The Old Folks Home

[Cynthia12]

LOL, that's why I left her thread. Too much chatting in between the hatching questions and advice. Nice people though if you don't mind wading through hundreds and hundreds of posts a day.

Same reason I left, but, I will go on..check a few posts real quick, like I just did, and throw them off! I try and answer some of the chicken/duck what ever questions. I'm worried about a ducky baby right now. :/

 

[Cynthia12]

Just a quick stop in before I head to bed. DD had our second grandchild yesterday. Fine young son. Welcome to the world Waylon Michael Garrett. That is Miss Liv his sister holding him. She thinks he is her baby. DD said she kept bringing people into the room to see her baby.

Congratulations Di Di! They are both little dollys.

 

[bruceha2000]

Yeah, I keep rereading through my own post...

trying to figure out how many I could box up.....

I just really "should" reduce numbers...

The problem is that being up in Alaska it is VERY difficult to get any good stock, so if for example I decide to chunk the dark brown leghorn roo, then if I ever want any more pure dark brown girls of good quality, we are talking at least $100. .... Or...... I could keep that roo and make my own. .....

It is hard for me to say " nah, I am really OK in never having that breed again"

But maybe I could super pare down... Trios of each breed I really like? But that is still 4 standard sized breeds (I just can't reduce more!!!)

Bantams... I am hoping to get down to 2 breeds, have to ask the kids, might need to stay at 3.

You have 5 boys thus you can have 5 breeds.

That's true but not like some threads " Hi." "Hi Back." "How ya doin?" "I'm good ." Old folks actually have intelligent talking points - Like anything I feel about ice cream & Alaskan's chicken dilemmas.. etc.

I can see that! I don't really want to read through pages of Hi and Hi back. Send a PM.

 

[bruceha2000]

Another question for you bunny people.

Clearly we do not have the same rabbit eating predators this year as we have in the past because we've never seen more than 2, MAYBE 3 before. Now there seems to be a new one every few weeks. I don't even know how many there are but there were 4 young ones of various ages out this morning. And I know there are at least 2 adults (visually, besides the obvious other reason).

Don't wild rabbits have large litters in hopes of beating the "stay alive" odds? We've not seen more than one "teacup" bunny at a time.

 

[perchie.girl]

Another question for you bunny people.

Clearly we do not have the same rabbit eating predators this year as we have in the past because we've never seen more than 2, MAYBE 3 before. Now there seems to be a new one every few weeks. I don't even know how many there are but there were 4 young ones of various ages out this morning. And I know there are at least 2 adults (visually, besides the obvious other reason).

Don't wild rabbits have large litters in hopes of beating the "stay alive" odds? We've not seen more than one "teacup" bunny at a time.

Population explosions are due to predator depopulation... Hopefully the predators will have a bumper crop too.

We see it here too. last couple of years rarely see rabbits... this year the bunny floppers are all over the place... The coyote packs are strong and I am seeing lots of birds of prey too.

deb

 

[Alaskan]

Deb is right... It is a cycle.. We see it up here, but I can't rememebr how many years the cycle is...maybe 10 years?


Anyway, bunny numbers keep increasing until the number of bunnies is insane... In a peak year the snow melted and I was looking at the gound... Took me over a minute of looking at the ground going "what is that" before I realized that as far as I could see was a CARPET of bunny poo. Crazy.

Predator numbers just can't increase as fast as the bunnies, and lag behind a bit.

Eventually there were so many bunnies (carpet of poo...just think how many!), that we not only had a crazy number of predators but the bunnies were getting nasty wormy mangy bad looking. They had cleaned out everywhere of all things that rabbits eat. All dogs were getting worms from the rabbits.....


So, sudden rabbit crash, dead rabbits here and there, the wildlife couldn't keep up.... Next year there were ZERO rabbits (well, some were out there, but very few, and you didn't see them any more). But.... Crazy number of very hungry predators...all wanting to move on to chicken

 

[chickadoodles]

We don't see any evidence of wild rabbit around here. But there are packs of coyotes all around our place.

 

[perchie.girl]

We don't see any evidence of wild rabbit around here. But there are packs of coyotes all around our place.

Thats why....

deb

 

[Wisher1000]

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I bought some sleeve protectors off of ebay to put our cards in so they cannot be scanned like that either. We have not had any of these problems.
I hope this might help you and some others.

Plain old aluminum foil works just as well......

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My DS#1 (19) plays this game. He has really been having fun with it. We have been traveling for over a week and he has "caught" quite a few. He is not obsessed with it, he does not look at his phone constantly (well, no more than usual.) This reminds me of the "Dungeons and Dragons" scare back in the 70's. People were talking about murders and assaults that were being committed by the players who must surely have been up to no good and maybe were dabbling in devil worship. This Pokemon Go game is new and exciting for the young people and confusing for us older ones. Yes, there are stupid people in the world and the do stupid things. But I think the genius and creativity behind this game is awesome. I think it is a wonderous time in which we live. I saw a video of a woman known as "One Funny Mother" that introduces a similar phone game for Mom's called Chardonney Go where she runs around looking for hidden glasses of wine. Ha Ha Ha. I would be interested in a MarGoRita app............

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Going back home, SCG? Or looking for a new planet?

People need guineas. Now those are much more fun and harder to catch than a Pokemon.

I have 9 that I'd be willing to donate to the cause.

After thinking on this...... I agree 100%

Hey there youngster.

Get yourself a Chicken Door. Automatic open and closing. Best thing I ever did. Google it.

Best $280 I ever spent.....seriously!

How do you know if you are middle aged?

How do you know what the BYC rules are.

Guess i can try it our and either get thrown our for being too young, too old, or breaking some rule.

It's mostly a state of mind, jump on in and see if you enjoy the water.....

LOL, that's why I left her thread. Too much chatting in between the hatching questions and advice. Nice people though if you don't mind wading through hundreds and hundreds of posts a day.

Oh, I can see how this thread was so much more attractive to you.

I'm with you Alaskan. Trying to decide whether to follow my head and keep only those with the qualities I need to move my program forward, or to follow my heart and keep the "sentimental favorites" that I've had for a while, but really have good reasons to be culled.

This is easy....... do what makes you happy, thats what it is supposed to be all about.

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My LGDs have started killing and bringing up rabbits. Now I understand why. They must have run off all the predators and now there are lots of rabbits to chase. Cool! But I hate it for the bunnies.

 

[drumstick diva]

The first several years of living out here, we had wall to wall bunnies and litters of bunnies. Also Bobwhite, pheasants in the yard, and deer on everyone's property eating flowers and destroying other plants.

Then it seemed to lessen nowadays - you barely notice a bunny anywhere, the deer aren't walking from the forest preserve to one house then another or standing in the middle of the street. We don't see them "dating," anymore. Coyotes used to use our street to get to wilder parts.

I figured the coyotes were the cause but, it is very rare to see them now. They were bold as brass, even the fox seem to have largely disappeared.

Either I just can't see well anymore or something is affecting them. Hope it doesn't mean larger preds have moved in. It's just so odd.