Yard full o' rocks :
Quote:
I'm soooo sorry. If it wasn't so freakin' hot I'd ship 'em to ya, but I don't think they'd survive this heat
I share Serrin's frustration. I keep trying to convince the long suffering DH that we need to car vacation in TN or northern GA. He's got me figured out and is not buying it.
The Sand Hill Delawares at 5 weeks are now twice the size of the buckeyes and speckeld sussex that came in the same box. Very boxy, chunky kids. I think the green legged girl may be getting more yellow, but it could also be wishful thinking 9or originally grass stains)
The Dels are still the first out of the coop every morning.
Talking to all the 4-H families about keeping thier combs and wattles warm.
The Whitmore Delaware girl went to the small county fair. We pasture and have no intention of changing our ways (the birds are so HAPPY) so the judge was forced to grade us down for brassy feathers, expected, no worries. This is not a fault with her breeding. She had one or two pure white feathers in her tail and was a little light in weight (also potentially our feeding methods). Judge commented that she looked like she was bred mostly for egg laying and not to SOP. She laid at the fair, and the bantams we all jealous of the egg size.
This is one bird from Whitmore and we only had two pullets to cull from, so may not indicate overall quality of their stock. However I believe it has been stated in the forum that they had to cross-with other breeds or use hatchery stock at various points in their program, so I guess I am not surprised to see the differences of these to true breeder stock.
It was really fun to have the first Delaware at our fair and talk about the breed history and efforts to save it. It was up against a Buff Chanteclier, which the judge did not like any better.
Meanwhile both the boys' broiler pens scored very highly and sold quite well at the livestock auction.
