A bad day all round.
My youngest took her mother out to Wales for the aftenoon. They went in seperate cars. The youngest left her mother at the car park, with her three dogs and drove home. Mother couldn't find her car apparently and her phones battery ran out as she was talking to the youngest...
Shredded paper on the floor and in the nest boxes during winter. Bare floor when the weather warms up.
Clean every day.
Wash out (rough) once a week.
I do a partial clean in the run a couple of times a week. I progressively dig over the run throughout the year.
First thing is what do you feed them, a commercial feed? Do you know the feed profile?
As a very rough average an egg shell needs around 3 to 4 grams of calcium.
The hen requires calcium and on those occasions she can get more than she needs she can store the excess in some of her bones. Agian...
Four hours today. Warm amd sunny.
Fret finally got the decent dust bath she's been after.
I lifted her off her nest again despite it being obvious from the pile of broody poop she had been off her nest earlier in the day. She ate well and headed off on to the allotments with Henry. She was off...
There are a couple of farmers markets but they are hard to get to on public transport. I'll make the effort soon and visit what is reputed to be one of the better ones.
The last one I went to was a bit short on farmers, a bit short on raw produce. I did buy a very good jar of quince chutney there.
I hope those of you have have posted gloating about how many eggs you've been getting know the IRS watches this thread and you can expect a demand for undeclared income through the post any day now.:p
There is also that rather annoying factor in that chickens seem to like the crap bread with all the chemicals in it more than say a pitta bread.:lol: It's all that salt and sugar with a handfull of E numbers.
One really needs to know the feed profiles of both the layers feed and the conditioner.
Is there a reason why you can't feed both the conditioning feed, or similar and provide a dish of oyster shell or calcium carbonate in some form seperately. Most hens will eat the calcium and most roosters...
I must confess, I've bought a lot of packaged junk since I've been back in the UK. Things got so bad on the veg front I started buying frozen veg which while fine nutritionally, perhaps even better than the supermarket stuff, does lack taste and the right texture.
Three hours today. Warm with occasional bouts of weak sunshine.
Trying to catch up on the work on the plot that got put off due to rain for the last month.
Carbon has been pulling feathers out again. She did the same last year and the year before. It's things like this I find most frustrating...
A lot depends on how one feeds ones chickens and how many there are.
If one wants feed available all day type of feeding then one is more or less restricted to some kind of feeder system. I haven't found one that works well yet.
If you have a mealtime type feeding routine then ground feeding is...
Golden Comets were a very popular breed here in the West of England a few years ago. Lovely looking hens I think. Very rarely see their male counterpart.
Easy to pick out from most of the other Red Sex Link production hens assuming you have decent examples of the breed which is unlikely from...
It was a lovely day.:thWarm at 20C. Light wind. Not a drop of rain.
Spent three hours there and the chickens didn't go to roost until after 8pm which is late by recent timing.
Fret is getting off her nest during the day when I'm not there. I doubt she's getting much to eat but I know she's had a...