The Natural Chicken Keeping thread - OTs welcome!

[mlowen]

@mlowen
Did you get the DVD... not sure it's even out yet but the preview looks fun!

I should be getting one. I contributed to the Kickstarter enough to qualify for the DVD. He seems so very earnest. Fun to read his blog & I'm looking forward to the movie.

 

[mlowen]

Big girls are letting the little girls sleep on the top bunk! But the littles are still very intimidated in the day time & stay as far from the hens as they can. No serious attacks, no blood--ever. Just "get away from me!" and the pullets run.

 

[COChix]

Hey gang been mia for a bit as we were madly packing to try and get out by our end of July deadline given by our landlord, who said he was selling. Long story short we get until the end of Sept/Oct to get everything out. So now I get a minute of downtime, our new flock is doing well. We have 7 one-year-old egg layers, one roo, 15 - 12 week old's from our April Hatch. They have been completely integrated with the adult flock. We ended up separating out 4 of the young cockerels who were terrorizing the adult hens. I believe we have 1 more and possibly two more cockerels that have been with the adult flock until we know for sure they both are males. We also separated the males out as the young pullets would follow them around rather than their dad, as the alpha baby roo effectively made his own flock. They were separate during the day but would all roost in the coop together. So once they were seperated out the young pullets have begun following around papa. So task accomplished! Our broody Cornish fledged her chicks at the beginning of the month and they were moved to a neighbors spot down the road where she had a broody and a chick which was one week older than ours.

Here are a few shots of the most pretty feathered young pullet and cockerel from our BO x EE cross.

 

[JulesChicks]

@COChix Welcome back! Glad you don't have to move in a rush because that is so stressful. I've been meaning to give you a shout out/thank you for posting on here a while back about your mama heating pad. After you posted that I went to the thread and made one for our chicks who were 2 and 3 weeks old at the time. I loved that system! Loved not having to worry about a heat lamp! I really like that it is much more natural, they tend to feather faster, etc. I plan to only use that in the future. Thank you very much for posting it here or I wouldn't have seen it. For any of you who brood chicks I highly recommend this system.

 

[COChix]

@COChix
 Welcome back! Glad you don't have to move in a rush because that is so stressful.  I've been meaning to give you a shout out/thank you for posting on here a while back about your mama heating pad.  After you posted that I went to the thread and made one for our chicks who were 2 and 3 weeks old at the time.  I loved that system! Loved not having to worry about a heat lamp!  I really like that it is much more natural, they tend to feather faster, etc.  I plan to only use that in the future.  Thank you very much for posting it here or I wouldn't have seen it.  For any of you who brood chicks I highly recommend this system.

Jules glad you found it such a success, I too never plan on using another heat lamp again because of that thread. Glad I could pass on a tip that You found useful. It is amazing how much quicker they do everything when they are raised that way. Ours were outside in the small coop at 10 days with that set up. I know others never had chicks in the house again after implementing that system. I am sold as well.

 

[JulesChicks]

Mine were not out that soon (still aren't, not until later today

) but it was no fault of theirs! Just took so long to get this second coop up! Next time around I will be much better prepared. This year it has been tough for several reasons: brand new to chickens, living down street from where the chickens are, not having the second coop ready for the growing out chicks, and of course the worst has been getting sick chickens from the breeder. We've learned a lot in 4 short months!

 

[COChix]

Mine were not out that soon (still aren't, not until later today  ) but it was no fault of theirs! Just took so long to get this second coop up!  Next time around I will be much better prepared. This year it has been tough for several reasons: brand new to chickens, living down street from where the chickens are, not having the second coop ready for the growing out chicks, and of course the worst has been getting sick chickens from the breeder. We've learned a lot in 4 short months!

I can empathize with your fast tracking in chicken education. I too am relatively new to chickens as well this is my second year. I think a lot of us learned by jumping in feet first and off we went. We started with 28 chicks last April and now have babies from them, it is crazy how fast the time goes. It is also very apparent how quickly chicken math gets out of hand when you starts having babies. Don't beat yourself up, the important thing is to remind yourself of how far you have come just based on your experiences. Nothing like learning by doing!

 

[COChix]

Hey guys, I am trying to help a fellow BYC person in the Colorado thread and they have had issues with chicks dying. Can anyone offer any advice?

......."Alright, I know I would probably get better answers from the sick help forum but want to post something real quick.
My chicks are about a week old. Monday night one was looking not right. Last year I had real bad luck with what seemed like any chick I got. I think in total it was 5 of them that died on me. All different places of purchase, all different batches and all exhibited the same behavior heavy breathing and a rasp. I thought maybe cocci so treated the surviving one with powder amprolium and it lived. Flash forward to Monday and I see those same signs in one of my new chicks. I ended up treating the water with the medication and Tuesday morning she's breathing normal and has since. Never really saw any bloody stool in any of them, this year or last.

Here are a few YouTube videos. Anything that looks like cocci? Something else. Worrying too much?

Sick chick video 1:

Sick chick video 2:

Sick chick video 3:

Sick chick video 4:

Sick chick video 5:

Edited by intangible04 - Yesterday at 5:31 pm"

Thanks all you knowledgable folks!

 

[slordaz]

my thought is they are in a brooding pen they are dehydrating because they can't get out of the light. They need a place they can get out of the light if they get to hot.

Yeah think they are too hot in there after watching all of them, move the light up higher away from them and it should help

 

[lalaland]

not a good night at all. Got home, let the chicken out - the raspberry patch offers great protection, the squash leaves running out of the garden do too . Was changing in the house, heard a ruckus. It was so bad I went running out barefoot and in my underwear. Chickens hysterical and everywhere. Got everyone together, counted, came up short. Found feathers.......more tail feathers.....followed the trail but lost the trail - no more feathers. No blood, but ....probably a dog.

THis chicken, grace, was a hefty girl, seems too big for a fox. maybe a dog but usually a dog just kills and sticks around to kill more. So sounds like a fox.

Spent an hour in the woods, looking but no luck.