Looking into getting some chickens right now. Just for eggs mostly. Currently building the coop and the run. Any tips for newbies Wauf? I'm thinking of starting with 4 barred Plymouth rock hens, they say they do well in heat and cold which is what I need as I'm in Kentucky.
Someone told me racoons will chew through the wires to kill hens, is that true?
I don't know about chewing through wires but they'll reach through and grab the hens and pull their head through the wire and bite them off and leave a headless corpse in the pen.
So don't have any roost bars positioned where that can happen.
I've found that landscape timbers last better than finished 4x4 studs used for walls when burying in the ground.
And use pressure treated 2x4's. The few extra bucks is well worth it.
Meant to link
bastards won't even eat the head, they just want to kill hens. So definitely get welded wire or hardwire mesh of a decent quality with gaps that they can't cram their little thieving hands through, or double it up so they can't pull anything through. Chicken wire is for keeping chickens in, not for keeping predators out.
why are the chickens so moronic they go near the fence with racoons around? I thought they were skittish?
It's when they're sleeping.
don't they sleep inside the house thing?
How deep should I dig for the posts of a small coop?
Atleast 12".
16"-18" is better.
Thank you.
if you're digging anyway might as well dig in some wire welded fence and gravel to dissuade foxes burrowing under and inside your coop btw.
That’s my plan currently so thank you for confirming it’s a good idea.
Concrete might be cheaper than gravel at this point if you're just buying bags at home depot vs going to a quarry and filling a truck bed.
All of my pens have concrete footers and I've never had a predator get in a pen.
Husband named our 3 newest girls after K-On characters. I let him name them since I named our others, but I may have made a lapse in judgement with that decision. Also, look at how small this bantam green egger is. Never had bantams so her size almost startled me. That’s a small egg, too. Girl is the size of a Kennedy coin.
I bought some chick's once at the auction that were just labeled "cochin".
I had just purchased half a dozen large fowl cochin that morning so I raised them together.
Turns out the auction birds were bantams.
It got to a point where they LF birds towered over the bantams, the little guys would walk under the big birds and through their legs.
I didn't have a place for the bantams so they went back to the auction but they were adorable, friendly little birds.
The Itty bitty crow from the rooster was a nice change from my other behemoths. I almost wish I would have gotten into bantams instead of fullsize birds.
probably for the best that they went back, I'm waiting for one of my larger girls to take a deuce on her head because she's the perfect height for it lol. Poor thing gets pushed over so easily by the normal sized chicks.
I have some really cool looking birds this year.
I'm getting close.
I'm not rich so I can only devote so much of my paycheck to this.
I might get one more hatch this year to bring it all together and then spring 2024 I'm hoping for something really cool.
I've been working on an experimental breed for a few years now.
This is a nice quality Cochin.
Notice how "full" it is, except for the head and neck.
This is a "frizzle" version.
The gene causes the feather quill to curl.
My my just look at those pantaloons.
I say pantaloons and everybody looks at me like I'm a moron.
Here's one of my actual hatchlings.
Not even filled out yet.
so what's the most beginner level hen?
https://hillsborough-homesteading.com/top-12-heritage-chicken-breeds/
Everyone knows how funky plastic waterers get.
You can get away with just wiping them by hand once or twice if they're kept in the shade but eventually they start to grow mold and you have to scrub them.
And sometimes you have to bleach them.
My automatic waterers are stainless so worse case is a quick scrub with a brush while im inside the pen, dump the water and it refills itself and I'm off to the next pen.
It's easy to get in that mindset of "crap, I have to do (that) again, I'll just do it tomorrow". If you eliminate as much of the repetitive shit as possible it's more enjoyable and the birds are happier- going out to a pen with an empty waterer on a hot days will make you feel like shit.
Putting a chunk of copper pipe in your waterer doesn't solve all funkiness, but it decreases it by well over half.
Just to answer some of those other questions-
My pens run about $1,200.
But they're large and a little extreme (the concrete footers, wire roofs, pvc plumbing).
Get cheap ass hinges and latches from Walmart, not lowes or home depot.
Yes chickens get sick but it's usually for a reason.
Wild birds carry pox so a dove landing in your yard can transmit it. It's usually just visually annoying on their combs.
Shit likes Mareks disease is fatal and can wipe out a flock. Thise hatchlings from Tractor Supply should be sage but after you put all of this time and effort into a flock you find some cool looking ornamental breed on Craigslist or the local auction, bring it home and now all your birds are dead.
That doesn't happen often but it's something to be aware of.
Worms is the biggeat issue in a flock.
It's common and normally a bird will get worms, they'll run their life cycle and be gone. Sometimes a bird.might become infested and have serious issues though.
There's multiple.ttpes, digestive tract, eye worms, gape worms that live in the throat....
Fenbendazole (however it's spelled) for goats. Half a CC per 10 pound bird. Use syringe to shoot it into their crop Repeat after 3 days.
Worm eggs are carried by insects so you'll get them someday. Everybody here probably has them in their flock but like I said they usually don't cause issues.
Most feed is medicated to combat what would be described as "kennel cough" for chickens.
>pvc plumbing
what kind of plumbing? Like your pen has water features?
I have multuple pens and I use automatic waterers so instead of a bunch of hoses laying in the yard I ran pvc pipe underground to each pen and put a spigot inside.
I also have electricity ran underground to one pen so I can easily deal with hatchlings in early spring.
The pvc is a little overkill for one pen, unless you don't want to move a hose everytime you mow if you run an automatic waterer.
Pvc is like 50 cents a foot so it's not expensive, mostly just labor digging ditches.
It's all those little things that make for a healthier flock.
If I get home late I don't have to think "crap, the one gallon waterer is low, I need to change shoes, go get the waterer out of the pen, take it to the porch, scrub it out, refill it and take it back to the pen because I'm going fishing early in the morning and don't want to deal with it then".
But in my case that's x25.
It's like designing the floor of the coop so you can scrape it easily. If it's simple and fast you'll do it more often.
What would be the startup cost generally? How do you get your chicken coops? Like is ordering from Amazon alright?
you're much better off building one, kits are crazy expensive for what you get, the actual chicks themselves and food/water is really cheap, like a few bucks per chick and $20/25 for 50 lbs of feed that will last a long time
but what if I'm a moron when it comes to building things? How hard is it?
What about medication and such?
Depends on how complex of a structure you want, the anon a few posts above has good guidelines but you could make something primitive out of 2x4s and plywood that would work decently as a starter shelter
And I've only owned chickens for a couple years but haven't had to medicate them, so personally I've never sank any money into that but I suppose your mileage may vary with breeds and such
what are the recommendations for the hardiest breeds?
Depends on climate.
And what you really want to get out of them.
Ameraucanas, Rhode Island Reds, White Leghorns (like the old cartoon with the rooster Foghorn Leghorn) Austrolorps, Barred Rocks, Plymouth Rocks do well free ranging- the roosters are defensive and will protect the flock.
Silkies are basically coyote bait if you free range.
In cold.climates you want small combs
In hot climates you want large combs.
Something like a Cochin with an extreme amount of feathers and small comb will be miserable in arizona- like a husky would be.
But they would do well in Wyoming.
You can still keep something like Cochin where it gets hot but you have to provide them with a lot of shade and they won't lay as many eggs.
If you just want low maintenance look for heritage breeds.
uh I live in cali. I don't think we have any coyotes around, maybe racoons and rats at worst. Something that lays alot of eggs preferably.
Is it better to get a single breed or mix them up? Will they care or get along regardless?
California has frickloads of Coyotes. They're the number 1 cause of cat mortality in LA, above even cars.
I got a big german shepard and my neighborhood is pretty nice, I don't think coyotes come around
>They're very friendly towards people but tend to be dominant over other hens.
like they're racist towards other breeds or it's better to just have one?
>racist towards other breeds
Pretty much.
All chickens will fall into a pecking order.
Some breeds tend to be on the top while some wind up on the bottom.
Sometimes it's more based on the individual.
My largest cochin is also the sweetest and gets bullied by smaller cochin.
Generally though if you get them all at a week old they'll get along all their lives.
Isa browns are complete buttholes towards new hens. They do lay a whole lot and are friendly towards human, but if you plan on adding to your flock (instead of replacing every hen) I would get something else.
I just had to pull my comets because they were picking on a couple hens they've been living with for a year.
I had 1 isa brown and 2 shavers, and I added 2 isa browns and 1 shaver to the mix. The old shavers would be curious, maybe peck the new hens once if they tried to eat. The isa brown would sprint from 30 feet away to attack the new hens, feet forward like a rooster. Now a year later, the newer isa brown is on top and she bullies the old one, forces her to stay away and pushes her down from the perch in the coop.
Ya I'm never getting them again.
I got 8 Isa browns a long time ago. Within 2 years half were dead.
Another 2 years and I was down to one.
(That b***h bird is still alive nearly a decade later).
They lay so many eggs it just burns up their system.
They lay large to jumbo eggs so that's a massive amount of protein and calcium they need every friggin day. If they don't have calcium supplements (like oyster shells) they'll eat other hens eggs (and their own) to get the calcium. Their body will even cannibalize their own bones if they can't get enough calcium.
Get hatchlings at the same time and different breeds do well together.
If you add later the more timid breeds may be picked on forever.
Most people have mixed flocks.
If you just want eggs then Golden Comet/Cinnamon Queen/Isa Brown (same hybrid just different copyrighted name by specific hatcheries) are rated at about 330 eggs a year.
They're very friendly towards people but tend to be dominant over other hens.
Self closing gate type latches are nice.
But I've found barrel bolt types, top and bottom, keep the wood frames from warping if you have humid weather.
Plan for shade.
Chickens want shade in summer and sun in winter of course.
Use existing trees if possible.
If the ground has a slight slope the chickens will level it quickly.
You don't have to level the entire area, just the perimeter. Or atleast be aware of how the slope will be changed and build accordingly. Chickens will do the rest.
I have a "threshold" on doorways.
Instead of running the door to the ground I have an 18"wall that I have to step over.
This keeps chicks from running out, and alo older friendlier birds.
Chances are you doors will warp a little.
Have them "overlay" the door jam, not inset. And you don't need to build them with 1/8" clearance.
Any neat ideas for a coop/run?
Like obstacle course or funcrionalitu/ease/comfort?
Either but I was think more utility/convenience.
Make everything over 6 foot tall so you don't have to stoop over when inside.
Run pvc pipe inside for a permanent water source (easiest to do if you have multiple pens) or atleast have a hose ran inside. Get automatic waterers used for livestock/dogs.
Put nesting boxes on outside walls so you don't have to go inside the coop.
Put hinged lids ontop so gravity closes them (some designes have "swing out" backs that require a latch that can fail or be forgotten).
Don't have a 2x4 frame on the top side of coop floor. Have it underneath so you can scrape poop out without hitting a barrier.
Run wire around coop house base portion to have extra run space that's always shaded.
Thos are basics
More "advanced" features:
Dig small trench (about 4" wide, 9"+ deep) around perimeter before building.
Level top with 2x4 before concrete sets.
Build run with 2x4 "footer" ontop of concrete to attach wire to.
You now have dig proof base for foxes and such and can use 2x4 footer as a "backstop" for weedwacker so it doesn't hit the wire.
Bonus for running 24" hardware cloth (it's the square hole wire) and then a "beltline" 2x4 to attach it to then chicken wire to the roof.
Grandma hen is still going... She has digestive issues, crop not emptying properly - it's soft, no obvious blockage. She hasn't laid for a couple of years now and started crowing occasionally a year ago, so I think the problem is probably something gynae. Charcoal tablets are helping with her sour crop, along with twice-daily crop massage. She's refusing all her usual food and treats and will only eat wild food - earthworms, insects and stolen bits of silverbeet.
Two of the babies hatched at Christmas. The little black hen enjoys flying up into the branches of fruit trees, she's very wild.
Beautiful roo
I love wieners so much it's unreal
This guy in Pakistan has the most fabulous wieners https://youtu.be/J0IEJkVqMgU
Hens helping in the vege garden, they aren't allowed anywhere near it usually
My chicks had their first real outside experience today. They checked out the dog, ate some bugs and a worm, and chased each other with sticks. Pretty eventful experience before the rain and thunder started rolling in.
Sorry about picture size/quality. The file size was giant for some reason so I had to crop it a lot.
Dear little pets, they're so pretty
Bath time!
What breeds are those glorious dirty bastards?
Two Easter Eggers and an ISA Brown, I also have some Polish and Jersey Giants
Life is good 🙂
Another if it helps
When "French" is used in the name of a chicken breed it means the legs are feathered.
French Black Copper Marans have feathers on their legs and outside toe. Feathers on any other toes is a defect.
The feathers are apparent from hatch.
Regular/standard BC Marans do not have feathered legs.
Color is correct for a BC Maran.
Grey shanks and toes (soles should be pink/white), red earlobes, comb and wattles.
Head shape is Maran, notice how the beak and comb transition in almost a straight line whereas other breeds there's a "dip" where the beak protrudes outwards/away from the head and the comb is inset.
This one will be easy to sex.
The copper color will come in on the head/neck (some individuals are more intense than others), if it develops any color on the body it's a male.
It's very apparent when you have both male and female but the male comb will darken and enlarge much sooner than females (compared to Ameraucana or Cochin where comb growth is almost the same between male and female).
If you start to see the copper color on the neck but it still has a small, pale comb it should be a hen. If the comb doubles in size and turns bright red before tou see copper colors it's probably a male.
Although it's hard to judge size it appears to be at the point where you'll see color any day now.
I'm 95% sure it's a BCM hen.
Oh ya, forgot.
Maran combs have 5 points.
Occasionally there are hatchlings with more but it's pretty stable in hatchery gene pools (can't tell from the pics).
Thanks! Didn't realize the diff between French and non-French.
I tried counting lobes but her comb is so small it was hard to distinguish without grabbing her. Will grab her later
Pic: 4 of 5 3.5 month old Buff Orpingtons who always refuse to go to bed
Cream Legbar "Spike"
The Wyandotte I posted is Faye.
We also got an unsexed unidentified freebie from the hatchery, think it's a Black French Maran female, she's "Jet" for any old head weeaboos
That's a hen btw.
Post Jet, I'll tell you if it's an FBC Maran (been breeding them for a decade).
Whiting True Green "Big Head"
You mean Whiting True Blue (?)
Nah, Whiting True Green
Yup. 20 ladies, 1 wienererel
Thanks.
Just incase you weren't aware.
Whiting True Green do not breed true.
It's a hybrid between a blue layer and a terracotta layer.
If you bred 2 whiting true blue you'll get various shades of blue to green to olive to kalamata.
The odds of getting a single bird with all the genes on both sides of the genome is like 1,000,000 to 1 so nobody has a breeding group yet.
>if you breed two whiting true green.
Sorry about that.
The blues breed true.
The blue is just one gene, the terracotta is (believed to be) 14 genes, 2 of which are only carried by the rooster (chickens aren't x/y).
So green gets very co planted after the first generation hybrid
I don’t know. I keep some but they kinda just hang there. I don’t really interact with them in any way.
Since all I have done is lament about problems with sick chicks, I have attached a happier photo of some of our Buff Orpington pullets chilling, with our Red Star and new alpha Ginger
Cute!
I posted earlier with the chicken in a dog crate I was trying to rehab. This stupid b***h kept getting better and eating more and eating more....and then today it is like she has sour crop and refused to eat or drink pretty much anything all day. This is her third time with sour crop, she barely cleans herself, she's the eldest but has bad habits like not roosting.
Tonight is her last night on Earth. RIP Mimi.
(I read great things about Sapphire Gems as a breed but my experience with a group of 10, after 3.5 years raising them from chicks...they are a dumb, easy to get sick breed.)
So how's she doing?
Oh she dead
Yesterday was kind of a relief. And then find one of the almost 3 month olds with a squishy crop. Try pouring her out...she has sour crop. And last night was too obstinate to let us syringe greek yogurt into her mouth. This morning set out enough greek yogurt for all chickens and she's acting way too timid (she's smaller than almost all other birds) to eat some. Tried to bring her inside in the dog crate but she is small enough to squeeze through and get out, can't cover it up don't want her to get heat stroke.
Going to try separating her later today and forcing her to eat more yogurt again.
I have 3 Gem pullets right now, IDK, seem fine to me. I don’t think they will be better than my barred rocks at anything, but mine aren’t notably dumb or poorly mannered or whatever and they look cool. I’ve also got 3 Austrolorp pullets I’m adding, that I’m less happy with, because they are more afraid of everything than any of the birds I’ve ever raised, and I probably should just have gone with RIRs or a couple more rocks.
Sapphire Gems were the first breed we raised from day old chicks, 10 of them as a group. I think we messed up, as their first year, they were allowed to free range our entire neighborhood. Once they were a year old, a neighbor complained about them tearing up their garden, so we fenced them in. After that, we lost them from hawk attacks (until we adopted a RIR rooster,) one from prolapsed vent, two from heat stroke, and the rest from crop issues.
I think they probably had a hard time getting used to not free-ranging the whole neighborhood, all day. This last one I am pretty sure was holding out for bugs and such free-ranging the yard, and after we put our rooster down for being too aggressive with the remaining hens and the Buff pullets, that time got limited to after work hours only.
All chickens we have now are used to their living conditions, and hopefully, won't die at a rate of 3/year moving forward, unless we choose to eat them (have a Bielefelder and a Cuckoo Maran hen that both look pretty thick.)
Sorry to rant lol but that's funny about the Black Austrolorps - we have one in our younger pullet group who is named "Trouble" because she is the explorer and rambunctious one of the group.
RIR roosters are the best. I had one growing up that killed 4 barn cats over 5 or 6 years, but my ol’lady can’t stand “aggressive” (ie good) roosters, so I’m stuck with this Calico Princess gay she adopted from a coworker. Useless thing doesn’t even guard the hens, so all he’s good for is a red dot in your eggs, but at least he doesn’t frick enough to cause feather loss or chase kids.
With how bad the RIR was, I'm super glad I didn't get an even bigger Black Cochin rooster that was also their. "Bruce Lee" was aggressive and fricked too much. But that Cochin was....Colin McGregor or some shit.
Pic semi related? Our handsomest boy "Ash," or Ashy Slashy for an Evil Dead fans. Bielefelder rooster, interested to see how big he is considering our Bielefelder hen is the biggest chicken we've had.
Sorry pic didn't load.
And that's crazy about killing cats. Our indoor/outdoor cat is able to just chill with the chickens. No aggression either direction. She has a boy cat stray boyfriend who comes and chills around them too now.
Also, I am going to dump pics of the Motley crew over here.
This is the Blue Red Laced Wyandotte (or Red Blue Laced Wyandotte?) that had a sour crop apparently my wife force fed her hard today seems like her crop is normal already. Musta caught it day 1.
Hens hanging out
>want to talk about chickens with people
>everyone you know gets annoyed when you do
Why did I have to be a chicken tard. Also there's a big poultry show near me in September and I've never been more excited for it
You know how your friends look at you when you talk chicken?
That's how you're going to look at the people at the show.
...and if you think the chicken show people are odd, wait til you see the pigeon mob, holy moly
Not gonna lie.
I've thought about bidding on some but they go for moronic prices and are always in big lots.
Like I just want a pair, I'm not bidding $25 (per bird) on a box of 20.
I would love to be outclassed by the weird chicken freaks at the poultry show. I want to pet a chicken there if I can
i love chickens but there's not much to talk about them unless you are autistic about their breeds and stuff like that, i like them all equally and watching them freerange and be dumb chickens is one of my favorite pass times
>i love chickens but there's not much to talk about them unless you are autistic
guilty.
>watching them freerange and be dumb chickens is one of my favorite pass times
I love this so much, especially the younger ones they do dumb shit all the time.
Do you guys have any idea why my baby RIRs don’t eat treats? I’ve tried giving them both scrambled eggs and spaghetti but the just ignore it. My baby Barred Rocks go nuts for them and the two groups share a brooder so I don’t know why they aren’t partaking.
Anyone have thoughts on the turkeys kept with chickens debate? I've gotten conflicting information in my own research.
Turkeys are really sweet birds.
If you have bitty chickens and bitty turkeys the chickens will bully the turkeys.
What do I do with the neighbours chickens that keep wandering into our property because they just let them out to frick up everyones yards?
I live in hilly suburbia and the owners are Chinese and do not/will not speak to me about it.
They didn't seem to give two fricks when we had flooding and their chickens were left in their hutches to drown, when the other neighbours left without theirs they assimilated them into dinner.
Local council body wants me to keep a logbook for a month, complete with videos, pictures and followup calls but that proved to be a waste of my time.
They're skittish enough, but will happily chicken their way into my garage with a food trail. Sick of them shitting all around our section and ripping up the grass.
Catch and rehome them to a rescue farm a few clicks away? An actual rescue farm, not my oven. I don't care about the owners, they called the police when I knocked on their door at 3-4-5am last month because their rooster kept crowing in a fricking urban area.
The old antifreeze hotdog always does the trick
If I wanted to kill them I'd just bust out the air rifle, came close with the rooster.
Either kill them (stealthily), capture them in the very early morning when nobody is around, or do what your council wants. I recommend the council route as the other two could result in a lot of problems for you and are, arguably, immoral. You council sounds like homosexuals and are useless leeches but go through with it and if they don’t do anything soon contact the police directly (via a non emergency line.)
Get one of those dildo drill attachments that beat off the feathers.
I'd post a video but homosexual mods will delete it before it gets viewed.
The drum versions are really cool but kind of expensive unless you process chickens weekly.
yeah I was looking at the drums and shit is like $500, like god damn
A drum plucker is a worthy investment if you do even just one batch of meat birds per year. If you're serious, check out used ones online or at farm meetups, you can get them for a little bit cheaper and the seller will be able to answer questions right then and there.
Love this little fella. Always perches on the door when I open it and lets me pet him/her. I hope it's a hen.
Also likes to walk on my arm. They grow real fast I 'member when he was just a fluffy chick.
One of my hens hatched 10 eggs today, but left the 11th one in the cold while it was still breaking out of the egg.
I put it under another hen inside my coop which was brooding on top of unfertilized eggs, and a couple of hours later it fully emerged.
I'm glad that she didn't peck it to death, however, the chick is a tad bit small and seems to be still quite wet even though it's been under the hen for the better part of the day.
Anything I should do?
>inb4 incubator
Best I got is an old lamp that I warmed a hypothermic lamb with.
How far along is the second hen?
You don't want her to abandon the eggs to take care of a single hatchling but you also don't want her to continue sitting and not forage with the single hatchling.
Personally I would slip the bonus bird under the first hen with its siblings during the night.
Also the hen might have sensed that last hatchling was weak and left it.
Since it's already hatched you don't need an incubator, just a heat source and a box/plastic tote that is large enough to have warm/cool sides. But a single bird isn't healthy for the bird and it's difficult to reintroduce a bird to a hen. Some will gladly take in orphans but most will reject them once they're done hatching.
Thanks for your insight Waufon.
I did as you recommended and in the morning she was dry, and the hen and chick were full of chatter, which I believed to be a good sign.
Ffw a couple of hours later and the chick was breathing quite laboriously.
I went and checked up on the chick about half an hour ago, and after checking out a few of the other chickens I came back to the chick once more where I found she had passed in those couple of minutes.
As you said, the other hen had probably sensed that she wouldn't make it in the first place, or the new hen accidentally crushed her.
It's a pity though, since her colors seemed to be quite beautiful.
On a brighter note, one of my cochins hatched a new chick today without any problems.
I guess that where there is death, there is life.
Crushing an already hatched chick is extremely rare so more than likely it had health issues from the start.
I've had chick's that seemed to be fine after hatch but the next day have labored breathing and then quickly die- in a brooder box with very few other hatchlings with no apparent sign of being smothered. And being last to hatch is indicative of health issues.
Post pics of cochin parents, they're one of my favorite breeds.
Here's one of mine that hatched a couple months ago.
I didn't know that, I'll keep it in mind.
However odd it sounds, it's reassuring to hear that cases like that just happen from time to time.
Picrel is the bantam hen with new chicks.
One of the two is from the other hen who hatched 10 chicks, though that one's a Wyandotte.
Love the look of her, can't wait to see what she'll look like all grown up.
I missed the "unfertilized" part.
If that's the case you can leave the single with her and just pull the other eggs . That should trigger her to go out and forage with the single. It's better if there's more hatchlings but a single chick with the mom is fine.
Definitely some beautiful chickens in here and some great advice.
I have a flock with 1 3-4 year old hen, 6 1 year old hens, 5 3 month old pullets, and 10 2 month old pullets. Just got the whole flock together and living relatively harmoniously last night.
Then my old hen falls walking up into the coop and is acting like she has no energy. Brought her inside last night, made her eat some cat food for the protein, she feels light.
I see her eat, their food which is Nutrena Feather Fixer mixed 50/50 with chicken scratch, runs around outside eating bugs, eats the multi-bug treat mix we throw, as well as is a boss pushing other chickens out of the way to get other treats like watermelon, cucumbers, etc.
She has like no body fat, and seems like she isn't eating at all despite knowing for a fact she is. Is she just old? Is she depressed? Worms? What do?
>Pic related, she's isolated and being fed more cat food and bug treats today
I always assume worms until proven otherwise.
Treatment is safe so it's cheap insurance. People have given their chickens 10x the required dosage and they've been fine.
But more than likely she's just old.
Chickens are such a mixed bag of genetics that 3 years is a good run for some hybrids (like Golden comets/Isa browns/cinnamon queens). But you might get 8 comet hatchlings and 3 years later 7 of them are dead and that lone survivor lives for another decade.
Pic related is used off label for chickens.
I've scoured the internet for dosages and for an underweight adult hen it's about a half a CC. Just use a syringe and shoot it down their throat, repeat 3 days later.
If I'm worried about a bird I'll do the dewormer and feed them 30% crumbles. Sometimes they prefer water added to the crumbles and they'll eat more of it. But it has to be replaced daily.
Hope she gets better.
Thanks based anon. My wife thought we should deworm her last night, we have pills. Last night she ate one, I spread another one out in her food today. Now to just get her to eat lol. Will deworm the rest after work too just to be safe.
-Pic of her group when they were just pullets
Can I keep my chicks on starter feed until they go on layer feed or I slaughter them? I don't wanna buy another bag of feed if I can help it.
Yes.
People use 20% or 30% feed to fatten birds faster to butcher.
You have to go down to 16% or else they'll become obese as adults.
I usually keep them on starter feed for the first 4 months.
My only worry is the health of the laying hens, I don't really care if the meat birds aren't as big as they could be. My starter feed is 20% I believe.
They're not going to get obese unless you're still feeding them 20% after they're a year old.
If you transition to layer feed at 5 months or even 9 months the birds will be fine.
When I have broody birds ull give them starter crumbles to help keep their weight on or get it back.
You should’ve been asking for tips about the coop / infrastructure, that’s the most important part..
>box with holes in it
>needs a perch, that's a board
>also needs some boxes for laying eggs
>build a greenhouse but with chicken wire instead of fiberglass
>put up feeders and waterers on posts
>done
There are so many designs, and so many suck, and it’s a relatively permanent fixture - the birds are not. Anyway, first for Bresse maximalism.
>permanent fixture....birds are not.
I have a 13 yearold Australorp that disagrees with you.
Damn bird outlasted my marriage.
Why did you marry a chicken?
It also depends on the weather, my chickens would freeze to death if I had built a shit coop.
Updated pic an Ayam Blue.
Turned out to be a hen luckily.
I'll rotate it into a laying group somewhere unless someone wants to buy it but I've only been doing auctions instead of selling to the public license for multiple reasons so chances are she's here for good.
>license
I have no idea what my autocorrect what tying to say.
It's like someone trapped in a Chinese fortune cookie factory that's trying to get help.
She's lovely
Make more of her
Ayam Cemani are sketchy (and mean) birds.
They're not nearly as popular or expensive as the internet would lead you to believe.
Usually when people buy them they just want one or two for contrast in their flock so they're not popular enough to breed heavily and having a crossbreed is even less desirable.
I think this one is cool but I don't want more.
How do I get rid of unwanted roosters?
I tried butchering a couple but they're pretty gamey
wiener fighting
>drive to state park
>open door, toss rooster out
>"goodbye, rooster!"
>leave
take them in as pets and cuddle
give them little rooster diapers to prevent shitting
Look up local auctions.
I just got $26 for a dickhead rooster.
I try to sell in groups so if someone wants some nice hens they have to buy the rooster too but he was solo.
Juveniles don't sell for shit but adults surprisingly will atleast pay for feed.
What does a gamey chicken even mean
I can finally join you anons in chicken wranglership. Bought an assortment of 3 blue layers from MPC, they’re about a week old now. The list of possible kinds of chook they could be: super blue layer, blue EE, cuckoo bluebar, silked EE, blue favaucana. P sure from left to right they’re bluebar, super blue and silked EE, but if you think differently I’d be interested in what you think they may be.
A man who loves wieners as much as I do https://youtube.com/shorts/-0g5B5boNGc?feature=share
Show me your water and food setups. Ideally I would like a system inside the coop that won't leave me with a bunch of wet chicken poop and pests. I don't have to worry about frozen water too much since I live in Florida.
Food in a cheap feeder under a chair so it doesn't get rained on. Water bowl is just there but the chickens prefer to drink from a ditch at the back of my property for some reason. Get a treadle feeder if pests are an issue. I don't like having food or water inside the coop.
Ancient 50 pound galvanized hanging feeder.
Automatic waterer for livestock.
Cat knows where the hole in the wire under the ivy is and goes in at night to get mice.
6ish week old chicks
cute cluckers
the barred or cuckoo patterned one is a roo, isn't he? that bright red comb and his feisty little nature gives it away
They're all kinda feisty, even the bantams jump around and do the stare thing, but he? is massive compared to the other chicks. One of the black ones is also slightly bigger, has a more developed comb and likes to square off. It's my first hatch so I'm not sure if that's a way to tell them apart early on. I wanted hens but they're all dual purpose except the bantams and the white speckled one. I might keep one wiener just to annoy the neighbours.
can tell you right now that it looks like a roo to me, but if other anons want to lean in and provide feedback go for it
I have one of them and 4 australorps and i'n in central KY. If you have neighbors I reccomend Australorps
My poultry permit finally came in! I got three RIRs and three Barred Rocks.
>poultry permit
what kind of cucked place do you live in
California.
My condolences anon, hope you enjoy your chickens, raise them well
West Michigan. Grand Rapids has done a lot of damage to the outlying area.
No idea who this guy is or why he’s pretending to be me.
It’s what the stores around here use. I’m replacing it with Timothy hay anyways so it shouldn’t be an issue.
Arrrgh the Woodchips Kill guy gonna growl your arse
Grandma Chicken (She is almost 10 years old)
she looks like a wise old grandma
Lovely old Grandma Chicken. I wish her good health.
Pic rel is my old grandma hen Louise, who is 10 years old and fading, unfortunately. She has cataracts and is generally frail, she now sleeps in a box in my kitchen. Today was a beautiful day of winter sun so she sunbathed on the deck and went for a scratch around under the apple trees.
my chickens exploring the super overgrown raised beds today in the rain
Blessed picture
I love chickens so much guys, you don't even know. I enjoy just watching them, how they interact with each other, all the different personalities. I recently got one of the "silked white easter egger" wienererels, I am going to raise him, then cross him with my cuckoo marans to make sex linked olive eggers.
Rooster Easter Eggers are always a gamble unless you know for a fact that they're an F1 (first generation cross).
There are no chicken breeds that produce green eggs and breed true.
Examples like Starlight green Eggers are a hybrid first generation cross and if you breed a starlight with a starlight you'll get approximately 25% that lay brown eggs, 50% that lay random shades of green and 25% that lay blue.
There are (currently believed to be) 14 genes that control the brown color of eggs, with 2 of those associated with only the male side of the genome (so breeding a Maran rooster with a crested cream legbar hen will produce darker green eggs than a CCL rooster with a Maran hen- in theory).
If you bred an F1 with an F1 there's about a million to one chance of getting a bird that has all of the genes on both sides to breed true.
I'm not saying don't do it it- just be aware that your rooster might be a dud.
>There are [...] chicken breeds that produce green eggs
man–made horrors beyond my comprehension detected
$75 to run a DNA sample on a chicken to identify what egg color genes it has.
If someone wanted to throw money at a lab they could create an olive egger that breeds true.
I've seen vibrant yellow eggs and red eggs from show breeders but they get a very, very limited amount of those layers and their line is a dozen generations in.
Realistically it would take a quarter billion dollars to create a specific colored layer.
And then someone would just buy a few and hatch them themselves and sell (patents on organisms only last 20 years).
It's like Ayam Cemanis were thousands of dollars when they were first imported but I can get chick's for 5 bucks now.
Better not look into duck eggs
Compared to like a dog, is a chicken easier or harder to keep alive and happy?
It's like having a goldfish.
Or if you put time into it and have an inquisitive chicken it's like a hamster.
is it possible to leave them in my yard for a few days if I go on a trip or something? If I leave a ton of water and food out will they be alright?
I fill up my feeders every 3 days or so. I have a larger feeder that holds 50 pounds of feed. If I had a dozen birds on that feeder I would fill it like once a month.
I have automatic waterers .
so I never have to fill them.
Only thing that can be harder is that much like an exotic pet, there may be no vet options nearby which means you are the doctor and have to figure shit out if things go south. However, they are very hardy birds.
>However, if they fail to thrive for some reason they are very comfortably within the "yeah, this animal is food" zone
Good news!
Ayam Blue is looking like a female.
I'll try to get a good pic tomorrow- it's still half cemani so that takes some effort.
left for 3 weeks and came back to a hen sitting on a hug pile of eggs (neighbor was supposed to take them since he was feeding/watering them)
now there are easter egger/rhode island red chicks and probably more on the way with how big the pile is
also glad to see the chicken thread still going
I like playing with Easter Eggers but usualy RIR's aren't a dark enough egg color to make anything spectacular.
But you should still get some cool colors.
I've had a few incubate before and they've all pretty much just looked like RIRs with the popcorn combs
very cute and fluffy chickens
I woke up this morning to find that overnight my chicks had all learned to roost. Before only 1 or 2 had gotten up onto the roosts and this morning they all just started hopping up there
I wanna get chickens too. But I want heritage chickens, and to hand-raise baby ones hatched from eggs, which require an incubator appropriate baby housing/heat.
>already gonna be $300+
What are heritage Chickens?
Fancy breeds that aren't just the brown layers which are the most common around here. Like the wyandottes, plymouths etc.
Very nice. Don't make me want to get some now.
Doesn't looks that great.
This cream and brown one is beautiful and I'll save some money
Wyandottes have fertility issues.
One problem is their fluffy butt makes mating more difficult.
Another is their rose comb is associated with a gene that causes embryo death.
So their hatch rates are typically lower than other breeds.
Hatching is fun and all but buying birds that are less than a week old to raise is less stressful.
This is at best an oversimplification and at worst a misrepresentation. In the USA, heritage breeds have to meet several criteria. First, they needed to exist pre-industrial farm era, pre-1950s. They also need to be recognized by the APA, or American Poultry Association. They need to be able to breed true through natural mating, be "slow-growing," and be able to live full lives via traditional pasture raised methods. Not all of these breeds are that fancy—in fact, a good chunk of them are utilitarian and inexpensive. The reason people give a shit about them is that their existence means genetic diversity in the long run, meaning better capabilities to do things. We've lost countless chicken breeds since the 50s because industry farms will shit out industrial privately owned Cornish Cross and Leghorn chickens without care or consideration of the longterm ecological damage.
It's a shame how many breeds are becoming difficult to find because of the min/max mentality of production farms.
Brahma and Cochin are listed as "recovering" because they've fallen out of favor and are not bred as much (I'm doing my part with breeding show quality cochin).
Sebrights are listed as "critical" and I'll probably pick some up this season from a local breeder and start hatching my own.
https://livestockconservancy.org/heritage-breeds/conservation-priority-list/
It really is sad. Personly, I'm a fan of Chanteclers, Buckeyes, Dominiques, Plymouth Rocks, Delawares, New Hampshires, Cochins, and Brahmas. All the cold hardy dual purpose large fowl with a biased preference for ones from the northwest Great Lakes regiom. The hardest part is deciding which breed to own, as I would want to be breeding to standard for utility dual purpose. Hoping attending a nearby poultry show this fall will let me see different breeds and talk to breeders 1v1 and narrow it down.
>mfw those typos
I'm pretty blasted already apologies kek
I thought it sounded too superficial. This is interesting.
Thanks, In the grand scheme of things, the conservation of heritage breeds and heirloom plants is one of the most important things we can be spending our time doing, and chickens are no exception. Keeping the genetic diversity of what we eat alive is what will keep us alive and fed in the future, and chickens have been a key livestock around the world for millenia. The industrial Cornish Cross and Leghorn will not rule forever.
I gotta get some chickens
Need to figure out how to keep them safe from foxes first tho
My chickens and my LGD.
4 Black australorps, 2 rhode island reds, 2 isa browns and a leghorn. Dog is a great pyrenees
I think one of my australorps might be a rooster, but they're only about 5-6 weeks old so its hard to tell. It's got super pronounced waddles and a big comb for its age. None of the other australorps have even a slight comb or waddles. It also has a super short tail compared to the others, and still has pin feathers despite the other 3 being fully feathered. They're all the same age so its developing pretty differently. Could still be a hen but I wont know for sure until a few months
6 weeks is when you can tell on australorps.
It's a boy.
slow to fearher plus red comb is pretty darn indicative hes a roo
Update I guess. This guy about 3 weeks later.
Handsome bird
Here's a 10 yearold australorp hen (which still lays in the spring).
10 years and still laying!
I have big expectations for "Trouble" now.
Also, pretty bird. Pretty bird.
I got like 12-15 from her this year.
When she was young it was like 290.
She's still healthy though.
Big girl too.
I've got 10 Barred Rocks myself (9 hens, 1 rooster, 1 dead rooster RIP Rocky) I get a ton of eggs from them each day. Haven't bought eggs from the store in months. Very fluffy little birds.
I want to touch their feet.
I'm glad this rooster isn't a dick.
Holy shit those are some spurs. How much are the hens defeathered?
I have to rotate out his "favorite" on occasion.
Picture of a chicken squinting.
bumping just to shamelessly show off my pretty girl
She's pretty
Fab picture
This afternoon I found my lot having a conference on the deck, where they aren't allowed. Boss rooster not pictured, as he was guarding the door.
They all look so guilty
>love my pet chickens and would never eat them
>still love going to chic fil a
I don't understand myself
I think my pet chickens are funny but will eat them anyways
>he fell for the don't love the animals you eat meme
Deal with your internalized guilt anon. This feeling isn't normal and hasn't even been around for a hundred years.
It's mostly just a byproduct of an industrial farming complex that arose post-WWII to compete with shitty, cheaper meat imports from commie countries, leading us to become very isolated from our food supply systems in an absolute race to the bottom.
Names and identities are one of the best ways we can connect with our world, it's what legitimately makes us human. We're also not autotrophs—we're meant to love and take care of plants and animals and that includes eating them anon.
Everything on our planet is food for something, it's only a matter of time and place. You think your pet chickens would have a moral crisis over their place in the world? They'd eat you alive if you weren't bigger than them. Learn from them anon.
Pic related.
Because the food you are getting from chic-fil-a you didn't know personally, you didn't raise it and then kill it yourself.
If people had to raise, care for and kill their own food, there would be a lot more vegetarians in the world.
>If people had to raise, care for and kill their own food, there would be a lot more vegetarians in the world.
Why? When it used to be that way, it didn't lead to widespread veganism.
If more people lived like me, more people would think like me, not like you.
Hunters have more respect for animals live's than vegans....
back to facebook
ISA Browns are great too, all of mine are super friendly and curious and come up to me first thing. If you buy from a retailer they usually have a 6 bird minimum but once you have 4 you might as well have 6 or 7 right? Its harder to introduce adult birds to one another so get more in the beginning so they grow up together. My advice is to watch out for rats, they will be attracted to the food. The only real way to get rid of them is to not have the food available. You cant poison or trap or shoot a rat problem away, more will come to fill their spot. Just keep the feed in a ratproof feeder and you will be good. Lots of info online, but be forewarned everyones got an opinion on bedding, food, temperature etc. Read up but dont take anything as gospel. Remember these birds have been living off the scraps of humanity for thousands of years, stick to the hardy breeds and they will be just fine. Good luck anon! You can do it!
I guess this is the chicken general now
Chica, who I shared rarely over the past few years, passed away in her sleep tonight. She was only a little over three but she was the most special little bird and I've never had a pet like her before. I miss her so so much.
When I first shared pictures of her someone said if I treated her right she would give me many eggs. That didn't turn out to be true because she liked to crow and cosplay as a rooster with her big floppy comb. On the rare occasions she laid eggs they were often soft and she had trouble getting them out. Still, I like to think even if I didn't get many eggs that that doesn't mean I didn't treat her right. I'll miss you, Chica.
>Sideways
Damnit
RIP dear little Chica.
She looks like a loving little character.
I'm sorry for your loss, anon.
Thank you both. Going to bed without giving her goodnight snuggles before returning her to her sleep box for the first time was really hard tonight. She would get so excited every night and if I took too long cleaning the room up and getting ready for bed she'd fly onto my shoulder and make a huge nuisance of herself. I'll never have another pet like her.
Take care of all your chickens, anons. They're all very precious.
That sweet little face and trusting eyes!
She really loved you, chicanon.
Good night, Chica. You were a real one. Sorry for your loss, anon.
>When I first shared pictures of her someone said if I treated her right she would give me many eggs. That didn't turn out to be true because she liked to crow and cosplay as a rooster with her big floppy comb.
Bro had a transgender chicken
Anyone know of a good site for chicken coop plans?
All the plans I've seen are generic and based off of shit from the 1880's.
Ya some things "just work" but you should build according to the breeds you have and the location.
As an example, large breeds like cochin and brahmas don't like roost bars high up, and heavy bodied birds can develop bumble foot from jumping down onto another hard surface.
If I had a coop in a fenced yard I wouldn't worry about predators as much, if I had one in a rural area with coyotes or foxes I would have a concrete perimeter footer at the base of the wire.
Sone simple pointers:
Make everything tall enough so you don't have to bend over when you go in.
Attach nesting boxes to the outside so you don't have to go in for eggs. Have hinged lid so gravity keeps it closed, don't have a swing-out door that relies on a latch.
Run water to the inside, either with a hose or permanent pvc pipe so you don't have to go in and out to clean stuff constantly.
Automatic waterers are awesome. I use a type for dogs/livestock that basically have a toilet tank type float. Get the stainless bowl, not the plastic (pic).
Design the floor of the roost so you can scrape out poop without hitting a 2x4 frame. Either frame the underside or only frame the sides and back.
Wire around the roost box base to have additional run space that's also shaded.
Doors are a pain- have them "butt-up" to the door frame, not inset.
So I had hens and I didn't get a rooster. I now wish I had a rooster, and if I do it again, I would get a rooster, no questions asked. They are worth the feed for the amount of 'work' they provide.
>walking security systems as invested in your investment as you are
>cool pets
>don't eat ANYWHERE near as much as hens
>help the girls find food better than the hens do, will pick every bug out of your yard clean
>vicious as frick to anyone who fricks with the hens
>alarm system
>can provide fertilized eggs in the long run should you want more chickens
they're worth every penny
It's pretty funny watching the rooster pick up every single bill of grass and calling for the hens to eat it.
Definitely great to have around to fight the hawks and they break up fights between the hens, too.
I get a kick out of the rooster presenting the hens with flowers.
I have one rooster that seems to do this more than others.
Ours does it with every random twig. He does that in the middle of the permanent enclosure that's all dirt, meanwhile there's whole sections of pasture for the chickens to graze on.
nice wiener
BBC
>screams at 4 am in the morning
I am raising chicks and I will try keeping one rooster out of the bunch but I'm pretty sure I'm gonna get complaints from the neighbours.
Get a bantam rooster.
They make cute little squeeze toy noises but they think theyre a real rooster.
I actually have 2 bantam chicks in the mix. It might be nice for the sound level but I don't really want to hatch more bantams.
Free roosters are easy to come by.
Sure but that doesn't solve the noise problem.
Third way, there might be some rule/law against roosters in my neighbourhood. We'll see when the time comes.
I checked the temperature in the coop at night, didn't drop below 90 with the heat lamp, so I put the chicks in there this morning.
they make anti-crow collars. Look them up. They're not expensive if you're really worried.
Do they also make anti-cow collars? You never know when bessie will start craving tendies
They're starting to go outside more and more. Whenever my old hens catch a glimpse of the baby chicks they make this angry-sounding call, like when when old-old hens were introduced to the slightly newer but now old hens.
There's two ways this can go. Either you tell them to frick off or you get them on your side with eggs. Everyone likes some good eggs.
It's good to have a rooster to keep the hens in line. Also, best to ask what sort of chickens you're buying before you actually pay for them. Barn raised can lay eggs outside of their nests.
>Just for eggs mostly
Don't objectify animals.
are animals not objects?
Too late.
You vegans probably see your pets as burglar alarms just like everyone else does. How is that not objectifying animals?
I'm not that guy, but my cat would be the worst burglar deterrent. He's literally always silent unless it's food time. He just hides from strangers at the house.
On topic, I'm looking at buying property with a decent space for chickens. Would love to raise my own. For eggs mostly, but also for their funny noises.
One of my buddies.
This is a heartwarming post. Thanks gramps, you're a cool guy with cool birds
This one was really cool.
I would buy crickets to feed him but when I was out I would walk around the yard and catch grasshoppers for him. Then he learned to follow me around and catch the grasshoppers I scared out of the grass.
Grey bird is same bird.
Sorry for shit resolution.
7 chicks I hatched. They're cute when they sleep, but they get rowdy very early in the morning. I don't have any litter because they started eating the paper towels, and based on how much shit they fling all over the floor, wood shavings wouldn't last long either. We should have a new coop to put them outside next week.
Timothy grass after they outgrow the paper towels.
Don't buy the little $7 bag for rabbits.
Buy the $20 compressed cube for horses.
I hatch 400-800 birds a year and a single compressed baul will last an entire season.
But hinsetly it's summer and those birds are ready to go outdoors anyways.
Some anon hatched ayam cemani/wyandotte crossbred chicks last thread. He said he’d give updates on how they looked.
Meant for
I was think of picking some up from there. Any idea what killed them?
I honestly think tractor supply just gets their birds from massive hatcheries that don't focus on healthy breeding stock, just quantity.
I've never gotten "quality" birds from there- they're always issue meeting the breed standard with some trait, regardless of breed.
Now I do have a "complete set" of faverolles that I bought years ago and none died. But they seem to be too closely related because their offspring have high mortality rates. If I hatch them with some of my other breeds ill loose most of the faverolles but the others will be fine (I stopped hatching the faverolles).
Jesus my grammar looks like an excerpt form an ESL class.
I swear that was either autocorrect or just typing faster than I was formulating my thoughts.
That was me.
The Ayam Blue is doing well.
Got a couple others but they didn't get the splash gene so they're just black.
The blue has a weird comb due to the wyandottes rose comb so difficult to tell sex right now. It's looking like a male but I'm honestly only good at guessing on a few breeds.
The color is on the charcoal side of the blue colors but definitely not black.
I'll get some pics when they cooperate today and post them.
Best pic I could get of the blue.
Oldest of the blacks.
It would sit on my lap for about 1/1000th of a second less time then it took my camera to autofocus so this is what we get.
This is basically what the blue's comb is looking like
Kek. Why does he have ears and hands?
And I had my flash on so the legs are reflecting that, they're actually darker and look more like the younger bird.
Avoid tractor supply birds.
I don't know what it is with them but their birds have a high mortality rate.
>hatch 32 birds.
>stop by tractor supply for feed.
>buy 7 polish chick's (3 white, 4 black/white crest
>put in with my freshly hatched 32
>within 2 weeks all 7 polish have died, lost 1 out of the 32
I also bought 15 barnevelder and 8 wyandotte one time.
Few months later I had 4 barnevelder and 3 wyandottye left.
Midwest tsc manager here, our birds are fine.
They are not the best but far from the worst, corporate put autistic effort into not fricking up anything that could give them undeniably bad PR and lose their rural clientele.
I can tell you where they fail as a corporation but the chick's isn't one of them.
I'm sure there's stores that are stuck with a bad hatchery but on average ship ain't bad.
Dude there were 2 instances this season of people getting birds from TSC with more than 2 legs
I've personally gotten scissor beaks and webbed toe birds from TSC (because you're not allowed to pick your birds, the sales associate has to get them).
Not only do they get bottom barrel reject hatchlings from substandard hatcheries but the employees don't give a shit and never inspect their birds or properly tend to them.
I guarantee every person here has walked into a TSC and seen a dead bird in the waterer.
One out of five of my buff Orpingtons that I bought there just died randomly in the middle of the night
>Any tips for newbies Wauf
Let them roam free they really like it. They will also dig up your neighbours flower beds.
>Chickens that live in local topsoil normally lay eggs with a high lead content due to 52 years of leaded gas
so its only applicable in the US, got it
In all seriousness it’s something to look out for. Mexico didn’t have any ban on leaded gas until after the US completely* outlawed it and Europe didn’t have any wide scale band until 1992, only 4 years before the US. So make sure to check your local area’s history and follow the previous advise just to be safe.
*Farm equipment is/was an exception to this law for a long time. This is the case in other countries so even in rural areas you need to be careful.
Can we make this the new chicken general? I really enjoyed the last thread and I wanted to see how that anon’s crossbreed chicks are doing.
Only reason I made this thread is because I couldn't find the chicken general.
What crossbreeds?
Won't litter on top of the topsoil turn into a mess?
Undeniably based.
Can I get away with no Brooding Box for Ducklings in summer?
That's questionable.
If you can put a heatlamp somewhere in the pen where they're out of the wind it will be fine.
Im talking about inside the house.
Don't think so. The brooder box doesn't just keep them warm, it keeps them at one consistent temp which is needed since they can't regulate their internal body temp yet. Brooder box helps with wind, breezes, drafts, whatever unexpected sudden change in heat. 100% worth the trouble, even in summer.
I'll put out week old birds in early spring and open up their house in the morning so they can run around the pen and they don't give a shit that it's 54 degrees.
What kind of homosexuals are they. Not even Human Babies need that much care.
I'm not surprised. They're wild Animals, how did you care look after them inside?
I have multiple brooder setups for indoors.
If I start early in the season (like january) I'll put hatchlings in a 150 gallon horse trough then rotate them to wire brooder pens before they go outside. This is in a shop building with concrete floors.
Once nightly temps are in the 50's they go into outdoor pens- that have roost boxes with heat lamps I can close up at night.
Here's a baby that got too excited when it ran away and fell down. He just layed there for a little while, long enough for me to get out my phone and take a picture.
He's fine but it was funny.
That is funny kek.
I'm not listening to you guys though. You work for Big Brooder or something. When it's summer it's hot enough in my Bedroom not to need to spend money on all of this equipment.
>all of this equipment.
It's a 5 dollar bulb and a plastic tub.
Or use a big cardboard box.
I thought I had to buy a specific type of box. Well anyway I live in the UK and electricity is extortionate.
A 250w bulb is $10 a month (typical U.S. rate) if left on for 24 hours a day.
Baby chick's get warmth from mom. Even if they're running around in 60 degree (F) weather during the day they can snuggle with mom for 10 minutes to warm up then go run around again.
The larger brood you have the more they can ball up together and conserve heat.
100 degrees the first week, dropping down 5 degrees a week until they are feathered out.
We have chicken breeds that go back to the Roman era. We figured out what is best for the health and growth of chicks a long time ago.
If you want to be cheap then wrap a 75w bulb in a towel and put in the box.
When people lose power during storms (I've done this) you can fill up a soda bottle with hot water and place it in the brooder box. The problem is that you have to refill every couple of hours at best.
You can do what you want but expect fatalities.
I can't have any fatalities my Lord, I'll get a Lamp.
That does sound safer I'll look them up now. Thanks.
don't listen to that idiot. you dont want a big brooder lamp. they're unsafe because if they fall they burn chicks and start fires. no one uses them anymore.
get an ecoglow. they're cheap as shit on amazon or any farm store. angle it slightly and the chicks can self regulate how much heat they want under it and they feel like they're under a hen so they're happier. They're also fireproof and safe. As the chicks grow you can just raise it up on the legs until they're ready to not need it anymore
The plates are cool and all.
But are you that big of a moron that you can't keep a lightbulb from falling or starting a fire?
Earthquakes
You need a gamefarm
Can't have that in Louisville as far as I'm aware.
Why not?
Not allowed to have any crowing birds.
Because of sound?
>
Looking into getting some chickens right now. Just for eggs mostly. Currently building the coop and the run. Any tips for newbies Wauf? I'm thinking of starting with 4 barred Plymouth rock hens, they say they do well in heat and cold which is what I need as I'm in Kentucky. (OP)
>502gay
bruh get out while you can