The Natural Chicken Keeping thread - OTs welcome!

[delisha]

Love the white orps

My splash orps seem to be all white..

 

[jlynnet]

My whites are so fuzzy and soft! I've never had Orpingtons before. They are such fuzzy little things!

 

[Leahs Mom]

I want to say one more thing about this roost.

When the "kids" want to get on the "big girl" roost war ensues. Pretty merciless war. The olders beat the snot out of the youngers...and still they tried every night until the gave up and were roosting in places I didn't want them to roost.

Enter the roost extension - with a bonus!



The vertical board you see was the right end of the original roost. Original roost is to the left.

We decided to leave that board there for a purpose. Not only to support the roost at that point, but to now become a divider that I was hoping would give the new kids a place to go that would be divided from the olders but still keep them at the same level.

Worked like a charm.

I went out tonight as they were roosting and put the littles over there starting with 1 only. One of the adults came over to knock some sense into him for getting up there and tried to reach around that board and found she couldn't do it without getting off the roost. She quickly went away and left him alone.

Tricky...

 

[jlynnet]

Who's the smart chicken now?! Roosting wars can be funny. Glad the meanie got it to her. She probably thinks that little one is so clever.

 

[TurtlePowerTrav]

Aoxa, love the pup/bunny pic. So did my DW. I was wondering if that was you in that one photo.

 

[CoopChick719]

Cold out and raining off and on. Moved the HRIR shipped chicks to a pen in the barn. Every chick on the place is chirping loudly from all the activity and stress of the move. I use a long handled aquarium fish net. I can swoop and scoop with no damage and stampeding is kept to a minimum.

In order of youngest chicks first:



HRIR Fogle line chick eight days.



Catdance Porcelain Silkie chick twenty days.



Johnny chick hatched by Judy the Broody twenty five days old.




HRIR shipped Fogle chick twenty eight days old.

It is interesting to me that the oldest HRIR chicks still under heat are slower to feather out but are more compact and have more substance than the Johnny chicks that free range with the broody hen. The free range Johnny chicks are much rangier, narrow, and wilder than the brooder raised HRIR chicks too. None of the chicks were happy to be handled out in the cold and rain.

The chicks are so pretty, Mumsy!! I'm jealous of the flowers too!! I'm just getting some tulip leaves poking through the soil now.

 

[kian]

Here's me sounding exactly like the newbie that I am:

Remember I posted that I had 6 layers now? Well....

I am so wrong.

I thought I did because I have one last pullet that looks so ready to lay (of her two hatch sisters, one is the one that laid the wonky eggs and is now in Chicken Heaven and the other has given me 15 eggs since she started laying about 2 1/2 weeks ago). I found an egg on the floor of the coop and it looked like a New Hampshire egg (which she is). It was the exact same color and it was smaller and since it wasn't in the nest I just assumed that it was her's and she just hadn't gotten it in the right spot.

Fast forward two days and I go to eat the eggs. I was washing 4 of them to cook and grabbed that one and started washing. I looked up to say something to my son, looked down at the egg in my hand and.... it was a different color! Yeah... it was a Marans egg that had either gotten rolled over there (they've done it once or twice but not that far) or my Marans laid it in her sleep off the roost, but it was very definitely the darker brown Marans egg! It was just covered in dust I guess!

So, now I'm back on pullet watch. She's 28 weeks today. She needs to get with the program already!

 

[CoopChick719]

Phew...finally caught up!! How do you know that you've been on the Natural Chicken Keeping thread too much? At work, you see a binder labeled BDM and you think to yourself Bulldogma??

BDM--Sorry hear about the 3 SFH you lost. Beautiful pics on all the others! I said to DH I saw the most beautiful chickens on BYC...he says We don't need anymore chickens!! I say I didn't say I wanted them I just wanted to show the picture. He says, Yeah, I know what that means!!

Oh Darn, he's figuring out the method to my madness!!

Aoxa--LOVE LOVE LOVE the pics!! I so enjoy seeing your photos!! Showed my daughter the Henry/bunny pic, she said He's sooooo cute she can't handle it!

To All--Love seeing all your pics & stories!! I think my family & friends are tired of my "chicken talk". I know I can come on here and everyone speaks the same language. Thanks for listening!!

P.S. Feeding the 3 week old chicks FF, it looks like they have licked the plate clean. DH said I didn't know chickens had tongues!

 

[OohLaLa]

My father-in-law made me a brooder....I showed him a pic of a cardboard version and he came up with this. It's square so it'll fit in a corner, unlike the octagon one made of cardboard. I'll be staining this and hopefully get many uses out of it.
The panels slide together, and then when not in use I can just stack them and put it anywhere.

Very cool. I build all of my own things (like this never ending coop) so I can appreciate it's simplicity and break down for storage.

 

[OohLaLa]