The Old Folks Home

[superchemicalgirl]

Okay opinions please....
I have two flocks of chickens and four ducks one of the flocks of chickens lives with the ducks...
Given my recent losses to mysterious predators I have been thinking about combining the flocks in the pen that's up against the house... There's a small pen (couple hundred square feet) and a coop 80 odd ft.²... Would be two roosters and one drake, 3 duck hens and 12 chicken hens....do you think they could live together?
It would also cut down my winter workload

Which of course I'm all for.

Only concern I have with this is the wet nastiness that the ducks create with the chickens for winter. You say the ducks already live with the chickens - any wetness issues?

 

[hennible]

I like a 10 square feet per bird minimum, combined inside and outside as long as it is all secured.  With 200sq' and 80sq' (280sq') you should be able to house 28 birds there, as long as none are particularly aggressive.  You have 18, right?

Yes 18, my eldest roo is incredibly docile... The younger one is shaping up the same way. Really I guess I'm only worried about the ducks being picked on... But they have free ranged together so it's not like they've never seen each other...

 

[Highcotton]

[COLOR=333333]Holloween weather report====[/COLOR] [COLOR=333333]Record snowfall last night in many towns, record cold tonight-low teens to single digits [/COLOR] [COLOR=333333]Good news tho is the "urchins" are more likely to be throwing snowballs than eggs, much easier cleanup! [/COLOR] [COLOR=333333]Never get any urchins at our door. They can't find us. We are about a 1/4 mile or so past the end of a dead end road and no yard lights. All the country folk load up the kids and haul them into the county seats to trick or treat. Only towns big enough to bother going to.[/COLOR] [COLOR=333333] [/COLOR]Edited by chickisoup - Today at 5:51 pm

We had a record high of 84 this week and it looks like a possible record low. It is windy today. Winds 15 to 26 MPH With gusts to 35. We haven't had a Trick or Treater since we moved here in 1988. They aren't willing to come up the driveway through the woods to get here.

 

[ronott1]

We had a record high of 84 this week and it looks like a possible record low. It is windy today. Winds 15 to 26 MPH With gusts to 35.

We haven't had a Trick or Treater since we moved here in 1988. They aren't willing to come up the driveway through the woods to get here.

No Grand children or relatives?

Growing up in the country, we only had relatives or the neighbor across the street. We would trick or treat at Grandmans, which was also in the country.

 

[Highcotton]

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Only concern I have with this is the wet nastiness that the ducks create with the chickens for winter. You say the ducks already live with the chickens - any wetness issues?

I have good drainage with the duck pond near the low side of the yard so the water quickly runs off. The ducks do like to make mud holes.

 

[chickisoup]

 

[hennible]

Only concern I have with this is the wet nastiness that the ducks create with the chickens for winter. You say the ducks already live with the chickens - any wetness issues?

The pen and coop are on a sand gravel base... Also with FF and the style of water bucket I use the duck mess is minimal... Lastly it will be too cold for a pool soon, so I will be removing those... I think the wetness is minimal... Defiantly worth some thought though... Oh and the pen and coop have lots of " shelves" for the chickens to get up on.

 

[Highcotton]

No Grand children or relatives?

Growing up in the country, we only had relatives or the neighbor across the street. We would trick or treat at Grandmans, which was also in the country.

Some of the Grandchildren live next door so they get Halloween treats but not on Halloween evening. My youngest is my avatar. She says that she is spoiled and she loves it. She owns the chickens and I am the caretaker. She now wants both Black and White silikes.

I made a good trade yesterday morning. I gave a co-worker some eggs and he asked if I wanted an incubator. It has automatic turners and a guail egg adapter. Now I can use the money that I was going to use for an incubator tp buy eggs. Is that chicken math.

 

[hennible]

Sweet deal!!! Best trade ever.

 

[chickisoup]

Wow, with all the wet/mud troubles you all have, I am NEVER going to complain about all our glacial sand again! It can really pour here but if we get a puddle one of us is going "hunny, come here and look!". Our only time we have a flooding/mud problem is in spring when we get too much snow melt before the frost comes out of the ground but even then that's only in the low spot in the yard north of all the critter areas and the one at the end of the driveway where it meets the road. That turns into quite a lake and that part of the driveway gets really soft but we just schedule trucks, etc. around it for a couple days. I'm sure Alaskan can relate to that.