Weighing chickens

[Mrs. K]

use a fish scale, tie his legs together and hang him upside down from the scale.

 

[Ponypoor]

use a fish scale, tie his legs together and hang him upside down from the scale.

I hope we’re talking about the chicken and not poor Kattabelly!

or the pony, tying that suckers legs and hanging her upside down would take some doing!!

 

[BDutch]

use a fish scale, tie his legs together and hang him upside down from the scale.

The question was not: “how can I traumatise my chicken! “

 

[Ponypoor]

The question was not: “how can I traumatise my chicken! “

I would think they were just kidding

(Ruth might tell me I traumatized her shoving her in a bag )

 

[redinator]

Here it would be:
Carry bathroom scales from home half a mile away
Level off some ground
Chase chickens away
Continue leveling off some ground
Chase chickens away
(Etc.)
Drag a paving slab up the hill to stand the scales on
Chase chickens away
Almost drop slab on chicken
Put scales down
Catch a chicken
Chase other chickens away
Stand on scales
Chase other chickens away
(Etc)
...

All that and add in go back inside to get pen and paper, come back and find the chickens have run off with the scale, lol.

 

[redinator]

That’s how I do it, but you forgot the part about chasing said chicken through the house after it flies off while you’re staring at the scale thinking “I weigh WHAT?!”

Right! I did just finish pigging out for the holidays. I won't be anywhere near a scale until at least June, lol.

 

[Ponypoor]

All that and add in go back inside to get pen and paper, come back and find the chickens have run off with the scale, lol.

 

[rosemarythyme]

I guess I hate myself because I carry out my digital kitchen scale (very well wrapped in plastic), have a scrap paper and pen ready, and pick up and plunk each bird on the scale. It doesn't need to be perfect, just good enough.

If I was smarter I'd have hubby help but I'm stubborn.

 

[RoyalChick]

I used to use a digital kitchen scale at night. Mine would stand still in the dark. So it worked well.
Then I tried to weigh Tassels when she was broody and she pancaked out and covered the whole thing so I couldn’t see the weight.
Then @Ponypoor shared her Ruth video and life became soo much easier. I still do it at night because mine don’t like to be handled, but it takes seconds to pop them in the bag, get the weight and pop them back on the roost. Thank you Pony!
I need a bigger bag for Mr. Chips though.

 

[centrarchid]

I have done research trials with hens and cockerels where they stood on a scale accurate to 1 g with a capacity of 2500 g. The platform was smaller than ideal. What I did was train the birds to stand on platform calmly to wait for small treats. My birds were weighed repeatedly. I now have Jersey Giant show stock myself and looking to devise a similar system with the much larger birds. What is obvious is the birds have a very good disposition for such effort although a balance with higher capacity is needed.