Shadrach's Ex Battery and Rescued chickens thread.

[Shadrach]

Yes some clarification on 'American way'.
I keep my chickens much like we always did growing up. Large run + coop, with everyone getting let out every afternoon. I do however still have the traditional semi-rural 1/3 acre section, and am in fact still living in one of my childhood houses.
My chickens are half pet and half livestock. I don't cull them when they get older and less-productive, but I don't have deep emotional attachments to them like I would have with a dog. I enjoy them and care for them to the best of my ability and knowledge, but as I would with livestock. I don't take them to the vet, if it's that serious they get humanely killed. I am somewhat sad when one dies or has to be killed but it doesn't impact my day much.

I guess I have the benefit of being raised with chickens and also of being raised with all kinds of other livestock. It's a country person mindset rather than only having had a pet relationship with animals and then getting chickens.

I don't think there is a wrong or right way to be clear!

It's very much like this for me with the Ex Battery hens and Rescues.
I am and have been for many years very fond of the chickens I look after. It became apparent very quickly many years ago that there are some things one can't do much about and probably shouldn't anyway. I don't mind them dying. I miss them but... What I want is for them to have as good as possible life while they live and if necessary a quick death.

 

[Shadrach]

Zora had it better than Chipie if she managed to terrorize everyone , and then go back to middle in the pecking order! Chipie has never been accepted by the flock and from the day she arrived, she has been bullied by everyone. She was aggressive upon her arrival, then scared, then tried to fit in, then just went apart.
She was in the coop when she was sitting but hidden from the sight of the flock so it's as if she had been away.
The only thing that has changed is that she is now also chased very badly by the rooster also, whereas he used to side with her as they arrived together and she was his first girl.
I think no one want her in the flock. With the chicks I'm not so sure.

Looks like she's decided to make her own tribe now.

 

[RoyalChick]

That depends who you ask to some extent. It was the change from mainly rural chicken keepers to the quarter acre/whatever the US standard was/is if they have one. The post you linked to is part of it. Chicken keeping became an urban hobby. It supports a quite a few small businesses as well as adding another market for the large commercial suppliers.
So, I see the American model as urban, probably hen only groups, kept permenantly confined in a coop and run. The supply of hens is primarily through hatcheries with prefered breeders.
This is the core model for BYC.
That's partly why the Coop building and coop pages are so valued by BYC.

Much of the advice on BYC is biased with that model in mind. In most cases it doesn't matter because not many farmers take their chickens to the vet for example.

The poll came about after a bit of a debate between me and U_Stromcrow. It was about the so called 10% treat rule which I said was nonsense for many chicken keepers. My reasoning being, that even in a couple of hours of say supervised free ranging, the hens in particular will eat a lot of stuff, grass, bugs, grit, etc etc. I've seem hens go from crop empty to crop full in an hour on good forage. Compost heaps speed the process up. This is on a morning feed.
I estimated by volume that a hen that packs her crop from empty to full, three times a day will have ingested the equivalent by volume of 100grams of commercial feed. Also, it is unlikely she will have consumed nutritionaly complete forage by eating one selection.
If the above crop volume estimate is near enough then its quite possible for a hen to fill her crop in a couple of hours on reasonable forage. Not a lot of point trying to apply the 10% treat rule to that hen given she's just eaten 33.3... of her intake by volume on non commercial balanced feed.
U_Stormcrow stated he was giving advice for what he believed were the majority and that majority was the fully confined coop and run model.

I didn't think and hadn't thought for some time that the permanently confined coop and run model represent the majority on BYC. The poll is U_Stormcrows effort to put some data behind the two views.

Very interesting - I was going to ask for your experience on time to fill up a crop and whether filling with foraged food might lead to it getting full faster with lower nutrients relative to the more nutritionally dense commercial food.
I notice that in general mine eat (forage or commercial food or a mix) for a couple of hours and then take a break to preen or sunbathe or whatever and then start eating again. That all makes sense.
Today however they were out for hours and hours eating constantly. There were a lot of crawling and flying bugs and to me it looked like they just couldn't resist - like an 'all you can eat buffet'. When they came back in for the night their crops were bulging, but when I tried to give Bernadette her vitamin B which I do in a mash of commercial chicken crumbles, they all mobbed the plate as if they were starving.
So then I worried that maybe because they were out foraging all day that they didn't eat enough and really were starving.
I know that sounds like nonsense but every one of mine I have taken to a vet has received the observation that they seem under weight. I don't know enough to compare so I am a bit paranoid that they aren't getting enough to eat even though they have free access to commercial feed and on most days access to a reasonably big area to forage.

 

[Shadrach]

My 1st & 2nd were large BRs for nearly 6 years. They were both very laid back. I lost both within 24 hours ~ which caused quite an upset in the flock as the next in line has never wanted to be top hen. However now she is. She's a favorelle X & incredibly calm & easy going but now she is top she will enforce if necessary as her 2nd is a Campine & a total nut job. The Campine has her good points as she's very predator savvy but she can be quite the drama queen & her ability to hide a nest is 2nd to none! My lead hens have almost always been super calm birds & lead a very calm flock. I am in trouble when I lose Luna as I find the Vorwerks tend to be bullies & the banties are on the nutty side.

Bluespot was a good Bantam lead hen. Not as steady as Gedit but she held on to top spot for ten years.

 

[Shadrach]

Did you have a role in determining the questions? The breakdown of hours and areas is interesting.

Nope, it's all U_Stormcrows idea and work.

 

[Shadrach]

Very interesting - I was going to ask for your experience on time to fill up a crop and whether filling with foraged food might lead to it getting full faster with lower nutrients relative to the more nutritionally dense commercial food.
I notice that in general mine eat (forage or commercial food or a mix) for a couple of hours and then take a break to preen or sunbathe or whatever and then start eating again. That all makes sense.
Today however they were out for hours and hours eating constantly. There were a lot of crawling and flying bugs and to me it looked like they just couldn't resist - like an 'all you can eat buffet'. When they came back in for the night their crops were bulging, but when I tried to give Bernadette her vitamin B which I do in a mash of commercial chicken crumbles, they all mobbed the plate as if they were starving.
So then I worried that maybe because they were out foraging all day that they didn't eat enough and really were starving.
I know that sounds like nonsense but every one of mine I have taken to a vet has received the observation that they seem under weight. I don't know enough to compare so I am a bit paranoid that they aren't getting enough to eat even though they have free access to commercial feed and on most days access to a reasonably big area to forage.

I'm very leery of these underweight guestimates.
Fit active chickens don't tend to weigh as much as their coop potato counterparts. It depends on who and where the vet is. Gloria my vet in Catalonia would of course make judgements on the average weight of free rangers in Spain.
They're just like people there's a large range in weight.

 

[RoyalChick]

I'm very leery of these underweight guestimates.
Fit active chickens don't tend to weigh as much as their coop potato counterparts. It depends on who and where the vet is. Gloria my vet in Catalonia would of course make judgements on the average weight of free rangers in Spain.
They're just like people there's a large range in weight.

So you think I shouldn't worry that after a full day foraging and with a visibly full crop they fall on commercial food mash like I hadn't fed them for a week? It was take your hand away or risk losing a finger time when I brought it out which is why I got to worrying.

 

[Shadrach]

We've managed a bit of brush and bramble clearing. This is the area I would like to site the new coop and a new run.

A few shots from today.

There is a rail strike tomorrowand that is going to make getting to a from the chickens more difficult. I'm going to have to go earlier and shut them in before dusk to be in with a shout of catching a bus.

 

[Shadrach]

So you think I shouldn't worry that after a full day foraging and with a visibly full crop they fall on commercial food mash like I hadn't fed them for a week? It was take your hand away or risk losing a finger time when I brought it out which is why I got to worrying.

You should always worry about chickens. What else is there worth worrying about?
If you are seriously worried then what I would do first is weigh each hen and then worm them. Weigh them every day. You can then establish a normal weight for them.

 

[Ribh]

Bluespot was a good Bantam lead hen. Not as steady as Gedit but she held on to top spot for ten years.

Olivia is pretty steady unless she's broody. My white Japs, Ceres & Tsuri, are bottom of the totem pole & like Titania on the skittish side while Desdemona & Chavi are bonkers. Chavi struts round the yard screaming as she looks for a nesting site then always ends up laying on the BBQ, which she has looked @ 1/2 a dozen times. My remaining standards are Vorwerks or Wyandottes. I don't think I can count in Beatha as she's always been the hen who walks alone. Shuri is a tree rooster & Portia is loud & prone to going broody @ the drop of a hat. I think it will be the Vorwerk, Freya, who eventually takes over from Luna & that won't be fun for anyone.