The Natural Chicken Keeping thread - OTs welcome!

[aoxa]

Oh another question.... Does it matter what kind of wood I burn to get the ash? We have mostly pine cut for taking camping.... Will that work?

What AFL said. No cedar. Nothing treated. Regular old pine is good

You know... We should have tracked that more closely. This is the third one we've made. The first was our own and it is 4x8. I use it around the farm for various things like growing out cull cockerels.
The second we built a few years ago was 3x6. It was for my sister and similar to this one. We had a budget of $100 and were able to stick to it.
We like the 3x6 size for transient people since it fits easily in the back of a pickup so it's easy to move.
I'm guessing this one cost us about $150. It has more hardware on it (3 sets of hinges). One side of the top opens as well as the triangular door in the back for collecting eggs and the bottom half of the back for filling the feeder. So in addition to the hinges we had the lumber, 1 sheet of siding, one roll of hardware cloth ($27 for 50' so plenty left), the hanging feeder, a water bucket, a couple of chicken nipples, and a rope attached to the back side to drag it to move it daily.

Well $150 is not bad IMO. Hardware cloth here is insane. $27 would get you 10 feet. That's it. Seriously.

PEAK
Hardware Mesh 1/2 inch x 1/2 inch 36 inches x 5 feet​

Nustock on the chicken & neem oil on the wood.
And no it doesn't matter what kind of wood except I probably wouldn't use cedar. I have used ash from pine trees before

 

[lindz8504]

Lice.

They won't kill a chicken, but they can make their feathering look terrible.

Dust them with wood ash, apply nustock where you see the eggs. Is that what you use, or is it neem oil? Someone correct me...

Mites are serious, lice are not.

You have chickens, lice will happen.

I've dealt with all parasites except worms.

Mites are by far the worst.

Oh another question.... Does it matter what kind of wood I burn to get the ash? We have mostly pine cut for taking camping.... Will that work?

Quote:

Nustock on the chicken & neem oil on the wood.
And no it doesn't matter what kind of wood except I probably wouldn't use cedar. I have used ash from pine trees before

Quote:

What AFL said. No cedar. Nothing treated. Regular old pine is good

Awesome! Thanks!

 

[SallyinIndiana]

Quote: I don't even give it a second thought. Then again I'll toss chick fil a scraps in their pen too, and should there be a cheeseburger from McDonald's left over its for the chickens too. I try to do many things naturally but I have my limits. My chickens have eaten many many things that are not natural to them and I'm sure are not gmo-free. Even my heritage chickens don't get organic feed just the higher protein stuff from RK or the feed mill.

I also spray by coop with seven stuff once in a while, well DH does the spraying due to me being in the family way. But I also try the natural stuff first. The vanilla worked for a while but it got to the point of the coop needing something stronger. The vanilla still works great as a bug repellant for people though.

We use wood ash and deep litter too to help keep bugs off of the birds. We have not had an infestation of anything other than flies. But flies are very very annoying to me. Next summer with the duck pool I will be on the look out for more mosquitoes. But the 2 ducks keep the water in motion pretty well.

 

[lalaland]

good lord, its a mite/lice epidemic! I'm going to go check my girls carefully tomorrow, but I've heard not to worry when it is so bleeping cold? anyone know if that is true?

ran out to do a mid-morning coop check.
good news is another sulmtaler is laying, and the third was checking out the nests.
bad news is one of the astralorps, who is about 3 yrs old, has a serious wheezing noise with evry inhale and exhale. Im going to hope she just has something caught in her esophagus and that she will get it out of there. extremely loud, but she was oblivious as far as I can tell.
also bad news is the mash was frozen solid (less than 3 hours) and worse yet, the girls aren't happy with the new feed bag of mash - it is just about as finely ground as flour is. they are ignoring it. I don't remember having these problems with winter feeding, but then, this weather isn't exactly the norm. It is all the way up -9F.
Booster: comb looks about the same and the little bugger jumped me from behind when I was adding some scratch to a feed pan. Buster, sr roo, kicked his butt.. A bit later, Booster and I sparred wtih my boot, and I finally got him to back down. I am hoping that when the weather improves, adn they are outdoors, he'll quit this. If not, soup pot time. Unfortunately he is the absolute best at hawk spotting.

redridge, that is a really sweet tractor coop

 

[aoxa]

good lord, its a mite/lice epidemic! I'm going to go check my girls carefully tomorrow, but I've heard not to worry when it is so bleeping cold? anyone know if that is true?

ran out to do a mid-morning coop check.
good news is another sulmtaler is laying, and the third was checking out the nests.
bad news is one of the astralorps, who is about 3 yrs old, has a serious wheezing noise with evry inhale and exhale. Im going to hope she just has something caught in her esophagus and that she will get it out of there. extremely loud, but she was oblivious as far as I can tell.
also bad news is the mash was frozen solid (less than 3 hours) and worse yet, the girls aren't happy with the new feed bag of mash - it is just about as finely ground as flour is. they are ignoring it. I don't remember having these problems with winter feeding, but then, this weather isn't exactly the norm. It is all the way up -9F.
Booster: comb looks about the same and the little bugger jumped me from behind when I was adding some scratch to a feed pan. Buster, sr roo, kicked his butt.. A bit later, Booster and I sparred wtih my boot, and I finally got him to back down. I am hoping that when the weather improves, adn they are outdoors, he'll quit this. If not, soup pot time. Unfortunately he is the absolute best at hawk spotting.

redridge, that is a really sweet tractor coop

I feed dry on cold days like this... Unless I am feeding in a heated dish.

Or you could use something rubber (unless you boycotted rubber and plastic with LM), and let it freeze - pop it in a bucket and bring it inside to thaw and refill. That's what I did last winter.

I can't be bothered this winter. I feed dry on days colder than -10. It freezes solid and it builds up in my gutter feeders.

 

[lalaland]

yeah, thats why I am not happy that the mash in this batch is so fine, the girls aren't eating it dry. I hate to go to crumbles. I have another feed mill about 30 mn away that has a decent all flock mash, I could get some on Thursday. I can keep them going just fine on scratch til then, supplemented with boss and meal worms.

I only fed them wet mash today because I am home and could supplement later today. But the frozen mash in the pans is a pain in the rear.

 

[aoxa]

yeah, thats why I am not happy that the mash in this batch is so fine, the girls aren't eating it dry. I hate to go to crumbles. I have another feed mill about 30 mn away that has a decent all flock mash, I could get some on Thursday. I can keep them going just fine on scratch til then, supplemented with boss and meal worms.

I only fed them wet mash today because I am home and could supplement later today. But the frozen mash in the pans is a pain in the rear.

Why not crumble?

Mash here is so totally different. It is a whole grain mix and it only is available for layer feed.

 

[TeaChick]

A quick feather trim seems a better alternative then holding a roo doing undainty things to him until he gives you a deposit then holding a hen while you give her the said deposit! lol

Yes, that second alternative is not happening. lol
I can't imagine doing undainty things to a rooster!

I have not done it, but I would have a person hold the chicken calmly wrapped in a towel while you gave it the trim in the vent area. Or maybe a dog gromming place would do it for a small charge. They have all of the sharp tools and the cleaning supplies to keep those tools clean. After all they have to trim near the dog's rear so a chicken's rear would not be that different and you could hold the chicken. I'm sure after watching them you would know exactly what to do too.

Ooh, that's a great idea, taking her to a pet grooming place!!!

I also like the idea of having someone hold her in a towel. My oldest would be able to do that with me.

My concern is the feathers being pokey when I cut them.
And cutting them too short and her butt being cold.

 

[TeaChick]

HELP!!! I've been using a chicken tractor all spring, summer, and fall with great success. I decided to make it stationery for the winter so we placed it up on our concrete patio (after first laying down tar paper then weed barrier over that) and added pine flakes and dry leaves. Chickens seemed fine and loved the leaves. Several days ago I was checking the coup area to see if it needed poop scooped out and saw some blood droppings. Scared the life out of me, but everyone seemed to be still eating, drinking and moving about. I checked all 6 chickens and discovered that one was a mess. I immediately got paper towels and warm water to try to clean what I could away from her behind to see. I then discovered that she had lost a lot of feathers underneath and her skin was extremely red and hurt her. I panicked and sent pictures to a friend who said it looked like lice and suggested I dust all the chickens with Sevin. Well, I have been raising them organically and I hated the thought but she was so bad that I had no time for extensive research into what to do. I really felt it was an emergency. I didn't know what to do about the coop. I read that lice stay on the chickens and that you don't have to worry about cleaning or dusting the coop. I also read that if you are deep littering then you definitely don't want to get rid of the deep liter. Well, I couldn't stand it so I decided to let the run alone, but cleaned the nesting boxes and the coop poop boards which are actually the flooring. Today (last night now) I actually had time to check up on how she was doing. She looked o.k. but not great and I decided to check the others again more thoroughly. Now, I am really, really, really upset because the other hens and my roo are infested!!! The question I can't seem to get answered is how in the world did these chickens get lice and in the condition they are in?!! I was fermenting their organic feed from Countryside in 2 bucket method, but something went wrong with the process at one point and I'm now thinking it was because the buckets weren't food grade. I was getting a nasty looking scum on top that everyone agreed I needed to dump and not feed to the chickens. Unfortunately, my husband had fed some already. Did this weaken/poison them? I basically spoil these chickens and love them. I chop fresh veggies up for them everyday and put them in their food tray and I have baked flockblock. I try to let them free range a couple hours a week but every time I let them out (and they want out badly) I get a bunch of vultures showing up and circling. Yes, turkey vultures. Now maybe they won't hurt chickens but they don't seem very intimidated even by me. The chickens were under tree branches but it still scares me. Again, I'm trying to give them every health benefit I can and now they are infested and ruined by Sevin dust because I freaked. So I have just spent 6 hours reading everything I can on what to do and and still wondering about the chicken tractor/coop. I have no place to move the chickens to, so what do I do? Please help!! I have fireplace ash and have read that I should rub down all the chickens with fireplace ash making sure to get it onto the skin and into feathers. So that is my plan for tomorrow. I also went out and bought a plastic tub to put sand into for dust bathing. I had put sand underneath the coop area, but that got covered in leaves and wet and froze so the chickens had no dusting area. The sand I bought was wet in the bag so it is now in my basement laundry room which is the warmest area in the house and is sitting beside a dehumidifier. Hopefully will be dry tomorrow so I can put it in the coop. I am hoping the sides are low enough they can get in, but high enough to keep leaves and flake out. I just cannot believe that I have taken such poor care of these poor birds. I love them and they are miserable, yet still laying 3/4 eggs a day. My poor little girls!!! My friend said she is always fighting bugs. That just doesn't seem right. Healthy birds that are well fed in a clean environment shouldn't have this kind of problem. Please tell me what I am doing wrong. I am now worried about their feet too. Not sure they look exactly healthy. I will follow up with pictures from my phone if I can.
''

Hon, I can't help with what to do, but I think you should be encouraged that you seem to have done everything right, as far as you know what to do. Now your chickens have lice and you're learning how to get rid of and prevent them; those are well-taken-care-of chickens!!!
Please don't fret so! You're not doing anything wrong; something you are doing or aren't doing might need to be adjusted.
Calm down, Hon. You're doing great and you're learning like all the rest of us.

Now, I will step out of the way for the chicken experts to advise and answer your questions. d

Here it is on Amazon in black, but it comes in different colors:

http://www.amazon.com/Egg-Skelter-Black-Medium-Large/dp/B006MXCLUQ/ref=pd_sim_sbs_hg_4
Thank you!!! I'm going to see if I can convince DH that we really do need one.

Do you worry about what's in food from Rural King? I can't tell if it's gmo or organic, so I'm assuming none of it is either of those things. The people who work there never seem to know anything about it, including whether they can order non-gmo feed or not.

That's how we feed our chickens scraps too! It all goes in their pile and they pick out what they want and let the rest compost. I try to throw away as little as possible (partly because of being good to the planet, and partly because we don't have garbage pick-up because of where we're located out in the country). I love the idea of turning our unwanted food scraps into eggs!
My sentiments exactly!!! =D

Hmm. :/

You're so expressive.

for show quality bantam cochins, yes that is pretty much the norm... many do AI so they don't have to trim fluff, if they're conditioning for a show as well. for hatchery quality cochins, no you don't need to because they don't have that thick heavy underfluff like the show quality ones do.

is it natural? no, is it necessary? if you are breeding show quality, without trimming you may not get ANY fertility... it just depends on what you want, and what birds you're working with. I have one new boy who will need to be trimmed, but most of my other boys seem to manage just fine on their own.

trim the hens above the vent, the roo below the vent... if you scissor it too short the girls will get stabbed by the stubble/feather shafts. many prefer to pluck. personally, I use scissors and just trim the outer edges of the fluff, down about an inch or so each time, until I start seeing better fertility in the eggs. maybe once a week or so. if the stubble gets so short that it's starting to irritate the hens, then you need to pluck.

sometimes just plucking some of the fluff to thin it out works as well, or a combination of trim and pluck. it's up to you.

Excellent! Thank you!
I'm so new I feel like I need almost step by step instructions for anything beyond making sure they have food and water.

 

[lalaland]

Why not crumble?

Mash here is so totally different. It is a whole grain mix and it only is available for layer feed.

ack, I just have a bias against crumble because it is a manufactured food and I very untrusting about the type of ingredients. I wish mash here was a whole grain food! it varies quite a bit here, but usually is a coarse grind/cracked grains and added vitamins/minerals.

I got 5 eggs today, and I'm wondering if one of the older hens has come back into lay because it was a big full size egg, compared to the 4 pullet eggs.