Washingtonians Come Together! Washington Peeps

[TurtlePowerTrav]

One egg hatched today. Yay. I didn't get to see the chick, it was hiding in momma's fluff. Hopefully the other egg will hatch tomorrow.

 

[hallerlake]

Quote:
I think it would depend on how overboard you went, and on how upset you made your neighbors and the city. I recently bought a chicken tractor with a small coop from a couple who went overboard big time. They had more than 60 chickens on a small urban lot - smaller than mine. They had 4 huge coops and the smaller coop/tractor. The city came down hard on them and they were required to get rid of all of them and are not allowed to have chickens ever again. The city even mandated the coops be removed ASAP. Honestly, DH and I were not surprised that the city had issues considering probably the top 6" - 12" of the land the chickens had resided on was composting poo. It was very, very stinky.

I wouldn't recommend going too overboard with the chicken math on a city lot. The only reason I'm having chicken math issues right now is because I'm trying to build a flock of six girls - and we want to hatch those girls ourselves, which, of course means we're going to end up with some boys to have to give away - and that puts us over our numbers until we can grow them out and figure out who's a boy and who's a girl. The eggs in the incubator are already spoken for if my chicks that I have right now turn out to be girls - so I have a pretty good back-up plan (I hope).
Slinglings is in Seattle. Someone complained my neighbor had roosters. She didn't. The city wrote her a letter telling her they would visit at such and such time. They came to visit. They told her to get rid of her extras (she'd hidden some). They noted that she did not have roosters.

 

[itsren]

Question....

DH just asked me about the logistics of how this was going to work when the newest chicks (up to 12) hatch. If all 12 hatch, the new babies will need the big brooder because that many will not fit in the fish tank brooder. We'll let them dry off in the fish tank brooder, but they'll need to move quickly to the bigger one. Will my 4 older chicks, who will be 8 weeks old at that time, be old enough to go outside full time in the mini coop/chicken tractor? The mini coop has a hardware cloth floor, and will be completely predator proof.

Today my older chicks played outside quite a few hours without being under the light, and seemed fine, so I hope that's a good sign.

I guess the tiny babies could go into a large Rubbermaid tote for a week or two, if we need to grow the the bigger chicks out in the big brooder a little longer.

 

[itsren]

One egg hatched today. Yay. I didn't get to see the chick, it was hiding in momma's fluff. Hopefully the other egg will hatch tomorrow.

Congrats!

 

[JennS]

I got a little bit of work done on the coop today, but my son took a short nap so I didn't get to finish putting the hardware cloth on. At least I should be able to finish it tonight after my husband gets home and can watch the monster.

While I was working in the garage, I let the Polish and blue silkie out of their cages to stretch their legs. Guess what they ended up doing? The Polish waltzed right into the silkie's cage, pecked her to make her get out of the way, and proceeded to scratch up all the shavings looking for treats. (The Polish is totally food motivated and the silkie isn't. But there is a barrier between them, so it's not like she's seen me giving the silkie treats.) The silkie ended up standing at the door, shuffling around nervously, and moping that her cage was invaded.

I am guessing that this was a pretty good introduction? The silkie did get pecked, but it wasn't hard and the Polish didn't care once she got out of the way. I got the impression that the silkie really wanted to scratch around with the Polish, but was uncomfortable going in the same cage with her. I had tossed a little scratch grains in front of the two cages so they could forage together, but the Polish wasn't going to leave the silkie's cage until I made her go.

Jennifer

 

[JennS]

Question....

DH just asked me about the logistics of how this was going to work when the newest chicks (up to 12) hatch. If all 12 hatch, the new babies will need the big brooder because that many will not fit in the fish tank brooder. We'll let them dry off in the fish tank brooder, but they'll need to move quickly to the bigger one. Will my 4 older chicks, who will be 8 weeks old at that time, be old enough to go outside full time in the mini coop/chicken tractor? The mini coop has a hardware cloth floor, and will be completely predator proof.

Today my older chicks played outside quite a few hours without being under the light, and seemed fine, so I hope that's a good sign.

I guess the tiny babies could go into a large Rubbermaid tote for a week or two, if we need to grow the the bigger chicks out in the big brooder a little longer.

I put a small heat lamp on my outdoor brooder and mine were fine. I put them outside around 8 weeks, I think? One of the GLW that I had still hadn't grown feathers under its wings by this past Monday. Is there any way to rig up a heat source in your mini coop?

The only issue I had was my SF pullet, who kept walking out the brooder door and crying in the cold and dark. I had to block the door the first night.

Jennifer

 

[itsren]

I don't really know how rare it is, but I do know that it's one of the most misdiagnosed diseases out there. Something like 80-90% of women diagnosed with hypo or hyper thyroid disease, actually have Hashimotos. Most Dr.'s don't know much about this A.I. disease so they tend to go more towards treating it the same as they would treat hypo or hyper thyroids, which is not the correct way to treat this disease at all.
A very strict diet is about the only defense against Hashi's. You have to find out (through lots and lots and lots of testing) what your "triggers" are and avoid them like the plague. My #1 trigger is gluten.
If not treated properly, Hashimotos can lead to many other auto immune diseases.

Hmmmm. Interesting. I'm going to have to go back pages and try to catch up with this conversation. 13 years ago I was diagnosed with Graves Disease (a distant "relative" of Hashimotos, except that it causes hyper-thyroidism). The past few years they thought I might have Lupus, too, because of all the Lymph node and throat swelling problems I've had, including, a positive Lupus blood test - but I never had the Lupus butterfly rash, so my doctor will not say for sure that I have Lupus until that rash appears. He said the Graves could have caused a false positive on that test. Then I went to the allergist and found out about the massive number of allergies I have. Somehow, I have a feeling that the allergies and the auto-immune stuff somehow has to be related. Of course the doctors won't say that for sure - I think the medical community is still trying to figure all that stuff out.

 

[FirewifeJess]

Question....

DH just asked me about the logistics of how this was going to work when the newest chicks (up to 12) hatch. If all 12 hatch, the new babies will need the big brooder because that many will not fit in the fish tank brooder. We'll let them dry off in the fish tank brooder, but they'll need to move quickly to the bigger one. Will my 4 older chicks, who will be 8 weeks old at that time, be old enough to go outside full time in the mini coop/chicken tractor? The mini coop has a hardware cloth floor, and will be completely predator proof.

Today my older chicks played outside quite a few hours without being under the light, and seemed fine, so I hope that's a good sign.

I guess the tiny babies could go into a large Rubbermaid tote for a week or two, if we need to grow the the bigger chicks out in the big brooder a little longer.

Mine were off lights at 8 weeks around the end of May, and they were in the big coop outside by then.

 

[itsren]

Quote:
There would be space to hang a very small heat lamp (do they make those?) inside the mini coop. I wouldn't want to use a high watt bulb. It is shaped like a barn and has a ventilated area that looks like a loft area of a real barn. Until I bumped the 100w infrared lamp yesterday, they were on a 100 watt in the garage and doing fine. Now they're back on the big 250 watt bulb because it is all I have at the moment. Any recommendations for a small ceramic heat lamp that would fit in a mini coop? And, would I be able to get away with a low watt red bulb outside at 8 weeks?

ETA: The mini coop has a pop door that will be closed at night, so they won't be able to escape into the dark tractor run until I let them out.

 

[itsren]

Quote:
May is typically a little warmer than December. Maybe not last year though, huh? How late did we have really cold weather last year?