The road less traveled...back to good health! They have lice, mites, scale mites, worms, anemia, gl

[Beekissed]

I feel much better now. I have eaten most of the pumpkin seeds which I haven't shared with the chickens. I don't think they will eat them.I will--I prefer not to have woms myself.
Okay. I checked. They will eat the seeds if I shell them. I have my limits.
They are strange picky eaters but they loved Bee's recipe for cooked pumpkin mixed with cottage cheese and topped with red pepper flakes--the dogs like it too.

You are SO dewormed now, Attila! Hide the unshelled seeds beneath the cottage cheese and they may eat them in their hurry to consume.

I happened to find some raw, shelled pumpkin seeds in the freezer that had been obtained at the health food store at some time or other, for bread making and other recipes. I put some in my ferment mix, along with some flax seed and BOSS. Should be the best ferment mix I've made...of course, I can't keep that up but it's nice here at the first and for these poor, raggedy-butt birds.

Had 2 eggs today! Fed them right back to the chickens.

 

[Pullet Surprise]

Well, they are eating the uncooked pumpkin pieces right on down......caught another one working out on it...so I guess they are good with it, the guts were quickly consumed. will try baking a small piece for them. Thank you Bee!!! I'll stick a pumpkin out in the shed for Feb.!

 

[Beekissed]

I'll warn you, it won't look much like a pumpkin by then...sort of like a deflated basketball with speckles of mold on it. But no worries...it's all good!

Applied plastic to some of the airier parts of the coop today so that the flock won't be having chilly winds blowing up their skirts while roosting. We are having temps in the low 40s at night lately and some night breezes. Now, ordinarily, my flock isn't babied this early but I'm taking pity on some birds that really, really need some TLC right now...poor things.

Actually, I'm just fulfilling my need to baby something since empty nest syndrome hasn't subsided.....

And, no, I'm not gonna start huggin' them!

You can see why this coop is just a little more....shall we say "breezy"?.. than most:




Will be cozy by the time it really gets cold. Just taking it slow and adding some weatherization a little at a time.

 

[bruceh]

bee i have a question > how do i ferment feed ?

 

[Beekissed]

I think it involves carrying it around in your bra for awhile, Bruce...do you think you're up to the challenge?

 

[normanack]

I think it involves carrying it around in your bra for awhile, Bruce...do you think you're up to the challenge? 

 

Now that's just silly. Bruce doesn't have a bra to put it in. He'll have to use his chicken diaper.

 

[Beekissed]

 

[armorfirelady]

Ok I see you feed eggs to your chickens,......now my hens are healthy but I have a half dozen eggs sitting in my fridge for over a month now. Can I boil them and break the eggs & shells up for the hens? They are not laying yet but combs are getting redder & wattles are growing.

I have a friend who raised chicken for years and she sort of gasped when I said I gave the hens broken up egg shells. She said once they get the taste of eggs they will eat their own. I have heard people say yes/no to this theory but if they are not laying yet how will they know what they are eating is something they are going to lay in the future?

And what do you think of stale cereal, bread, etc? I always here people taking out any kinds of old/scrap food for the hens. I admit I gave them a few chunks of the left over apple crisp today.........the one hen gobbled that up like it was caviar

 

[stonykill]

Now that's just silly. Bruce doesn't have a bra to put it in. He'll have to use his chicken diaper.

is that what the kids are calling an athletic supporter now???

 

[Beekissed]

This is a common myth that is perpetuated here and everywhere....feeding eggs to the chickens will make them into egg eaters. This just happens to be one of my worst pet peeves...puts my teeth on edge.

If I've said it once, I've probably said it a hundred times, all chickens are egg-eaters. They are opportunistic eaters and will hoover up an egg quick as anything else when presented with a soft shelled, cracked, or damaged eggs. Certain times of the year this happens in most any flock...and this is the same time of year that you will see a plethora of posts about "egg-eaters".

God designed these chickens to keep their nests clean. This keeps predators from scenting their nests and it also keeps bacteria from the eventually rotten yolk/egg from harming the bloom of the other eggs in the nest. Birds in the wild do the same thing and will clean up any broken eggs, much like a chicken.

Generations of women in my family have been feeding eggs and egg shells back to chickens, as is, and never once had an "egg-eater". You will hear the same thing from other experienced flock keepers. The thing that makes people think that their "fake eggs" and other such deterrents left in nests have "cured" their egg-eater is because, along about the time they have placed these things and notice the results, is about the same time that the hen's reproductive hiccups have corrected themselves~as per usual, if you wait a bit~ and any anecdotal "curing" of the egg-eater is purely coincidental. No soft shells or broken eggs means no chickens with yolk on their faces. Opportunity now over.

The lady who cringed is obviously someone who hasn't spent years with chickens and believes everything she hears from others of the same ilk. This is why I started the OT thread and others like it....these myths keep making the rounds as each new group of new chicken owners enters the field and someone has to be a voice of reason in all that muck.

You are completely safe feeding eggs raw, shells uncooked, shells uncrushed or not ground fine....it's all the same to the chicken. The scraps are fine as well...pretty much anything we can eat, the chickens will and can eat. They don't usually eat potato skins or onions, though.