Shadrach's Ex Battery and Rescued chickens thread.

[RoyalChick]

I also feel like it's impossible to find perfect solutions. We have definitely decided we are not getting ex-batts again, but I don't regret having them.

Here individuals don't buy chicks from hatcheries, there are only a few of them, that are massive and provide mainly batteries and some breeders. As an individual you would most probably buy from a breeder : the last one that used to send live poultry through mailing has stopped doing it recently with H5N1.

The now two times I have got new chicks I have got them locally. Once from a breeder and once from a local farm with a small scale hatchery business.

 

[bruceha2000]

That's a respectable age. How old is your next eldest?

I have 4 that will be 7 in June. One has been laying soft shell eggs for the last 3 years though. One EE, one White Rock, 2 Black Australorps (one is the soft shell girl).

For sure some behavior is learned, but other behaviors are instinctive but may have been suppressed in battery life.

My original 12 came as day olds from a hatchery (as have all my girls). They were shipped as there are no local breeders or hatcheries anywhere near here.

They had no one to teach them to roost, dust bathe, scratch for food and what to eat when free ranging but they all learned. Thus I'm not sold on the idea that battery rescues can't learn especially if they have mentors

The battery supplied Tescos with their Happy Eggs brand. The brand is no longer for sale.

Maybe they got shut down for false advertising. Happy eggs don't come from unhappy hens

The bonus is they are going to live longer & be healthier chickens for not laying so often.

I don't know about that either. Persephone was still laying last year and never once went broody so 9 years of regular laying. That said I do NOT provide light in the winter because I do believe year round laying will shorten their lives.

Don't ever let anyone tell you Campines don't go broody!

Are they broody or just hiding eggs from you. My little Golden never went broody, she showed up every night prior to going missing. No way she would try to sit on that huge pile of eggs I found. She would have needed at least 2 if not 3 friends to cover them all.

Plus the spelling and grammar is much better than mine

True since you think a boot is something on a car rather than on a foot. A bonnet also on a vehicle rather than on a head and you throw the letter "u" into any number of words like colour

and can wild salmon

There are wild salmon in Illinois? In Lake Michigan maybe? LONG trek from breeding to living and back to spawn!!

 

[ManueB]

Raising my own poultry, which is the meat I mainly eat, has reduced how much I eat.
Having to wait until a hen goes broody, 3 to 4 weeks to hatch a chick or poult, then 16 weeks to 6 months before I start harvesting. Lot of time, effort, feed and especially stress getting them there. Also taking a life is not something I take lightly.
I also eat eggs of course, and can wild salmon. Sometimes I trade turkey eggs with a farmer for pork or beef. I have a big garden and some years I grow enough veggies for most of the year....other years I would die of malnutrition if I couldn't get to the store lol

We were lucky to have the rare opportunity to make that jump back in time and go live in my partner's family old home, that was until the 70s what you would call a homestead in the us or a microfarm here.
We are only two on a land that used to feed twelve so we do have enough in the garden to eat year round (granted we eat a lot of potato and beans). We haven't gotten to having a few pigs and cows like my partner's family used to because I feel I would never be able to eat them . We don't eat meat except when we are invited.

Growing the garden, and also seeing my hens lay, made me realize that any food in your plate requires a lot of work , I never realized that having spent my first 40 years in cities .

 

[ManueB]

Thus I'm not sold on the idea that battery rescues can't

My ex-batts never used to build nest to lay until they saw my bantam that arrived in December making everytime a beautiful quaint little nest for herself. Now two of them (they're 2 years and a half) are building nests that are definitely more coarse and loose, but it's definitely something they learned from her. (Even though they hate her guts!).

 

[Molpet]

There are wild salmon in Illinois? In Lake Michigan maybe? LONG trek from breeding to living and back to spawn!!

LOL I should have said I BUY can salmon.
Although there are Chinook that they introduced to lake Michigan that have reproduced for 50 yrs... so I could fish and can salmon.

 

[Molpet]

Growing the garden, and also seeing my hens lay, made me realize that any food in your plate requires a lot of work , I never realized that having spent my first 40 years in cities

Same here. I'm on what is left of the great grandparents homestead. I thought I could raise food cheaper than the farmers market. Vegetables yes. Heritage poultry free ranging is not cheaper to raise than meat poultry types in a tractor.

 

[pennyJo1960]

Okay so had a day away.. I grew up first 8 years in Wisconsin .. Was moved here to another farm in Washington state .. I do not shrink from butcher, know how to do it.. Cannot bend my neck I get dizzy ..
So full farm no more I do sell the eggs or incubate them.
My birds run most days in their yard where dogs are not allowed. 1/4 acre is for them if they run the yard they will come back to their yard with mealworms ..
Then let dogs out ...

 

[Ribh]

Are they broody or just hiding eggs from you. My little Golden never went broody, she showed up every night prior to going missing. No way she would try to sit on that huge pile of eggs I found. She would have needed at least 2 if not 3 friends to cover them all.

Oh, no, she's broody. She never hides eggs unless she's planning to sit. The trouble is she doesn't act like any other broody I've got ~ & I've got plenty of them! The first I'm likely to know about it, unless I spot I'm not getting any eggs from her, is she goes missing.

 

[Ribh]

True since you think a boot is something on a car rather than on a foot. A bonnet also on a vehicle rather than on a head and you throw the letter "u" into any number of words like colour

Since the Aussies, the Kiwis & pretty much everyone else are with the Brits on this one I think it's you lot that got it wrong.

 

[Ribh]

I don't know about that either. Persephone was still laying last year and never once went broody so 9 years of regular laying. That said I do NOT provide light in the winter because I do believe year round laying will shorten their lives.

I've not have a hen get to 9 yet ~ I haven't been going that long. I am making assumptions from what I have learned. I don't have a massively cold winter or hugely long hours of darkness so many of my birds will lay through winter once they're done moulting. It's summer they quit laying in the hope of raising chicks.