Washingtonians Come Together! Washington Peeps

[itsren]

I got one from some guys who were living in Bothell that is built the same. Mine is a little bigger, but I took out the "nesting boxes" and going to build an external nesting box for it. Not much room in there. I have mine in my secure run and I did put hardware cloth over the openings in the ramp. I would look for something bigger if it were me. I wonder if this is the same person who built mine. Some things to check if you go with it......nails that are too long used to put the roofing on. They were sticking through the inside of the roof all over the place. I had to cut them all off! Not easy in that small of a space.

Aaagh! My pet peeve on my little chicken tractor. I tore my favorite (and expensive) Cartwright shirt that I got for Christmas on a nail that is sticking out on our small chicken tractor. We cut off a few, but didn't get all of them.

I'm glad I have it as a temporary home for the "Littles" but I will be doing some major modifications to it as soon as I get their big coop finished.

 

[lilfarmmomma]

Quote: It's funny what kids do. My little guy woke up this morning rarin' to go. He barely got his cereal down before he was out the door to jump on the trampoline that my mom brought over. He is dying to get the swingset up, but it's not quite ready. It's all I can do to get this one inside, even when it is ugly out. My 14 yo, on the other hand...

 

[FirewifeJess]

Quote:
That's how my kids are (except John...he would live outside in a tent and never set foot in the house if I didn't make him)! I have to force them to leave the house and I even lock the door and set a timer for the amount they are required to play outside. Jeanine, if I didn't make her, would NEVER leave the house or the confines of her comfy places. She's so low energy and sedentary! The boys are an entirely different story. William still likes me to be out with him though, and never stays outside alone with just kids for very long. I think my neighbors think I'm super mean though, one day I really did make them go out and locked the door. They sat on the porch crying for 10 minutes before deciding to play together and have fun...for the next 2 hours. Silly kids!

 

[itsren]

Mine are confined to the coop and run until about 2pm and even then I get a late layer.

My girls will lay as late as 5 or 6 p.m. Yesterday, I got 2 eggs after 6 p.m. Silly birds. Fortunately, for them, they are not confined to their run during the day. They go back to the coop to lay, too. If someone tried to sneak off and lay somewhere else, Rhodie probably wouldn't let them get away with it. She sings the egg song for EVERYONE who lays. Wish I could put a muzzle on her beak.

 

[itsren]

It's funny what kids do. My little guy woke up this morning rarin' to go. He barely got his cereal down before he was out the door to jump on the trampoline that my mom brought over. He is dying to get the swingset up, but it's not quite ready. It's all I can do to get this one inside, even when it is ugly out. My 14 yo, on the other hand...

A trampoline is our next purchase. I have bugged my husband for years to let us get one, and he would not allow it because he's afraid the kids will get hurt. I *think* I finally convinced him to get one. We'll see. I won't believe it until one is actually set up in our back yard.

After years of begging for a bunk bed for the boy's room, it finally came down to me standing in an expensive furniture store and texting him a picture of a $900 bunk bed and stating I WAS about to spend $900 right then and there, whether he liked it or not. He immediately found a bunk bed on Craig' List and told me we could go buy it that night. LOL! Two beds in the boys room took up the entire room and I completely had it with the boys not having any space.

Stand-offs between husband and wife are not always pretty.

 

[itsren]

Quote:
That's how my kids are (except John...he would live outside in a tent and never set foot in the house if I didn't make him)! I have to force them to leave the house and I even lock the door and set a timer for the amount they are required to play outside. Jeanine, if I didn't make her, would NEVER leave the house or the confines of her comfy places. She's so low energy and sedentary! The boys are an entirely different story. William still likes me to be out with him though, and never stays outside alone with just kids for very long. I think my neighbors think I'm super mean though, one day I really did make them go out and locked the door. They sat on the porch crying for 10 minutes before deciding to play together and have fun...for the next 2 hours. Silly kids!

My kids usually struggle with the transition. If they are used to being inside because of the rain, they have a difficult time transitioning to playing outside. As soon as it is warm outside on a regular basis, mine will play outside all day.

It's good that you were the one to lock the door! When my oldest was 2, I went outside (without a set of keys) and he locked the door! I tell ya, that wasn't my best day. LOL. He didn't know how to unlock the door. I've locked the door, too - but not to keep them outside - just to keep them from going in/out every 2 seconds and leaving the sliding glass door open. If they need to come in, they just knock and I'll let them in and remind them to stop leaving the door open. When they start knocking every 2 seconds, I tell them to go play and they usually get the idea.

 

[lilfarmmomma]

Quote: This is an older one, so it has no safety net and the spring cover has been gone for years. It is sturdy as all heck though, and huge. I might see about ordering the spring cover, since the boys are pretty crazy and I want grandchildren.

When we moved to this house, there were built in loft beds in the boys' room. DH wanted to take one down, because he was worried about the little one as he was 3 at the time. I put my foot down. I liked the beds and their room is small, so it gave them each a space of their own. Isaac has a small loveseat under his, with a little tv and his gamecube. Logan has a 60 year old kids' rocking chair, with a crate of books and a tv with a gamecube. It kills me how over-protective the men can be.

 

[FirewifeJess]

Quote:
Yup, Ethel bok bok bok BGOK!!!!!!!!!s while EVERY egg is being laid. It's ridiculous. I kinda hate that bird, but she's a good layer.

 

[Totalcolour]

Eggs Wanted for Hatching!​

Anyone want eggs hatched but don't have an incubator? We have a recently stripped and rebuilt big Hatchrite incubator that we want to try out. So far in testing, everything is spot on - temp, humidity and turning. But, there's nothing like the real deal is there - we'd like some eggs to put in it. We can go from small up to Ostrich although we'd prefer not to do Ostrich; they take such a long time. Since we don't want any poultry right now, we are offering this free to anyone who needs it! PM me if interested.

(Incubator is too big and heavy to loan out, so they'd have to be hatched here and picked up)

 

[Duck Drover]

My phone won't let me scroll to the bottom so I am going to reply above the quoted section. The Australian Spotted duck is a bantam duck so that was the reason the website gave 26 to 27 days as the incubation period rather than the standard 28 days for ducks (except Muscovy ducks). So far only one has pipped and it has not hatched yet but the ducklings are alive in the eggs so I will wait and see what happens before I add the next clutch to the hatching incubator.

Someone told you wrong. Ducks are 28 day incubation normally. Exception is Muscovy which is 30-32 days.so your incubator temp and everything is apparently right on. Happy hatching.

The ducklings are starting to hatch tonight instead of Monday night. Either they take 28 days and not 26 days like I read or they are late because the incubator temperature was low. I have another batch that are due to go into lockdown today according to a 26 day incubation period but I will delay moving them for a couple days, assuming they are on the same timeline as this first group. The first eggs I set were also some older eggs because I had hoped the hens would hatch them but then I decided to buy an incubator. I have some that I don't think will hatch because I did not see any movement when I candled them (they are supposed to be in lockdown but I wanted to see if there was still hope they would hatch) but most of them seem to be alive and well so hopefully they will hatch and the ducklings will be okay. I was worried that I killed them when I moved them into the hatching incubator but now I know they are just late.