Trials And Tribulations Of Suburban Meat Bird Production

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Well, i'm on day 29 now and things are going swimmingly! the Mother Heating Pad is turned down to 3 now and I've hiked it up to about 7 inches in the front, 5 in the back. Some birds sleep under it at night, some on top and some off in the corners with their pals. the fact that they are sleeping at night seems to be helping them, in part since I don't have to pull the food, they are not frantic in the morning when I go to check on them. None of the cuts and scrapes on them that I've seen in the past, presumably from their sharp claws as they climb over each other when I withheld food and then went to feed them in the morning. They are really putting on the weight, running with more of a thud, but still running from end to end of the pen. I spoke with the developer of this waterer today because I've been so impressed with how well it works, is BPA free, UV resistant to reduce algae growth, has a top cap on the lid for easy, in place filling, and most importantly, doesn't leak. I ordered more nipple from him so I can swap out the other nipple waterers I have that do leak. the guys name is Leonard Wogsland, he's in Pensacola Florida, the best price I found on these waterers was $19 here: http://www.atwoods.com/poultry-feeders-watering/cheery-chicks-chicken-kooler-35-gallon.htm I purchased some additional lids that have a hose attachment for direct filling, which I'm going to set up. This guy recommended using this deicer as the fall turns to winter: https://www.amazon.com/Allied-Preci...-fkmr0&keywords=heated+bucket+poultry+drinker I asked him how it is that his vertical waterers don't leak like the others and he said that there are several companies that make the nipples and only one really decent one, the one he goes with. He had an amazing story about how he came up with the design, that it literally came to him in a dream and he woke up and set to work. at one point he had 250 stores that carried them and then through some under handed stuff with larger distributors he lost the contracts, which is a shame because I hear about people switching to the horizontal nipples because of the leak issues, when it's really not an issue of design as it is poor production quality, according to him. anyway, I'm sold, and he was a really nice fellow to talk with, shared lots of interesting gems about all this.
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Here I have a close up of one of them, you can see how much more they have feathered out in just one more week! I'm starting to think about when I will remove the MHP and let them go without heat. I figure another week or so though I'm fairly confident that if I put in a box for them to huddle in that they'd be able to go without heat at this point just fine.


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Ending week 4 with them still running around, full of pluck and nice and clean sure feels good and that's without restricting the food any more than darkness is doing on it's own. It always seems to feel a bit out of control at some point and then I feel like it's high maintenance to keep things from going down hill the last few weeks leading up to harvest time. I'm curious to see if I can keep things more together as we approach harvest date. so far things have stayed dryer and their droppings are still firm even with the high protein count. fingers crossed over the coming weeks!
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Looking good!!
Love the updates.
Keep forgetting your location(put it in your profile?).
Wondering how cold you get there, you have a layer flock, correct??
I went with HN's because you can put the vessel down instead of hanging it, both while in use and other times.....and it will stay thawed better because seal is inside vessel. Also easier to install in small vessel and attach to sides of crates or in a holder.
 
aart said:
Looking good!!
Love the updates.
Keep forgetting your location(put it in your profile?).
Wondering how cold you get there, you have a layer flock, correct??
I went with HN's because you can put the vessel down instead of hanging it, both while in use and other times.....and it will stay thawed better because seal is inside vessel. Also easier to install in small vessel and attach to sides of crates or in a holder.
Click to expand...

thanks for the encouragement! I'm just north of Seattle, we are seeing 50's daytime and 40's night time temp, which is probably why they are feathering out so fast. I have 6 layers on the floor level of the coop. I like having the CX up off the ground, having them closer to my eyes and nose keeps me honest, as they need more attention, but over a shorter period of time. As for the HN vs VN, I'll give them a try at some point and probably start singing the gospel about HN then, LOL! Winter is coming on strong here so we'll see how well the VN hold up in the cold, to the extent to which it gets cold here. this isn't Michigan, but what we get here is wet and cold with huge temp swings, which has it's own challenges. For now the VN are working great and I do hang my waters so they are easy to adjust as the chicks grow. the multi floor design leads to low ceilings for easy attachment on both levels.

yesterdays "big" discovery was how to make a daisy chain out of zip ties for easy waterer height adjustment, I'd been trying to figure out the best way to create a simple height adjustment and it had plum evaded me and then, bing, light bulb turned on when I was staring at a pack of zip ties. I'll see if I remember to take a picture... in life, it's the little things :~)
 
I must have gotten a bad (old) batch of zip ties. Those things are always breaking on me. I've started using more rope for holding stuff up.

I was using rope in the chicken coop and wife told me that they will pick strings to pieces. Well, what do you know? She was right (again)! So all those accumulated dog chains are being recycled.
 
just like with waterer nipples, not all zip ties are created equal! it seems that it depends on what they are made of. the black ones have more UV resistance often, the clear ones seem to have less tensile strength.
 

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