The Natural Chicken Keeping thread - OTs welcome!

[Leahs Mom]

Quote:
Curious - what will you use to treat?

 

[wlhtx]

One of my LF layers is a year old now. She has been a consistent layer of large eggs. She will occasionally produce double yolkers. Recently I noticed she takes longer on the nest than she used to. Also, her eggs are more frequently coming out with ridges and odd shapes. Today she produced a whopper with big cracks. The egg must have cracked in the Uterus because they were healed over and the egg is hard. This hen is Phoebe and I hatched a lot of large pullet eggs that produced large chicks. We've eaten all the cockerls and I sold four pullets of hers and have three nearing point of lay. I fear Phoebe is headed for big problems. If this egg had shattered in her Uterus and stayed there, she would be in serious trouble now. Phoebe eggs. One hard cracked and one odd shaped with ridges on the tip. The small egg is from a bantam RIR pullet.

Odd - I had my very first egg ever like this yesterday too. Out of my flock of 46, I only have 3 layers: 2 JGs and 1 BR (all the rest range btwn 3-14 weeks old, which totally makes for a very out of whack food bill!). I'm not 100% sure who the culprit is for this crazy thing. When I get a 3 egg day (like yesterday), I get 2 medium/large size eggs and 1 very large egg - so my suspicion is that it's the BR who is laying the larger eggs - and this cracked one... She's my oldest hen (4-5 yrs is what I was told when I got her last yr). The cracks in this egg were barely sealed over. Almost translucent cracks compared to the more healed over look of Mumsy's egg. It's got a weird shape to it too - bulging out where the cracks are, almost like stress fractures or something. I feel sorry for the poor girl who had to lay this sucker.

This egg will be fed to the baby chicks today since it was also cracked on one end - either fell hard or pecked by one of the others. Not cracked enough for fluids to come out, but enough to make me leery to eat myself...

 

[delisha]

Happy Farthersday

Quote: coryza, CRD, and mycoplasm. Not IB in my opinion.

This is so cute..

Quote:
Curious - what will you use to treat?
X2

 

[bbdal]

Our RIR chicks are 21 weeks old now. We are awaiting our first egg. The chicks free-range morning until they go in their house. Any tips on making sure they lay their eggs inside the hen house in the nests? Thanks!

 

[BlueMouse]

Stony, I eagerly await the photo installment of the day Love your pictures of mama, her ducklings, and the local wildlife.

Going to add my .02 to the discussion of constant feeding of ACV/garlic/oregano/etc. This is you must understand, based on a lot of experience with humans and other animal species, NOT chickens, which I have kept for only a few months, I think that anything which works by supporting the imune system and creating an unhealthy environment for bad bacteria is best given consistently in moderate to small doses. Garlic, specifically, supports the healthy immune system, and is an anti inflamitory, preventing cellular inflamtion which blocks the proper functioning of hormonal systems. (In humans at least) Garlic as well makes animals less "tasty" to ticks/fleas/lice, and must be given consistently to achieve this effect. ACV is wonderful for making the body an unhealthy environment for "bad" bacteria (wrong PH) and also giving a nice "boost" of good bacteria. This is best achieved by regular dosages. So, many of these tonics work best if used consistently. I think that the dosages are the concern, if you give these as such a large percentage of the diet that not enough nutrient dense foods are being consumed, surely you would run into malnutrition. but, I don't think dosages of a clove of garlic per bird per day is going to do that. Personally I consistantly dose my birds/dog with garlic and kelp, and ACV in their water. If I thought they were drinking less water in the heat than with plain water, I would remove the ACV, but frankly, on our property, if they want plain water they can drink out of the dish leave by the hose or one of the myriad puddles.... I consistently dose my turkeys with a LOT of cayenne because I've read some very interesting articles about preventing blackhead in turkeys by dosing them for the first six weeks with cayenne. I figure it can't hurt. About once a week I put the whole flock through a cayenne dose for a few days, and once a week I dump oregano into the ferment buckets. I'm looking into oregano oil. I figure I might replace my dried oregano with a couple drops of the oregano oil once a week and it might be simpler.

I think a lot of this depends on your environment locally and other husbandry practices as well, we all find methods that are the "best fit" for us, and for most of us we are constantly striving to improve the health and vitality of our flocsk via good genetics and improving management practices. That's why having the free flow of information and exhange on this thread is so amazing. We can see how other people do things differently, and maybe glean ideas for our own flocks in the process. Besides, I find knowledge, for it's own sake, to be always worthwhile!

 

[aoxa]

thats great that cleared it up - I'll be interested to know if they keep their fluffly butts for a good period of time. I occassionally have had to clean up someone whose stuck poop gets to heavy on the feathers like that - I think once some gets caught, the next load catches, and it kind of repeats itself. havent done the nustock, just cleaned them up. let us know how long they stay clean an d fluffy! If it lasts longer than mine do, I'll add nustock to the routine next time.

update on banty chick
i finally heard back from the hatching woman and she did offer to trade for another chick. but now I've gotten attached, and the comments from some of you about your own bantams makes me think I'm going to try it. this banty doesn't really act like a chick, totally different personality.

I've resigned myself to just not knowing what some of these chicks are! mysteries are fun.

Aldo, welcome to the thread. I take it some of the chicks you raise are for meat?

Glad you decided to keep banty chick. I love Margaret. She's the sweetest thing you could ever ask for.



Here is Margaret today. She is the only one we will allow to be a pet. I'm not really attached to any of the others, though I am really fond of them. Margaret is definitely a pet.. She really seeks us out and will hop up in our lap, or fly to us when we enter the room.

Susan is giving her a 'sun hat' here lol. We were enjoying some time out in the sun with the goats and Margaret.

Ahhh so I am not the only one with dogs who crave raw eggs. You fared better than I since the dogs eat the eggs once Lily gets them off the counter. For 5 months they never bothered the eggs then one day they decided to try them and wham !! I have 2 dogs who love eggs........people keep saying they will have shiny coats now

And my guys take them inot the living room to eat them on the rug. Apparently they dont taste as good on the kitchen floor that's easily cleaned up

I now keep them in the cupboard.


Do you have a link or website where I can read about this. Id like to learn more about it. I understand the rounded feather.pointed hackles theory. But I am still trying to figure out of the males molt again to get the different colors in them ? My EE is white but I have no idea if thats a pullet or roo color lol

I was also looking for info about what age you can sex BCMs & BR. And what age they start laying. I figure September would be the earliest since that's when they will be 6 months old but I figure will be October or November.

I'm not sure where you would read about sexing them by feathers at that age. Everything I look up comes up with chicks.. You can not accurately sex based on the images I provided until they are at least 12 weeks old - when those feathers start coming in.

As for BRs: http://www.dominiquechicken.com/sexing_dominique_chicks.html
They are sexed same method as Dominiques.

 

[salt and pepper]

Happy Farthersday
coryza, CRD, and mycoplasm. Not IB in my opinion.
This is so cute..
X2

Tylan 50, injectable. I only have week to treat them, so Need something that will act fast.

 

[aoxa]

a duckling finally found the pool. It is the one who's life we saved the other day. Mama chicken was super mellow about it

So adorable!

 

[Ashdoes]

Tylan 50, injectable. I only have  week to treat them, so Need something that will act fast.

Did you ask/tell the owner you were going to treat them?

 

[salt and pepper]

Did you ask/tell the owner you were going to treat them?

No.... The thing is, is that He is my senior by a few years, and I don't want to tell him something that he's doing wrong. He's already lost a few birds to " unknown reasons " And I just don't want him to lose anymore.