Washingtonians

[Chicken Rustler]

OK I figured I will ask the pros here first. I was ask for some info about turkeys. I guess they think that since I hang out with a bunch of em on BYC I should know all about em !!!

How hard /easy are they to raise? Can they be raised with chickens? What is a good meat breed for our area?
Thanks

 

[cackleberrylinda]

Quote:
Hi, I have 3 BR and I love them to pieces. They are so sweet and mellow and personable. They love to follow me clustering around my ankles just incase I uncover some delectable tasty morsels. I call them my Checkered Chickens. I think I would like to get a couple more next spring. These girls are going on 3? 4? I really like the plain old standard breeds too. They are what I cut my teeth on, after all.

 

[justbugged]

I have standing water in my backyard. It is almost halfway across the yard. We it is like this I would guess that the back corner of the yard is at least 6 inches or more deep. We need another sump pump out in the far corner. At least my girls are not in the water, but I noticed that the ground under the cover in the coop is now wet. I am not sure if it is because the water table is so high, or maybe the rain just blew in under the cover.

 

[Chicken Rustler]

I also have 1 BR hen. she is also very nice. If I pick up a shovel Rozz will follow with her head right at the point of the shovel. She loves me to dig worms for her.

 

[justbugged]

Quote:
Wow! I had to go outside and check if the wind was blowing here. And much to my surprise It is extremely breezy here at the moment also. In fact one of the ferns that I through out of the house yesterday had blown off the patio table. As I was taking a look out back this is what I saw.

 

[4cats3kids1hubby2many]

I am glad to see that others love BR as much as I do. I would like to spread out and get one or two more hens of another type.

 

[justbugged]

Quote:
My son and nephew got a firewood permit for the Wenatchee National Forest. There is access off of Hwy 410, just before Greenwater. I believe that you can get the permit here in Enumclaw. The office is just east of Safeway and McDonalds.

The problem with getting firewood on this side of the hills is that it is almost always very wet. The Wenatchee NF is a massive area of public lands. With a permit you could access forest in Eastern Washington. That would give you much dryer wood. I don't know of anything closer to Bonney Lake, where you could harvest wood.

Was informed by a state patrol officer, that any wood that is 5 feet or less away from the edge of the road is fair game. Just don't trespass past the 5 foot invisable line. I'm not sure how acurate that is for your area, but thats how it is here in Kitsap county.

I can ask my DS about this. He works for the county road operations. I do know that he has brought us wood from falling fir trees. (It still scares me that he is often out working when the weather is at it's worst. ) The last time the rounds were so bing that DH was straining things because they were a bit to big. I finally had to tell him to cut them in half. Once he did that the rounds were much easier to handle and they fit in to the log splitter. Now I want a wood stove in the house.

 

[T Hi]

Quote:
OK, I just candled your DUCKLE eggs just now...
and every egg has duckles swimminhg inside !!!

I cannot tell you how much action is going on in each egg !!!!!!!
The duckles are due to pip on the 28th, today is day 16 as we set them on New Years Day...

I have a small doubt about 1 egg, but all the rest are full of swimming duckle babies...hope I do it all correct, I have had various input that waterfowl need more humidity than chickens...etc, and no one can tell me if that is true and I have gone on every site looking....so, mzzzzzT-Hi...you have alot of baby duckles coming on February 1st!!!

I'd love to know their color, ask Illia, but my guess is the black will be dominent, BUT I also have heard the hen determines the color of the baby, and type (condornation), and the Dad duck will determine the sex, and the size and color of the egg in his daughters...so we may have all blacks and may not, ask Illia she knows more about it than I.

You are soooo funny!!!!

Hmmm.... the 28th is a Friday!!!

I wish I could see what the candling looks like! How neat!! Are ducks usually more active in the shell than chickens? Maybe because they are Runner ducks!! LOL

 

[Ogress]

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We have a great big fireplace that we can't use ... smokes up the house and sets off the fire alarms. The opening is too big, the FP too shallow, the winds here too much. I saved up to get a wood stove and $ for all the ahnges we need to make to get it in a shallow space, but then the rains started hard and I changed my priorities. I'm having a walk-in coop built with a large, covered, walk-in run so I don't have to crawl in on hands and knees through the snow or mud and ice and chicken poop just to fill the feeder or muck-out the run. You can't move a tractor if the rest of your yards is a river or a swamp, so the current run gets quite nasty.

I'm also starting a job tomorrow so we can still get the woodstove. When we built this place we put in geo-thermal heat, but the coils are not burried deep enough, so when the weather gets below freezing for a few days, it just runs and runs, but the house remains cold. We don't have forced air, or any back-up heat. Back-up was supposed to be the FP, but that does not work. A few years back we had a big chill in January, the heat pump ran and ran and then caught fire. We had no heat for 3 weeks during the coldest temps on record here while we tried to find someone to repair the system and while waiting for parts. There were no space heaters left anywhere I looked either. We ended up spending $600 on an UGLY ornate fake fireplace to keep one room warm, and then managed to borrow a few other space heaters. Replacing the pump was another $2,000 and it was not under warrenty because they found a little rock rodged in it. We broke a pipe when digging to put in an apple tree the previous year, and that rock worked its way into the pump. We hit the pipe at less than 3' and it was supposed to be 6' deep. Installer refused to pay as he said we had landscaping done, so changed the soil depth! BS! We only added soil! I forgot how much that repair was. It also was not cheap.

 

[Chicken Rustler]

Quote:
Don't know how they would get along with yer others but We just got 3 RIR BANTAMS and just love em. they are so friendly. I talked to a breeder and he told me O yeah if you want them to move ya just about have to kick em out of the way. They are just starting to lay and they are producing some nice eggs for little girls. We got ours at the show in Chehalis but since I found out I know a guy who breeds and said he will give more. I may get into them more.
Well I may be about to get taken out for the night. It is windy and the lights just flickered.