The Natural Chicken Keeping thread - OTs welcome!

[Mumsy]

mumsy so glad you posted this I have it planted on one side of my yard but didn't know its vommon name. Chickens lay under it buy never eat it. Thanks

You are welcome. Yep. Chickens may lay under it because of it's bug repellent properties.

A few pages ago someone asked about plants to deter mosquitoes? Penny-royal comes to mind. sitting around a camp fire my kids and I would pick branches to fan our selves. It's very strong smelling herb. Penny-royal oil is highly poisonous to humans and animals but the plant itself is nice and I used to rub the leaves on my clothes to keep mosquitoes away while working in the garden. Make sure you always read up on any plant before adding it to an area where chickens or small children play or hang out.

 

[TurtlePowerTrav]

Quote:

. I still have chicken math going on here. Up to as high as 33, down to 29 after processing a few "Frankenchickens". Gonna be getting some Dark Cornish eggs hopefully in the next week for my broody. Gonna get some Blue Marans down the road with next broody to work on a Blue Wheaten Marans project color. I am still working on which breeds I wanna keep for layers and which to keep for breeding. Silkies, Marans and maybe one more breed.

 

[Sally8]

Warning! Graphic necropsy images of turkey chick

Thank you so much for sharing this. I've never seen anything explained so well. I bought 2 Blue Slate Poults and they are doing great so far. I'm really enjoying raising turkeys. At 3 months, mine always seem to want to fly. Time to clip a wing. DH rescued 2 from the woods at dusk. So many wild ones here.
Anyway, I also have had poults die at about the same age. I blamed it on the light somehow. I'm sure they were not electrocuted but they were dead under the light or al least very near. I wondered if they stayed in a much too warm area, etc. Just didn't know. I do know that turkeys/poults are very dumb. Their only purpose in life is to try to find a way to die until they are much older. Tonight, I found my 7 older poults all in a pile, it looked like they were playing football and had just tackled someone. And wet turkeys smell very, very bad. We keep having wind and thunderstorms with heavy rain. I look out to see 7 very wet poults and I keep going out and have to pick them up 1 at a time and take them to the coop or under it. They never say thank you.
I can't wait to see how pretty our slate turkeys are as adults.
Thanks again for taking the time to explain the necropsy.

sue

Oh, I attended my very first poultry auction at our county fairgrounds. It was very disappointing. The birds all had runny butts. They were handled roughly. Cardboard boxes on top of each other, stacked next to each other. I wondered if the ones in the middle would even be alive when their time came. No testing for the birds when they were registered. I would never have bought a bird as I don't think any amount of quarantine would have been enough. There were so many peacocks there. And rabbits. Since when are rabbits considered poultry? lol Everyone just walked around in a circle as the auctioneer auctioned off a bird that had been (literally) thrown in the cage and around and around we went. One person would pull the sold bird out and behind him someone would throw another in. By noon, there was such a crowd, I thought if I should slip and fall, I'd be trampled. My DIL and I were discussing all this when someone next to me said that Ohio had a very nice auction and no ill birds were allowed in. What an eye opener it was for me.
Sorry about the long post. sue

 

[TipihlowLadies]

Now - you KNOW I couldn't leave that statement alone...

(I've always wanted to use that slappy guy...no offense meant...)

Treated lumber has arsenic in it. You can't even use it for fence posts on an organic farm because of ground contamination. When we put in our new fence, we specifically didn't use treated lumber posts due that restriction.

Shouldn't inhale the sawdust, shouldn't burn it and inhale the smoke, don't use in landscaping mulch, wear gloves if handling, etc. etc. When you dispose of it you have to handle it as hazardous waste.

I definitely wouldn't want to eat out of it!

A friend of mine made calf feeders with treated cca lumber and started loosing calfs . Vets told him the dust from feed collects and draws out the copper,cromate& arcinic then animals scrape it of in big amounts and die

 

[camilleathome]

Not a chicken but I wanted to share who came home today . Both need a bit of beefing up they lost weight over winter but their finally home!

 

[FarmerJH]

Awesome Camille, you must be so happy to have them home!

 

[amberr]

I had no idea chickens would get ticks, we have tons but hoping the Guineas take care of that for next year. So now what might be a dumb question.... Are chickens bothered by foxtails like other animals? We have tons of that stuff growing around what will be their free ranging areas. And now a photo this is one of the 3 week old BR that jumps out of brooder to visit me while doing chick chores in the spare room

 

[Leahs Mom]

Quote: Interesting. Thanks for posting.

 

[jlynnet]

Not a chicken but I wanted to share who came home today . Both need a bit of beefing up they lost weight over winter but their finally home!

That's so exciting! I miss having horses.

 

[aoxa]

For those of you - a little GMO humour.
(GMO is not a joke - but I thought this image was so true).

Kian, what a bad helper!

Sally, We have strict regulations during sales here. Every bird has to be provided water, but I still hate to see how they lift the birds and move them. There are easier ways. I say them carrying Geese in by the necks.