The Natural Chicken Keeping thread - OTs welcome!

[Reina Rana]

OMG!!! Finally got totally caught up on this thread! I started at the beginning and told myself that I would not talk until I got to the end, lol. Well, I am here now!

This is my first time, as an adult, to have chickens. We currently have 25 5week old brown egg layers and "Auracanas". Still trying to determine what all of the breeds are, but have most figured out. Looks like I have at least 2 cockerels, one of them is an Auracana (Yay). I originally had 31, but we had several losses in the first 2 weeks. DH said that he would replace the ones that died...so 2 weeks ago, I come home to 12 new babies from TSC! We also have 6 Mallards (straight run). We moved the bigguns to the brooder box in the barn 2 weeks ago and they love all the extra space. We have the older ones on semi-ff and they love it.

Ok, well, I want to say more, but must away to work! ;o)

Just wanted to peep in.

 

[lalaland]

leahs mom, that totally makes sense to me. really interesting. I am still searching for the best feed - in my past I would drive 4 hours one way to pick up organic feed - and funny enough, now that you can find organic feed just about everywhere, I am not feeding organic, because it is still highly processed. AM still looking for non soy feed.

 

[Mumsy]

for those of you that have the hoop coops, do you have any problems with wind or rain damaging the coop? I keep wondering if a wind will be able to blow the thing over once we finish it.

Mine has gone through wind and rain storms all winter long. The tarps haven't budged at all. We have it tied down with laced cord. It is zip tied to steel t posts using construction heavy ties.

We haven't had burrowing predators on our property except for rats and I bait and trap those regularly. I use electric wire and insulators at the top and four inches from the bottom to deter raccoons.

My hoop coop faces North. I really didn't have a choice if I wanted it to be convenient for access. All of my property that gets full sun or half day sun even, is devoted to growing food. The chickens can find sun when they free range.

 

[Leahs Mom]

Good to hear from you Reina! I had seen you reading on the "currently viewing" box for awhile.

 

[armorfirelady]

I've noticed a funny thing with the hens sometimes.... They pickup branches etc etc and twist to try and place them on their backs. I figure they thinking they are piling up nest building materials that they will pack in like a mule to the desired nest??? Of course as soon as they take a step everything falls off. It is amusing to watch and I was wondering if you all notice this behavior too??

Tank looks wonderful !!!

And yes my girls do the same thing and put material on their back. They have no rosster so they wont be needing the nests they think they are going to build lol

 

[Leahs Mom]

So my good neurotic frizzle bantam Cochin sensed that I was talking about her being broody and promptly went broody. If only I wanted or needed more chickens!!! Popcorn was made to be a mama hen... Totally found her calling. Oh well hopefully she will snap out of it soon!!

Tank who some of you might remember from the GB thread is thriving and finally returned to laying last week!!! She looks good but on closer inspection the red patched she had picked clean by her vent have not regrown feathers.... You'd never know if you didnt look closely as the surrounding down covers the skin. I nu-stocked her a few times during her recovery.... Here is a recent photo of her :

I forgot how chalky her egg color is!!!

I did notice that Caesar my GLW who was also mite infested is looking good & returned to laying! BUT her neck feathers looked strange so sure enough I inspected her and found mites again!!! I can not for the life of me find my Nu-stock I have to tear the house apart. It is the one thing misplaced from my chicken 1st aid kit. Ugh!!! I dusted Caesar with DE as I had it on hand and no wood ash .... I mixed in a little sulfur powder for good measure. I also sprayed the coop with orange guard and sprinkled DE & sulfur powder.

I have a few hens who feel light even though they are on FF, ACV, cayenne, garlic etc etc. they also have messy bottoms. I'm not sure what is causing this. So I keep watching for clues. Maybe the mites but those birds are in a different coop and none of them appear to have mites. Hmmmmmm.

I've noticed a funny thing with the hens sometimes.... They pickup branches etc etc and twist to try and place them on their backs. I figure they thinking they are piling up nest building materials that they will pack in like a mule to the desired nest??? Of course as soon as they take a step everything falls off. It is amusing to watch and I was wondering if you all notice this behavior too??

Beautiful photo! And good to hear the update.

Do you think the messy bottoms is vent gleet? If it is, that is a fungal infection and should respond to the NuStock if you can find it! Have those girls ever been treated before for vent gleet? Also was wondering if they are able to get out of the hen house during the winter or if they stay indoors a lot. Sometimes I think the litter needs to be partially changed out a little more often in the winter if they spend most of their time in there so I'm wondering if a little change-out may help too? (Just some random thoughts.)

 

[jlynnet]

I had a chicken attack today. Luckily I only lost one hen and a few eggs. Poor girl was attacked in the nesting box. We have Dutch doors and the top was left open. The screen on the top was bent and pulled down. Must have been not long before I went out. My son will be so bummed and asking for a replacement.

 

[aaggjg]

NOW A FEW "REASONINGS" ON SOAKED OR FF

I remember my mom saying something about wet feed that I've been contemplating.  Now HER feed was dog food.  They had a collie kennel when I was really young.  They used to soak the food in water before feeding but she told me that the vet told them that the dogs would eat less since the VOLUME was higher. The vet's take on that was that they wouldn't be getting as much nutrition in that case.

Now my thought on that is that they were feeding processed dog kibble that had already been cooked to death in the manufacturing process so there prob. wasn't a whole lot of nutrition left in there in the first place and what was had been altered by heat.

Comparing that to the feed I use for my chickens:  mine is just coarsely ground raw grains, fish meal, and some nutribalancer.   In my case, it is RAW GROUND GRAINS that are being soaked rather than COOKED, HIGHLY PROCESSED GRAINS/GRAIN PRODUCTS that are used in dog food.  

It has been proven that soaking raw grains makes the nutrients more bio-available partially by reducing phytic acid (phytates) and, therefore, increases the nutrients that can be absorbed by the body.  HOWEVER, the cooked stuff that is used in packaged dog food is a whole different deal.

All of this to say -
[COLOR=006400]Does it stand to reason that PROCESSED FEEDS (pellets, etc.) like you'd get in a bag on a shelf that have been heat processed would not result in the same nutritional benefits as a feed that has UNPROCESSED RAW GRAINS in it?[/COLOR]

LM I did a bunch of reading on FF last weekend as I gave a FF presentation to our Local urban chicken meetup group. What I found in my research is that feeding wet feed regardless of wether it's fermented or not has benefits. The study found that wet feed causes the villi in the stomach to grow longer. This results in a larger surface area of villi which absorb the nutrients in the intestines. I thought that was really interesting so I thought I'd pass it along!!

 

[aaggjg]

Beautiful photo!  And good to hear the update. 

Do you think the messy bottoms is vent gleet?  If it is, that is a fungal infection and should respond to the NuStock if you can find it!  Have those girls ever been treated before for vent gleet?  Also was wondering if they are able to get out of the hen house during the winter or if they stay indoors a lot.  Sometimes I think the litter needs to  be partially changed out a little more often in the winter if they spend most of their time in there so I'm wondering if a little change-out may help too?  (Just some random thoughts.)

I don't think it's vent gleet but I don't know what that would look like! I remember B saying they stunk to high heaven. My girls don't stink so I'm thinking it's not VG

 

[kian]

Jlynnet, so sorry about your hen.