Washingtonians

[SadieSue]

Quote: What kind of chickens does trader joes use to lay their eggs? Can you even find out?
I have Fav/EE fertile eggs if someone wants to see what they would get from that cross.

Might be interesting. Might not.

Aww, they'd be pretty little bearded babies! Maybe olive eggers? Someone should hatch those!

 

[SadieSue]

Quote:

Hackle feathers and saddle feathers look rooish to me.

Yes, and with a Silkie comb, it appears to be spreading more than a pullet's would. Roo.

 

[SadieSue]

Quote:
My builders, (DH and buddy) built the wooden nest boxes specifically to fit small kitty litter boxes I had picked up at either Petsmart or Petco. I wanted something I could remove and clean out easily. I have LOVED using them. So it's a wooden frame work, kitty litter boxes inside that and excelsior pad inside the litter boxes. Ultra cushy and my girls are great about using all three next boxes.

 

[itsren]

I would go 14"x14" for the nest boxes. If you are going to have large breeds. Or if you are doing both bantams and LF you could do a couple of each size. Just my opinion.

I think 14"x14" is what mine are. I'll double check. But, my girls seem to love 'em.

 

[FirewifeJess]

Quote: The reason we ALL have our own library cards (that I keep) is because each card holder gets 100 free prints per week at the library! I've never used more than just my own allotment but if I ever needed to print out a bunch of stuff I have the means. I LOVE the King County library system! It makes home schooling so super easy! 10 days before I need books, I go through our huge long 40+ book long list for that week of school books and reserve whatever is available through the whole county; they gather them all in one place at my Covington library and I go pick them up the day before we start that school unit. If I need printouts of anything, I bookmark the websites on a USB flash drive and plug it into their computer, bring up what I need and press print.

Quote: While I love the idea of buying them, it's just not possible to find our school books at garage sales. I'd need 10 years advance notice!

 

[FirewifeJess]

Quote:

My builders, (DH and buddy) built the wooden nest boxes specifically to fit small kitty litter boxes I had picked up at either Petsmart or Petco. I wanted something I could remove and clean out easily. I have LOVED using them. So it's a wooden frame work, kitty litter boxes inside that and excelsior pad inside the litter boxes. Ultra cushy and my girls are great about using all three next boxes.

That's a great idea! I did love my girls using the basket in the rabbit hutch but now I'm super glad I trained them to use the coop nest boxes. Now I don't have to enter the chicken run for eggs ever, much nicer for us! There are so many things I'd do differently now if I could start from scratch with a coop and run, and I like your idea.

 

[itsren]

The reason we ALL have our own library cards (that I keep) is because each card holder gets 100 free prints per week at the library! I've never used more than just my own allotment but if I ever needed to print out a bunch of stuff I have the means. I LOVE the King County library system!

I didn't know that. We're on the KC system, too. I keep the cards, as well... I just can't keep the numbers out of the kid's brain.

Now that our library is remodeled, I'm going to have to see if our library does that, too. It would sure help with the cost of Cub Scout and Girl Scout prints.

Thanks for the info Jessica!

 

[Farmin Momma]

Wow ya'll talked up a storm lastnight! So I will have to go back and read those posts in a minute. Now I have a new problem in with the old one

. This morning I went out to let the girls out and everyone was nice and safe, but my turkeys sleep out side. When I was checking on everyone I noticed that one of my turkey hens was attacked by something

. She is now missing a lot of feathers and she has a few wholes in her. The biggest one is right on her chest about the size of a nickle and a few smaller ones on her back and head. The one on her chest is pretty open though and deep, right down to the fat layer. I am wondering what if anything I should put on it so that she does not get an infection????? I plan on waking up about 5 or so tomorrow and sitting on the roof so that I may catch a look at what is doing this and where on the property it is coming from.

 

[SadieSue]

...so I'm stuck on the 'breeds' section, adding breed after breed to my 'want' list... at this rate I'm going to need a farm much sooner than I thought LOL

How many birds does one usually keep to a flock (assuming they are cooped/run not free range) - I've been reading that if the flocks get too large you may have 'pecking order' issues and it would be best to segregate the birds in to smaller, more manageable flocks. And do any of you do that (have more than one coop/run to separate your birds)? Does anyone do that to keep breeds separate so you don't end up with 'mixed' breed eggs (assuming you have roos and hatch your own chicks)?

Oh, sorry. These are all very good questions. Seriously. I believe I asked all of these same questions when I first considered getting chickens. Living in the city, I thought we'd get a nice backyard flock of 4-6 chickens. I knew there were SO many pretty chickens that laid different colored eggs so I tried hard to narrow down my choices. I studied and reshuffled breed pictures, considered all of my choices and finally settled on 8 different breeds. Hmm... a couple more than I'd anticipated. So I hatched some baby chicks of my favorite breeds to add to the POL pullets I'd purchased from some of my favorite BYC breeders, and then had to keep a few more than I'd planned on because I'd hatched them myself for crying out loud and now I'm like their MOTHER, so my flock grew to 10. That was the first year.

I also realized as I was hatching that I would need a grow out coop which would also double as an integration coop so the chickens could see each other without hurting each other until they could join the big flock. So I purchased one of those "kit coops" sold by Garden Sphere. I do not like the quality of the coop and have had to do a lot of jeri-rigging on it, but it's functional. So, now I was up to one large layer coop (8X12 footprint) and the mini coop.

Oh, then my light Sussex went broody that first year, so that small coop also became a broody/nursery coop. Wow, that mini coop is really getting a workout with all of it's uses. Maybe I need to add a third coop to our backyard?

Fast forward to Summer 2012 - VF Coop Building World Tour. Wow. Now I have a beautiful new strongly built coop with a nice 4X4 house and enclosed run. In the meantime I hatched some beautiful little Silkies so now that coop is being used as a banty pen. Huh. I sure don't remember planning on raising banties. I'm not sure exactly when that became a decision.

Oh well, I'm hoping when they go broody they can hatch in there and maybe the banty pen can double as a nursery since it's just Silkies... I mean, they're small, right?

Somehow -

I have no idea how this happened, my small suburban lot that I thought I could raise 4-6 layers on, has turned into a lot filled with 12 layers, 5 Silkies, and 3 coops! And let's not forget the 2 small Seramas living in a bunny cage in my computer room that are also providing me with teeny tiny eggs... Thank goodness I got rid of those 8 roosters I accidentally hatched this spring. At one point I think there were over 20 chickens at my house.

It's a sickness I'm telling you.

 

[FirewifeJess]

Chicken math and indecisiveness have really gotten me badly. I only started this spring!! Figured we'd have 8 hens and no roosters. Came home on day 1 with:
4 Rhode Island Reds and 4 Buff Orpingtons from Seattle Farm Supply. Stopped by Reber Ranch on the way home to see what they had because they'd arrived that morning. Came home with 2 Easter Eggers and 2 Welsummers.

Hmm, that's 12. Don't worry dear, some might die and a couple could be boys. None died.

Hey guess what? Today is my birthday Honey!! I stopped by Reber Ranch. You can't really be mad at something so little, black, and fluffy can you?! Add 3 Black Australorps of the exact same age.

Oh no! Indecisiveness has struck; we have too many girls. My dear friend comes to take 2 of my Rhode Island Reds and 2 of my Buff Orps; now we have 9. I want more colorful eggs. Now we have 10. We don't need so many Australorps. 8 birds left. And so on and so on until I had 9 bird. I'm SOOO happy with my 9 girls. Until I get to Seattle Farm Supply to pick up some Scratch & Peck. Oh no! They have wheaten colored EEs...who are 10 weeks younger than my flock. Good think I scored a rabbit hutch and have a safe place for them! Now I have 11 girls. And darn it we're not getting enough eggs yet and I'm impatient and don't want to wait for the little girls to start laying, so now I just scored 2 more layers who've started and are older than my original flock. Whew!!!

That makes a Baker's Dozen and I'm thrilled with each and every bird and the eggs they lay. Stick a fork in me I'm DONE!

Until someone goes broody...