The Front Porch Swing

[Beekissed]

I've never seen that. Was she a Buff Orpington? They are always hot to trot to get bred.

 

[Triple Willow]

I've never seen that.  Was she a Buff Orpington?  They are always hot to trot to get bred. 

No. It was a Delaware. I thought she was acting like a little harlot. LOL

 

[BCMaraniac]

I've never seen that. Was she a Buff Orpington? They are always hot to trot to get bred.

They go broody quite often too, don't they? I enjoyed my broody BCM's last year. sure make life easier for me with them raising the babies. This year, I am just going to have to figure out the best way to get them away from Mama when they are ready to be caponized and then see if I can give them back to her. If not, then I will just keep them out.

 

[LeslieDJoyce]

I just had the most interesting and unexpected visitor.

While feeding the dog and making coffee this morning, I stuffed my iPhone into my bra (note to the universe: Womens clothes need more pockets). I'd been in bed intending to check out BYC when Gust told me it was past time to get up, so the iPhone was open to my profile page. I guess I boobietapped a button on my page and discovered I had not one but two messages I never knew existed as "comments" on my avatar photo. One was from Robert Blosl. I had posted on his Heritage Large Fowl thread, and not gotten too much of a response, and now I know why ... here is part of what he wrote ... I hope nobody minds that I share it here because I think it is great advice:

"I see you had 100 hatchery chickens and some of these behave different than our Heritage type fowl. Prolaps or vent poping out is common on these as they are breed for one pupose and that's to lay lots of eggs but don't look like the real breed we promote. That's just the way its been for 50 years. I had that problem as a boy in Centralia Washington. Went to a chicken show in Portland and and saw the real chickens and made the change to the old fashion breeds.

"Need to narrow down your numbers of birds and breeds to a hand full, to many chickens on a lot will cause illness. You will figure it out. It's part of getting started. Have you found a few breeds you enjoy? Remember if you pick say Rhode Island Reds or Plymouth Rocks from the hatchery they are not the same as we promote. The males can be aggressive and that's because they have Leghorn blood in their linkage to lay lots of eggs. Hope this helps you. Let the rest write something for you. I write to much as it is. bob blosl"

I never knew there was a comments section for my avatar photo, and it never occurred to me that someone might try to contact me that way instead of just sending me a PM ... I wonder if there are any other little easter eggs waiting for me here at BYC.

 

[Triple Willow]

@LeslieDJoyce... That's really pretty cool.

 

[Triple Willow]

They go broody quite often too, don't they?  I enjoyed my broody BCM's last year.  sure make life easier for me with them raising the babies.  This year, I am just going to have to figure out the best way to get them away from Mama when they are ready to be caponized and then see if I can give them back to her.  If not, then I will just keep them out.

You may end up with a capon one of these days that will raise chicks for you. That would be nice.

 

[TexasLisa]

Here is a cute video to warm your hearts. It is called 'Puppy Love':

Lisa

 

[LeslieDJoyce]

Here is a cheerful collection of photos I've posted before that I thought you guys might enjoy today ...

This is Gust greeting some fresh chicks. He is a natural bird dog, and had to be taught that these birds are family, but now he ignores them. We still always supervise, but it is nice to be able to have him help with the chicken chores. He is a real ace at poo patrol.



Here is a photo of young turkeys drinking from a bucket. This is our first batch of poults. My previous poultry partner and one of the girls from the feed store pulled a trick on me and slipped a single poult into a box of cockerel chicks (I did NOT want the cockerels, and they caused us so much trouble, but that's a whole other story). My partner and the feed store employee had made a bet about how long it would take me to figure out "One of these things is not like the others." It took me precicely one second. I pointed into the cute little "take out" box they pack the chicks in and said, "That's a drumstick!"

After doing some research I decided Drumstick wouldn't be raised with the cockerels, and so got him 4 little friends so he wouldn't be depressed and lonely. But we were completely unprepared for turkeys and already had our hands full with the oversized flock of chickens. We didn't have a plan for a turkey house, and kept the poults in my office for much longer than ideal ... they had *much* smellier poo than the chics and one day Dad came into the house and announced "The Turkeys Have To Go." He could smell them from outside. Ugh. My office is next door to my bedroom ... it was revolting even though we changed the bedding all the time. The poults had gone from tiny to monster practically over night. Then came a series of make-shift turkey houses ...

This photo would be better with sound because the turkeys make the most adorable gurgling noises when they drink. This was part of our morning routine ... I'd go out soon after dawn to let the turkeys out of their bedroom, and then we'd go have a drink. Then they'd spend the day guarding the perimeter of the chicken run while I did other chores. It might not sound like it, but I absolutely adore turkeys. I'd love to be able to keep and breed heritage turkeys, but the thought of managing flying monsters is too much for me. These are Broad Breasted Bronze, so they don't keep, but they also don't fly.



Here is how the ducks use that same bucket. The lady duck would take a swim in it while her drake stood watch. SO cute!



These are our First Eggs ... gathered a couple years ago. Actually, we'd found two eggs inside the coop and had spent an hour or so photographing them. When we'd finally calmed down, we went around the run doing chores and found these eggs under the bushes. That means instead of having A First Egg, we had seven ...



A couple months before that, Betty helped us build the Naughty Cage. Most people with chickens have a Betty ...

(yes ... that's me ... )


Soon after the flock started laying we found this egg with a very thin shell (turtle egg?) and took photos with a light shining through. The darker stripes are where the wet shell dried a little thicker. Even mistakes can be beautiful.



This one is for Beekissed cuz I know she likes this photo.

Such determination!

Here are the eggs I gathered on Christmas Eve (on the left towel) and Christmas Day (on the right towel). Duck eggs at the bottom of the towel, broken or Delaware eggs in the dishes, and then the regular chicken eggs at the top. Every day I like to arrange the eggs by color, I catalog them by color too, though I've now started putting the buff eggs right after the white eggs, and then the darkest eggs right after that. When I put the eggs in cartons I distribute them by color, and then distribute the biggest eggs, and then fill in with the rest. It isn't the most glamorous photo of eggs, but it represents me very well ...

I got into chickens because a girlfriend from college posted a beautiful photo of a basket of eggs she'd gathered ... it was the first time I'd seen blue/green eggs and I announced right then I was going to get chickens ... I think I had 100 birds within the year. I still can't get enough of the pretty eggs. I'm always forcing people to admire them, in detail.

Bob is right, and we do have too many birds for the size of our pastures, and "hatchery" birds are "inferior," but we are supposedly expanding our pastures by a lot over this winter, and I am also now going to be hatching Delaware eggs as part of a breed restoration project and will begin replacing the laying flock with "real" birds over time. I'll have to figure out a way to keep having blue/green, white, and darker brown eggs as my original flock ages. Maybe I can "make do" with colorful duck eggs ... ? I'm getting a lot of demand for duck eggs now.

 

[Triple Willow]

Cool pics Leslie. I especially like all the eggs, love all the colors! What kind of ducks do you have? I'm thinking on getting some Campbells this spring. How much do you ask for duck eggs in your area? Who seems to be buying them - regular folks, bakers, Asians, etc.?

 

[lovingmyhens]

Here is a cheerful collection of photos I've posted before that I thought you guys might enjoy today ...

This is Gust greeting some fresh chicks. He is a natural bird dog, and had to be taught that these birds are family, but now he ignores them. We still always supervise, but it is nice to be able to have him help with the chicken chores. He is a real ace at poo patrol.



Here is a photo of young turkeys drinking from a bucket. This is our first batch of poults. My previous poultry partner and one of the girls from the feed store pulled a trick on me and slipped a single poult into a box of cockerel chicks (I did NOT want the cockerels, and they caused us so much trouble, but that's a whole other story). My partner and the feed store employee had made a bet about how long it would take me to figure out "One of these things is not like the others." It took me precicely one second. I pointed into the cute little "take out" box they pack the chicks in and said, "That's a drumstick!"

After doing some research I decided Drumstick wouldn't be raised with the cockerels, and so got him 4 little friends so he wouldn't be depressed and lonely. But we were completely unprepared for turkeys and already had our hands full with the oversized flock of chickens. We didn't have a plan for a turkey house, and kept the poults in my office for much longer than ideal ... they had *much* smellier poo than the chics and one day Dad came into the house and announced "The Turkeys Have To Go." He could smell them from outside. Ugh. My office is next door to my bedroom ... it was revolting even though we changed the bedding all the time. The poults had gone from tiny to monster practically over night. Then came a series of make-shift turkey houses ...

This photo would be better with sound because the turkeys make the most adorable gurgling noises when they drink. This was part of our morning routine ... I'd go out soon after dawn to let the turkeys out of their bedroom, and then we'd go have a drink. Then they'd spend the day guarding the perimeter of the chicken run while I did other chores. It might not sound like it, but I absolutely adore turkeys. I'd love to be able to keep and breed heritage turkeys, but the thought of managing flying monsters is too much for me. These are Broad Breasted Bronze, so they don't keep, but they also don't fly.



Here is how the ducks use that same bucket. The lady duck would take a swim in it while her drake stood watch. SO cute!



These are our First Eggs ... gathered a couple years ago. Actually, we'd found two eggs inside the coop and had spent an hour or so photographing them. When we'd finally calmed down, we went around the run doing chores and found these eggs under the bushes. That means instead of having A First Egg, we had seven ...



A couple months before that, Betty helped us build the Naughty Cage. Most people with chickens have a Betty ...

(yes ... that's me ... )


Soon after the flock started laying we found this egg with a very thin shell (turtle egg?) and took photos with a light shining through. The darker stripes are where the wet shell dried a little thicker. Even mistakes can be beautiful.



This one is for Beekissed cuz I know she likes this photo.

Such determination!

Here are the eggs I gathered on Christmas Eve (on the left towel) and Christmas Day (on the right towel). Duck eggs at the bottom of the towel, broken or Delaware eggs in the dishes, and then the regular chicken eggs at the top. Every day I like to arrange the eggs by color, I catalog them by color too, though I've now started putting the buff eggs right after the white eggs, and then the darkest eggs right after that. When I put the eggs in cartons I distribute them by color, and then distribute the biggest eggs, and then fill in with the rest. It isn't the most glamorous photo of eggs, but it represents me very well ...

I got into chickens because a girlfriend from college posted a beautiful photo of a basket of eggs she'd gathered ... it was the first time I'd seen blue/green eggs and I announced right then I was going to get chickens ... I think I had 100 birds within the year. I still can't get enough of the pretty eggs. I'm always forcing people to admire them, in detail.

Bob is right, and we do have too many birds for the size of our pastures, and "hatchery" birds are "inferior," but we are supposedly expanding our pastures by a lot over this winter, and I am also now going to be hatching Delaware eggs as part of a breed restoration project and will begin replacing the laying flock with "real" birds over time. I'll have to figure out a way to keep having blue/green, white, and darker brown eggs as my original flock ages. Maybe I can "make do" with colorful duck eggs ... ? I'm getting a lot of demand for duck eggs now.

Your eggs are soo pretty...I hope I can keep my flock to just my 4, but I sure do like the dark eggs!