The Old Folks Home

:barnie I found someone to come and take all of my extras for free. (Old hens, bunches of cockerels, and my genetic defects)....

But now I am all ooooooh, maybe I should downsize and chunk everything into the "to go box"

So.... I decided/ or am thinking

1. Don't keep the about 8 bantam male wheaten ameraucana that I was going to grow out and figure out which would be a good replacement for my current rooster.... Sure the current roo is HETEROzygous for pea comb, but he has great conformation, great color, and perfect personality.......

2. Get rid of all older hens that don't look good. I have three that just can't get their act together. One has feathers that are too soft so she always looks ratty, one is on the very bottom of the pecking order, and even with lots of space is always pecked on, and one I just can't figure out... Also, there is that one with the bent back that I never got rid of....

3. Could I get rid of the old d'uccle hens? They are horrid broodies, and since they love to "try" to brood, they are poor layers..... Kids might get upset .... :rolleyes: Might have to keep those.... I have four....but they are named, kids will know if we go from 4 to 2 ..... Hum...... Maybe keep those, kids have to stay happy since they do all of the work -sigh- (kids that care are right now at camp...can't ask)

4. Get rid of Spitz roo I used this spring, he is bad color, no crest, and fathered a bunch of genetic "oops" (odd noses and toes without toe nails) eventhough he has a perfect persinality....still, chunk him, yep. I have two possible replacements, I need to decide if I want to keep both (they are different colors).

5. Since the majority of my grow-outs mysteriously disapeared... I think I only have 2 male standard sized black ams.... They are layed back....maybe I could just keep them without too much trouble... Because I think my Black Am cock is also heterozygous for pea comb. :rolleyes:

6. Should I keep the blue am cockerel I was given? He has a great body/conformation and zero leakage and a nice small comb so might actually be homozygous for pea comb, what a thought! I have always wanted blue hens and some splash hens too.... But his personality has been developing into SUCKY. But I want his color. -sigh- Unless someone wants to send me free blue and splash pure bred Ameraucana hens? :lau

7. I have a very cute trio of single comb bantam white leghorns growing up. They are looking stellar show quality! What idiot would keep that little cockerel? What am I gonna do? I will need two more coops!!!

8. The male dark brown rose comb standard sized leghorn...I gotta keep him, :rolleyes: so I can hatch some lovely pure chicks... That no one will pay me for... Unless I sell them for $2 each or some other insanity.... But maybe I could hatch out 100 dark brown chicks next year, those things are super wild/flighty. I can try free ranging them and see if any make it...but why? I already have enough eggs to eat...I could sell more eggs, but :sick that takes work.... But he looks promissing.... Could be a stunner... Feet aren't very yellow, but the rest of him should be stellar...hard to get the good yellow feet on a dark brown....
 

Thanks Ron! I see there are 14 or 15 additional PAGES in the 9 hours since she posted. I don't know how much is in response to her post or if it is always super busy. I don't incubate so I haven't followed it.

Hey there youngster.

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

Not sure who you are replying to. I LOVED my Pullet-shut door but have disconnected it. We were awoken at 4 AM a few nights ago by a huge noise. Found a missing (turns out she was brooding infertile eggs in the bushes) hen and a coon up the tree when we ran out. I disconnected the door to make sure the girls couldn't get out of the coop into a raccoon in the run (barn alley) in the morning. I put the hen in a spare, not pred proof
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stall/coop where I had an ailing hen recovering in the broody buster to make sure she got her antibiotic water. 2 mornings later I found the headless hen in the coop. That evening at 7:15, still very light, I found the coon going into the open people door in the "pred proof" coop, presumably after the hen in the broody buster which I had moved into that coop in the morning. Had I still had the auto door connected and not seen and killed that coon, it would have massacred the entire flock after they put themselves to roost as they have done nightly for 3 years because the door doesn't close until it is quite dark outside. I have a woodchuck problem and they daily pop huge holes in the dirt floor in the run which is how the coon got in the night before. Now the hens are trapped in the coop before dark until I let them out in the morning. The pecking is terrible. Not sure how long it will take to be sure there are no more coons to worry about or get rid of all the chucks so they stop making highways into the run.
 
Um, I have one Al, the NON predator safe one. I set it up for integrating 4 white Chantecler pullets I never got. I left the door open because "why not" and some of the girls WERE roosting in there at night by choice. The coon didn't show up until recently (possibly 'rehomed' by some A-H??) and as it happened on the night we found the hen, all the girls were in the safe coop. I would have put the found hen in there but she needed to cool off and get un-broody so I closed her in the other one as it has no nest boxes. I would have put her in the buster but Echo was using it.

I can add a lot of hardware cloth to that second coop so it is more safe, not sure how I explain to the hens "mean girls go in this coop, those getting pecked go in that one". There is ~ 8.5 sq ft of floor space/bird in the safe coop, 24' of roosts at 4' and an 8' one at 2'. These hens are going out of their way to peck the lower ranked girls. Just POed that they are in jail I guess. The lower girls were already showing signs of abuse but it has gotten much worse since I started shutting them in.
 
A lot of threads have gotten like that - all chat, no real news and go on and on and on. I dumped a few and am happier with the ones I did keep, like this one.
 
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.
 

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