The Natural Chicken Keeping thread - OTs welcome!

[Scott H]

I want to give Cookie a kiss right on the beak....

 

[Jewelwing]

Ok fellow BYCers here is a weird question.............

Anyone have owls near them? DO they who...who at night? Why I ask is because I have heard several nights after dark someone Who..whoing while I was out at the coop. And it seems close.......there are no barns near us. But I have a dozen pine trees on my property & some woods behind me so I wonder if its in there nesting?

I live in town so it seems kind of weird to hear them. Usually we here morning doves but they havent come back this spring yet & we only hear them during the day and I have never heard them at night.

Thoughts??

have to love the owls calling. and they call at all hours during the night and early morning and dusk. I love it when they do the monkey cackling sounds too. I have owls and this time of year they are really calling.

We have some barred owls nesting somewhere near us. They make the "Who, who, who cooks for you?" call, and sometimes the cackling stuff at each other when they really get going.

Here's one of them:

I love the tail feathers. What a gorgeous bird!

Here it is (or its mate, I have no idea!) the next day in the sun:




As long as I'm posting pictures, here are some of my recent eggs. I'm sure those huge ones are double-yolkers! They were laid two days apart, by different chickens. We gave one away as a thank you gift, and it was indeed double-yolked. We haven't opened ours yet.

Am I right that owls will take out hawks if they have the chance?

Maybe the owls are around because you have the hawks around. So if the owls scare the hawks away, and the chickens are locked inside at night...that might just be a win-win situation.

Maybe it depends on the kind of owl & the kind of hawk. The red-tails around here sure don't seem to care that we have barred owls.

Seems like you could go for one heck of an easter egg hunt around there.

I want to give Cookie a kiss right on the beak....

 

[mlowen]

Beekissed managed to hatch at least one chick using a cardboard box with dirt, hay, feathers and a heating pad. It's a very interesting experiment thread.
"Simulated Natural Nest Incubation~Experiment #1 So it begins...."

 

[lalaland]

Delisah, Cookie is adorable. When you get time, would love to hear more. Is he sleeping with chickens who are behind fencing? Or is he literally in the coop with birds at hand?

-6 this morning and am waiting til sunrise to see if Booster has new frostbite - he is in the tiny coop with just 3 hens and that coop doesn't hold heat the way the big coop does. I want it to be spring. Am 2 weeks later this year for the robins returning. Don't think I can take another late spring!

 

[Leahs Mom]

Delisha - I (and I think the rest of us) want to have your lgd chronicles throughout the next months. It will help some of us who might get one some day to learn from your experience in how to make this work when there are just chickens and not other livestock.

 

[delisha]

Delisah, Cookie is adorable. When you get time, would love to hear more. Is he sleeping with chickens who are behind fencing? Or is he literally in the coop with birds at hand?

-6 this morning and am waiting til sunrise to see if Booster has new frostbite - he is in the tiny coop with just 3 hens and that coop doesn't hold heat the way the big coop does. I want it to be spring. Am 2 weeks later this year for the robins returning. Don't think I can take another late spring!

Thank you..She i a good pup

I think I am pretty lucky..she seems to have natural instinct.
She sleeps with two chickens. I selected two that i felt would work well. They are young, but not baby's. They are males and ...I hate to say it..*disposable* if she decides to play too hard. I will have to keep these two birds now and not butcher them out so selection is pretty important. The three of them stay together most of the time. I picked young birds so they would not treat her like a preditor and bond with her as much as give her an oppertunity to bond with them. They are a little ruff on her and peck her, but I think that will work out OK. She weighs almost 25lbs and is larger than most of my chickens now. In a few weeks she will be larger than them all. My adult chickens are afraid of her and avoid her. I try to limit time with all the birds. She can see all the birds when she is outdoors. She has access to one coop only right now. She has access to only two birds 24/7. She has access to about 12 birds when she is outdoors. She does mock chase and I try hard to catch that. It is bad business. She stops as soon as she sees me so she knows she is not supposed to be doing that. She gets bored.

Delisha - I (and I think the rest of us) want to have your lgd chronicles throughout the next months. It will help some of us who might get one some day to learn from your experience in how to make this work when there are just chickens and not other livestock.

Limiting people attention is important. I spend 10 minute with her 3 times a day. Most of that is chicken chores.
They have to be with the chickens and not the house during critical bonding times. 2-12 weeks.
She is bonded to people and dogs and not chickens..however that is changing.
She is now reserved to all strangers and immediatly goes to her chickens/coop when new people/dogs approach..
I have her in the coop with two younger chickens..they are 4 months old. They eat out of the same bowls..sleep together etc..no other chickens can get to them during eating and sleeping times.

 

[RedRidge]

Quote:
Sounds like you're trying to do all the right things.
That bonding will extend beyond 12 weeks, so don't get soft at that age. ;-)
She will likely be fine with them until sometime between 6 and 7 months... then the envelope will begin to be pushed just to see how much fun her new found friends can be during that daily romp (frequently post meals).
She sounds like overcoming lack of confidence will be the biggest issue, so you will need to tread lightly there.
(side note... I always pick the most confident pup in a litter. That is not a criticism, I have just found it is easier to bring em than to bring em up).
So... while you want to continue to leave her with the livestock 24/7, since she lacks confidence I would suggest getting other people to feed her periodically... and pet her. She has earned the positive attention... it's just a fine line to give her too much. It would be hard to give her too much right now IF she is with the poultry at the same time.
But trust me... if you ever want or need to be gone, you want her to feel comfortable with someone else coming into the coop.
There is protective, and there is insecure. As they mature, they become more and more "intuitive" such that strangers with bad intent are bad, but strangers with good intent are not bad. They DO learn quickly to tell the difference - frequently much quicker than we humans. Trust to tell you the difference and have different people (include kids) pet her and feed her periodically. As long as she is not taken away from her poultry for human interaction she will be fine. And... she really needs that human interaction right now. It's just most people take it too far by allowing them in the house for it.

Keep up the good work... you will have an awesome dog in a year or so. And it is so fun to watch their little brains evolve.
Side note... If she lacks in confidence... timing will be even more critical when you get to the day that play gets a little rough. Do not use a verbal correction any stronger than necessary to get her to stop her behavior and the exact instant she stops the negative behavior, then praise her. She'll figure out the boundaries of her play really quickly IF your timing is good the first few times it happens.

 

[CoopChick719]

I have no idea what attracts the crows and ravens here. Always wondered if they thought the Black Sumatra's were a funny looking crow

In our neighborhood the crows are attracted by Trash Day!!

My new Hawk deterrent [COLOR=800080]COOKIE[/COLOR]

Delisha, Cookie is beautiful!! It sounds like she's got a good start. It's so wonderful to have Red Ridge's expert advice so handy! Best wishes for Cookie's continued success!!

 

[armorfirelady]

So Stella is still bald. Think mr T and her comb is the 'hair' she has left and bald on the sides. My mom held her and I sprayed some blue kote on her head to see if it will deter the other from pecking at her. I think I got more on me than her head :/

Snow all day today. Big flakes but nothing is really sticking & once the sun comes out it melts. It's been in low 20s all day.......they are saying Thursday is the end of the cold temps. Fingers crossed the wx people are actually right this time

My first view of the coop cam outside only caught pics of me. Guess no outside predators around the last few nights. It's in the coop now. I had it upside down but still got a few pics of the girls as they went in & out of the nesting box. It's in a different spot now and right side up. The funny part is I caught several pics of Lucy in there yet haven't seen any of her darker eggs with spots on it since last fall.

Can a hens egg change colors as she gets older? She is BCM/EE mix and she laid a darker egg last spring.

 

[stonykill]

In our neighborhood the crows are attracted by Trash Day!!
Delisha, Cookie is beautiful!! It sounds like she's got a good start. It's so wonderful to have Red Ridge's expert advice so handy! Best wishes for Cookie's continued success!!

I don't have a neighborhood or trash day

4 houses on probably 500 acres make up my neighbors. Someone 5 miles away is still considered a neighbor

. Not a neighborhood. A GREAT life, but not a neighborhood

I lived in a tiny village once. No thanks, not for me.