Washingtonians Come Together! Washington Peeps

[itsren]

Quote:
Good idea! You know what... I think I still have a smaller sized foam ice chest that DH's medicine came in. It nestles perfectly inside a cardboard box that came with it. I think I'll use that. So they should be kept cool?

Heaven knows ya don't want to refrigerate them - cuz ya get little roosters then!

 

[Chickielady]

I have one egg from each of my 3 breeds that are laying with Pig Pen over them. I will be getting 3-5 day old silkies from Marge in 3 weeks to put under my broody when my eggs hatch. I will have the brooder on standby since Whitie will be a first time mom.

Daring in this cold !!!
Hope you have a nice draft free barn for them to be in ?

 

[Chickielady]

Q for CR::::

We have a cast iron Dutch west (I think?) wood stove given to us by brother...and alot of dual walled (open) pipe, ya want it for your (icy colddrafty) shop ??????????????
Would keep ya a bit warmer out there !!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Einstein says come & get it !!!
he wants it out of his shop...no room.

I have sent him to the shop with the camera, and as soon as he uncovers the wood stove he is taking photos of it~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

[Chickielady]

Everyone says it is yummers. I don't eat pumpkin anything. My loss I guess. But I will be eating the ice cream(Lactose intolerant=lots of Lactaid pills) for my 1 of 2 times a year I eat ice cream.

Have her make a plain cheese cake with drizzles of Blueberries or strawberries on top ?

 

[TurtlePowerTrav]

Quote:
I am gonna move her, eggs and nest too in 2 weeks into the tractor, It is covered with a heavy tarp to keep dry and wind out. I can also put heat in it. My brooder is in the shed and tried to put her in there yesterday, but she was not gonna do it. Refused to sit on the eggs. So I put her back into the coop. I will be moving her in the night about 2 hrs after sunset, so she will be in the tractor nest box for about 11hrs before light. Otherwise she will just have to hatch in the coop and I will have to spend a couple of days in there to get the chick so they don't fall down(her box is on top row of boxes, go figure.). Once hatched I know she will be ok in the tractor, she spent 2 weeks in there with her BR sister(injury recovery).

 

[TurtlePowerTrav]

Quote:
CHOCOLATE

 

[Chickielady]

Good idea! You know what... I think I still have a smaller sized foam ice chest that DH's medicine came in. It nestles perfectly inside a cardboard box that came with it. I think I'll use that. So they should be kept cool?

Heaven knows ya don't want to refrigerate them - cuz ya get little roosters then!

All hatching eggs should be (ideally) kept between 45 and 60 degrees F.
With 50-55 ideal.
And not held long, as hatchibility goes down everyday. Eggs at no more than 4 days old to ship, or at home, I save them no more than 8 days.
Lower temperatures and harm can be done (such as in a refrigerator), and over 60 the embryo will attempt grow and suffer, causing death often (bloodrings)
You also need to rotate (tilt) eggs several times a day while you gather them, so an egg carton leaned against an ice chest wall is great, tilt one way, then the other way, several times a day.
Once you have collected all you intend to set, bring them indoors and allow them up to room temp, then set them in the incubator.
If they are soiled, I use a dry scrubby to "sand" soil off.
If they are poopy I disacard them.
These recommendations come from "Giude to better hatching" by Janet Stromberg...a good book to get, available at all big hatcheries.

 

[itsren]

At the possibility of sounding dumb... guess I gotta take a chance and ask, anyway... I'm still a little confused about the whole quarantine process.

Is it to keep the new birds off of the soil your other birds have been on? My birds have been on just about every inch of my back yard and I can't quarantine anywhere but in the back yard.

Is it to keep the new birds and old birds from getting anywhere close to each other? Does this mean that I need to somehow rig my back yard so when the "old" girls free-range that they can't go near the new birds? That will be tricky with my little back yard. Or, if the new birds and the old birds can see each other on the other side of the tractor hardware cloth, is that OK?

Or, it is just to keep the new birds and the old birds poop separated? That will be easy to do. The new birds can stay in the chicken tractor, keeping their poop contained. The old birds will still probably free-range - and will probably get into up-close staring contests with the new birds - but, I clean up their poop in the grass every day, so there's rarely poop lying around.

What I want to do is put the new chicken tractor and its tiny liltle coop up next to the shed, toward the end of the yard opposite the old girl's coop, so it gets wind protection. It would sit on the grass - the grass where the old birds love to hang out. I want my old girls to still be able to free-range. I want the new girls to be able to free-range, supervised, and with the old girls locked in their coop, after they have been here a few days. They'll all be free-ranging in the same little back yard, just at different times, and only after the prior birds poo has been cleaned up. Will this work?

Please advise... I really don't understand how Cocci works.

Oh... and the babies have been out and about on warmer days, and they go inside the PVC chicken tractor, inside the greenhouse, with the red light, where the older girls have never walked or pooped. I was very worried about Cocci the first time I put them out there, but so far, so good. They've only gone out on the warmest days - so they've only been out a few times.

 

[Chicken Rustler]

On the drive back from Lakewood around 4 am Friday morning in CR's neighborhood it was 30 according to tractor's outside temp gauge and the fog was crystalising on the highway edge. Gotta love that freezing fog.

I have recorded 24* the last 2 nights in.

 

[Chickielady]

I am gonna move her, eggs and nest too in 2 weeks into the tractor, It is covered with a heavy tarp to keep dry and wind out. I can also put heat in it. My brooder is in the shed and tried to put her in there yesterday, but she was not gonna do it. Refused to sit on the eggs. So I put her back into the coop. I will be moving her in the night about 2 hrs after sunset, so she will be in the tractor nest box for about 11hrs before light. Otherwise she will just have to hatch in the coop and I will have to spend a couple of days in there to get the chick so they don't fall down(her box is on top row of boxes, go figure.). Once hatched I know she will be ok in the tractor, she spent 2 weeks in there with her BR sister(injury recovery).

Here you can see how DH wired up a space heater to a wafer therm, so that I could "dwell in" the temp, and the babies stayed toasty warm.
The heater on it's own, did not respond fast enough to keep the babies warm.
The wafer did excellent in turning the heater on & off exactly when the temps fluctuated.
The little tanish rectangular thingy is a wireless temp sensor, the temp readout is on my window sill...so I always knew exactly what the temp was inside, once the lid lowered.
DH made the hitch in front so we could easily pull it anywhere with the lawn tractor.
he made the hitch out of an old bed frame.