop into the coop. The hot air rising should pull the cooler air in.

 

[TropicalChickies]

Why does it say "Redmi Note 8 AI Quad Camera" in the bottom left corner of the photo?
I'm going to guess Xiaomi is taking advantage of you.

I have to go into Settings and turn that stupid thing off

 

[TropicalChickies]

It is true, sudden changes in diet can cause problems.
BUT, and it's a very big but, one needs to beat in mind under what circumstances the chickens who are having a diet change live in.
If for example the chickens have never (or rarely) been out of the coop and run and have been eating commercial feed all their lives then a change in diet may well cause problems.
If the chickens have been out ranging and have had household leftovers as well as what they've foraged then they will be used to a varied diet and be fine with most changes.
As with a lot of BYC advice, context and experience is very important.

Ok, good to keep in mind. My group forages and has always gotten lots of leftovers and much of the same foods I'm transitioning them to-- rice, quinoa, oatmeal, lentil curries, mashed plantains, cassava etc. So it's not like they've never seen this stuff before. But I'll keep an eye out for any problems. I really want to make a study of this transition now that I'm into it.

It's interesting to watch the broodies with the homemade food I've made so far -- they seem to be clucking more excitedly to offer to the chicks.

 

[TropicalChickies]

Likewise. Disgusting.

Yes, Bolsonaro has blood on his hands. He and his cabinet have direct ties to neo Nazis. Thankfully he lost (barely) the last election and Lula is trying to improve the situation but there are still a lot of Bolsonaristas in the Congress, so it's a hard road. I wish more people understood that what happens to rainforests, especially the Brazilian Amazon, affects everyone.

 

[notabitail]

I have to go into Settings and turn that stupid thing off

Or put a custom watermark.
They don't sell those phones here in the US so I have never had the chance to mess with one.
Shad is going to go after me for tax. Maybe my VAIO will appease him.

 

[Somewhere_In_The_Clouds]

There is no one number that fits all circumstances. Not helpful I know but true non the less.
The coop you can see in the picture below I would be happy keeping eight birds of a similar size in. I have had 20 in that coop but I'm not recommending that. As you've mentioned, they'll pack into wherever they feel comfortable and I'm happy to let them do that provided, they have another coop to use if they wish and that they get let out early in the morning every morning and stay out until roost time apart from egg laying.
This applies for all nightime temperatures up to around 25C. For nightime temperatures above that 6 would be my limit.

More important than space is whether the ventilation system one has works. Again, it's not about square footage; it's about air flow.

There is a way if you have a coop that allows one to do this to check if overcrowding is likely to give health issues. If condensation can be seen on the walls or roof you have either too many hens or poor ventilation. If the walls remain dry then it's probably okay.

The recycled coop you can see in the pictures in this thread with the current ventialtion breaks down with ten to twelve chickens in it. Condensation appears on the wall/roof.
I haven't finished with the ventilation on my coop yet. Currently it's adequate but not good. I may go for floor vents to bring cool air from the sheltered spac under the coop into the coop. The hot air rising should pull the cooler air in.

Thanks for the info I did find the picture I was wanting, I am positive they would've squashed more on there if they could (I have since fixed that awkward roost angle btw)

 

[ManueB]

What's your experience with hens who calm down once they get to be mums? Do any of them stay more tran

I'm totally a beginner at this, I'm watching a broody hatch for the second time, but I do have a sweet anecdote that I think I already wrote about here. In November 2021 I got my first roo, Théo, when we helped an old farmer friend Gaston rake his stables. He handed me a cute little cockerel in a basket so I couldn't refuse. Turns out our ex-batts are going to murder the little thing : he was only three or four months old, a cross bantam, and the first stranger chicken they had ever seen. The next day Gaston turns up at our place with a lovely little bantam, feet tied, saying she's company for Théo. He tells me with a smile "she's a bit feral, but she'll calm down once you let her hatch and raise chicks". We quickly understood he had found a good way to get rid of the trouble child because she raised hell with the other chickens and kept getting herself in trouble. The first day she was there she flew out of her isolation pen, attacked the ex-batts, then flew away and disappeared !
Anyway, six months later we let her sit even though she was the most hated feral hen of the flock, and he was right, she did change. She was the sweetest mama and she kept coming asking food for her chicks. And it lasted after she finished with them. She did not became a lap chicken, we still can not catch her, but we can hand feed her, call her by her name, and get her to go inside the run if we need to.
My partner gives her a piece of banana every morning from his breakfast and she runs to him and calls for him when he forgets.

Tax from the past : broody Chipie last summer.

 

[Perris]

How much space do you plan for if the chickens are out all day? Almost every one of my chickens is out from 9ish in the morning to 5-7 in the evening.

if I let the chickens decide which pens to sleep in (leave them out till dark and just go close doors) they sometimes cram as many can fit on the perches.

As one of very few people on here who does receive official visits by a govt agent responsible for ensuring standards in our poultry industry, to check that I comply with them and sign me off as officially allowed to grade, pack and sell eggs, I can speak authoritatively on this for UK regs; probably different but not very much so in Australia.

This is copied from ManueB's thread where we were talking about the Nestera coops recently. M = medium size and L = large size, officially capacity 6 and 8 LF respectively.

all Nestera coops are the same height and depth; the only difference between M and L is width (and weight; yes the L is hard to carry far even on the level). And while the official space requirements say the M is for 6 LF and the L for 8, the other night 14 piled into the L hmm ? party night? ) leaving just 2 in each of the Ms (and Polka in the border ). (On that, the EMI assures me that when the birds have free choice and have multiple options, as here, it does not matter how many pile in and how cosy they want to get; the regs are designed to ensure minimum standards where birds have no choices.) That apart, the point is that 14 large fowl can actually squeeze themselves into the large coop without it looking like

 

[BDutch]

That's just the CO2 costs. There's a lot more to environmental impact than that.

You can choose from more categories :

choose impact category
Global Warming Potential (GWP)Ozone Depletion Potential (ODP)Photochemical Ozone Creation Potential (POCP)Acidification Potential (AP)Eutrophication Potential (EP)

And you are right about desperate people with a severe mite infestated coop. Burning the coop, seems the only left solution to the problem. If I ever get a severe infestation in my coop and I tried to eliminate the red mite without succeeding , I would probably do the same. And buy a recycled plastic coop after that.

But I also believe it’s not just luck that I didn’t get into these kind if trouble for 8 years on a row. Mite infestations are just as common in the NL as they are in the UK. They say the songbirds spread the red mites. And many songbirds come into the run/coop for a snack every day.

Furthermore I believe that a more natural environment is healthier to live in. Moist regulation is one of the benefits of wood. And I imagine what I would prefer. A plastic bedroom or a wooden bedroom. Easy choice. I also prefer cloths of natural fibers and always check the label nowadays before I buy anything new.

Tax for rambling:
I gave the mama’s and chicks chopped grasses. Scattered some very small stones in the run too to digest the grass in case they need it.