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Hahaha reminds me of the time I had an escape artist get out of the coop while I was away, and come evening after I let the chickens free range there's only one drat chicken in the coop, so I'm stomping around the property with a flashlight trying to find the three others. One underneath the mud porch, one in the pine trees and the other in the rhododendron... Chickens are dumb.
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Jul 4, 2013 14:12
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| # ? Apr 19, 2024 22:43 |
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Lyz posted:Hahaha reminds me of the time I had an escape artist get out of the coop while I was away, and come evening after I let the chickens free range there's only one drat chicken in the coop, so I'm stomping around the property with a flashlight trying to find the three others. One underneath the mud porch, one in the pine trees and the other in the rhododendron... I think that lack of sunlight confuses them. Sun goes down and it's time to roost 'n' snooze! Grape Soda: did you ever figure out how your chooks got out of their coop?
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Jul 4, 2013 14:29
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unprofessional posted:I never clip, so my chickens have a chance at escaping predators. Of course, I freerange, and have a completely enclosed coop at night, so different circumstances than most here, I think. Not saying anybody's wrong to clip, just sharing a different perspective. If I didn't have neighbors or our fence was higher I wouldn't clip either, but one of my henhoes, Tissue, sometimes decides that our avocado tree is the best place to sleep. Cue to us getting her down and trimming her wings really, really short. The neighbors have a big dog and I don't wanna risk having Tissue land next door by accident.
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Jul 4, 2013 19:04
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unprofessional posted:I never clip, so my chickens have a chance at escaping predators. Of course, I freerange, and have a completely enclosed coop at night, so different circumstances than most here, I think. Not saying anybody's wrong to clip, just sharing a different perspective. We're in the same boat. Most of my girls don't range, but Dahlia gets out no matter what we do. Since our dogs mostly don't care about the chickens, we leave them unclipped in case they need to get away from something. We got our third egg! It's the second "good" one - and now I know who laid it, and the first one. Looks like Daisy, the Faverolles, is the winner of the Egg Race. Her eggs are smaller and tan/beige, while the egg I found this morning is a nice brown and slightly bigger (so it's one of the golden sexlinks). My mom is now referring to me and my husband as "Grandma" and "Grandpa." This is the sexlink's egg -  And the new coop is coming along nicely! It's more than twice the size of the old one (it's about 4x3, where the new one is 8x8x6). 
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Jul 4, 2013 21:19
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I have three chickens, I just haven't figured out what to name the Australorp yet. Audrey the Wyandotte got named while I was walking around the neighborhood with a chicken in my arm yesterday, looking like a weirdo and I started to need to have a name to call so that I didn't look even weirder than I already looked. I'm bad at naming animals, they get really weird names based on what sticks. That's why I have cats with weird names like Dweezil, Widget and Snooki. I have four foot fencing around the run on two sides, with a six foot fence section and the garage being the other two sides. I had taken the tarp down from the run because they decided to hang out on the tarp the first day I set it up. They must have figured out that it was possible to fly four feet in the air by jumping on the doghouse they sleep in, perch on the fence and jump on the six foot fence section, and then to the garage roof from there. I'm not concerned about predators as long as the chickens stay in my backyard and are in their run when the dogs come outside to use the facilities or when I'm working with the dogs. I live in the city, we have a six foot vinyl privacy fence around the perimeter of the backyard. The only real ways a non flying predator could potentially get in the backyard would be to climb the tree that overhangs our deck and jump down or to dig under the fence. If a critter climbs a tree to get in, there's not an easy way out. My dumb terrier mix and cocker spaniel/poodle mix dogs have pretty strong prey drives which is why the run has chicken wire around the bottom parts to keep dog noses and paws out of the run after they killed a hen because the run hadn't been completed. I still blame myself for that, ugh. If something tries to kill my birds, Tucker and Ella are probably going to find it and either spook it or make sure that its chicken killing days are over. I am a horrible mean vegetarian, but I have no tolerance for predators attacking my animals. It's my rural roots showing, but I get it from my dad, who had to deal with predators attacking livestock when he was a kid on the family farm. I really, really, really wish I could have a rooster for flock protection, but I live in the city. He's given me the go ahead to install electric fencing if I want to/when I can afford it because he's a bit  in the way that he talks about how even the most stubborn animals figure out to stay away from the fence reallll quick.My solution to my dumbasses getting out has been to clip wings and cover the run in a tarp while I figure out a better system. I'm thinking about a net of some form. I'm still stuck in a weird situation with my coop thanks to some dumb family drama (they were supposed to live at my brother's house, my brother let a bird die of heatstroke by neglecting to check on them/bring them ice water on a 100 degree day, I took the birds away from him, he is now dragging his feet on getting my coop to me because it apparently won't fit through the fence gate but can't be lifted over the fence or...something so he's insisting it be 75% disassembled to move it) so I'm making do with what I have until I can either get the coop back in as few pieces as possible or just buy a coop from someone else. I'm still not sure what happened to Lincoln to have her missing so many feathers. Everyone seems back to normal, so I'm thankful.
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Jul 4, 2013 21:32
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Been doing more work on the coop. Eggbox is attached and trimmed and we painted! (not quite done painting, need to finish out the corners and edges)  The tubing you see is the misting system, the wire by the Eggbox is the extension cord that runs the coop fan. It's a box fan pointing up and sitting on the mesh above their coop. It really helps move the air at night. Errant Gin Monks fucked around with this message at 23:47 on Jul 5, 2013 |
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Jul 5, 2013 23:45
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Errant Gin Monks posted:Been doing more work on the coop. Eggbox is attached and trimmed and we painted! Your coop looks great! Love the red/white paint and I bet the chooks love that misting system. 
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Jul 5, 2013 23:53
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I'm sure you've all already seen this video; but, it still makes me laugh. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FLt7bLIgv9o I wonder how the hen felt when it laid that egg.
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Jul 6, 2013 00:41
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c355n4 posted:I'm sure you've all already seen this video; but, it still makes me laugh. Thanks for the link! I've never seen this but I have read about it! Interesting!
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Jul 6, 2013 02:39
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 Pip, one of our spookygonk fucked around with this message at 20:16 on Jul 7, 2013 |
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Jul 7, 2013 20:14
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spookygonk posted:
Awwww. That photo made me smile. She looks so happy and content, soaking up the sun. Her wattles and comb make her head look like a red flower.
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Jul 7, 2013 20:41
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spookygonk posted:
Oh my god she is so cute sleeping like that.  Do you adopt them from commercial farms?
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Jul 7, 2013 22:02
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This seems to be the month for chicken drama. It became really obvious that the Ameraucana I got was a rooster, and he was being a total hormonal rear end in a top hat. Fortunately I found someone who wanted him to make pretty Easter Eggers and who was confident she could get him to calm down. Which was good, because I don't have the time or energy to try to tame him, even if I was allowed to have roosters, so it was a new home or the stewpot for him. On the good front, when I contacted the guy I got him from, to find out if he had any Ameraucana pullets that I could buy as a replacement, he gave me one for free, which was really awesome. This also ended up being another reason to want Roo-boy gone. The girls were relatively cool about the newcomer, but Roo-boy kept chasing her and beating up on her, and generally making integration a ton harder. Now that he's been gone a couple days, things are going much more smoothly for the pullet, who I've named Storm. The Plague of Broodiness is continuing. I like having a broody every so often, but this is getting nuts. Buffy, the creatively named Buff Orphington, decided to go broody late last week. Getting eggs for her isn't an option, since its been so hot (reaching highs consistently over 115) that viability is likely to be an issue, plus everyone's hens have slowed down because of the heat, and producing a lot of thin shelled, odd shaped and generally bad eggs. for the first time, I tried breaking her by slipping icepacks under her, but that did no good. Happily, a friend is ordering in some chicks from Meyer Hatchery, so I'm going to get chick to slip under her sometime next week. I hope that works, because if it doesn't I have no other options. My girls are handling the heat pretty well, I think that is largely because the coop we have is made of block, and the run is well shaded with shade cloth, plus we run a mister during the hottest part of the day, which seems to really help.
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Jul 7, 2013 22:08
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WrathofKhan posted:Happily, a friend is ordering in some chicks from Meyer Hatchery, so I'm going to get chick to slip under her sometime next week. I hope that works, because if it doesn't I have no other options. I love this. You can just stuff a chick under her and her silly little chicken brain will just go YES THIS BABY MUST BE MINE. 
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Jul 8, 2013 16:08
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Serella posted:I love this. You can just stuff a chick under her and her silly little chicken brain will just go YES THIS BABY MUST BE MINE. Get two chicks. So the chick has a buddy as it gets older. (Chicken enabler? me?) 
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Jul 8, 2013 17:03
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Inveigle you monster We've got a lot of work done on the new coop! It's taking way longer than I expected, but my excuse is that I've never built a building before. We've got the floor and 3 walls framed. Now we need to figure out what kind of door to make/use. Any suggestions? I'm thinking a pop door of some kind for the chickens (probably an up/down door so we can automate it later on with an opener), but we also want to be able to get in there to clean. The ceiling's going to be about 6', probably a bit higher with the roof. We'll need a people-door. Any suggestions from folks who've made their own coops? Had my first fresh egg yesterday It was so good. I haven't had good fresh eggs since I was little. The girls are cackling up a storm (the layers, anyway). Two of the four aren't laying yet, but I figure they probably will soon.Here's some chickens! The new chicks went from this:  to this:  And the coop is looking like this now (although there are 3 walls now): 
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Jul 8, 2013 19:34
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Lynza posted:We'll need a people-door. Any suggestions from folks who've made their own coops? If I had to do it again? http://www.homedepot.com/p/EMCO-100...l2#.UdsI4r1NSrs I made my own and getting that bastard to fit took some (read: a whole lot of) sanding, and when it gets real humid and the wood swells it still sticks pretty bad.
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Jul 8, 2013 19:47
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Picture dump. Tetrazzini, pissed off after a rain storm.  Pilot and Fajita, post-rainstorm.  Fajita looking punk metal as gently caress after the rainstorm.  BFFs  Training them to jump for their food. Two of my reds will jump to waist level to either knock the food out of the scoop or to grab the rim with their beak and then run off with it. 
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Jul 9, 2013 00:06
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The Rat posted:BFFs Tetrazzini and Fajita are so cool-looking, but I guess that I see why the phrase "madder than a wet hen" is very accurate. The photo of the two chooks snuggled together is very sweet. Lynza: Love the coloring on your chickens. Your coop is starting out well! Post update pics for us to see!
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Jul 9, 2013 00:42
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[quote="Lynza" post="417249667"] Had my first fresh egg yesterday It was so good. I haven't had good fresh eggs since I was little. The girls are cackling up a storm (the layers, anyway). Two of the four aren't laying yet, but I figure they probably will soon.I want to hear the Egg Songs! pretty please......  Oh, and I'm so jealous, I wanna fresh egg!
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Jul 9, 2013 02:06
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I wish you lived closer, bobbie, you could come visit the biddies! I will try to get some audio of the cackling. It's pretty hilarious. I probably won't get a chance until the weekend, though. Going to do some more work on the coop this weekend. I think it'll probably take at least another full weekend to finish it. I didn't realize it'd be quite so involved. But hey, I'm gonna have forearms like friggin' Popeye when we're done! Daisy has figured out, rather suddenly, how to get out of the pen. I have a feeling it's because my husband has been closing off the old/existing coop's nesting box. The other hen likes the nesting box he made outside the coop, but I think Daisy prefers the one inside.
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Jul 9, 2013 03:55
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Errant Gin Monks posted:Been doing more work on the coop. Eggbox is attached and trimmed and we painted! Are you gonna use sand in your coop? That's what I'm using and it works great!
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Jul 9, 2013 20:05
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Bantaras posted:Are you gonna use sand in your coop? There is sand in the run, I dmup in fresh sand every other month and put the sand I rake out weekly into the compost pile. In the coop itself its pine/aspen shavings. Easier to clean that way. The egg boxes are full of hay. Edit: I haven't had lice on my girls but a friend did. They blasted the chickens with Sevin dust every two weeks for 2 months, Backyard chickens said to put sevin medicated powder in a trash bag, stuff the chicken in it with its head sticking out and shake the bag around to coat the bird, then let it out. Do this with all the chickens. Lice can't really live off its host for long, so no need to treat the area. Errant Gin Monks fucked around with this message at 02:23 on Jul 10, 2013 |
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Jul 9, 2013 20:24
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My chickens definitely have lice. What is the best way to fight them? A lot of people say Sevin or DE but what do you guys use? Also, my situation is kind of different than most. My chickens are freerangers and sleep in the rafters of a very large barn and it would be very expensive to dust/spray the entire barn. I can treat the beams, egg boxes and the chickens but would that be enough? Edit: They're for sure lice, not mites. hypoallergenic cat breed fucked around with this message at 01:10 on Jul 10, 2013 |
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Jul 10, 2013 00:58
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Disco Nixon posted:My chickens definitely have lice. What is the best way to fight them? A lot of people say Sevin or DE but what do you guys use? Also, my situation is kind of different than most. My chickens are freerangers and sleep in the rafters of a very large barn and it would be very expensive to dust/spray the entire barn. I can treat the beams, egg boxes and the chickens but would that be enough? You can use a broad-spectrum wormer on them orally, wormers kill both internal and external parasites once it works it's way through their system. I always worm AND spray my birds twice a year though to get the external parasites dead & off immediately. In between if I see a bird having an external parasites problem I use the spray. I've used both powdered Sevin dust and Adams Flea & tick spray for external parasites, and have come to prefer the Adams spray. Click here for my page on parasites and scroll down to 'Mites' (works the same on lice): http://jackshenhouse.com/VSChickHealth.htm That same page has info on DE, pros & cons. I also use a hand-held steam cleaner to kill the little fuckers on roosts, coop, nest boxes, etc. Click here and scroll down to 'Cleaning & Sanitizing The Coop': http://jackshenhouse.com/VSChickCoop.htm
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Jul 10, 2013 05:51
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For those of you dealing with overheated chickens, we've been freezing bottles of water and sticking them in the run and coop, and the birds are loving laying next to them at the hottest part of the day. Our Easter Egger, who was panting from around 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. before, is now a way happier bird. Plus this way we don't have to spray them with water that often, which they haaaate.
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Jul 10, 2013 16:34
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cucurbit posted:For those of you dealing with overheated chickens, we've been freezing bottles of water and sticking them in the run and coop, and the birds are loving laying next to them at the hottest part of the day. Our Easter Egger, who was panting from around 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. before, is now a way happier bird. Plus this way we don't have to spray them with water that often, which they haaaate. Oh? You just take plastic gallon water jugs full of water and then freeze them? And then you put the frozen gallon jugs into the run? That's a great idea! The chooks can just snuggle up next to the frozen bottles to get cool (and no wet, mad chickens).
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Jul 10, 2013 20:27
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Inveigle posted:Oh? You just take plastic gallon water jugs full of water and then freeze them? And then you put the frozen gallon jugs into the run? That's a great idea! The chooks can just snuggle up next to the frozen bottles to get cool (and no wet, mad chickens). We use little 12 oz bottles of water; we were moving recently, and bought a pack to drink while we moved, and we just filled them back up with tapwater (not to the top to allow for expansion), freeze them, and throw out a few in the morning and a few in the afternoon (they melt, it's North Carolina so it's hot by 10 a.m.). I don't have room in my freezer for gallons, but it'd be nice to use those as they'd melt much more slowly. Maybe when we get a chest freezer!
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Jul 10, 2013 21:29
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We put frozen bottles in their waterer every morning when we change the water out. It seems to help. But the mister (which they hate) does a good job cooling everything down.
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Jul 10, 2013 21:50
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cucurbit posted:We use little 12 oz bottles of water; we were moving recently, and bought a pack to drink while we moved, and we just filled them back up with tapwater (not to the top to allow for expansion), freeze them, and throw out a few in the morning and a few in the afternoon (they melt, it's North Carolina so it's hot by 10 a.m.). I don't have room in my freezer for gallons, but it'd be nice to use those as they'd melt much more slowly. Maybe when we get a chest freezer! Yeah, if you had a big chest freezer, it would be easy to freeze gallon jugs of water. You just have to remember to pour a little of the water out of each plastic jug so that the water has room to expand when it freezes (or else you might crack the plastic). Next time we get a hurricane, I am freezing gallons and smaller bottles of water to keep in my freezer and refrigerator to keep the food cool. A lot less messier than melting bags of loose ice.
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Jul 10, 2013 21:58
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Finally got all my cocks crowing on video. Pilot, the Polish that I thought was a rooster but then this thread shattered my illusions: http://smg.photobucket.com/user/rupert42/media/chickens/PilotCrows_zps7ad0da7c.mp4.html Dumpling, the little banty Cochin who narrowly escaped a fox a couple weeks ago: http://smg.photobucket.com/user/rupert42/media/chickens/DumplingCrows_zpsfd58dcec.mp4.html Tetrazzini, the ugliest of the bunch, with the least manly crow: http://smg.photobucket.com/user/rupert42/media/chickens/TetrazziniCrows_zps7b716eb5.mp4.html
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Jul 11, 2013 19:53
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I love how cochins look like they're wearing bellbottoms.
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Jul 11, 2013 20:28
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Ahahahaha I like Tetrazzinis crow the best. Its quieter.
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Jul 11, 2013 21:39
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Awww, they're all so important! HEAR their mighty cries! I need to get some audio of The Ladies doing their cackles.
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Jul 11, 2013 21:49
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THE RAT - Thank you for posting those adorable videos! AHAHAHAHAHA Do you plan on keeping all 3 of those roosters?
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Jul 12, 2013 01:32
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Gonna keep them as long as we can. Neighbors haven't complained yet, and if they were going to, they would have by now. It helps that we have 2 acres, so the chickens can roam around and stay occupied chasing bugs most of the time.
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Jul 12, 2013 04:33
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Had one of my ladies lay their first egg yesterday. ...on the driveway. 
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Jul 12, 2013 20:13
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unprofessional posted:Had one of my ladies lay their first egg yesterday. LOL! She just wanted to make sure you found it! Or else she was just walking along and suddenly felt the urge to lay.
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Jul 12, 2013 20:27
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unprofessional posted:Had one of my ladies lay their first egg yesterday. That sounds so... chickeny.
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Jul 12, 2013 21:40
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| # ? Apr 19, 2024 22:43 |
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Breed ID question, what are these? I took this picture last year in Helmand province before I got bit with the chicken bug, so I didn't think to take more pictures.
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Jul 13, 2013 00:42
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