Texas

[RustedOak]

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Good luck! 

I love my water bucket. Nothing fancy, but easy to use and it lasts my 21 chicks about a week. 

That was one of the reasons I chose this system. We'll be going on vacation for a few days for July 4 and I don't want anyone to have to tend to them for me. Mostly it's because standard waterers are always nasty and unsanitary.

 

[Starfire669]

Well the storm and flooding yesterday caused poor Daisy to get injured. It was pouring rain and I was looking for her and Ivory to put them up. A loud crack of thunder sounded overhead and she screamed and ran out. The ducks, Daisy and Ivory were under some tree branches we had just cut as a safety precaution, they were dead and we didn't want them breaking. She somehow managed to cut the tip of middle toe on her left foot and has a small cut over her left eye. I think she cut it on the tree branches she was foraging in when the thunder scared her. She is doing fine, cleaned her foot and face and applied some Blu-kote, both to prevent infection and keep the chickens from pecking her. We are under flood watch so the waterfowl are bunking with the chickens this week. Daisy managed to smear the Blu-kote all over her face and on her left wing. She looks like she is wearing a purple mask, lol. She is doing fine, still "breeding" or dominating Ivory, foraging for food (my mom gave her some squash that she loved!), and she is not showing signs of pain. No limping or anything, the cuts themselves are small. My biggest concern is chicken pecking and her walking in poo. Her foot gets cleaned 2X a day to minimize the risk of infection and I have some antibiotic on hand just in case.

1 of the geese also got a minor injury from the craziness yesterday. When the thunder sounded all the geese took off zooming in fear, the smallest Chinese got trampled by its flock mates and has a pulled muscle. I really wish that the weather channels could tell us these things before it happens. Most of the time I get a bad feeling and take precautions before the alerts come through. Yesterday we were forecast cloudy but no rain till 4PM, so I let the flock out, intending to put everyone up at 3PM. We got hit hard at 11AM and parts of my yard were flooded in less than 30 minutes. I am very glad my house is on top of a small incline and is a post and beam foundation. I had also let the chickens out and Screwball led us a very long chase through the downpour and puddles. He was the very last bird to be put up, and he looked so pathetic soaked, like a drowned rat. Today only the waterfowl are allowed out, they are much easier to put away and can take a small wetting. Plus I want Daisy and Maybel (the injured goose) out of the chicken coop for a bit so they don't get pecked on. The coop is fine for overnighting everyone, but they can't all be shut in there for days on end, and we are supposed to get scattered storms all week, because of the storm in the Gulf. My poor chickens willbe shut up as long as we have storms rolling through.

My gosling, Gertrude, who has perosis is responding to the vitamins and minerals. Her foot isn't turning inwards anymore. She is still limping though, so I will continue to give her the supplement. I just don't know how much is correct for a young gosling. I am giving 2 cc a day of a poultry vitamin, the directions say 1-3cc for adult chickens. I give Gertrude 1cc in the morning and 1cc at night before bed. Also gave 1cc to Ebony, Daisy, and Maybel, hoping it will speed their healing.

Ebony is continuing to improve, she is feeling pretty good and really really wants to get out and forage. I would let her but for the rain. If I have to round everyone up in a downpour I don't want her getting trampled, Maybel is much bigger than Ebony and had no injured and still was trampled, so i wont risk it. When the storm in the Gulf stops sending bad weather this way I will let Ebony out to free range again. She still limps, but the limp is less sever and she has a strange limping run now when she sees her food coming! When she sees me come for swim therapy she smiles at me, lol. Very cute, spoiled duck!

The rain has nearly destroyed my garden, the corn that survived the last storm, is all flopped over. The squash is rotting on the vine, the tomatoes are being held up by their cages, but aren't looking good. The carrots are drowned. My roses have black spot, rust, and leaf blight from no sunlight for the past few days. About the only thing that's looking good is the grass, it's lush and green and the birds are loving it.

Sorry for not being on yesterday and for the really long post. Due to weather I may be off more than usual.

 

[henless]

That was one of the reasons I chose this system. We'll be going on vacation for a few days for July 4 and I don't want anyone to have to tend to them for me. Mostly it's because standard waterers are always nasty and unsanitary.

Nasty is right! Not just anyone would want to come in and change a chicken waterer or feeder for that matter. This would make it loads easier for someone to come and check on your chickens without having to get "hands on".

Sorry for not being on yesterday and for the really long post. Due to weather I may be off more than usual.

Hope everyone ends up being ok and you don't receive any more damage.

The rain has slacked off here. I checked the rain gauge when I left to pick up my granddaughter. We've gotten 9/10s of an inch so far.

 

[Starfire669]

Nasty is right! Not just anyone would want to come in and change a chicken waterer or feeder for that matter. This would make it loads easier for someone to come and check on your chickens without having to get "hands on". 

Hope everyone ends up being ok and you don't receive any more damage. 

The rain has slacked off here. I checked the rain gauge when I left to pick up my granddaughter. We've gotten 9/10s of an inch so far.

It was really strange yesterday. I checked the weather and we got a few sprinkles in the morning from nearly cloudless skies. Then at 4 we were supposed to get storms, so I let everyone out. Figured sprinkles wouldn't hurt no one and they could enjoy half a day put before being locked up. Well, the weather guys were very Wrong! I am upset that I trusted them and let my babies out. If I had only kept the chickens in Daisy and Maybel would not have been injured. I would have had them safely put away before the thunder sounded. But because I had to round up the chickens in the rain the geese and ducks had to wait their turn. I usually do the chickens first, it's habit now. The geese and ducks are so good about going to their coops any time of day easily. The chickens put up a fight unless it's night time. I am just very grateful the injuies are minor, a little TLC and they will be fine in a few days. I should probably take a picture of Daisy, her smeared purple mask is funny. But it is keeping the chickens from pecking her face, which they had started to do. I doctored her foot right away, and since the cut on her face was more of a scratch, with feathers over it, I just cleaned it. But the dang chickens went for it, so I went ahead and coated that too. When Daisy went to bathe in the pool she smeared it Everywhere! Lol.

We got a lot of rain, the lower part of my yard was flooded up to just past my ankles. And I was chasing chickens through the puddles trying to get them under cover! Right now, we are supposed to have clear skies, but we have had a few sprinkles. So I am taking no chances. I am going to take the chickens some greens and scratch and throw it in the coop. If it rains again I need to get the geese and ducks under cover ASAP to prevent any more injuries.

 

[magpiesing]

Good day folks
Won't complain too much about the rain. Just would like it spread out a bit more...like in July and August...lol
New roof on the coop is great. the only part that got wet was along the front where water still went under. When this started yesterday all the big chickens went inside and were milling around the floor and the youngsters were afraid to go in so we got soaked herding everyone inside. Poor babies were drenched. When the rain quit about noon today I let them out only to have it rain again but this time everyone went in. Going to put some type of lean-to in the yard for those who insist on staying out. The ones that had it the best were Becka and her brood. They may be locked down inside but they were nice and dry sitting on their roost watching it rain.

Our garden is holding up pretty ok. Got some tomato plants down because I didn't get them tied up better yesterday. The green beans are layed over but I'll fix them when I can.
What took the worst beating are my flowers. Sunflowers are all on the ground as well as zinnas and marigolds. My rain gauge is still not back up but a feed pail I left on the table has probably 5 inches in it. I think we got lucky most of the rain was slow and steady only some of it was really hard.

Our other catalana Nell has gone broody. She went into her zen mode Sunday so she has 4 big eggs and one bantam egg. Put her in the dog crate Sunday nite. We'll check the eggs next Sunday and see if we got any good ones. This will be the last chicks we'll let hatch until spring. We went from 20 to 38 birds really fast. When we bought our chicks we wanted different breeds but didn't think we would get any more chicks this season. Surprise!! But that 's ok we'll take them.

Looks like our four SLW will be a flock. Pretty sure we have a roo and 3 hens. I think y'all had it right about the cuckoo marans too. I think we have a pair. The one I posted pic of is starting to get curved tail feathers. So far out of 10 chicks it looks like we got 4 roos. The second in command roo...Kanga is starting to learn some manners. The older hens are teaching him how to be nice. Good thing he was headed to the freezer. He's still practicing and hasn't crowed yet but he's trying to. But with the leghorn roos coming up he will be replaced eventually.

Hope everyone gets through the storms ok. Y'all be safe.

Starfire...sorry you got hit so hard...I hope all your birds will be ok and heal from their fear flight. Your garden may yet recover...plants are pretty amazing and can take alot. I thought my green beans were done for from the storm earlier but I cleaned the sand off of thema nd pushed dirt up around them to prop them back up and they recovered fine.
Good luck to you and take care.

 

[Starfire669]

Good day folks
Won't complain too much about the rain.  Just would like it spread out a bit more...like in July and August...lol
New roof on the coop is great.  the only part that got wet was along the front where water still went under.  When this started yesterday all the big chickens went inside and were milling around the floor and the youngsters were afraid to go in so we got soaked herding everyone inside.  Poor babies were drenched.  When the rain quit about noon today I let them out only to have it rain again but this time everyone went in. Going to put some type of lean-to in the yard for those who insist on staying out.  The ones that had it the best were Becka and her brood.  They may be locked down inside but they were nice and dry sitting on their roost watching it rain.

Our garden is holding up pretty ok.  Got some tomato plants down because I didn't get them tied up better yesterday.  The green beans are layed over but I'll fix them when I can.
What took the worst beating are my flowers.  Sunflowers are all on the ground as well as zinnas and marigolds.  My rain gauge is still not back up but a feed pail I left on the table has probably 5 inches in it.  I think we got lucky most of the rain was slow and steady only some of it was really hard.

Our other catalana Nell has gone broody.  She went into her zen mode Sunday so she has 4 big eggs and one bantam egg. Put her in the dog crate Sunday nite.  We'll check the eggs next Sunday and see if we got any good ones. This will be the last chicks we'll let hatch until spring.  We went from 20 to 38 birds really fast.  When we bought our chicks we wanted different breeds but didn't think we would get any more chicks this season.  Surprise!!  But that 's ok we'll take them.

Looks like our four SLW will be a flock.  Pretty sure we have a roo and 3 hens.  I think y'all had it right about the cuckoo marans too.  I think we have a pair.  The one I posted pic of is starting to get curved tail feathers.  So far out of 10 chicks it looks like we got 4 roos.  The second in command roo...Kanga is starting to learn some manners.  The older hens are teaching him how to be nice.  Good thing he was headed to the freezer. He's still practicing and hasn't crowed yet but he's trying to.  But with the leghorn roos coming up he will be replaced eventually.

Hope everyone gets through the storms ok. Y'all be safe.

 Starfire...sorry you got hit so hard...I hope all your birds will be ok and heal from their fear flight.  Your garden may yet recover...plants are pretty amazing and can take alot.  I thought my green beans were done for from the storm earlier but I cleaned the sand off of thema nd pushed dirt up around them to prop them back up and they recovered fine.
Good luck to you and take care.

Thanks, I am a bit upset about the garden. But I can replant again if needed, though I did that after the last storm. Even though I checked 3 different weather channels and they all said no rain till tonight,I am hearing thunder in the distance. Going to round up the flock here in a bit. I am not taking any chances on someone else getting injured. I just feel awful that they will be cooped up for the better part of a week with these storm bands rolling through. I had a 5 gallon bucket in the yard, it had about 8 or 9 inches of water this morning. I need a rain gauge, but till then I'll use my bucket as one, I just emptied it to see how much rain we get today/tonight. Most of my chickens were hiding under our trailer, my kids 13 foot trampoline, and our picknic table. But they were terrified of the rain and were very hard to put up yesterday. none of them wanted in the coop until we caught them and put them there, then they stayed inside. They made no attempt to get out so we left the door open to keep tossing chickens in, lol. The geese and ducks loved the rain till the thunder hit, then they were terrified. No one wanted out this morning, I had to catch and carry all the ducks and geese out.

I do however have great news, I put Ebony in a pool for swim therapy and Ivory came to say hi. Ebony started zooming around the pool! Her limp is much, much better today. I don't know if it's all the therapy and care, or if the vitamin supplement helped, but yay for Ebony! Shouldn't be long before she is all good to go.

 

[TherryChicken]

I can complain! Love rain, but hate it in large amounts. We have a huge puddle in out backyeard that scatters all over. Ducks and chicken coops are filled with inches of mud and muddy water, so discusting!!

 

[harley1975]

Me and the wife are going to canton this Saturday. We will be going to dog ally to see what chickens they have there. So if anyone else is going to canton let me know.

 

[Starfire669]

We are bracing for impact. The temp has dropped from 81 to 72 in the last 10 minutes. Lightning struck across the highway from us. So much for the weather predictions, my back is a better meteorologist than them! It's a dang good thing I listened to it this time instead of trusting the weather forecast. Everyone is locked away in the chicken coop, safe and sound.

 

[texpainthorse]

We have been planning on going for a month now. I hope our plans don't get doused. I have lived in Central Texas my entire life and have never been to Canton!