SufficientSelf's Chicken Thread!!!

sdwolfden

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Just ran acrossed this thread and thought I' through in my two cents. My SO, Marie, has been pestering me for sometime to get some chickens, so this spring I caved in. My landlord was no big help in detering her since he is now too cripled up with old age ailments to keep chickens himself. He offered us an old shed he had used for chickens quite sometime back. After refurbishing the coop and building a yard, enclosed do to predetors around here, we were on our way. Since I raised chickens umpteen years ago, I was recruited to go buy the chicks, day olds from our local farm store. We desided on some DP's for eggs and some Cornish Crosses for quick meat birds. When I got there I ended up with 6 Barred Rock pullet chicks, 12 Cornish Crosses and what was supposted to be 12 straight run Buff Orpingtons, actually ended up with 11 Buff hens and one Aricana that happend to be in the same brooder tank that kept running into my hand when I tried for the buffs.
Trying to keep this short, 11 CC ended up in the freezer within 10 weeks, the largest tipped the scale at some 11 and a half pounds. We lost two birds, one CC to a heart attack and one buff to over crowding one cold spring night when we didn't lower the brooder lamp. We now have 17 little ladies producing 12 to 14 eggs per day in late November. Being "old school", we mix our own layer feed from a recipe I learned from my parents when they were on the farm with a few modifications. We buy 50lb bags of COB (corn, oats and barly) and mix in 5 lb. fish meal (60% portin) and 5 lb. mineral suppliment. We also feed free choice calcium along with "reconstituted" dehydrated alfalfa since we can't let them free range. They just seem to love it. Our latest addition is a rooster we got from our rancher freind. I think he is some sort of RIR cross and his name is "Shanghia". We got him in June and after some initial getting used to time, he fits right in with the girl. We are hoping that our aracana goes broody come spring and we will let her sit on a clutch and hopefully, we won't have to buy too many replacements.
If I knew how to upload pictures, I'd show the girls here. I guess it is something i'll have to work on.
 

Hinotori

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One of my silkie chicks is looking pretty good I think. If she lives up to promise of her current looks, I may actually try her at a show to see what the judge thinks. She has that nice S shape when she stands and a wonderful big crest for being 11 weeks old. Nice feet with good feathering and well placed toes. We'll see.

DH really doesn't care for the silkies. He allows them because of their chick raising abilities. Even my silkie rooster takes good care of chicks and finds them food and allows them to snuggle and warm under him. And he's apparently psychic. Even with that massive crest of feathers, he is always the first to see hawks or other things fly over. He puts the EE rooster to shame. Hopefully the growing ameraucana and brahma cockerels are as good as the silkie.
 

Bettacreek

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Wow. Our silkie/ameraucana mix always has to have a haircut. She can hardly see at all without a cut. You can see a big difference in her when you cut them, because she can finally SEE! She actually does quite well with the haircuts too, you'd think she'd spazz out, but she's pretty good about staying still, even though she's rarely ever held.
 

Hinotori

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What started as one silkie hen has spread. They dunk their heads in the water and soak their crests, then rub them up out of their faces. They look like little punk rock chickens. I have given haircuts before. They figure out really quick that it helps them see and cooperate.
 

Hinotori

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So I let out the birds today. Went back out about 15 minutes later to give them some treats. One of my silver ameraucanas was gone. I did a head count of everyone else and they were all there. I looked all over. Was walking around with scratch calling, hoping to find her but she was just gone. She'd never left that pen before willingly.

Apparently my EE rooster has been hearing about me wanting to get rid of him. I had come back to the run and was sitting for a second trying to figure out where she might have gone. I hear some squawking and here he comes herding her back to her pen from out in the marsh.

He hasn't shown much interest in those girls as they aren't part of his flock. So maybe I will keep him around if I have enough girls to go around. Currently there will be 30 hens in the big pen once I get these 6 girls integrated. Some of those will be culled this coming year, but I'll have replacements by then. I guess 30 is a bit much for two cockerels who aren't mature yet. The girls push them both around. The 6 in the pen were bought for the one and he apparently knows it. He dances around their pen trying to show off to them. That gives him 7 girls of the same breed and I'll give him a few of the EEs, definately the 3 young pullets. The brahma boy has 6 girls since the older brahma has been hanging out with them for the last month. I was going to give him the 4 rocks as well if I split up the flock.
 

Marianne

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Chickens are so entertaining when you take the time to watch! This morning there were 7 bluejays trying to eat leftover scratch on the ground. One of my Barred Rock roosters and a hen stayed pretty agressive in chasing them off. Funny stuff!!

Anyway, I just started fermenting grains for my chickens. I had read about it on Backyard Chickens a while back, then recently I found Bee's blog at http://naturalchickenkeeping.blogspot.com/p/fermented-feed.html that gives simple, well stated directions.

I have two hens that are 'recovering'. The ferments grains should help.
 

Beekissed

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That's not my blog... :D She features some of my content but that blog belongs to a lady from over on BYC that started it and built it in less than 2 wks time, got 2 sponsors and over $160 in giveaways during that short time. She's great!

I only WISH I could accomplish the work she has done...would take me forever! :p She is a writer/journalist that took an interest in natural chicken keeping and decided to start compiling some info on it for a blog site because the threads on BYC are so big.

My fermentation methods are a little more simple than the one described on the blog site so the one described and pictured there is her own method. STILL good info and fermentation of the feeds has become a byword over on BYC now...and all that happened since March of this year. Folks are finding out quickly how amazing it is for flock health, egg production, feathering, conditioning and savings on feed costs.
 

Hinotori

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I've been reading on the fermentation. As soon as I can find a good place to put the containers to do it, I'll try it.

We have kittens getting into everything, so I'm busy teaching them to stay off stuff at the moment.
 

Beekissed

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I have mine in my bedroom and it has a lid on it, so nothing can get into it. The lid is cracked open on one side but is still secure. It takes up just enough room for the bucket and doesn't have any smell unless I am stirring it and dipping some out.

I use the two bucket system and this decreases the mess and fuss exponentially. Nice and neat, efficient and cheap.
 

Hinotori

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I'll talk to DH about that. I can find room in the back bedroom that is mostly used for pantry and storage. I figured it needed to be someplace temperature controlled.

Temp stays about 55 in there in winter. Will that be ok? We only keep the main house at 62.
 
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