The Natural Chicken Keeping thread - OTs welcome!

I got an 18-270mm lens I use it as a universal. It is a respectable zoom capability, but also wide lens for landscape. A good lens can cost as much or more as the camera. When I get another lens it will be a macro for sure.
 
Hope everyone is having a great Christmas. My Mom knew how much I missed my George so she got me a Roo that I could have
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The light inside is on a timer. And he is very quiet :)
 
Thanks to you both - when I bought it I was fairly sure he could buy other lenses for it, is that true? Like a zoom, for example? Or is that another thing that's really not necessary? This might be the first gift I've given him in 11 years that he likes.
Yes definitely get a lens!! 55-250 mm is what I have, and I love it!
 
New camera does nicely on chick closeups :) Have to work a bit on everything in focus but these are the best chick pics ever taken in this house.



I hardly use the lens that comes with it other than for close ups. I use my 55-250 mm for everything else.

Hopefully tomorrow is sunny so I can get some good pictures of the 20 chicks that just hatched - all silkies! :D
 
I'm behind on this thread by about a week, but I have some news to report today.

I finally got my first egg (chickens are 23 weeks old, and a couple have been squatting for a few weeks), but it's not really happy news. I went inside the coop, instead of just checking the egg boxes, and there was a squashed egg on the wood chips on the floor of the coop. Probably laid yesterday, since I was in the coop a lot the day before. My first egg, and it's a squashed, frozen egg with a super soft shell, and it looks like it's been pecked. So it was laid outside the nest boxes, had a soft shell, and my chickens ate part of it. Aaugh! I don't get to eat it, or blow it to save it as a trophy. I'm so upset I'm on the verge of tears. No congratulations due here.





Cut in half with a butter knife (still frozen):



I don't even know who laid it. I have a wildlife camera in the coop, but for some reason it didn't take any pictures yesterday (likely when the egg was laid). Maybe the battery's getting low, but it did take several pictures on the 24th (of me putting out scratch in the coop on the wood chips), and a couple today just of chickens walking around. So I don't know if it was actually laid inside the box and then pushed out, or laid on the deep litter.

It doesn't look like a Welsummer egg - not dark enough, I think. So I don't know who laid it - Speckled Sussex, Brahma, Australorp, or Faverolle.

What am I doing wrong? I have plastic eggs inside the nest boxes, which are lined with cross-cut shredded brown paper. They seem welcoming to me. I'm feeding my pullets grower food with free choice oyster shell and crushed egg shells. Why is this egg shell so soft? Is this something that happens when the egg freezes, or are they not getting enough calcium?

At least the yolk is nice and dark.
 
Could be both plus a new layer plus really cold weather - right this moment I would not worry too much. If you are concerned about calcium you can always give them some yogurt, kale, eggshells, whatever you have handy. Meal Worms are an often-overlooked source of calcium as well, and they usually gobble them up faster than you can say, "Treat, girls!" If it makes you feel any better, I had one looked almost exactly like yours the other day, between the roosts. I tossed it in the compost pile and didn't worry. They will figure it all out. You might try bedding the nest boxes with straw or shavings if they don't seem interested in climbing into the shredded paper - it flattens out fast, retains moisture, and might make them worry it will wrap around their legs. Never know what a chicken thinks - or, according to DH, *if* it thinks LOL.
 

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