Shadrach's Ex Battery and Rescued chickens thread.

[Shadrach]

I also think antropormophism without experience and knowledge can lead to denying difference. I'm not 14, but I only have 28 months experience keeping chickens and I could easily fall into that trap because i find their behaviour are actually very similar to that of humans in many ways, much more than cats, or sheeps or horses for example. And from a theoretical point of view I believe it could also lead if taken to it's extreme to a denial of any alterity other than human.

It's the high degree of social living that made chickens an interesting study with some obvious parallels to humans. The tribal nature of the chicken for example.

 

[Shadrach]

That's wonderful! If I may ask, would you care to explain why you began doing that, and also why do you ferment (I read Shadrach's article on the subject ) ? And do you raise the mealworms or buy them ?

Thank you for the explanation! We grind it because when we give it whole, it comes out whole . The gizzard is not up to it somehow!

Cracked corn is what the majority of the corn feeds are. As you've found out, whole corn tends to pass through as is.

 

[Shadrach]

I am just moving mine over to a no soy brand. It uses insect protein. So far it seems popular with my Princesses.

I've been looking for that here in the UK without much success so far.

 

[Shadrach]

I'm certainly not thinking you are a conspiracist, in fact you have just made it on the list of my personal heroes !

Thank you for all the explanations and the links, I will read those carefully. Everytime a thread comes up on BYC about making your own feed people are basically saying it's impossible or very difficult, so I'm really pleased to hear you have a different perspective.

It is difficult to get right, especially if commercial feed is all the chickens get.
Making a feed that keeps them alive for a few years is doable and that is basically what commercial feed accomplishes. Making a feed that substitutes what a chicken free ranging would eat is another matter.

 

[Shadrach]

A general comment on fermenting feed.
Quite a few of the chicken keepers I knew in Catalonia and some of the multi coop keepers I've been in contact with in other parts of the world make a fermented feed. The important thing to note here is they make a feed that responds well to the fermentation process. It isn't just a matter of getting some off the shelf commercial feed and letting it sit in water for a few days.
Perris is doing something similar and it may well be benificial.

 

[Shadrach]

Things have got that bad in the coop run I've taken to feeding in the allotment run.

 

[Shadrach]

This has been of particular interest to me for a few years now; dust bathing, the why's and how's.
I've mentioned in an a couple of articles and a number of posts that my observations and the observations of some others I consider reliable, that roosters have different bathing habits to hens. Generally people fall about laughing and I just don't bother mentioning it on the general threads on BYC any more.
In this thread I've posted a number of dust bathing pictures and what one might have noticed is the pictures are of hens dust bathing. Henry is usually standing around keeping an eye on things but not in the bath.
This is Henry having a bath. Note none of the hens are in there with him.
Note the condition of the soil. It's been raining a bit and the soil is damp; not dry and dusty.
This is what I observed with the males in Catalonia. I don't think I ever saw a rooster in one of the dry baths the hens use. They always chose places where the soil was moist. No I don't know why but I do know what I have seen and now what I'm seeing with Henry.
This isn't a it never happens statement. What it is is there seems to be a marked preference for roosters to bath in moist soil rather than dust.
Here you go. Not much in the way of evidence in one set of pictures but I've got lots and the soil always has similar qualities to that of the soil in the pictures below. Make of it what you will.
I should also mention he had a wondeful time chuntering away to himself and rolling around.

 

[Shadrach]

These pictures may give you some idea of just how desperate the coop run ground conditions are. My foot went through yet another thin sheet of accumulated shite and bedding this evening. In many places the ground is essentially hollow a couple of inches below the surface. There is no make to and patch to sort this out. The lot needs digging out which I will do once the new coop arrives. It's that bad that I may have to terrace the ground once the old coop is removed.

 

[Molpet]

My foot went through yet another thin sheet of accumulated shite and bedding this evening. In many places the ground is essentially hollow a couple of inches below the surface.

Rodents tunnels?

I have moles that tunnel into the hoop coops. I worry about weasels following in.

 

[Shadrach]

Rodents tunnels?

I have moles that tunnel into the hoop coops. I worry about weasels following in.

Yup, rats.
It can be minimised if the problem is addressed when the run is built. Unfortunately that didn't happen here.