Savingdogs-Saving the chickens

[savingdogs]

Well around here the dust bunnies multiply like real rabbits, I have a golden retriever! Not to mention the other animals living in the house (currently my other four dogs and two foster dogs, a little terrier mix and a dutch shepherd). And did I mention the three cats?
Seriously though, the golden retriever could shed a whole dog about once a day. I keep saying I'm going to stuff a pillow with it. It would probably smell too much like a dog though.

I thought the dutch shepherd was going to get adopted today, but he is a little bit of a demon and the person is "thinking it over". Which I think is a very polite no thanks. This one jumps fences, digs holes, chases chickens, chews whatever he can get his teeth on and has incessant energy. Did I mention his good points? Uh....he doesn't have many. But he is housetrained and aims to please. Since we hadda warn the poor fella, he backed out, surprise surprise. This is the third time for this dog, too, of that happening. Sometimes it is really hard for them to know which ones to pick out of the humane society.......
My other foster is a little cutie, a 10-pounder "Harry" who thinks he is really tough. He was just returned from his adoption, he was being naughty also, but in his case it is kinda funny. I place him with a family with a 100-pound Anatolean shepherd, who was another dog I fostered a year ago and these people were a return adopter. Well Harry was bossing around the giant dog and making his life miserable. Wouldn't let him go near his own food bowl and such. The lady worked on it for a couple months but finally realized the first dog was really unhappy ever since Harry came.....and Harry was very happy! But he is back with me now.
We decided Harry needs to be the only dog in his next home. If you want to see their photos, they are at mustlovedogsnw.com under Harry and Mookie. Here at my house, Harry beats up on Mookie but NOBODY else. He wouldn't dare.
Came home with a migraine today with Mookie still in the car and our tails between our legs.............

 

[savingdogs]

So, my sister is in town and we are going tomorrow for early thanksgiving....or Canadian Thanksgiving she is calling it.

I was supposed to bring deviled eggs but my chickens decided to go on egg strike this week for some reason. I think two are moulting but I don't know why we got so few, I'll have to work on that problem. Guess I'm stopping at the store for veggies and dip. Not very self-sufficient!

We are meeting at my brother's house and he just moved in, so it is kinda a housewarming thingy too. It should be fun. My family is great, I just don't get to see them often. My mom is still around and in her 80s, she will be there and she has a live in boyfriend (isn't that SINFUL!) too. And I should get to see my granddaughter, which is always fun, she is only eight months old.

This works out great because I have to work on the real thanksgiving this year (I work at a boarding kennel and drew short straw). :/

 

[Blackbird]

Whoo! Go grandma!
Have fun at the get together!

 

[savingdogs]

I'm still getting used to that "grandma" title....but the baby is a charmer!

 

[Blackbird]

Oh, sorry, I meant your mother, not you! Sorry, no disrespect!

 

[savingdogs]

So how do you all change the titles in your journals? I'm brain dead when it comes to computers............guess that comes from being a grandma. lol

I wanted to make my title "Egg eating!"

For a while my egg production has been diminishing and we couldn't quite figure it out. We had started to suspect egg eating and now my son has "caught" two culprits. I'm thinking I should eat them asap! We had them isolated though and they ESCAPED, the little buggers, and tried to get back to the coop. They got into the duck pen which of course has eggs too.

So far we have identified two of my Buff Orpingtons as the eat eaters. Of course they are the prettiest ones. Some of them have feather loss, but these two are perfectly gorgeous. I think they are high ranking in my flock, too, the highest ranking I believe. Some of my BOs are rather raggedy from being my roo Charlie's "favorite" and from being pecked on my Ms. Egg eater number one and Ms. Egg eater number two.

I think chicken is on the menu for the week. And chicken soup................

 

[Henrietta23]

So how do you all change the titles in your journals? I'm brain dead when it comes to computers............guess that comes from being a grandma. lol

I wanted to make my title "Egg eating!"

For a while my egg production has been diminishing and we couldn't quite figure it out. We had started to suspect egg eating and now my son has "caught" two culprits. I'm thinking I should eat them asap! We had them isolated though and they ESCAPED, the little buggers, and tried to get back to the coop. They got into the duck pen which of course has eggs too.

So far we have identified two of my Buff Orpingtons as the eat eaters. Of course they are the prettiest ones. Some of them have feather loss, but these two are perfectly gorgeous. I think they are high ranking in my flock, too, the highest ranking I believe. Some of my BOs are rather raggedy from being my roo Charlie's "favorite" and from being pecked on my Ms. Egg eater number one and Ms. Egg eater number two.

I think chicken is on the menu for the week. And chicken soup................

Go back to your original post and click on edit. Then you can change the title!

 

[ohiofarmgirl]

crazy chickens!

shh.. i tell you a secret.. one of my favorite hens, Fats, is an egg eater. but i cant bring myself to do anything about her b/c i love her! yikes! i'm a softy

hows those crazy goaties?

 

[savingdogs]

Very very sad here.
We have a horrible egg eating problem with my flock of chickens. It started with one hen and we didn't identify and cull her fast enough and now it seems like most of them have learned it within a week or three. I don't know how to tell, but I have not only my older birds doing it, but some of my newly purchased young pretty birds my hubby just bought me as a gift, and my newest chicks were just introduced to this flock and have been witnessing the egg eating.
We have at least four to kill and of course they are our nicest, friendliest Buff Orpingtons, which is the main breed we wanted to raise. And my new EE I have to cull....we just bought her about two months ago.
I'm having a really hard time not feeling really discouraged about the poultry. I had a significant egg business built up and now have no eggs to provide and I was bragging we would soon have blue or green eggs too. Everyone is hopefully bringing me cartons and I have not even enough eggs for our family. I also have ducks and those eggs have been getting eaten too (my EE!) and they may have learned to do this too, I don't know how to tell. I had a customer buying the duck eggs as well. If anyone has advice for me please speak up. I also posted at BYC.

My goat plan isn't working so great either. I bought my little nigy stud and he did his job great. But now when I advertise him on the appointed date for sale 45 days later, no one has called. We are not out so much financially, but we did not plan to house him for the winter so I'm not sure what to do with him. He makes everything smell! We find his odor drifts all about the farm no matter where he is. I thought breeding my does really early in the year would give me plenty of time to sell him, but now my ad has been running two weeks with no response. I hate to keep dropping the price as soon he will be too cheap to seem like a good goat! He is very good natured and sweet so that isn't a problem, but I only have one winter goat shelter and he eats a lot, it seems like he eats as much as my other three put together. Perhaps that is normal for a buck, but he is smaller than my other three so it seems odd. He tore down the roof we put over our buck pen, so we had to move him into our regular pen! So it is starting to stink over there! Hes gotta go but we don't know where. At this point I'd practically give him away since he isn't needed here anymore. Suggestions?

This is all happening with my husband's birthday tomorrow as well as me feeling really crappy with my health issues. I think I need to file for disability as I just can't work a full work week ever anymore. I not only can't hear any longer, but I get vertigo spells and have to lay down in my car during work or pull over when driving. It used to be just now and then but now it happens daily and I just have to make a change soon. So it is pretty hard to celebrate hubby's birthday. We did have friends over for the weekend and they really helped make it feel more like a celebration, but we postponed killing the chickens like we should have. These were our very first ones we brought home and of course their feathers are beautiful from all the eggs they have been eating! We are very sad and I hope we can even swallow the meat.

I did get a cool new thing for my birthday, which is a Kindle book reader from Amazon. But it certainly isn't very self-sufficient.....it feels odd downloading books about homesteading and living off the grid and reading them off of a battery-charged electronic device! But ya gotta pick and choose which technology to take and which to discard....we can't all do EVERYTHING from scratch. The thing has been the only thing cheering me up this week!

 

[dragonlaurel]

Hope you can get what he is worth, soon.
Do goats eat silage? Maybe you could harvest some weeds from your friends for it. I would have been happy to give you some.
Good luck with the eggs situation.

I saw rechargers with the batteries on sale at at Walgreens. A solar charger would be even more SS but it's an idea.