Should I buy eggs or wait it out?

[okallthis4eggs]

I am going to be 12 in another 120 months. Time flies.

 

[mortie]

As you ask with elation
Status of our situation
Retirement brings a new vocation
Planting, harvest, irrigation

Also house renovation
And tractor restoration
In a new localization
Chickens still a machination

Will be months to realization
Of chicken materialization
With the eggs for consummation
To give us great gratification

All poetic license aside, the chicken house is a pile boards, insulation, siding and tin. Have some poles and wire still in rolls. The chicken house and safe yard area are an old setting for a double wide modular home. Deadmen need to come out and the indentation needs to be filled in. It does have access to water, electricity and even sewer if need be. Think I can train them to go in a toilet and flush?? Chickens will be free range/yard ornaments with a safe yard and house because we have about every predator known to man with the exception of possums.

Chickens will have to wait on the house, tractor, planting this spring.....

Later

Artful Codger

sounds like something my dad would like. He is having some difficult times right now and last I heard he's thinking of selling his house and randomly moving to alaska. I hope he finds himself soon and doesn't do anything too crazy.

It sounds like it's warmer where you are than where I am! I can't wait til it's warm enough to start on my coop. Right now with windchill we're at -7.

 

[okallthis4eggs]

​

Yeah I can't believe I missed that.  Duh, I mean it's the title of the thread!

My chicks are from a breeder, they're a little fancier than the hatchery sex links that I wanted to go with at first.  Hopefully they'll last a little longer.  This little enterprise starts to lose a lot of its....well at the very least egg value if I am constrained to such small numbers and they don't live long.  I will learn as I go I imagine.

Buuuuuuut here I am counting my chickens before they hatch again.  So far I have ZERO chickens.  All I have are 24 viable eggs.  One step at a time.

Hang around with us. Your next problem will be what to do with all of the chickens. Promise. We will help enable you.And provide you with every excuse in the book.

 

[Wishing4Wings]

not sure what is wrong with her got meds that we have to give her 2x a day,
we where gettig 22 eggs then the bad weather came and they where keep in coop, we do have 29 hens counting the sick one, but this is the first year in five yrs that they slowed this bad that is why i say it is the weather, we have 2 roos that keep the hens active.

Hope the meds do the trick. Mine slowed down quite a bit this winter, but I can't really blame the weather, I think it's just that they're older. On the good news side, my Buff Orp that quit laying late last summer has started back up again. Woohoo! I though she was laying internally or something, but happily we are getting her cream colored eggs again.

More happy news, the poofy girls (Cochins) have started squatting and have gotten pretty red in the combs and wattles. Should be soon for eggs. No way of knowing with the Silkie. She just eats and stares at the dogs.


This pic was 2 weeks ago, and they look different, much more red. Have to take more pics.

 

[mortie]

​

Hang around with us. Your next problem will be what to do with all of the chickens. Promise. We will help enable you.And provide you with every excuse in the book.

Yeah my husband already told me I should keep 6 instead of the 4 we are leagally allowed to keep. Asking for trouble if you ask me. And this is the man who, just a couple of weeks ago told me NO CHICKENS.

Crazy bunch of enablers.

 

[Scrambles55]

mortie... as long as no one calls the chicken police you should be fine. Keep six... I have 4 and would like 2 more, but my coop will not handle 2 more. But..... when we move.... and I retire..... LOOK OUT!!!

 

[Artful Codger]

Mid fifties with rain and wind today. Crocus are blooming and daffodils are budding. Have scads of "I don't knows" pushing through the dirt. Fruit trees are trimmed after a few years of neglect. Did the primary tilling on the garden space last summer. Insulated the shop and added a wood stove and sheet rocked. Stayed warm while working on the tractor. Jacked up the little house (16 X 20') and redid the pilings and added metal skirting. Prepped both the little house and the machine shed for painting this spring. Got frozen out of that endeavor late fall of last year. Gathered up and hauled off all the excess detritus. Insulated the crawlspace of the house. Not bad after driving a desk for 30+ years. Rather pleased with the progress since we closed this deal last July.

Currently have a split household as I retired last year and DW has 11 working days left. She was not going to leave while her dad was still alive in late stage alzheimers. He passed two months ago, a blessing for him. The other house is under offer and appraisal and inspection come Friday and Saturday. Final negotiations and close set for 3/31. We plan to be on the road to here that day. In laws coming to help us with the rest of the packing. They insisted since we helped them. Have done multiple moving trips with the truck and 22 foot trailer a couple of times so this move should be relatively easy. We knew we wanted to do this years ago and the opportunity finally arose.

Tractor was fired yesterday, the independent power take off issue is solved but I did not put something together quite right and the three point lift arms go to the full up position. Will pull the inspection cover in the am.

 

[Wishing4Wings]

Went up to the farm couple weeks back to see about the tree that went over. This is where I grew up!
My dad had already started in on cutting it up



because he doesn't have enough firewood! Didn't know an 80 yr old could be so incorrigible.


This is the view beyond the downed tree, part of a very old orchard. Couple of the apple trees are at least 60 yrs old.


Little building in the foreground is our old chicken coop. The run has been smashed in by falling branches and has mostly fallen into the little creek on the far side. Larger building behind the coop was the original homestead house (circa 1900). It was only 2 rooms and was later used as a carriage house. The last incarnation was as my dad's workshop.

See the daffodils? Spring is coming!

Such an overgrown mess. No one has time any more.


View off dad's back porch. 3 little deer are in view. I planted that multi-trunked oak from a seedling when I was in grade school. Mom said it wouldn't grow there because of a hardpan layer in that area. Explains why it's so puny for a 40 year old tree!


Here's the barn. Many hours spent playing in that barn, swinging from the rafters and climbing on the alfalfa bales.

 

[lindz8504]

Hey guys! We got 13 eggs today... we also finished the wall with the chicken door in the new coop. So now, all we have to do is finish the screen door between the feed area and the coop, sealing the floor, and putting in roosts and bedding. Then chickens will be moved over! I am hoping to get it done this weekend, because I am supposed to get those RIR maybe next week....

 

[okallthis4eggs]

Bear with me, first post.

Inspired by Mortie.

THE FARMERS LAMENT

In the depths of this our nation
Nearly dead with constipation
Farmers wait with anticipation
For that first egg creation

What made me choose this avocation?
Was it just imagination
Product of speculation
That revels in hallucination.

Chickens with determination
Shotguns, whips, recrimination
Won't keep us from our destination
Omelets, quiche, inebriation.

Produced in collaboration
With chickens in a yard location
With the help of mass libation
Just for your edification

Chickens in a tight formation
Without the art of persuasion
Demanding in loud ovation
WHERE'S OUR PIE???


.......and our dad gave us cheese....watched our celebration
....but we pushed out our tail feathers.....from severe constipation