Washingtonians

[FirewifeJess]

Anyone's chickens ever make quacking/honking noises? Yup, QUACK. Over and over again! *sigh* Not all of them do it, but quite a few! Don't know if it's a typical teenage-voice-change chicken noise, or if it's a respiratory infection. I'm not worried, I just keep hearing these noises and it's weirding me out! My 2 newbies do it, Princess does it, and 1 or 2 others. Oddly enough, so many strange noises have been happening lately. My black australorp sat all by herself making so much noise clucking like no other, for at least 10 mintues before I went to check on her. She was alone under a bush in the shade; maybe calling the other girls? "Where are you all?!" They didn't care enough about her to answer...

 

[VelvettFog]

Anyone's chickens ever make quacking/honking noises? Yup, QUACK. Over and over again! *sigh* Not all of them do it, but quite a few! Don't know if it's a typical teenage-voice-change chicken noise, or if it's a respiratory infection. I'm not worried, I just keep hearing these noises and it's weirding me out! My 2 newbies do it, Princess does it, and 1 or 2 others. Oddly enough, so many strange noises have been happening lately. My black australorp sat all by herself making so much noise clucking like no other, for at least 10 mintues before I went to check on her. She was alone under a bush in the shade; maybe calling the other girls? "Where are you all?!" They didn't care enough about her to answer...

Chickens have over 30 vocalizations. Some are quite easy to recognize. Like the egg song.. bock, bock, bock, bock, BOCKAA (repeated). With the age of your birds there is a high chance that they will lay their first eggs in the yard and not in the provided nesting boxes. I use wooden eggs (golf balls work as well) in the nesting boxes of young birds to try and train them where they should lay.

 

[Chickielady]

You only need to refrigerate if they can not be kept cool.... under 70F
I don't refrigerate my eating eggs either. they will be fine for 2-3 weeks easy if not a lot more..... They just never make it past 2 weeks.....

If you keep them cool at 50-60F then they will last a good 6-9 months.... I've even heard up to a year... But I'm not testing that.
If you pack them in lard like they did on the old sailing ships... they will last for 2 years..... (not refrigerated)
You can pickle them too

I think the ones pickled in beet juice are fun!

Pickled eggs are yummy ! try doing it with a few hot peppers !
I clean & refrigerate mine as they are sold to others, and I take no chances on any embryos forming....
That and I have 5-8 broodies at any given moment who love to sit on eggs unless I collect them several times a day.
And within a day or 2 you will have a baby forming in any eggs under a broody hen.
Eggs we eat I wash straw off & crack them in the pan.

 

[Chickielady]

Well, the only animals I was worried about with the fireworks were my cats and the chickens. Cats stayed inside all day and the chickens could not care less about all the noise. But I will be very busy trying to find my great dane Jazz. One of the kids left the gate open and he walked out, which normaly is fine and he is such a momma's boy he never takes off. He has never had a problem with fireworks either, so we think that maybe he was walking around out by the street and some one thought he was a lost dog and picked him up. Or the big mortor booms scared him this year. I am losing my mind with him not being here. If I had not had a fewe drinks last night there is no way I would have been able to sleep. I hope we find him soon.

Hope no one elts lost a family memeber (pet) to the fireworks. Also I hope that you all had a great 4th of July!

Oh I hope you found him !

 

[Chickielady]

I think we are going to take the boat out today - himself is now checking the tides. Better do it soon, summer is over on Saturday.

We gassed ours up & charged the batteries & checked all the gear & then never did go anywhere.
I myself is waiting for the fall salmon run, then I will go.

 

[Chickielady]

Do you have little life preservers for the chickens?

Raz do you have a pet Norwegian Stink Kitty ????

Don't let JustBugged see it !
She wants one bad !!!

 

[Chickielady]

AAAARGH! I knew there was something I forgot. I do have one for the dog though. Besides, I thought chickens could swim?

so, you popped in here to escape that horrible heat huh. Glad to see ya.

Gear up:
HORN, Flare Gun...Flares, life jackets, mmmmmm what else ?
How about current registration...it is easy to forget.

One year we hitched up the boat, took off the cover & drove to the ramp to launch and there was a yellow jacket nest in the boat........YIKES !!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[Chickielady]

Well I spent some time in the growing on pen yesterday...and the birds are coming along so nicely !
Almost POL...Blue Copper marans, BBS Jersey Giants~~~~~~~~
So many Blue, Black & Splash that I have to look at shank color to tell them apart, that and the JGs are slightly bigger at this time.

Almost have to waite til they are full grown to seperate who is what they look so much alike, and to top it off, I have 4-5 Black java in that pen too...which look so much like Black JGs that I can not tell them apart !
Have to waite til they are adult sized !!!

Note to self: Self, never brood Black Javas and Black Jersey Giants in the same brooder ever again !

Venison and Jumbo Prawn Kabobs on the barbie for dinner~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
yesterday I was mildly upset at the fact that dinner was a left over casserole, and I had no dirty laundry to wash

It seemed like such a shame to waste the sunshine with no laundry hanging on the clothes line~~~~~~~~~~~~and no barbie going.
So today I stripped the bedding & have it washed & on the line and feel much better......

 

[Teva]

Well I had a scare today, the birds decided to check out the rest of the drive way and went around the bend while I was cleaning my car. Something startled them and they all started screaming and flying back up the road....all I could see through the grove of trees were ears and it looked tall enough to be a coyote....so I took off to check it out and count the chickens. Whatever it was high tailed it out of there....it took me a couple of hours to get a good re-count (I was missing one) since they all went for the bushes on the other side of my house. Birdies are all accounted for, and now that I think about it, it could have been one of the fawns that I've seen wandering around. I haven't seen the deer for about 2 weeks, so I am sure the fawns are about coyote height by now......

And I know it's crazy to consider that a coyote would attack in broad daylight, but one of my neighbor's white geese got hauled away in broad daylight about a month ago...

 

[RaZ]

AAAARGH! I knew there was something I forgot. I do have one for the dog though. Besides, I thought chickens could swim?
so, you popped in here to escape that horrible heat huh. Glad to see ya.

Two of mine will be swimming in gravy. I was going to put them on the barbie, but I think crock-pot instead. Depends on how long this triple-digit heat lingers. Or I could just lay them out on the driveway and flash fry them.

Raz do you have a pet Norwegian Stink Kitty ????
Don't let JustBugged see it !
She wants one bad !!!

He is a Laurentian Striped Phew Pooter.

One year we hitched up the boat, took off the cover & drove to the ramp to launch and there was a yellow jacket nest in the boat........YIKES !!!!!!!!!!!!

That kind of happened to us. Out in the middle of the lake the outboard stalled so we pulled the cover for a look-see. Big hornet nest in there.
That was after towing the boat about 50 miles and then running it for about 10 minutes.