How Many Eggs Did You Get Today?

[Ponypoor]

You make layer mash for the babies? Does it have calcium in it?

Nope I make the layer mash for the hens, the mama and babies go out in the run for some exercise for an hr or so and the brats bee line it to the mash! Brats I tell you brats! They eat everything! Fingers included.

I am going to make a hot mash of some of their chick starter tomorrow for them seeing as they enjoy the wet feed so much.

I have let my youngsters run wild with the older hens and eat what they want for years. Never have any issues. They have access to starter then grower (which they also eat well) as they grow up.

They also get to eat copious amounts of horse poop (actually picking the grains that pass through), and any grains not thrashed in the straw bedding. Needless to say they all completely trash the horses’ stalls during the day. Also there is not one spider or bug within 2’ of the barn floor! Yummy!

It’s a pretty good deal my gang has here, my eldest is around 8 or 9, she and my one silkie are my Roo’s favourite ladies.

 

[Ponypoor]

If you know which layers are giving you brittle eggs, you can give them a Calcium Citrate +D3 capsule directly in the beak every day for about a week and that should help. Get it at any store that carries vitamins and supplements.

Yep tried that didn’t work. Sometimes it’s just the factory falling apart with age. As long as they are laying something I am happy, laying internally I get very uptight about.

 

[Ponypoor]

Too much calcium for non-laying birds can mess up their kidneys. Roosters shouldn't have layer feed, nor retired hens or birds that are molting. This is why I've gone to all-flock and keep oyster shell on the side in a separate container. The laying hens help themselves, the non-layers ignore it. I learned this from the Educators here.

No such feeds up here like that, I haven’t had any issues with my gang, they eat what they want pretty much. The oyster shell I mix with their feed so they can pick at it or not. Some do some don’t.

I just follow how the old folks fed their flocks in Newfoundland - no fancy chicken feed there in the past, and likely not much now available either. They were fed scraps, fish guts and waste and grain. My grandmother had hens all the time. Of course if they stopped laying they were soup. Where as I have about 20 freeloading elderly lawn ornaments!

 

[Winderdear]

2 eggs today, from Brelly and Helmi

 

[Ponypoor]

2 eggs today, from Brelly and Helmi

I love your ladies names

 

[BigBlueHen53]

That's a pretty clutch of eggs, @Ponypoor!

 

[BigBlueHen53]

I got 9 eggs today. I don't know whom to blame for this, somebody posted what their eggs weigh so now I'm doing it, lol. I mean I'm weighing my eggs, I won't be posting it. I have to scroll back and find the app they were using. Sigh, like I have nothing better to do!
Anybody else have extreme weather moving in? We're expecting an ice storm tomorrow.

 

[Winderdear]

I love your ladies names

Thank you!

Helmikuu is Finnish and means February, or “pearl month”, I believe. I thought it suited her since she’s a Splash Marans. Brelly is Ebrel’s nickname, which is April in Cornish. I had fun looking through months in different languages and picked out the ones I thought were cutest. If I ever add more girls to my flock I’ll be in trouble though, as there aren’t many feminine sounding names to be found in the last months of the year!

 

[Ponypoor]

That's a pretty clutch of eggs, @Ponypoor!

Yup foumd it hidden under the sheet on the straw pile, I use the sheet to protect the straw from poops, nothing says good morning like grabbing a bales by the twine and getting a handful of cecal poop at 4:30am!



That’s Jaffarra she lays the very dark olive eggs.

 

[Winderdear]

I got 9 eggs today. I don't know whom to blame for this, somebody posted what their eggs weigh so now I'm doing it, lol. I mean I'm weighing my eggs, I won't be posting it. I have to scroll back and find the app they were using. Sigh, like I have nothing better to do!
Anybody else have extreme weather moving in? We're expecting an ice storm tomorrow.

The ice storm is going just north of where I’m at, and tornado weather just south. I’m hoping the predictions are accurate, and things don’t fluctuate one way or the other.

I hope the ice isn’t too bad where you are, and that you and your flock stay safe!