Recent content by Newchick429

I’ll try to get a better photo tomorrow

Thanks for the advice. I’ll look into the breed too! I’m sure they’re crosses, as it’s a free for all where we live. The new baby has upward tail feathers. Should I assume it’s a roo?

We have had two chicks and a rooster that we rescued when he was young. He’s still bald on most of his head, but otherwise doing well. I found a tiny chick left in the field next to us. It’s grown up well and I’ve introduced her to our other flock, they haven’t welcomed her in, but don’t pick...

Not yet, but we did buy a hanging feeder. So I’ll put that up and see how it goes. My husband spotted a fat adult in the yard yesterday and I saw a baby last night. So they’re still around. We have our rooster, along with another that comes by a few times a day. I guess we’ll have to resort to...

Another question from a newbie. I had my 3 older chicks out with our rooster and 3 other loose older chicks that spend most of their time in our yard. I heard a peeping distressed call, but everyone was accounted for. The peeping continued for over an hour, so I finally looked out to the field...

I really appreciate the comment on dog crates. I never thought about a rat squeezing through those holes. But I can see it happening now. We went and got hardware cloth to over every inch of the coop. So that’s the project for this weekend. They’ll be free range when one of us is outside to try...

We’re on stone island in Mexico. I haven’t seen any hawks or falcons. Luckily my husband works from home, so they can be outside when he’s there.

Even a shipping crate? I didn’t think that was possible! Looks like they may be in the bathroom for a while longer if that’s the case. Excuse the mess. Cleaning up after them is a full time job!

It’s a rental home. Our main fence is made of coconut trees with gaps. I thought about putting mesh screen over that, but the back ends to our landlords backyard that has a massive wrought iron gate up. He needs to open it when he fills the water tanks, so they could get through there. We tried...

Yes, there’s a large open field next door. It’s a coconut grove with a lot of brush. I assume it belongs to one of the restaurant owners in the area, they harvest coconuts often and put the brush in a pile to burn when the time is right. But a perfect breeding ground for rats.

I also posted in raising chicks for more information. But long story short, I lost three chicks at around 3-4 months old when I put them in the coop mid day. It didn’t have hardware cloth on the bottom, so rats made short work of my babies. We have new chicks, around the same age. I’m free...

Yes, I know that’s a possibility. There are cats and dogs on the island we live on. There’s not much tolerance for any aggression towards chickens since many people here depend on them for food and eggs. As far as I know the only predator has been the rats. My neighbors that do use coops have...

I have three fairly new babies. About three months old and fully feathered. We’ve had them outside with the ducks and our neighbors free roaming chickens, as well as our rooster. So far so good. We lost the last three babies when I put them in a coop around the same age. Rats got to them in a...

Thank you, that’s what we’re hoping. Most dogs roam around where we live, so poison isn’t an option. I’ve been watching YouTube videos on how to keep rats out. One of the main problems is these rats are fearless. They’re out all day and night. Thank you for the response.

It obviously needs a lot of work. We made it for a baby rooster that was almost pecked to death. He ended up sleeping in a crate in the house at night and never really used it. Now that he’s matured, he comes inside if there’s a bigger roster in the yard. Otherwise he sleeps in the trees. We...