The Natural Chicken Keeping thread - OTs welcome!

[Kassaundra]

Kass - I have sprouts! First experimental bag s/b ready tomorrow

Wooo Hooo awesome, see piece of cake

 

[Leahs Mom]

Quote:
Yep
I started with the half-size bags. And I DID clean the laundry room sink

 

[Jewelwing]

I put my feed in glass containers for the regular feeders.

During the summer I was tossing some out on the ground in the afternoon and they did eat it up. What they avoid as long as possible are the legumes. Never had any problems with them eating everything. But when I put it on the ground I try to put in grass. But they have also eaten it off the wood chips too.

My girls eat FF off the ground because I haven't built a trough feeder for them (yet) and two glass dishes I have for them aren't long enough for them to eat without squabbling. They gobble up their FF so I'm afraid our banties won't get anything at all to eat if I don't plop a bit down on the ground for them.

OK, thanks! I think maybe I'll get some glass bread pans and make wooden boxes for them to fit in (like your clementine box, LM!). I think I'll still feed them in the run, though, so the coop stays cleaner. I keep a glass dish inside the coop with ff in it, so if they don't get enough food free ranging & from the kitchen scraps (after their ff breakfast, of course!), they can always go inside and eat more.

Will they just know to go back inside to lay their eggs? I don't think they're inside after the pop door opens until it's time to roost, but I'm hoping they'll go inside to their wonderful nest boxes when it comes time to lay. Should I put curtains on the nest box openings? Or maybe just on the door that's opposite them (it's a screen door that's mostly glass)?

 

[CoopChick719]

Ki4got: Now here's an idea for you.... If you want some bush hogging done, do it yourself... or if you don't know how to use the equipment, put on your little puppy dog face, and innocently suggest that since he's too busy, perhaps he would teach you how to use the bush hog... Now, not knowing him, I'm guessing that he'd cringe inside to let you use his bush hog. Keep asking him to teach you until he either does teach you, or out of fear, he does the bush hogging himself. I'm learning how to use all sorts of power tools, and when the task looks too difficult, I use the puppy dog face, teach me... and though it takes a while, the job gets done one way or an other!

LG, I have used this method in the past but when he blows me off too many times I just say Do you have a ____ tool? I need it for X. He now knows that I will go find the tool and do it myself even if I don't know how to use it. So what if a screw gun isn't supposed to be used as a drill...hey, it made holes where I wanted them!

I've been learning my hawk calls by using the web site that has recordings of the calls. I keep going back to it and listening so that I can id them if I hear them.

Hi LM, When I played the hawk call from that website, all 3 dogs jumped up and ran to sit with my husband. The 2 cats took off like rockets. Everyone, DH included, looked at me like, "Why did you do that?!"

 

[Jewelwing]

The chickens found their way up to our house for the first time today! DH says he may revise his opinion of them if they start eating the "wrong" plants around the house. They were pretty happy with themselves for finding this fun new foraging spot. They probably got curious about where it is that I always go when I walk away from them!

Notice their admirer in the window!



It's just the sort of scene I imagined when I first thought of getting chickens.

 

[ChickChickChicky]

Just read this interesting article about the purity (or rather, the HUGE lack thereof) in various herbal supplements. After testing (via DNA analysis) 44 different supplements sold by 12 different companies, they found that one third of the products contained NONE of what was listed on the label: and that 59% were contaminated with species not included on the ingredient list. Only two out of 12 companies sold supplements that were all completely genuine and free of plant substitution, fillers, or contaminants. Unfortunately, the authors don't name any of the companies.

http://www.biomedcentral.com/content/pdf1741-7015-11-222.pdf


Edited to add: I'm not sure why the link above isn't resolving properly, but you can just cut and paste the entire thing to view the complete article.

 

[mlowen]

Will they just know to go back inside to lay their eggs? I don't think they're inside after the pop door opens until it's time to roost, but I'm hoping they'll go inside to their wonderful nest boxes when it comes time to lay. Should I put curtains on the nest box openings? Or maybe just on the door that's opposite them (it's a screen door that's mostly glass)?

I had my little flock in a chicken tractor quite a ways from the coop. The leghorns had started laying, so I had a Home Depot bucket on its side with shavings in it, so they could lay while out "ranging." One of them decided she needed to lay and she was by George GOING back to the coop where she was supposed to go!!! She paced and whined and tried to get out the corner of the tractor nearest the coop. I put her in the bucket. Heck NO! Finally, I just picked her up & carried her back to the coop. Immediately into the next box she went. Once they've decided where it belongs, that's where they'll go. Hopefully, it's also where you want them to go!

 

[Leahs Mom]

Hi LM, When I played the hawk call from that website, all 3 dogs jumped up and ran to sit with my husband. The 2 cats took off like rockets. Everyone, DH included, looked at me like, "Why did you do that?!"

Well.....I guess the calls are accurate!

CR- If I put food on the ground it's always outside. I have wood chips in the dog kennel run (jail) too..but I prefer to be able to put it in the grass when they're not in jail over on the other side near the woods.




Inside - the bread pans



& The pie pan.

 

[aaggjg]

What are the drops she gave you?

Diclofenac sodium .....

 

[aaggjg]

I have a question, do you know that it is abnormal for her? When you posted pics of both sides they both looked the same to me. I was just at a friends house this week and she had a cochin boy he had that same "saucer" type look around his eyes, and he has always been that way from hatch according to my friend and healthy. I don't mean that all cochins eyes are like that, but that there may be some genetic mutation or trait that shows up in some individuals?

OKay so I found some pictures from a few months ago .... and took some new this morning , although every time I so much as looked in her direction she took off running!

Today .......

Today ......

Today .....


Few months ago......


Few months ago.....