Shadrach's Ex Battery and Rescued chickens thread.

[Shadrach]

I know what you mean but they breed at an alarming rate.
I do not allow myself to trap unless I am also working on exclusion. If I don’t work on exclusion I am just killing for the sake of it. Another mouse/rat will come to take the place of the one I killed.
I use my cameras where possible to identify where they are coming in and block it off. In the Chicken Palace once I had blocked the entrances I was left with those that were trapped inside and those are the ones I killed.
A humane killing is important to me so I either use the electric chair or a snap trap. Both are pretty instantaneous.
Just for fun here is some poor little guy who got trapped inside the Chicken Palace.

And for tax here is what happens if I don’t kill them humanely (apologies but many of you have already seen these videos).

She didn't want to share then...

 

[MaryJanet]

A word of caution on this subject.
Poisoning rats is very common in the UK. Some of the poisons take a few days to take effect I'm told. Just because a trap caught and killed a rat does not mean it is safe to feed to wildlife.
Where I lived in Catalonia, because it was a National Park, poisoning any pests was against the park rules, mainly to protect the wildlife and in particular the owls who eat a lot of rats.
It's not like this in the UK.
Do not leave rats out for the wildlife.

Good point.

 

[Shadrach]

Public transport was running again today so I got to the allotments. Lots of bits had been blown around but the coop was fine and it seems the chickens were too.
Lima was back to her normal self.
They were all very hungry. I only had 1.6 kilos of pellets today so I split them in half so I could give them some tomorrow (Sunday). I can get more on Monday.
I also took 300 grams of haddock and oats.
They ate all the pellets before going to roost. Usually there is enough left to provide an additition to whatever C chucks at them.

 

[pennyJo1960]

Did he get injured?

Only his pride thank heavens then he shook it off.
He lost tail feater but 1. Poor guy had just finished moulting.

 

[Shadrach]

On the far left is an egg from one of the Legbars. The next is one of the RSL. The next is from the Legbar Marans cross. She lays small eggs. The pale brown egg is from Slide (Golden Comet) and the last from Matilda (Light Sussex)

 

[Sortacountrychicken]

Beautiful eggs! I'm glad to hear the chickens and coop survived the storm. Does the coop have posts driven into the ground or does it just sit at ground level?

 

[GregnLety]

I have no problem with that, or with the idea of hunting in itself! The things that seem horrible to me are things I've seen in my village, but I know so little about hunting that I can't say if they're usual or exceptional in my country. Like not eating animals that have been killed because no one wants to cook boars anymore, feeding massive trunks of corn until some species become so invasive it is a problem, or deliberately not being careful when people are hiking on the paths of the hunt.

The dogs that are caged are used to hunt deers, roes and boars like you describe in europe, @Solanacae. A team of 10 to 15 hunters, most of them at different posts waiting for the animal to be tracked by the dogs. Hunting small game, be it bird , hares or mountain goats is done individually or by two or three people and not the same dogs. Those lucky dogs get to stay at their human's home, I don't know why !

And we don't have mountain lions but I sure don't understand why anyone would want to hunt them!

I understand hunting the mountain lions as a way of pushing them away from any livestock. I enjoy hunting deer, boar and grew up hunting quail and grouse. 99% of the meat in my freezer is deer and boar.

 

[micstrachan]

I'm usually very wary when smallholders and wannabe farmer types describe the few unfortunate creatures they aquired and imprisoned as livestock. To some it seems to mean something much less that what the creatures deserve. It's okay to underfeed livestock as long as they are still producing eggs in the case of chickens as an example. Of course, for proper farmers and smallholders trying to make some sort of return on their labour and the productivity of their livestock, the health and well being of their livestock is an important and critical matter.
Properly fed and kept chickens produce more eggs even if it's just because they live and lay for longer.

I have absolutely no objection to people who keep chickens who have never fed them commercial feed. I knew many keepers in Catalonia who fed their chickens diets that had been passed down for generations and thei chickens were very healthy. Much of these diets were/are based around household scraps, but the people I knew, knew something about nutrition and knew some scraps were okay and others not so much. The problem I'm having here is about quantity and quality, not necessarily the type of feed. This is classic wannabe smallholder ignorance. You can't adequately feed contained chickens, especially Ex Battery hens any old scraps when you've got some and expect them to thrive. You may get away with this type of feeding with a properly free range group on a large acreage. Even then most experienced keepers know that there are certain foodstuffs that need to be supplemented, Bvits and Calcium are a couple that spring to mind.
There isn't anything to eat in the coop run; nothing. Any nutrients have been exhausted long ago. There isn't even grit there. It's just an accumulation of rotting bedding, chicken poop and mud.

This is all so sad, Shad. I know you have your hands full, but I have another idea. Do you have any plastic containers you could poke or drill little holes in and sprout some wheat or something for them? Would it be too cold to sprout outdoors at the allotments? I’m just trying to think of inexpensive but nutritious things you could add for them. If you put a tray of sprouts out when you left, they could have it in the morning. The trouble is, you’d need at least a couple trays to rotate if you’d like them to get some a couple days a week. Or you could sprout them on your own kitchen counter and bring them with you in a plastic bag or something.

 

[micstrachan]

Grass is much overlooked. It's the key to the success of 'pasture-raised' anything. It has enough nutrients for a cow! The trouble is, people overstock, so the grass in chicken runs and small lawns is stripped beyond its capacity to regrow. That itself is, of course, an obvious clue to grass's value to a chicken as food. It isn't just scratched up to get at bugs under; it is eaten. My lot typically graze for a period after breakfast and dinner, as if it was dessert

Mine looove grass, as well. The wild grass also has a variety of weeds mixed in. The mini pasture I grew from seed is also loaded with clover. They are also nuts for the oxalis this time of year!

 

[micstrachan]

Those post-dust bathing pictures made me smile! I was worried there was something seriously wrong with my girls when they did that at first.

I’m not sure what the rules are elsewhere, but where I live in the US (Utah) it is illegal to use dogs to hunt almost all kinds of big game (elk, deer, moose, etc.) with mountain lions being the only exception I am aware of. I don’t know why anyone would want to hunt a mountain lion, but we had a neighbor who did. He was an odd fellow. Dogs can be used for upland game (pheasants, quail, chuckar, grouse, etc.) and whether they are kept inside or outside depends a lot on the individual. I don’t know much about the European styles of hunting, but it seems like they work in a big group with a lot of dogs to kind of push the birds towards where the people with guns are. In the US, you may have a small group of hunters working together, but just as often it’s one fellow with a dog and a gun working as a pair.

I grew up eating venison, and for a long time thought that beef was gross, though most of those instances were with severely over cooked meat. My parents didn’t have much money and hunting put meat in the freezer to stretch our food budget farther. We would (and still do) butcher the animals ourselves, and there is very little wasted. The animals are all of the trendy catchphrases you hear being tossed around - free range, organic, no antibiotics, all natural, local, heritage breed - and live the way nature intended. They are usually killed quickly and humanely with one shot, though that sometimes doesn’t happen just as it doesn’t always happen in a slaughterhouse for a cow or other animal. In terms of the overall treatment of the animal, I think the way my family and I do it is very respectful and that the life of the animal is valued and honored.

I realize that it’s not an option for everyone, or even appealing, but it works for us. We have worked to improve and conserve the land so that it is a better habitat for the local wildlife as well.

Sorry for taking the thread off-topic, Shad. I’m out of town this weekend visiting family, but I’ll get some pictures when I get back and pay my tax.

You know, when I was younger, I thought hunting was awful. But after becoming a chicken lady and becoming aware of animal welfare, I think it is a WAY more humane way to get meat than farming. I can respect it.