The Natural Chicken Keeping thread - OTs welcome!

[TeaChick]

Hey I have my total animal count! WOOOHOOO for me!

161 chickens (EEs 10, Crested EEs 3, Buckeyes 2, Silkies 31, Barred Rocks 33, SPPR 11, Frizzle 5, Layers 38, Houdans 9, CX 3, Naked Neck 10, Mixed 5, Ameraucana bantam 1)
2 geese
1 duck
4 goats
1 alpaca
3 dogs
2 cats

I really didn't expect to have that many chickens. I had my Partridge Silkies vaccinated in June, and don't know how many I have now, as I sold a few.

You have an alpaca?!?!?!?
Cool!!!

BTW, what do you do with it? Milk, fur, both, neither???

 

[TeaChick]

Jime: I'm guessing that the birds your Dad had, perhaps were game chickens, or similar. These breeds have not had the broodiness bred out of them, thus probably had the instinct to take care of their chicks, and do well in a communal flock situation. I'm only thinking out loud here, so don't take my thoughts too seriously, so here goes: Just because a hen/pullet is able to sit on eggs and hatch them, doesn't make her a good mother. Here's the question: Are mothering skills in the animal kingdom instinctive or learned? Or a combination of both? Aside from keeping each broody and her brood away from the rest of the flock, what kind of management would ensure that an other murder fest does not occur in a similar situation? I'd love to hear from other flocksters re: their experiences with broodies, especially re: the circumstances that have not been successful, the successful broods, and most importantly, the hens who appeared to learn from past failures and have gone on to be successful. Breed info as well as flock dynamics would also be helpful. Follow up thought: Breeding for appropriate behavior is at least as important as breeding for SOP.

In the animal kingdom (including humans), some species exclusively learn and some are exclusively instinctive and some are a combination, and then there are exceptions where a species thought to only learn ends up being a good mother in spite of being raised without one, and vise versa.

For humans, some of us are mothers (or fathers) and some of us aren't parents, etc. Think about how your mom raised you, think about how you did, do, or would do things with your own kids; you would do some things the same, you would do some things different, and you would be surprised at how many things you told yourself you'd never do or say and then you do. lol
At any rate, I don't know how it is with chickens, how much is instinctive and how much is learned, but I bet it varies by breed and bloodline and situation.
An example of a variation by situation would be if a breed learns its mothering skills, but is raised by a person, that chick (when she becomes a mother) might do things the way she perceived things were done by her surrogate (human) mother. That hen might not do anything with the chicks when it's dark b/c the human made sure she was warm and had food and water, but she might lose chicks b/c she expects them to sleep separately from her and say it's cold. Does that make sense?

Just thinking out loud like everyone else.

 

[TeaChick]

Interesting thoughts Lady Mc. It entirely makes sense to me. I wonder if Centrarchid cares to respond. He's working on a line of self sustaining Dominiques, so might have some input re: broodiness related to molting.

My girls were hatched in Feb and early March. They've all gone through at least a bit of a molt, with the RIR going through a hard molt, just now getting back some feathers, BSL going into a fairly heavy molt. EE have done a light molt, mostly beards, anterior neck and tail feathers. Obviously they didn't read the book re: the age of molting. Also, an other question to ask in relation to molting is if supplemental light is used, or any changes in nutritional status. My girls have all lost a lot of weight, for some reason, stopped eating the crumbles, though they smelled and looked fine. I just replaced with a new bag of 22% protein crumble, hoping that will help. I'm also supplementing with BOSS, cracked corn, sprouted wheat and barley. I may with-hold the seeds and sprouts for a few days to see how they do with the extra protein feed.

On an unrelated note, the loft of my coop is 4 x 8 which is closed in with an inch of insulation, windows covered with glass on north and south, 4 x 8 vent over girls favorite roost north and south, pop door under their favorite roost south. Doors and windows north and south not well sealed, so there is some ventilation around them. I'm doing DL shavings, have used permethrin and DE under litter which has obviously been scratched up. The girls are not coming out into the vinyl covered (open on the south) coop run (8 x 12) much. So, obviously they're building up some poo in the loft with smell noticeable in the morning. The poo is not capped, well scratched in. If you were me, would you clean all of the litter out (b/c of the permethrin) and start with fresh litter, or just throw a couple inches of fresh litter on top? I wonder if I should remove the glass from the south window which faces into their vinyl covered run, and perhaps close in most of the south opening of the run??? Advice? Temps down to 0F last night, high +10F today.

I'm not positive that I'm completely clear on all the ins and outs of your coop specs, but in general, if it stinks, it should probably go. I wouldn't just throw out all of it. Maybe throw out the worst of it and then add something absorbent and drying to the rest????
Just an idea, not necessarily a good one.

 

[MeatMyChicken]

I raise all my chicks communally. I allow brooder chicks to start free ranging around 5 weeks but they have a place where they can get away from the bigger chickens if they need to - a door open only enough to let the little ones through.

 

[aoxa]

You have an alpaca?!?!?!?
Cool!!!

BTW, what do you do with it? Milk, fur, both, neither???

Fibre and because she is freaking adorable.

Alpaca milk is nasty I hear..


Here is Vivian

 

[Scott H]

They've got great eyelashes. ....

 

[lindz8504]

Fibre and because she is freaking adorable.

Alpaca milk is nasty I hear..


Here is Vivian

She is most definitely freaking adorable!

 

[TeaChick]

From Delisha:

They free range. I offer fermented corn for now, working on getting some layer pellets/crumbles. Mostly, they eat what's around the yard. =) I also give them treats; peanut butter tortilla here, cheese sandwich there, oatmeal sometimes, stale bread when we have it, etc.
I know I'm a horrible chicken keeper to feed them fermented corn

; I'm working on the layer feed.

With chickens there is not many things you can't feed them, though be wary of certain seeds like apple seeds, they contain cyanide with in the seeds that kills birds. SO nothing wrong with the fermented corn at the moment until you can get some scratch or layer.

I have to disagree about seeds ..apple seeds have a place for chickens.

What is that place, please?

 

[aoxa]

They've got great eyelashes. ....

Only the best ever!

 

[TeaChick]

Golden Comets are sex link, but can vary a bit by hatchery as to what their parentage is -- What's your "BA" roo?

If you want more buff Silkies, get a Buff Silkie. Black Silkies will give you mostly black birds, et al.

Just putting this out there:

I have four gold Comets from Tractor Supply. Three of them are red in color and have the calm, semi-friendly, eat-from-your-hand demeanor of a Buff Orpington.
The other one has coloring much more Buff, like a dark buff Orpington, but she's much less friendly, and downright rude sometimes, quite the old bitty hen type (the almost semi-aggressive RIR attitude, if I'm not mistaken).

What does anyone think of that?
I'm also curious if their personalities can indicate broodiness, but that's mere curiosity.