I spent time with them in the yard & gave them their treats (gourmet cornbred [yeah, who knew?], greens & boss), let them free range for a few hours, then gave them some more treats to put corral them a wee bit earlier than normal.
Some of the luckiest chickens in the world have owners who hang out @ BYC.
Ooohhh, tomato soup...clever! I have been trying to find a warm treat for my ducks. They won't touch oatmeal, I need to get some alfafa cubes to add to warm water to make a "soup". But they like tomatoes...maybe they will like tomato soup. Do you dice up and add tomatoes or corn, or just plain ol' soup? And do you make your own, or out of a can? I'm all to happy to open a can...but not cooking for them. I did that on Thanksgiving. And if its out of a can, what about salt? Folks are always "concerned" about salt.
Just Cambell's but I added some crushed tomatoes. The amount of food that gets waisted around here makes me cringe, but at least the chickens benefit from it. My dogs think they are 3rd class now.
I have found that by taking a bucket of KFC out to the coop for an evening meal and counseling session with the non layers works wonders.
My spoiled birds? They would just want me to share it.
I fed them a whole bunch of black beans and rice then let them out to turn the mulch on the garden for whole day. There is about 10 inches of sawdust, leaves, grass, horse manure, etc. over the whole garden that has decomposed into rich mulch. I just dumped about 120lbs. of coffee grounds in there the other day too. They had a blast digging for worms and dust bathing. My family and I were replacing the single pane windows and the sweet little olive egger, Emma,(finally named her) was climbing up the latter to see what we were up to. She is the most docile bird we got, but she wasn't that way 'til I started putting bag balm on her comb. Anyway, a happy day all in all. Now it is time to get ready for the Christmas parade.
Nothing today, had to work and my son will barely go out ot feed them. He does just doesn;t do anything extra. Tomorrow they will be getting some Wild Bird Seed, and maybe a few scraps (they love them) shh, don't tell them they're scraps, they think it is a gourmet meal.
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So get this. Yesterday, I asked my wife to name the OE, so she named her "Emma". Today, she commandeers the doghouse and lays the first green egg since October!! I'm thinking we better name the last 3!
Poor chickens haven't been getting much attention but their coop is clean, water is fresh and not frozen and they get scraps and scratch every day. I still haven't replaced the poultry wire, even though I got heavy duty hardware cloth rolled up back there. Having a good fence around the property and two bull dogs really helps keep predators away. I got to make a change to the back of the run 'cause the sparrows can climb through the vine tangled chain link and eat all the chicken food. My coop is getting covered in sparrow poop and that is a disease risk. Besides that, our cat is having too much fun with all the fat sparrows. Sometimes, there are hundreds of them perched up in the trumpet vines.
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Today I went out cleaned the coop,throw out some scratch and grit, and gave them some love before work! This is a little off topic but Moabite I just wanted to say hello! I lived in Hurricane for a while before moving back to Texas. My wife is from there and her grandparents live in Pintura, we go back to Utah every year to visit! Living in Utah and my wife growing up with her grandparents having chickens is the foundation for us having them as well. We love Utah and plan to raise chickens there one day. Sorry for getting so off topic just nice to meet someone from Utah!
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Today I went out cleaned the coop,throw out some scratch and grit, and gave them some love before work! This is a little off topic but Moabite I just wanted to say hello! I lived in Hurricane for a while before moving back to Texas. My wife is from there and her grandparents live in Pintura, we go back to Utah every year to visit! Living in Utah and my wife growing up with her grandparents having chickens is the foundation for us having them as well. We love Utah and plan to raise chickens there one day. Sorry for getting so off topic just nice to meet someone from Utah!
Nice to meet you. I really like it up here in the red rock desert. There is a real sense of community here. Beautiful scenery, fresh water, four amazing seasons.