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What is the best bedding (straw, hay, pine shavings, etc) for nesting boxes to get the cleanest eggs? I am currently using straw. Whenever there is wet weather outside - almost all eggs are dirty. Also occasionally there is a poop in the nest (possibly because of some of them molting and have...

With 1:30 roosters to hens ratio I am afraid there will be below normal fertility at my next hatch. I am wondering if instead of removing infertile eggs I could replace them with fresh ones and by that increase number of eggs that will develop. I would have to do it as early as possible. So...

Does anybody use 1/4" hardware cloth as incubator/hatcher floor? I need to make one, but my concern is a possible galvanized metal reaction with chick poop during hatching and affect that may have on the chicks. I will not be able to put any liner onto it because there will be another floor with...

I will have about 60 birds to process in near future. They will be 3-week old cockerels and 2.5 year old hens - all leghorns and their crosses . Last time I have processed 20 for human food it took too many hours for the meat collected, and even when skinning not plucking. We buy chicken...

I have 56-egg Chinese made incubator with motorized egg turner I used successfully a few time. Instead of doing 2 sequential batches this time in it I would prefer to do one large batch. So I was thinking about adding 2nd floor to it with just wire mesh and turning them by hand as I don't have a...

Got another sudden chicken death within 10 days, this time it was caught on video Explanation/timeline for ease of tracking: @0:35 she gets out of the coop. Chickens are thirsty after night in the coop, she is the lowest in pecking order so she keeps distance as usual @1:21 frenzy starts...

One chicken suddenly died overnight. Some time between lights off and sunrise according to coop camera. She was only pecked by others after she was dead in the morning. It only dropped to -5C in the coop overnight, but might be the coldest that we have had this winter. The was found dead on her...

Just wondering would it be safe to use feed grade whole grains, specifically whole barley for making bread or beer, does any one do it and would I need to wash and dry it first before crashing it in a corona mill?

Have added 20 two months old pullets to the main coop of 17 egg layers recently and started to get poopy eggs due to some chicks hanging out or sleeping on the edges of the nest boxes with their heads looking out and consequently poop going in. The nesting boxes front boards are about 6" deep...

I need outdoor remote control for a fence that would remember its "on"state after power blip or outage. Any remotes at Amazon I looked or tried so far will become off following any power interruption. This is unacceptable for a electric fence that should be relied to remain on unless switched...

Have been raising chickens for 3 years and never have felt a need to deworm any of them. About 2 months ago we hatched 30 new ones, which are about 7 weeks old now and one of the chicks showing what I believe a sign of worms in a form of droopy wings and not gaining weight at the same pace as...

Everything looked normal, than found 1 chick dead when came back one hour later . No signs of injury, crop is huge and soft, some soft liquid food in the throat. Necropsy has showed no obvious blockages, the crop was huge like that of adult bird and filled with soft food. The crop size was may...

Our chickens never eat or peck bell peppers and we are getting lots of them (both red and green) in discarded produce - they all become worm food. Bell peppers and root veg are about only things they won't touch. There are plenty of people at BYC who say their chickens love bell peppers. Is...

When feeding purchased crashed oyster shell free choice, the egg shell thickness is "normal", may be tiny bit thicker than that of supermarket bought eggs. Our chickens are no big fans of oyster shells. However they go crazy about own baked & crashed egg shells or local crashed clam shells when...

1 of 33 2-week old chicks in the brooder became not steady on the feet stretching one leg to the site, limping,falling, being stepped on. Also opening mouth often (but not yawning). Is it an injury or Marek's? Can Marek's affect 2-week old chicks and what would be the symptoms? We do have...

She's almost 2y old Great Pyrenees / Lab mix. We have got her at 6 months age as a puppy mill rescue. About 2-3 weeks ago she started shedding heavily - mostly on the legs, tail and belly we have attributed to hot weather. We brushed here and took her for a dip in a river daily to minimize...

About 2.5 months ago 16 two months old leghorn & leghorn X pullets and one 2 months old leghorn cockerel from the brooder were introduced to 1.5 year old hen. The new pullets tried to peck her, but she stood the ground and they left you along, The cockerel stopped crowing and became may be 1/3rd...

The default search button (right top corner) drop down option ("Threadloom Search") seems to be not rendering proper resulting page, example: https://www.backyardchickens.com/threadloom/search?keywords=biochar&tab=0 and none of its results links are valid. "XenForo Search" works ok, as well as...

I have made a couple of 40-gal batches of charcoal lately and added it to a small section of chicken run deep litter for the purpose of chicken enjoyment and making/incorporating biochar in a future compost. Crashed to powder by foot traffic, even after thorough water hosing, the charcoal...

We have had 7 BR hens (and one roo) we bought as chicks in spring 2018 and by end of winter-spring 2019 they sucked at egg laying - going broody repeatedly with 2 week interval, pecking feathers (despite protein supplement), and just being big frame fat chickens upon butchering. Their...