Recent content by twoquinns

Most of our chickens are black and we still have a terrible time with hawk predation. We also have guineas get taken by hawks.

I was thinking scaly leg mites, too. A terrible, untreated, long standing case of it. Previous owner should be shot.

Do you base this statement on any scientific evidence?

I use pine shavings in my nest boxes. I’ve never heard of pine being a problem with poultry, just cedar.

We use these cage clips on hardware cloth. They do require a special tool but work well and are plenty strong.

The economy has nothing to do with honesty.

Snakes don’t leave body parts like legs. They swallow their prey whole.

Just as a heads up--sometimes hens will crow, too. Not a full-voiced, all-the-time crow like a rooster, but I've had several hens that occasionally crowed.

I started out using indoor/outdoor carpeting cut to fit my brooder. I changed it every day, taking the dirty one outside and hosing it off using a bit of Dawn dish soap, and hanging it in the sun to dry. After a few years of doing that successfully, I frankly got tired of having to hose them...

Does anyone else have problems gripping the lid of their Brinsea Octagons? I love the incubator but would like to figure out a way to attach a handle for lifting it. I have actually dropped it on occasion, and as you know, it's too expensive to take a chance on breaking it.

Thank you for the thoughtful reply. I really appreciate all the information. Regarding the Bielefelder, what the person actually called him in her text to me was a German Battlefield, but I can find no such beast online, so I assume she meant Bielefelder. Maybe we can blame the auto correct...

We have had a lot of losses from hawks this year and wonder if there might be a rooster that makes a good watchdog. We have 8 bantam hens and 2 bantam roosters, a Silver Duckwing Old English Gamebird and a Silver Sebright. Although the gamebird is sometimes aggressive toward us and tries his...

Came across this thread while looking for information about keeping hens and roosters together. Twice recently I have had newly hatched chicks killed but I don't know if they were killed by roosters or the mothers or other hens. This morning was the most recent incident. The chick was still in...

Thanks for the response. I do normally move the family to a smaller cage within the coop once the chicks get out from under mom. But these had just hatched yesterday and shouldn't really have been wandering yet. That's why I'm wondering if the hen is the one who attacked them. Usually the...

I've had a hen trying to steal a nest from another hen for about a week. I kept tossing her off but she kept coming back, so eventually I decided to let them work it out. So two days ago the interloper won out. Today, only two days after the 2nd hen won the contest, was hatch day. I just...