Texas

[Starfire669]

V

Very true!! We had farm geese when I was a kid, not sure the breed. I'd have to look up some pics. Anyways we had some mean 1s that no dog wld go near, not even the neighbors evil little pack. They'd snatch a chicken, very rare duck (they stuck near the geese) or turkey. We actually had a very large male named Junk Yard Dog. He was also know to steal hub caps off of strange cars in our driveway, lol!!! I think I'd have a few emu on my imaginary farm/ranch. U sold me, lol!!!

Lol, I would probably raise them from babies in an attempt to make them friendly towards me and my family. But if they were mean to me I would take extra precautions when handling cause I don't want to get kicked by one of those guys. Lol.

You got lucky, a lot of dogs around hear will tear a goose apart. That's one reason I keep a loaded 9mm, a shotgun, and a metal bar handy. I'm not above smacking a dog in the head with a baseball bat to save my chickens or geese. I would probably cave the dang dogs head with how furious I would be in that situation. I love my animals very much and can't stand the people down the street who let their dogs run lose sickly and viscous. Those dogs have ripped a full grown German shepards front leg off (they tore through chain link to kill that old mans pet and the poor dog bled to death) they also killed a weenie dog in its yard, and a Shepard/husky mix that got lose. A 15 year old boy was attacked and bitten, but the father didn't report it as he wants to shoot the dogs. Stupid to risk rabies if you ask me. I myself have been chased by them. I have a no tolerance policy for those dogs. Which is sad considering I rescue cats and dogs off the streets and try to find them homes, out of my own pocket. But they are too mean to take chances with.

 

[Cassie Collins]

Lol, I would probably raise them from babies in an attempt to make them friendly towards me and my family. But if they were mean to me I would take extra precautions when handling cause I don't want to get kicked by one of those guys. Lol.

You got lucky, a lot of dogs around hear will tear a goose apart. That's one reason I keep a loaded 9mm, a shotgun, and a metal bar handy. I'm not above smacking a dog in the head with a baseball bat to save my chickens or geese. I would probably cave the dang dogs head with how furious I would be in that situation. I love my animals very much and can't stand the people down the street who let their dogs run lose sickly and viscous. Those dogs have ripped a full grown German shepards front leg off (they tore through chain link to kill that old mans pet and the poor dog bled to death) they also killed a weenie dog in its yard, and a Shepard/husky mix that got lose. A 15 year old boy was attacked and bitten, but the father didn't report it as he wants to shoot the dogs. Stupid to risk rabies if you ask me. I myself have been chased by them. I have a no tolerance policy for those dogs. Which is sad considering I rescue cats and dogs off the streets and try to find them homes, out of my own pocket. But they are too mean to take chances with.

That is ridiculous & sad!! Animal control won't deal w/ them?! I love animals, but I wld put them down too bc of their history!! All ur poor neighbors & u !!!

 

[Starfire669]

That is ridiculous & sad!! Animal control won't deal w/ them?! I love animals, but I wld put them down too bc of their history!! All ur poor neighbors & u !!!

Nope, animal control doesn't trap strays, you have to trap and hold them for pickup, then pay them to do it! The sheriff did give them a warning and advised them that I can legally shoot the dogs if they come on my property. The biggest problem is when they walk past my house to get to the gas station, they are followed by 4 to 8 dogs off leash. Those dogs broke a section of the old lady across the streets gate to chase her cats, she is in a wheel chair and can't do anything about it and those guys don't care. When the dogs came after my cat (before I had chickens) I grabbed a pipe and went for them, the dog ran before I could swing and then I called the sheriff. The next time the dogs came by same thing happened only this time we got in a very loud yelling match at which point I told them to keep their dogs off my yard or lose them. (I know I shouldn't have threatened but I was steaming hot!) the thrice time, I nearly got the dog and they apologized. That's when my hubby got me both a 9mm and a shotgun and has been taking me to the range. I am an excellent shot with rifle and shotgun but am not confident enough with the handgun to rush firing it unless absolutely needed. I have it loaded with hollow points though, so it will kill the dog if it's in my yard. I am also trying to train my Belgian mix and Rott to be guardians to the chickens. My Belgian is my baby (I found him badly beaten, abused and starving on the road. Then discovered he was very aggressive to dark skinned men, could not stand any type of collar on him, and most telling, he was deadly in a dog fight. Found out first time I took him to a dog park for socialization), and my Rott has a very high protective instinct. With those 2 on guard I will know before a dog gets in after the chickens and be able to repell/shoot the stray. It is very sad that we have to put up with this though. I have been extremely lucky that they haven't walked by with their dogs since I started free ranging my birds. The day that happens World War 3,4,5,6 will happen in my front yard.

 

[hungnguyen]

I went out to buy some Taco Pastor for a group overhere. Now I am so sleepy after lunch.Are there anything crazy happened today????

2-3 weeks ago I turned loose 4 little 3 mo chicks. They grew so fast. But now only 1 is seen in the yard. I have about 20 more that are 2 mos... cannot turn them loose any more.

 

[henless]

Your open air coop is what I am attempting to build for my birds. It's attached to a metal building on the back side and juts out from that. I am going to extend it, (only had chickens and geese 8 weeks and I'm already extending and thinking of where to put a 2nd pen

)


Is that a dirt floor or bedding? And how do you clean it out?

It's a dirt floor, with bedding on top. The bedding consists of some pine shavings, but mostly leaves/pine straw from our yard. I plan on doing the Deep Litter Method, so won't be cleaning it out until this fall, or next spring. Still trying to decide when I want to do my yearly cleaning.

One day I will be over run with eggs !

Sounds like you have B-I-G plans in the works! Be sure and get some really, really good chickens. Then I can pick some up next time I head that way!

Good Lord Almighty this thread has gone to Hades!!! You women need to exchange phone numbers!!! How do you expect a man to post on this thread without checking his testosterone levels!!
Great Granny Grunt give us men a break!!

David

I signed on to 80 posts this morning! Had to stop reading and fix lunch, stop reading and go check the chicks and just now finished reading.

Ty for the nice welcome

If you ever want more Orp let me know. There one my fav breeds!!

Well, consider yourself "let know"!!

Seriously, I do want/intend to get more Orps. I'm tossing around plans to turn a couple other stalls in the barn into another coop or two.

Well, I had a major wake-up call this morning. I was sitting at my computer geting ready to logon here and my birds started going nuts. I looked out the window and saw a coyote trying to get at them. I grabbed my 9mm and went out the door and took 3 shots, he was on the run, maybe hit him, but don't know for sure. I went and looked for him, but no sign. All my girls are safe but a little shaken. They will stay in today, they will be mad, but better mad than becoming a meal for a coyote. I really need a drink, but will settle for coffee!!!

Shame you missed!!

On a chicken note, anyone else have open air coops? I have questions about how to set up for ease in cleaning. My coop is attached to my hubbies car shop, (he is still acquiring tools so it's not noisy yet) the shop is metal and is up against the back of the coop and a small section of wall extends about 4 feet up the left side of the coop. We anchored our walls to metal pipes using screws and also anchored the bottom part of the coop to concrete with bolts. We then enclosed the wall about 4 feet using metal roofing panels and put the roosts there. No predators can reach in after my girls on their roosts that way. The rest of the coop is on dirt floor, (which we are going to install a wooden floor, didn't realize that when it rains the gutters shunted the water close to the coop), and is an open air design. The coop is about 11 feet by 6 feet, the height goes from 8 feet closest to the shop down to 6 feet. I already have plans to extend it out, lol.

My questions are, what is the easiest way to keep a coop like that clean? And how many chickens can it hold comfortably? If my chicks were full grown it would be way too small, I'm concerned that even after culling all the Roos it still won't be big enough.

Lets see, your coop is 11 x 6, so that's 66 square feet. If you go 4 sq ft per bird, you can have 14. How big is your run? The "standard" is 4 sq ft for coop and 10 sq ft for run.

Any way you can reposition the gutters so the run off water wouldn't run into your coop?

What kind of details did you need from my coop? Check out my coop thread, link in my siggy. We didn't go by measurements, we used what we had. The barn has been up for about 15 years, so we just reworked a couple of the horse stalls into the coop/run.

Just a quick announcement! We are have a chicken fun day and seminar at the Backbone Valley Nursery in Marble Falls Texas this Saturday morning at 10:30. Please try to join us! We will have over 100 nice birds ther and lots of info and many handouts!

Sounds like fun! I'm way over in East Texas. Nothing much ever goes on around here. *sigh*

My girls love strawberries, oatmeal, watermelon and pill bugs. I don't think they would mind if I ran out of feed. LOL!! The thing that surprised me is that they don't seem to have any interest in greens. I've tried kale, beet greens, lettuce, mint and they totally ignore it.

I just cut fresh mixed grass out of my yard/pasture for mine. Mine will eat spinach, its just not their favorite. Since spinach is the only "salad" greens we eat, they better get used to it! lol I also feed mine cabbage, specially on days I will be gone and don't have time to cut them fresh greens.

 

[Starfire669]

It's a dirt floor, with bedding on top. The bedding consists of some pine shavings, but mostly leaves/pine straw from our yard. I plan on doing the Deep Litter Method, so won't be cleaning it out until this fall, or next spring. Still trying to decide when I want to do my yearly cleaning.

Lets see, your coop is 11 x 6, so that's 66 square feet. If you go 4 sq ft per bird, you can have 14. How big is your run? The "standard" is 4 sq ft for coop and 10 sq ft for run. 

Any way you can reposition the gutters so the run off water wouldn't run into your coop? 

What kind of details did you need from my coop? Check out my coop thread, link in my siggy. We didn't go by measurements, we used what we had. The barn has been up for about 15 years, so we just reworked a couple of the horse stalls into the coop/run.

 I just cut fresh mixed grass out of my yard/pasture for mine. Mine will eat spinach, its just not their favorite. Since spinach is the only "salad" greens we eat, they better get used to it! lol  I also feed mine cabbage, specially on days I will be gone and don't have time to cut them fresh greens.

Part of the coop is always shaded, that side i have to clean everyday because of flies, suggestions? Sweet PDZ does help a lot but doesn't eliminate the problem. I don't have a run, I prop open the coop door during the day and lock them up at night. If I am sexing my birds correctly I will have about 18 pullets and 2 Roos. So it won't be big enough when they are full grown, back to the drawing board. Maybe I can talk the hubby into letting me have his barn looking storage building and giving the geese the coop as their home. Hmmmmm. How deep do you keep the bedding on the floor? Spot clean everyday?

 

[ClovisMan]

Quote: You can get away with 2 or 3 square foot per bird if you are allowing them to free range during the day. They will do all there activity during the day out in the yard and then just roost in the coop at night. I do suggest having 3 or 4 nesting boxes with that many birds though so there isn't a long line of chickens waiting to lay.

 

[Cassie Collins]

I

Nope, animal control doesn't trap strays, you have to trap and hold them for pickup, then pay them to do it! The sheriff did give them a warning and advised them that I can legally shoot the dogs if they come on my property. The biggest problem is when they walk past my house to get to the gas station, they are followed by 4 to 8 dogs off leash. Those dogs broke a section of the old lady across the streets gate to chase her cats, she is in a wheel chair and can't do anything about it and those guys don't care. When the dogs came after my cat (before I had chickens) I grabbed a pipe and went for them, the dog ran before I could swing and then I called the sheriff. The next time the dogs came by same thing happened only this time we got in a very loud yelling match at which point I told them to keep their dogs off my yard or lose them. (I know I shouldn't have threatened but I was steaming hot!) the thrice time, I nearly got the dog and they apologized. That's when my hubby got me both a 9mm and a shotgun and has been taking me to the range. I am an excellent shot with rifle and shotgun but am not confident enough with the handgun to rush firing it unless absolutely needed. I have it loaded with hollow points though, so it will kill the dog if it's in my yard. I am also trying to train my Belgian mix and Rott to be guardians to the chickens. My Belgian is my baby (I found him badly beaten, abused and starving on the road. Then discovered he was very aggressive to dark skinned men, could not stand any type of collar on him, and most telling, he was deadly in a dog fight. Found out first time I took him to a dog park for socialization), and my Rott has a very high protective instinct. With those 2 on guard I will know before a dog gets in after the chickens and be able to repell/shoot the stray. It is very sad that we have to put up with this though. I have been extremely lucky that they haven't walked by with their dogs since I started free ranging my birds. The day that happens World War 3,4,5,6 will happen in my front yard.

It is very sad. So sorry for u! I have never heard of an Animal Control not picking up strays!! That shld be their job!!! Glad u have ur 2 dogs ! I hope their training goes well!!

 

[TexasLisa]

There is no help out there for chicken obsession!! With all the enabling going on here and other people in real life just do like I have and go with it. Stop fighting it and find away to move forward. I have changed what my original plan was. which was to have 30 layers for eggs to have eggs for my home and to sell the rest to pay for feed. Now I have talked with a feed store owner which has said he will buy all the chicks I hatch from spring to fall. So I am building breeding coops and pens. Also building a incubator that will hold around 720 eggs. That would give me 240 eggs a week to hatch out. I just need to get the pens made and fill them with birds to stat laying by this time next year.

I should have added to my last post that is all Liza's fault!!! She is the biggest enabler of them all!!!

Harley it seems to me that I should be in on your profits. If I am 'enabling' you, I should get paid for my promotion.

Don't you all agree????

Lisa

 

[harley1975]

Harley it seems to me that I should be in on your profits.  If I am 'enabling' you, I should get paid for my promotion.  :yiipchick Don't you all agree????

Lisa

Mmm Ok Lisa I pay off in eggs!!