Making Lemonade [Selective Culling Project - very long term]

[U_Stormcrow]

Darker than the phone camera shows - there is a grey (blue) undertone. These tend to be my most attractive birds, actually, when hey end up with the grey underbellies.

 

[U_Stormcrow]

Second chick is (fake) butter yellow with much fainter markings on the back and no eye pencilling that I can see.

Sorry for the glare, was a before coffee photo.

 

[U_Stormcrow]

The count is now 8 happy, healthy, somewhat noisy chicks. Four left to hatch. Picture later, after the latest has had opportunity to dry off, fluff up, and be transferred to the brooder box with the others.

 

[Sally PB]

Congratulations! Noisy chicks are healthy chicks.

 

[U_Stormcrow]

 

[U_Stormcrow]

Final count is nine. To stop progression somewhere around day 9:10 when I candled. Clearly developed eye spot didn't progress much further. Going to have to egg Topsy the 12th, see what went wrong.

 

[U_Stormcrow]

I did not plant this color. I guess we will see how it does.

 

[U_Stormcrow]

Will get pics of the latest hatchlings soon. Debating starting another hatch. Next week's long weekend priority is new predator protection for the birds. I think I'm going to build a 50' x 50' chain link enclosure, use the fence as the ground, and run some solar-powered hot lines around the outside. Metal fence on wood posts, ala

My main fence should discourage large predators, its got all the voltage - this will just be for small critters tring to scale the fencing.
Will need to come up with some way to keep the "littles" from simply going out between the links. Debating either the "privacy fence" stuff (fancy woven nylon screen, basically) or some harder solution. Yes, chicken wire would do it too, but it rots so quickly in my climate - if I use it, it will be on the inside of the 4x4s, which will create a 3 1/2" gap to discourage predators like trash panda from simply reaching thru to grab my birds.

Would love to paint the fence black to reduce its visibility, but that would defeat the fence grounding.

 

[U_Stormcrow]

By privacy fence screen, I mean something like this - Though less obstructive would be fine. I already use this material to screen the camper, it holds up well.

 

[U_Stormcrow]

$2,000 in materials in the cart for a 6' fence, posts, concrete, framing, nails, two gates, and horizontal boards to enclose 50x60. No roof, no relocation of the rabbits, and no delivery until after the coming holiday...

I may need to rethink this. Can repurpose a lot of the materials from the existing hen house, but not enough.