The Natural Chicken Keeping thread - OTs welcome!

[4Hgirl]

So sorry, we've had many colic's over the years but only 1 founder.

Thanks it has been heart breaking. Are you in TB or QH racing. He is Runaway Colors out of Beduino bred which apparently Is a big name in the QH racing. This horse and I got 74th out of 900 runners at our state finals in June. This is so devastating but his X-rays look like nothing every happened so he might have a future but we are dealing with a string of abcesses now.

 

[uglychickens]

Hay y'all my chickens got into a bag of fish poo I was keeping to put in the garden... Any ideas on why they would have eaten this? And would it hurt them? I've seen no ill effects as of yet but still can't figure out why they would eat fish poo?!?!

 

[armorfirelady]

Hay y'all my chickens got into a bag of fish poo I was keeping to put in the garden... Any ideas on why they would have eaten this? And would it hurt them? I've seen no ill effects as of yet but still can't figure out why they would eat fish poo?!?!

Must be tasty to them. Mine love when I dump horse manure in the veggie garden in the spring. They spend hours digging thru it. They have weird taste lol

 

[AletaG]

Quote:

OMG we're thinking seriously of a BSF bin too! OK we have to have tea! LOL!

Also, I just cooked up some beef liver for my girls. First taste of that treat they've ever had. Popular? Oh Ya!
It's good, locally raised organic stuff. Came with the cow we put in our freezer last year. I'm the only one who actually likes beef liver, and even I can't eat an entire cow liver in a year's time. I remembered we had a few packages still in the freezer a couple days ago, set one to thaw, and boy oh boy what an awesome treat.

Heh. You found out! We like bugs!
Liver, kidney, whatever, they sure like it. I don't bother to cook it though, just cut in pieces I think they can handle (partially frozen is easier). I like kidney, not so fond of liver. Whenever I smell it, all I can taste is the shoeleather my mom would make us eat, and the gallon of ketchup making me queasy!

Aleta: you raise a question for me... re: your statement about wanting to include animal protein, and using fish. What will a chicken do with a fish that is thrown into the run? do you cook it first? Debone it? At certain times of the year, there are a lot of "junk fish" that can be caught from the lake where my Dad has a camp. I'm wondering how much fish can be fed without worrying about giving the eggs a fishy flavor, or tainting the chickens with mercury and other toxins from a heavy fish diet. Also, can you please explain your statement on keeping the tuna in the freezer for 20 more days. I wish I was in a more temperate zone to be able to raise BSF. I'm also running the idea around in my head about importing some and trying to winter them over in my green house. It's an unheated hoop coop, and I'm in zone 4 or 5A. If I wasn't so squeamish, I'd consider giving some frogs to the girls, but, honestly, I hate it when they catch a frog, b/c I think frogs process a lot of insects!

Well, we haven't actually done it yet. They've eaten fresh crab guts and whatnot and been just fine. That's cooked, though. I'm approaching it sort of like for my dog. We feed him raw, and trout and salmonids in the NW carry liver flukes, so to feed raw you need to freeze for 2 months at -20F. Tuna is *probably* fine, but since it came from someone else, I'm just treating it like salmon, so, 20 more days to first Tuna feed.
I figured since there are chicken feeds that use fish meal, I'm not anticipating fishiness. Didn't notice any taste difference when we were glutted with crab meat, anyway. Will let the thread know, when I find out!
Not sure about mercury... Since random fish will only be one of several protein sources, I'm not going to worry about it much. If you had caged hens, and fed them nothing but barley and catfish/tuna every single day? I wouldn't be happy doing that. But, if a pregnant lady can have tuna once a week, I figure chickens should be fine with some once in a while. Eventually we're going to try farming our own trout/tilapia... got all the plans, some of the equipment, but the garage is still a disaster from moving in in Feb.

Anyway, dinner time... people hungry.

 

[Jewelwing]

Chaos, is that a Great Dane puppy in your avatar?

Why yes, it is! It's an old picture (she's a year and a half now), but I really like it.

Unfortunately, she has a really strong prey drive (I've never known a Great Dane like this!), so she stalks our cats and treats them like squeak toys at any chance (they hardly ever dare to come out of the basement while the dog is in the house). So I don't think I can train her to ignore the chickens, at least not well enough that I could ever have her out while they're free-ranging. Too bad.

 

[Jewelwing]

I was also able to purchase some old fashioned glass bases for quart canning jar chick waterers on ebay.

The bases look like this:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Old-Vintage...565?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item4612a7ec1d

Just fill a quart jar with water, put the glass base on top and turn it over (like those plastic ones...except glass!)

For the older girls, I put pyrex baking pans of water out during the summer for them to drink from and stand in to cool down if they like.

Yes! I actually found one like this on Etsy, but it's for a gallon mason jar, so it's pretty big. I thought maybe I could put the ff in the jar (if I can find a jar big enough for the dish). Maybe it'll be too thick to leak into the moat, but it would be awesome if it did! I should get another smaller one for water. Do you worry about the water freezing in the glass jar in the winter?

I like your set-up with the bread pans. Do the hens kick shavings into them? My babies kick pine shavings into their food and water all the time! I was thinking I might make a couple macrame plant hangers and use them to hang the food and water dishes. I've never done macrame before, but I remember those plant hangers from when I was a kid (don't see them much any more), and I thought how hard can it be?

But I think you're right - glass is the way to go, and cheaper is better! I had been thinking I needed a trough, like people make out of PVC pipe or a length of gutter, but a couple bread pans may be just fine, if my mason jar idea doesn't work.

 

[Jewelwing]

When I have chicks I use a pyrex pie plate. It's shallow and they can get to the feed easily.

I've also just thrown the ff on the ground for them. They LOVE to scratch around to find it!

Don't the chicks poop all over in the food if you use a pie plate? And get food all over their feet? I have a couple Brahmas, so their feet feathers drag in everything.

If you through the ff on the ground... oh, I just realized you must mean outside, not on the pine shavings! I was thinking the shavings would soak up the liquid and get all yucky, but in the dirt and grass it might me fine. My chicks haven't been outside yet, just in the coop. The run isn't built, and I don't think I could reliably get them back in the coop when I need to let the dog out.

Otherwise, I like the idea of throwing the ff on the ground!

 

[Jewelwing]

I wish new feeders and waterers were glass. I'm really not happy using plastic or metal. For lots of reasons.

Ditto this! Funny that I'm scouring the web hoping to find "vintage" chicken waterers!

 

[Jewelwing]

Great ideas! Here's a picture of a wooden trough we had-I put a 2x4 through the middle

That's a great idea! Does the wood soak up liquid from the ff and get all yucky? It looks pretty clean in your picture.

 

[Jewelwing]

Welcome to the thread!!!!

Never use galvanized..if you think plastic is bad..that is hard on the chickens and might cause illness to both.

I made wood feeders and use glass bread pans also. I collect them at rummage sales. I just picked one up today for a quarter.

Thank you!

I'm glad I followed my gut about the galvanized. I never thought of using wood! Doesn't is soak up liquid from the ff?