The Natural Chicken Keeping thread - OTs welcome!

[Sally8]

Here are Cecilia and her babies. They are so much fun just to watch. They were even dusting themselves along with Mama and another hen named Ducky.

 

[delisha]

Here are Cecilia and her babies. They are so much fun just to watch. They were even dusting themselves along with Mama and another hen named Ducky.

Beautiful

 

[MumsyII]

Here are Cecilia and her babies. They are so much fun just to watch. They were even dusting themselves along with Mama and another hen named Ducky.

How pretty! I love that color!

 

[aoxa]

Justine,

Your free rangers look so good out in the yard. They are very fat and healthy looking. They do not need more feed. You are feeding just right for them and you. They probably could do with out the morning feed but you will worry to much.Great job! They will be tasty lil treats.

The pictures look so good.

Thanks Del.

I don't know why I worry so much if I avoid the morning feeding.. I mean, I NEVER EVER feed the rabbits.. and look at how plump they are. I should just relax and stop feeding in the morning. I will try this weekend when I can enjoy their extended free range.

I took some videos that I will edit tonight of them running around. The fattest ones waddle around like a pregnant woman (or a penguin..)

They are such sweet birds. Honestly I'd love to keep one or two of the smaller ones to raise like you do. We shall see...

Here are Cecilia and her babies. They are so much fun just to watch. They were even dusting themselves along with Mama and another hen named Ducky.

These are great photos! What a wonderful mama!!

I am up to seven broodies right now! Three are going to hatch this week (candled for the first time yesterday because I forgot how far along they are!) There were internal pips. Wow I did not realize it was that soon... One is due next week, and one is due the week after. Two are already with chicks.

Tina went broody yesterday. I took eggs from a broody who was sharing a nest with a further along broody.. I assumed the chicks would start hatching and she'd leave the eggs, so they are with a fresh mama now. My hens seem to love to co-parent.

Must get that from their two mamas LOL

 

[rowerjen]

So, I have a question about flock dynamics. I originally had 7 hens who were free ranging all day. About a 6 weeks ago I came home to find two forlorn hens sitting on my deck railing; never found a trace of the others. My house is surrounded by woods with fox, fishers, coyotes etc so I'm assuming they got eaten

. Among the disappeared was my lead hen. She was never aggressive or mean, but in her own quiet way she made sure there was never any drama in the flock. Really miss that bird. I was left with one buff brahma, who's pretty docile, and a barred rock that I would have mainly characterized as stand off-ish until I acquired 5 juniors (4 5 month old pullets and a cockerel). The 2 hens still get to free-range. For now the juniors are confined to the run unless I'm home. The brahma gave them a few pecks to let them know their place (and floggs the crap out of the cockerel when he tries to do the deed without so much as a by-your-leave. Boys!). When they are free to roam, they all get along okay. When they are in the run, Ms. Cranky Pants, aka Attila the Hen stalks and flogs the juniors. Some times she leaves them alone, but other times she's just relentless. I finally had it about 10 days ago and kicked her out of the coop.

She spent a night on top of the roof. She spent the next 2 nights in the run but locked out of the coop. Conditions improved for a while but this weekend she started flogging them again. I kicked her out of the coop again on Sunday night. She spent the night in the run, while the others were locked up in the coop. Last night she wouldn't go in the run, so she spent the night in a tree, in the rain. I do feel just a little bit bad about that. This morning I let a miserable, wet bird back in the run; so far things are fairly quiet. She's a reliable layer, has (obviously) good survival instincts, and she and the bhrama are actually both pretty good about watching the littles, who are in a separate brooder, when I let them out to run. Trying to decide if the situation may be salvagable of if she's destined for the stew pot once the juniors start laying.

 

[RedRidge]

So, I have a question about flock dynamics. I originally had 7 hens who were free ranging all day. About a 6 weeks ago I came home to find two forlorn hens sitting on my deck railing; never found a trace of the others. My house is surrounded by woods with fox, fishers, coyotes etc so I'm assuming they got eaten

. Among the disappeared was my lead hen. She was never aggressive or mean, but in her own quiet way she made sure there was never any drama in the flock. Really miss that bird. I was left with one buff brahma, who's pretty docile, and a barred rock that I would have mainly characterized as stand off-ish until I acquired 5 juniors (4 5 month old pullets and a cockerel). The 2 hens still get to free-range. For now the juniors are confined to the run unless I'm home. The brahma gave them a few pecks to let them know their place (and floggs the crap out of the cockerel when he tries to do the deed without so much as a by-your-leave. Boys!). When they are free to roam, they all get along okay. When they are in the run, Ms. Cranky Pants, aka Attila the Hen stalks and flogs the juniors. Some times she leaves them alone, but other times she's just relentless. I finally had it about 10 days ago and kicked her out of the coop.

She spent a night on top of the roof. She spent the next 2 nights in the run but locked out of the coop. Conditions improved for a while but this weekend she started flogging them again. I kicked her out of the coop again on Sunday night. She spent the night in the run, while the others were locked up in the coop. Last night she wouldn't go in the run, so she spent the night in a tree, in the rain. I do feel just a little bit bad about that. This morning I let a miserable, wet bird back in the run; so far things are fairly quiet. She's a reliable layer, has (obviously) good survival instincts, and she and the bhrama are actually both pretty good about watching the littles, who are in a separate brooder, when I let them out to run. Trying to decide if the situation may be salvagable of if she's destined for the stew pot once the juniors start laying.

Here's what I do when it's time to integrate new hens... don't know if this will help, but I did this again just last night and it's worked great for me for years.

My main coop contains the production layers... I have a grow out pen just for my "pre-layers".
As the pre-layers begin to lay, they are moved to a large wire dog crate I have set up in the middle of my main coop.
They stay there and are fed there, in the middle of existing layers, for 3 days.
At dusk on the third day, I go out and take the hens out of the dog crate and put them up on a roost with the existing layers.
The next morning the existing layers wake up to a few new birds. There is a pecking order which needs to be established, and by slow introduction, and then adding them while roosting, that pecking order is something they work out. I have never had anyone hurt.
It also helps to add them in "batches" instead of just one at a time...
For instance, last night I took 3 hens out of the dog crate and added them to the 8 hens who were already there.
About Oct 1st (at the sign of the first egg) I will add another 14. The ratio will then be 14 new to 11 old. The dynamics will change so much that no one will have the "advantage" - there will be less drama on Oct 1st than there will be today.

Now.. all this said... this is my "second" favorite way to integrate. My most favorite way is to let my live incubators hatch eggs and raise the chicks - automatic integration that way. But... not always possible.

The basic idea is you want them to co-exists "next to" each other for a while and not just introduce them cold turkey (or cold chicken in this case).
Give em a chance to get to know each other first... they establish somewhat of a pecking order prior to integration... then there is less of a fuss.

Last, but not least... if you have a roo with the group... he will frequently become protective of the new hen(s). This helps if you HAVE to add just one and not a group.

 

[camilleathome]

So excited right now! My friend is coming down to get me with my moms car(Shes about half an hour away). We are going to pick up goats! One of them is already producing milk as well! Going to be a fun busy weekend. Im picking up insulators to convert one of my paddocks into a goat area and I have friends visiting from the city that I havent seen in a long time(Their coming tomorow). My landlord is down from our west and Im hoping I will get to see her and hopefully go riding with her as she was my old riding instructor and I now have her old horse(He was her first horse) so I cant wait to see her up on him after so long. Its going to be a great weekend!

 

[rowerjen]

Thanks, Axoa. I'll keep this in mind as I get ready to mingle the littles with the juniors and the two old bats. Right now Attila seems sufficiently grateful to be out of the rain and all's quiet. Phew!

 

[aoxa]

So excited right now! My friend is coming down to get me with my moms car(Shes about half an hour away). We are going to pick up goats! One of them is already producing milk as well! Going to be a fun busy weekend. Im picking up insulators to convert one of my paddocks into a goat area and I have friends visiting from the city that I havent seen in a long time(Their coming tomorow). My landlord is down from our west and Im hoping I will get to see her and hopefully go riding with her as she was my old riding instructor and I now have her old horse(He was her first horse) so I cant wait to see her up on him after so long. Its going to be a great weekend!

Is it a long weekend Camille?

It's exciting! Jill is awesome, and I know you will have a fun adventure and will take pictures to document it

 

[Sally8]

So excited right now! My friend is coming down to get me with my moms car(Shes about half an hour away). We are going to pick up goats! One of them is already producing milk as well! Going to be a fun busy weekend. Im picking up insulators to convert one of my paddocks into a goat area and I have friends visiting from the city that I havent seen in a long time(Their coming tomorow). My landlord is down from our west and Im hoping I will get to see her and hopefully go riding with her as she was my old riding instructor and I now have her old horse(He was her first horse) so I cant wait to see her up on him after so long. Its going to be a great weekend!

When my son was a baby, goats milk was the only thing we drank. I've been trying to convince DH to buy one but he's not giving an inch. Ours were Nubian Goats.