The Natural Chicken Keeping thread - OTs welcome!

[dreamcatcherarabians]

I'm wondering about cats in the coop. I am getting sick of having rats and mice tunneling under my fences and coop and tramping around my shop. I have bait boxes, traps and plain ol' poison tossed under the coop where nothing else can find it but I STILL have tunnels! ARGH! I've gotten so freaked out hearing stories about weasels and possums getting into the run but the darn rats keep making grand entrances for them! I am considering getting a couple of older kittens to live out in the coop and shop. I don't have the huge barn set up that many of you have, just a nice little 6x8 shed with an attached 15x35 run. I am thinking I could put a cat door in our shop which is next to the coop and garden so they could have a safe warmish place to go. I am a little worried about how cats would do with the chickens though. I'm not worried about my big girls. I've got a RIR that would take a cat out if she felt like it but I have 2 silkies and a little d'uccle that I worry about. Plus I'd like to let my silkie hatch some babies in the spring. What kind of experiences have you all had with cats and your chickens. Any advice about teaching the cats what they should hunt? As always I so appreciate all of your experience.

I have several barn cats and they don't touch my chickens. I don't have any small breeds but they have been around my chicks since they were very young. I feed the cats well and they kill mice, gophers and such and don't even look at my birds. To keep the mice/rats out of the coop or from digging under it, if you take hardware cloth ( wire) and put it on the ground and partially up the outside walls of the coop and run, they can't tunnel under anymore. I've never figured out why they don't try to dig at the edge of the hardware cloth, but I've never had one do that. We put the hardware cloth on the ground and put dirt on top to hold it down, then turned up about 4 inches along the base of the walls of the coop and run and stapled everything in place real tight. So far, 5 years, so good.

 

[aoxa]

What kind of chicken laid that beautiful blue egg. It has such nice color.

I am sure that blue egg is a true americauna
The real kind ,hard to find kind

You may be surprised to know it came from an Easter Egger. All of my EEs lay like this, though in person it does not seem that blue. Definitely blue though, with no hints of green.

Just buying the lens isn't going to do the trick if she's photographing on auto without an understanding of photography. Your daughter has to understand about exposure to make the images look like Aoxa's. It's an expensive lens to purchase, so don't be hasty until you know for sure that she understands what to do with a lens like that. Said with the greatest respect

Jen, aww that's sweet

I always use manual or video. About the only two settings I use. Jen, have any tips for taking pictures of chicks under a red heat light? Still drives me crazy.

 

[aoxa]

She has 2 years of photography from the vocational center at the high school. I think they called it media graphic arts. So she is good to go just needs the right equipment. She does take excellent pictures with what she has but with better equipment could be even better. She did do 1 wedding for a Friend. Really nice. I could have ask her this question but would like it to be a surprise. I will buy more equipment for her as time progresses and money is available. I'm pretty sure I can swing this lens right now though.
Need to bring it back to chickens now. My dad got a bag of 20 loafs of whole grain bread from the bread store to dry and give as treats or what ever to the chickens. I thought it was a good deal.

I was offered left overs from the food bank. Veggies that are starting to wilt. I still haven't picked them up... I should get on that!!

 

[aoxa]

I'm wondering about cats in the coop. I am getting sick of having rats and mice tunneling under my fences and coop and tramping around my shop. I have bait boxes, traps and plain ol' poison tossed under the coop where nothing else can find it but I STILL have tunnels! ARGH! I've gotten so freaked out hearing stories about weasels and possums getting into the run but the darn rats keep making grand entrances for them! I am considering getting a couple of older kittens to live out in the coop and shop. I don't have the huge barn set up that many of you have, just a nice little 6x8 shed with an attached 15x35 run. I am thinking I could put a cat door in our shop which is next to the coop and garden so they could have a safe warmish place to go. I am a little worried about how cats would do with the chickens though. I'm not worried about my big girls. I've got a RIR that would take a cat out if she felt like it but I have 2 silkies and a little d'uccle that I worry about. Plus I'd like to let my silkie hatch some babies in the spring. What kind of experiences have you all had with cats and your chickens. Any advice about teaching the cats what they should hunt? As always I so appreciate all of your experience.

I have several barn cats and they don't touch my chickens. I don't have any small breeds but they have been around my chicks since they were very young. I feed the cats well and they kill mice, gophers and such and don't even look at my birds. To keep the mice/rats out of the coop or from digging under it, if you take hardware cloth ( wire) and put it on the ground and partially up the outside walls of the coop and run, they can't tunnel under anymore. I've never figured out why they don't try to dig at the edge of the hardware cloth, but I've never had one do that. We put the hardware cloth on the ground and put dirt on top to hold it down, then turned up about 4 inches along the base of the walls of the coop and run and stapled everything in place real tight. So far, 5 years, so good.

I really want a few barn cats but my road.. it's so busy.. I am just so scared of losing more. Three in one year is a lot. Especially when those cats were my pets and came inside as well.

My cats were great with the chickens. The cats were at the bottom of the pecking order. Just how it was. Even the neighbours cats (4 of them) watch the chickens with interest and are quick to retreat when a chicken goes near.

 

[Miss Lydia]

That is one of the reason i haven't gotten a cat again is because of chicks I thought that would be way to tempting for a cat.

 

[aoxa]

That is one of the reason i haven't gotten a cat again is because of chicks I thought that would be way to tempting for a cat.

Well I've never even lost a chick to a cat.

 

[pcappy2]

Question about if an egg is fertile or not. I cracked my hens egg open last night and there was what looked like a tiny white ring or bullseye. Should it have a small white dot inside that ring? I guess my question is... Will a unfertile egg have no small white ring at all? Thanks in advance, DH wants to incubate instead of scramble them!!! He's so funny.

 

[aoxa]

Question about if an egg is fertile or not. I cracked my hens egg open last night and there was what looked like a tiny white ring or bullseye. Should it have a small white dot inside that ring? I guess my question is... Will a unfertile egg have no small white ring at all? Thanks in advance, DH wants to incubate instead of scramble them!!! He's so funny.

Here is one of my fertile eggs.



and one of Leigh's (BDM's) infertile eggs.

 

[Melabella]

plus IMO, a bird that is relaxed around/used to dogs is extra vulnerable to coyote loss... but my area is loaded with yotes, and I have never had a dog good enough at being an LGD to protect my flocks, so that's what my opinion is based on. That's why I got the donkey, lol.

I have often wondered about this very thought. My birds are so used to dogs, would they even worry if a fox or coyote made a run at them. It is funny though, when the dogs are just about their business and not looking at them, they don't even worry. Yet the other day when I was in a hurry and had to leave to get my daughter sick from school, I used Jack to help me collect them. He sensed my urgency, and went after them a bit rough, and boy did Duke my roo get a bit nutty. He didn't like it one bit, and they all rallied together, and ran to the coop. It set him into a 15 min crowing session that he was still going on about till I got back from the school! I hope when the day comes when something does make a run at them, I am around, and Jack is out with them.

I can't say enough about Jack's sense of protecting what is his. I sometimes feel like I have a Ferrari in the garage, used for going to town every day. He needs a herd of cattle or sheep to herd, I think he gets a bit bored by the birds and their antics. He gets so upset if he sees me heading out to bring in the horses, circling them, and barking... get a move on, because they aren't moving fast enough. I had to break him of that habit I hear there is a woman near me that helps you to train your LSGD with her geese. I have to find her number. Like everything, as you state, it's train, train, train Work in progress. His natural insticts are there, up to me to hone them. I noticed the other day when my niece was over,he just followed behind her the whole time she was toddling around outside. For the birds and his sake,, I almost wish something would make a run at them....just so they both will learn. I guess they do ok for hatchery birds, as good as they can.
I know he has the makings of a great dog, he has run a lone coyote off of our property, I thought it was the neighbors two doors down German Shepherd. It was quite a scrap, and tumble which I remember was odd, as they always tolerated each other in the past. I called my neighbor to apologize and say Jack wasn't too friendly. She informed me her dog had all ready been out, and it wasn't him. Jack was unsettled all night, and afterward we saw this lone coyote several times before he moved on. A friend who was visiting from Chile at that time ran around with her silly inexpensive cell phone snapping pictures of the property, and barn and horses. She came in and said she got a great photo of the neighbors dog, (which she took on the far end of the property, NOT the neighbors side). When she showed me, I almost fell off my chair. I informed her,, that is not the neighbors German Shepherd,,, it is a coyote! Here is the pic. She said he was eating something on the ground, and when she approached,,, he lifted his head and she snapped!



We still laugh at her face when I told her it was a coyote....Crazy stuff....
Here is Jack, he is an English Shepherd.

 

[aoxa]

I have often wondered about this very thought. My birds are so used to dogs, would they even worry if a fox or coyote made a run at them. It is funny though, when the dogs are just about their business and not looking at them, they don't even worry. Yet the other day when I was in a hurry and had to leave to get my daughter sick from school, I used Jack to help me collect them. He sensed my urgency, and went after them a bit rough, and boy did Duke my roo get a bit nutty. He didn't like it one bit, and they all rallied together, and ran to the coop. It set him into a 15 min crowing session that he was still going on about till I got back from the school! I hope when the day comes when something does make a run at them, I am around, and Jack is out with them.

I can't say enough about Jack's sense of protecting what is his. I sometimes feel like I have a Ferrari in the garage, used for going to town every day. He needs a herd of cattle or sheep to herd, I think he gets a bit bored by the birds and their antics. He gets so upset if he sees me heading out to bring in the horses, circling them, and barking... get a move on, because they aren't moving fast enough. I had to break him of that habit I hear there is a woman near me that helps you to train your LSGD with her geese. I have to find her number. Like everything, as you state, it's train, train, train Work in progress. His natural insticts are there, up to me to hone them. I noticed the other day when my niece was over,he just followed behind her the whole time she was toddling around outside. For the birds and his sake,, I almost wish something would make a run at them....just so they both will learn. I guess they do ok for hatchery birds, as good as they can.
I know he has the makings of a great dog, he has run a lone coyote off of our property, I thought it was the neighbors two doors down German Shepherd. It was quite a scrap, and tumble which I remember was odd, as they always tolerated each other in the past. I called my neighbor to apologize and say Jack wasn't too friendly. She informed me her dog had all ready been out, and it wasn't him. Jack was unsettled all night, and afterward we saw this lone coyote several times before he moved on. A friend who was visiting from Chile at that time ran around with her silly inexpensive cell phone snapping pictures of the property, and barn and horses. She came in and said she got a great photo of the neighbors dog, (which she took on the far end of the property, NOT the neighbors side). When she showed me, I almost fell off my chair. I informed her,, that is not the neighbors German Shepherd,,, it is a coyote! Here is the pic. She said he was eating something on the ground, and when she approached,,, he lifted his head and she snapped!

We still laugh at her face when I told her it was a coyote....Crazy stuff....
Here is Jack, he is an English Shepherd.

Jack is beautiful, and I always loved that name for a dog.

Koda my corgi mix just hates the sheep I have. He shouldn't. He has very good herding instinct. His favourite: Children. It's really funny, and cute. He doesn't like how disorderly they can be when getting off the bus. Straight line folks. He runs circles.

Now we don't live near a bus stop. But he just hates the sheep. Not sure what to do about it. He loves the birds. He does not bother them at all.