Shadrach's Ex Battery and Rescued chickens thread.

[Shadrach]

Henry on guard.

Oats and Haddock for tea.

Time to relax a bit. I do crop checks when the settle close to my chair,

Lima can't get to her favourite spot just by my feet.

Henry not quite approving of me handling his hens.

Last of the sun.

Cloud who still gives me a wide berth.

 

[MaryJanet]

When I'm obliged to buy eggs, I always buy them from the egg farm on Kangaroo Island where there are no foxes. They free range all day and have barns for roosting. Some hens are lost to hawks and as they age out of productivity, the farmer goes out at night to pop their necks, then their remains are buried to nourish the soil which gives rise to the grasses and bugs that feed future generations of chickens. They never leave their families. They never leave their home. They're as safe as free ranging hens can be and their death is quick.

To my mind, this is an extraordinarily high standard of care in the egg production industry.

PS In case anyone's interested, here's their website

https://www.kieggs.com.au/

 

[pennyJo1960]

PS In case anyone's interested, here's their website

https://www.kieggs.com.au/

Nicely done site

 

[RoyalChick]

When I'm obliged to buy eggs, I always buy them from the egg farm on Kangaroo Island where there are no foxes. They free range all day and have barns for roosting. Some hens are lost to hawks and as they age out of productivity, the farmer goes out at night to pop their necks, then their remains are buried to nourish the soil which gives rise to the grasses and bugs that feed future generations of chickens. They never leave their families. They never leave their home. They're as safe as free ranging hens can be and their death is quick.

To my mind, this is an extraordinarily high standard of care in the egg production industry.

Wow - you are lucky to have that available. Is it a commercial enterprise?

 

[MaryJanet]

Wow - you are lucky to have that available. Is it a commercial enterprise?

Yes, but family owned.

Even though the eggs are expensive, enough people buy their eggs to keep the business viable.

With high prices, they don't need many customers to flourish.

One of the supermarket chains provides online shopping and lists KI eggs on the website at

$7.56 doz extra large
$7.98 doz jumbo

But I think they're cheaper than that on the shelf.

Those are Australian dollars and I think the delivery charge is packaged into the price.

 

[tranquiliti]

I have been living for this thread over the past… week or so? Lost track of when I started “reacting” to the range of wonderful posts, but I’m hooked!! What a vision for these charming birds.

And now that I’ve reviewed some of the early history I’d overlooked — here is my first attempt at TAX!
Photo #1 shows my guineas at ~4 months of age, back when they used to try perching in trees.
Next — fowl originating in Africa loving snow? (2022 Jan)

 

[micstrachan]

PS In case anyone's interested, here's their website

https://www.kieggs.com.au/

Quite nice!

 

[micstrachan]

Henry on guard.
View attachment 2959666

Oats and Haddock for tea.
View attachment 2959667

Time to relax a bit. I do crop checks when the settle close to my chair,
View attachment 2959668

Lima can't get to her favourite spot just by my feet.
View attachment 2959669
Henry not quite approving of me handling his hens.
View attachment 2959670

Last of the sun.
View attachment 2959671
Cloud who still gives me a wide berth.
View attachment 2959672

I’ve grown fond of Lima. It warms my heart to see that alert expression of hers!

 

[Perris]

I put out grit and calcium carbonate on a regular basis. When I get back to the allotments the tray I put it in has had the grit thrown out somewhere and bits of bread or corn or birdseed in it. I think it may be because I clean the tray every day so all C has to do is empty and fill.
If the chickens ranged over the entire allotment from dawn till dusk then the calcium and protein might not be such an issue. Just looking at the pictures I've posted gives some idea of what 20 plus chickens will do to an area of ground. In the early pictures there was a lot of greenery, now it's begining to look like the coop run.
Those that have dealt with full free ranging seem to think that a pair would need about an acre of mixed grass, shrub, and woodland to survive just on what they forage. Of course, the breeds that can do this are about half the size or less than the heritage breeds that lay 200ish eggs a year and they lay a lot fewer eggs.
What needs to be born in mind is these chickens are production breeds and they need a production breed diet.
If a hen lays an egg a day the recommendation is between 4 to 5 grams of calcium per day. That's a lot of calcium.

https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rsif.2021.0502

Have you explained to C and Wendy what the grit and OS are for, so they don't chuck it out? And yes your girls' munching of the greenery is very apparent, as are the potholes But you're not dealing with birds depending entirely on foraging, which is of course the extreme case, and I was thinking of the distinction made in many of the old poultry manuals I've read between production rations and maintenance rations, and at this time of year, with little to no laying, they'd be on maintenance rations. Also, your comment about production breeds needing a production diet seems to go against the grain of much of the earlier discussion about whether and to what extent the rescues are a breed apart from 'normal' chickens, so to speak.

Also, those old books (i.e. written before the invention of commercial chicken feed) usually supplied the calcium (and a good dose of protein) via dairy products, which were produced on the farm of course. So perhaps you could just take more milk than you need for your thermos of tea and share it with them...

 

[Perris]

Excellent. You might have some good genetics in there then.

Yes I think so too; 6 out of 7 hatched (all were fertile, but 1 stopped developing after about 5 days), and 5 out of the 6 are just reaching maturity now (1 died at about 3 months, apparently of congestive hearth failure or something similar). It will be interesting to see how dark the eggs are when the pullets start laying - assuming they lay somewhere I can find them of course!