Our introduction to keeping chickens, the high's, the lows and pics of our journey.

[EverMystique1]

Well... Ever... The only REAL reason ya'll stay inside when it gets that cold, because in Burr Oak... There ain't a darn thing to do in the middle of winter. Unless you're a kid and you're running about in the middle of the night with your cousins having improper snow ball fights that are aimed in bad directions, taking out windows, then running like all get out to hide. You know how some of them Burr Oak people are. And it wasn't my fault. It was Harvey's and Jaybirds. Beaner (Cabrina) was to cold to go out. LOL. OH, and lets not forget hood riding... ya know... hook an old car hood up to a chain, chain to a truck, and go for a sled ride... Or maybe that was just when I was stupid enough to think it was a good idea with the cousins... Hmmm...

Speaking of heat lamps, I am right of Lake Mich. I used heat last year because I ended up with some sick birds. My first winter I had NO frost bite, used no heat lamps either. Last winter, heat lamps... Lost toes, comb points... If you don't need to, don't. If the temps are getting down in the negatives in double digits at night, what you really want to do is just before bed, hot oatmeal, and corn. Corn burns hot in the birds. Just like in summer you want to have LESS corn in their feed, but higher protien. Check that your birds have a full crop, yes, even if that means you are feeling up 60+ birds. The way my roosts are, I can duck in between the rows to get to every bird.

A birds used to heat sources are dead birds when those heat sources are suddenly gone because of power outages and the birds haven't developed a heavy down for winter..

Dear Lord. Jaybird and I were in the same car in driver's training, way back when. LMAO. I never did the hood riding, though. I was the sickly member of the family. The only part of that which has changed is that I am a lot more careful of being exposed to others when they are ill, due to my compromised immune system and the rare disease. (Nothing like a 4-hour bug for the rest of the family that puts me down for 3 days, and possibly in the hospital getting fluids and calcium gluconate to keep my heart from stopping, right?)

I am in the process of installing more roosting areas to accommodate the extra birds, at least until they are sent to freezer camp. I was going to defrost my freezer today, but it was too danged hot to do anything other than nap. After having slept until 6pm yesterday, you wouldn't think I would still need a nap, but it was a heck of a week at work. LOL.

The closest we have to any sort of heat lamp is the light inside the coop. Just enough to take a little of the edge off, but without actually affecting the temperature much. The ones we had through this last winter all seemed to fair quite well. In total, I have had a whole 2 birds die of unknown causes, 3 of my free rangers and 3 in my original make-shift run were taken by some sort of local predator(s), and it appears we have lost 2 of the free range baby chicks to (most likely) the local hawk.

On a separate note: I have a young man who will be 17 years old at 8:43 am tomorrow, a measly 12 hours from now. I just told him that at 4:30am, I am coming in to dump a bucket of water on him and ask him, "How does that feel, jerk?" LOL. He's free for the taking, if anyone wants him. He'll eat you out of house and home, refuse to do anything that doesn't agree with his agenda, swear like a sailor, and get in your face... but he's such a nice young man. LOLOLOL.

I feel really darned old. *sigh*

 

[Bens-Hens]

Quote:
Hahahah, I know how it feels to wait! I don't think they were stolen, I was had a weird feeling as I saw them in the nest boxes getting ready, but no eggs at the end of the day. Must have just changed their mind. Our RIR Rosie was just in a box, but seemed to have changed her mind too, I really thought she was going to lay her first then.

 

[Bens-Hens]

Quote:
Happy Birthday to the young man, I love the bucket of water trick lol!

 

[Bens-Hens]

OK, small update time.

Smudge seems to have perfected his early morning crow, and learned that if he crows long enough I feel bad and let him out before 8 am.

I let him out early and he crows early, I keep him in and there is a couple of hours of muffled crowing, then is quiet when he has lady company for about an hour.

I can't let him out earlier, so I had to perform a upgrade of the night box.

Used a old PC fan, piece of off cut mesh and a Nokia phone charger to make a guarded fan over a side vent. I made a wall from some old pool fence to reduce the size (was made for two roosters and we only have one) He now has a compartment 500mm x 500mm x 500mm. I then lined it with acoustic panel foam, was a bit costly at $55 for a sheet, barely big enough to do the job, but so far it seems to work well. I put my phone in there with the alarm blaring and could not hear it with my ear to the door.

The other compartment gets used to store the power cable and timer for the fan.



Also, Cleo (LS), our newest layer (of the four we have) dropped this whopper today!


Hope everyone has a great day!

 

[NovaAman]

Those are some nice colors there, Ben!

I got a pic of Honey's feathers up close. She's the lemon blue girl... Might have a more accurate color name later...

Look at all those blue tips. Her tail is nearly all blue, as well as the tips of both wings.

 

[houseofknauss]

Well... Ever... The only REAL reason ya'll stay inside when it gets that cold, because in Burr Oak... There ain't a darn thing to do in the middle of winter. Unless you're a kid and you're running about in the middle of the night with your cousins having improper snow ball fights that are aimed in bad directions, taking out windows, then running like all get out to hide. You know how some of them Burr Oak people are. And it wasn't my fault. It was Harvey's and Jaybirds. Beaner (Cabrina) was to cold to go out. LOL. OH, and lets not forget hood riding... ya know... hook an old car hood up to a chain, chain to a truck, and go for a sled ride... Or maybe that was just when I was stupid enough to think it was a good idea with the cousins... Hmmm...

Speaking of heat lamps, I am right of Lake Mich. I used heat last year because I ended up with some sick birds. My first winter I had NO frost bite, used no heat lamps either. Last winter, heat lamps... Lost toes, comb points... If you don't need to, don't. If the temps are getting down in the negatives in double digits at night, what you really want to do is just before bed, hot oatmeal, and corn. Corn burns hot in the birds. Just like in summer you want to have LESS corn in their feed, but higher protien. Check that your birds have a full crop, yes, even if that means you are feeling up 60+ birds. The way my roosts are, I can duck in between the rows to get to every bird.

A birds used to heat sources are dead birds when those heat sources are suddenly gone because of power outages and the birds haven't developed a heavy down for winter..

we had below zero for several weeks off and on and low teens--I had a hard time keeping the coop between 25 and 30 degrees with 2 heat lamps running---but..... I have a large coop also(too big)

my chickens and ducks get plenty of corn, layer pellets and table scraps--this coop is also shared with the ducks who are partitioned off with hardware cloth. last winter I had 13 chickens and 13 ducks. I can't see letting their coop get to zero and below just doesn't seem right, but .....that's how chickens have survived forever!

 

[houseofknauss]

OK, small update time.

Smudge seems to have perfected his early morning crow, and learned that if he crows long enough I feel bad and let him out before 8 am.

I let him out early and he crows early, I keep him in and there is a couple of hours of muffled crowing, then is quiet when he has lady company for about an hour.

I can't let him out earlier, so I had to perform a upgrade of the night box.

Used a old PC fan, piece of off cut mesh and a Nokia phone charger to make a guarded fan over a side vent. I made a wall from some old pool fence to reduce the size (was made for two roosters and we only have one) He now has a compartment 500mm x 500mm x 500mm. I then lined it with acoustic panel foam, was a bit costly at $55 for a sheet, barely big enough to do the job, but so far it seems to work well. I put my phone in there with the alarm blaring and could not hear it with my ear to the door.

The other compartment gets used to store the power cable and timer for the fan.



Also, Cleo (LS), our newest layer (of the four we have) dropped this whopper today!


Hope everyone has a great day!

ARENT THOSE EXTRA JUMBO SIZED EGGS CRAZY?? IT BLOWS MY MIND THAT CHICKENS CAN DO THAT.

 

[NovaAman]

we had below zero for several weeks off and on and low teens--I had a hard time keeping the coop between 25 and 30 degrees with 2 heat lamps running---but..... I have a large coop also(too big) my chickens and ducks get plenty of corn, layer pellets and table scraps--this coop is also shared with the ducks who are partitioned off with hardware cloth. last winter I had 13 chickens and 13 ducks. I can't see letting their coop get to zero and below just doesn't seem right, but .....that's how chickens have survived forever!

It used to seem kinda mean to me too. Then I used the heat lamps to take the chill off. I think it was meaner, though not intended for me to have birds lose toes and comb points. I have heard/read on here that some people wrap their roosts in old thick pile carpet for the winter months... I am thinking about it. BUT I used WIDE roosts in most places now. Lesson learned... Anyway... Have you ever put your hand in a live chickens down in the winter? talk about toasty warm. AND I have had hens brood in the dead of winter, snow on the ground, and hatch all the chicks, raise them with out losing a single one, so apparently mother nature has equiped them well. It's just us stupid people who get birds not suited to our environs..

 

[joannefiddler]

OK, small update time.

Smudge seems to have perfected his early morning crow, and learned that if he crows long enough I feel bad and let him out before 8 am.

I let him out early and he crows early, I keep him in and there is a couple of hours of muffled crowing, then is quiet when he has lady company for about an hour.

I can't let him out earlier, so I had to perform a upgrade of the night box.

Used a old PC fan, piece of off cut mesh and a Nokia phone charger to make a guarded fan over a side vent. I made a wall from some old pool fence to reduce the size (was made for two roosters and we only have one) He now has a compartment 500mm x 500mm x 500mm. I then lined it with acoustic panel foam, was a bit costly at $55 for a sheet, barely big enough to do the job, but so far it seems to work well. I put my phone in there with the alarm blaring and could not hear it with my ear to the door.

The other compartment gets used to store the power cable and timer for the fan.



Also, Cleo (LS), our newest layer (of the four we have) dropped this whopper today!


Hope everyone has a great day!

Ben, you are the type of person who would be most valuable if shipwrecked on an island...your ingenuity is fascinating! Necessity truly is the mother of invention, but we're not all equally endowed!

 

[Bens-Hens]

Hahahaha, thanks.

To quote the kids movie Robot's "See a need, fill a need!" I could not hear Smudge this morning until we opened the back door of the house. We are by far the closest people to the box so that makes me feel a little better about bothering the neighbors.

Still working hard on our next hatch list, it's a fluid piece that's for sure.

Blue Australorp's top the list,
Found some Barred Rocks I like,
Some full sized Fav's too
but am not set on a dark layer. I was all keen for some French Wheaten Maran's, but after some research am wary of the breed. Not that it's a breed issue, I think it's more an isolation issue. We are very remote here and it seems that has an effect of breeds. Also, the local supplies are not as dark as our US counter parts, so I am trying to find out how dark local Welsummer's are. We already have Curly the Barnevelder, but until she lay's we won't be certain how dark her eggs will be.

I am really keen for a dark layer to add to our coloured egg tray goals.

See what answers come in from the couple of places I have asked.