The Old Folks Home

[ronott1]

Just gathered eggs for the day. Here are two of my Welsummer girl's offerings. Not bad for old ladies, heh?

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I may be prejudice but I think these are pretty spectacular eggs as far as overall color is concerned as for size, probably extra large to jumbo.

Another plus in the Welsummer's favor is they are great foragers. My hens would be blissed out if I let them roam the yard and pasture...they'd be hawk bait, but they'd be blissfully happy hawk bait.

I love those eggs!

 

[Alaskan]

Thanks everyone, They came from a NPIP local breeder. I don't even know if she is breeding Welly's any longer but these girls have been great. The roosters didn't stand up to the Marek's but I have only lost one of 8 hens. What I find really fascinating about them is that I think their feather color is getting improving as they age.

I had one, one I hatched via a broody two years ago this summer go broody on me last June. She was my best broody hen to date, amazing since they are not known to be particularly broody or good brooders of chicks. But she stayed with her chicks for 8 weeks and was fiercely protective of them. My funniest Welly I call Dillon. She has a set of 1 inch spurs and while she is a regular layer,I don't think I have ever witnessed her being covered by a rooster. I HAVE seen her beat up roosters and seen them run for their lives away from her, but nobody messes with Dillon.

well that explains why the color is so good! I don't think the hatchery girls usually have eggs that dark.

 

[microchick]

I've really come to love my Welly girls. They aren't warm and cuddly, never going to be lap chickens but their independence won me over. I told DH that if I was ever tempted to keep large fowl around it would be the Welly's. Excellent layers, pretty birds. I have one two year old Welsummer rooster who has survived the Marek's purge. Maybe I will get brave and breed a few this summer and hope for pullets.

@CapricornFarm, No doubt about it your DH loves you. Sounds like you got yourself a keeper, too.

 

[getaclue]

micro, that's how you do it so hopefully you will eventually get a Mareks resistant strain of birds. Of course, breed them!

 

[Alaskan]

x2! Breed the Welsummers!!!!

 

[drumstick diva]

There was a thread I devotedly followed for years called "J'est Another Day in Pair-A-Dice," until she flew the coop for Facebook, early December. If someone has the fortitude to go thru a very long thread - she mentioned having Marek's in her flock, and how she bred(?) it out . Her birds have remained healthy ever since.

 

[chickadoodles]

My Wellie girls had a nice dark color eggs. They were very nice hens.
I can't remember if I got them from Cackle or Meyers. My Welsimmer rooster was an awesome bird. Very good with all the girls. He saved his girls form one of the dog attacks and he lost most of his tail feathers. But they grew back. He was a beautiful bird.

 

[Beer can]

Two words my friend:
Ear buds.

Ever see that commercial "TV Ears saved our marriage" ?
Every time it is on DW says daddy needs those

I'd rather just put a TV in the garage and crank it up lol.

 

[bruceha2000]

Another plus in the Welsummer's favor is they are great foragers.

Betty is being a bit TOO good of a forager. Good thing I did a headcount last night (I usually do). She was missing, I found her perched on the edge of a broken wood and wire gate (rotted, unrepairable, needs to be gone) that is leaning up against the back of the barn. As before, NO tracks in the snow to suggest how she got there so she must have flown but WHY?? Certainly nothing to forage up there.

He is used to having me around. We have been married since May 21st, 1978. Were engaged for 4 years before that!

No sense rushing things! But given I know your approximate age, I'm glad you did wait. Lots of changes in people from the time you got engaged until you got married.

well that explains why the color is so good! I don't think the hatchery girls usually have eggs that dark.

My Meyer Welsummer girls lay dark eggs.

 

[getaclue]

I was reading a couple of those reports regarding the way they checked for Mareks, and developed what they're calling a vaccine for it. While a great deal of it was over my head, there were a couple places in each of the reports that talked about how some of the newly hatched chicks gave a positive results, but it was simply antigen, not an active case. It mentioned that the antigen was produced, either in the yolk, or immediately when they hatched. This is part of why the vaccine has to be administered within so many hours of them hatching.

What I deduced from that, if a percentage of newly hatched chick shows antigens immediately after hatching, but the pharmaceutical company didn't consider it to be an active case, then there is an immuno-response in a certain percentage of first generation chicks. Of course, those chicks were disposed of, so they could do their research. The pharmaceutical company was not interested in learning how much resistance those chicks would have had naturally. Nor were they interested in letting those chicks grow up, become exposed, and see if the next generation of offspring had even more resistance. If they did, they did not publish their findings, because it would have been counter-productive to their goal, of making, and selling a vaccine.

I still think those with flocks that have Mareks, could easily close their flocks (no new birds coming in, or going out) hatching from your own eggs, and within a few generations, have a flock mostly, to totally resistant to the strain of Mareks affecting them.