New Mexico

[WilderSkye]

Hatching can definitely yield lots of boys. I used to hatch a lot of quail and some hatches were 75% boys! It definitely helps if you know to and can process your birds, it's actually healthier for the flock to pull out the undesirables and ones that can't keep up for physical or health reasons.

Black SexLinks and other high production birds don't live much past 2 or 3, and usually die from some reproductive ailment or cancer. 2 years passes very quickly and if you have a lot of high production birds, somebody is always dying. So keep that in mind.

As for taking the crow out of a rooster, it's really not possible to tame down the crowing. Surgery usually kills birds that undergo anesthesia as well. There are some breeds that have the potential to crow less, although every bird is different and crowing is just what roosters like to do. After a while you don't even hear the crowing.

Oh gosh, sorry to hear you froze up last night! We rarely freeze up, I think one time about 14 years ago we have -30 for 3 days straight and we did freeze up then. Good grief it was cold, wildlife died, trees exploded, I had every heater and heat lamps running in the coops, everybody survived!

Well stay warm out there, hopefully this Arctic blast moves on soon!

Crowing doesn't bother me. I was thinking more that if you kept them around, at least they wouldn't bother the hens so much. But I am only coming from a cattle background, where we kept steers with the herd until we processed a few and sent the rest to 'away'. Later I learned 'away' was the auction barn.

I forgot to put the little heater on last night; I thought we only needed it when it was below zero. Apparently below 20 deg will be our new setpoint. A few more nights in teens this week and we should be headed to warmer temps.

 

[WilderSkye]

Btw, that is sad about sex links.

75% quail roosters would be my luck. I would order four hens and get three roosters.

 

[TwoCrows]

I forgot to put the little heater on last night; I thought we only needed it when it was below zero. Apparently below 20 deg will be our new setpoint. A few more nights in teens this week and we should be headed to warmer temps.

Hopefully a bit warmer weather moves in soon, still not happy with the overnight lows of single digits and low teens!

 

[WilderSkye]

Hopefully a bit warmer weather moves in soon, still not happy with the overnight lows of single digits and low teens!

Our aging bones do not like this bitter cold. We have good chance of snow this coming week.

BIG ANNOUNCEMENT: After weeks on end of studying chickens, hatcheries, etc., we have finally made our purchase......French Blue Copper Marans from Alchemist Farm. We realized we would need and want a rooster so that opened up a load of breeds I really liked. Loved the philosophy of Alchemist Farms and their focus on breeding for quality and good temperaments. We set the June 3rd ship date. This will give us loads of time to obsess over and set up the coop. I am hoping to get 2 or 3 hens and this gives us a chance to choose the best rooster to keep. We won't have any problems rehoming one of these around here. Or keep them all.....oh the slippery slope we land on.

I am so glad to set this part aside and move forward. I refuse to research another chicken breed.....until a later date....

 

[TwoCrows]

Our aging bones do not like this bitter cold. We have good chance of snow this coming week.

BIG ANNOUNCEMENT: After weeks on end of studying chickens, hatcheries, etc., we have finally made our purchase......French Blue Copper Marans from Alchemist Farm. We realized we would need and want a rooster so that opened up a load of breeds I really liked. Loved the philosophy of Alchemist Farms and their focus on breeding for quality and good temperaments. We set the June 3rd ship date. This will give us loads of time to obsess over and set up the coop. I am hoping to get 2 or 3 hens and this gives us a chance to choose the best rooster to keep. We won't have any problems rehoming one of these around here. Or keep them all.....oh the slippery slope we land on.

I am so glad to set this part aside and move forward. I refuse to research another chicken breed.....until a later date....

I think you will love Marans, lots of people keep them here, and I've heard nothing negative about the breed. Excellent choice! I have never heard of Alchemist Farms and will have to look into them. Where are they located?

 

[WilderSkye]

I think you will love Marans, lots of people keep them here, and I've heard nothing negative about the breed. Excellent choice! I have never heard of Alchemist Farms and will have to look into them. Where are they located?

That is really good hear about the Marans.

They are in northern California. I will link their farm here. She does youtube videos on their chickens that is pretty zen and informative all at once.

I realized today that having the chicks arrive first week of June is advantageous in that the garden will be well and established by the time I can let them in there to bug for me.

https://www.alchemistfarm.com/

 

[TwoCrows]

That is really good hear about the Marans.

They are in northern California. I will link their farm here. She does youtube videos on their chickens that is pretty zen and informative all at once.

I realized today that having the chicks arrive first week of June is advantageous in that the garden will be well and established by the time I can let them in there to bug for me.

https://www.alchemistfarm.com/

June is a great time for getting chicks, gives them plenty of time to mature before winter and they won't get chilled during shipping.

Thanks for the link, I will check them out now!

 

[WilderSkye]

One thing they don't do is vaccinate for Mareks. So, I will look into doing that. I am a retired RN, and spent years owning horses, etc., in the past, so pretty good at giving injections to people and animals, albeit, dogs, horses, and goats. Famous last words: how hard can this be?

Btw, spent the day in Palo Duro canyon yesterday with my husband, it was his 64th birthday. It was warm, windless, sunny, and glorious. We had a picnic of take out pizza, and while eating, there were a ton of cardinals and some sort of little bird with a crest. I need to look it up, chickadee or nuthatch or something. They would come right up to you. My husband is the bird man, birds just flock to him. I do not know what it is he has, but it was amazing gift for him. We don't have cardinals here, they are so brilliantly red right now.

Bird is the word!


Edited: the little birds were tufted titmouse. Or do you say titmice?
Re-edit: black crested titmouse

 

[TwoCrows]

One thing they don't do is vaccinate for Mareks. So, I will look into doing that. I am a retired RN, and spent years owning horses, etc., in the past, so pretty good at giving injections to people and animals, albeit, dogs, horses, and goats. Famous last words: how hard can this be?

Btw, spent the day in Palo Duro canyon yesterday with my husband, it was his 64th birthday. It was warm, windless, sunny, and glorious. We had a picnic of take out pizza, and while eating, there were a ton of cardinals and some sort of little bird with a crest. I need to look it up, chickadee or nuthatch or something. They would come right up to you. My husband is the bird man, birds just flock to him. I do not know what it is he has, but it was amazing gift for him. We don't have cardinals here, they are so brilliantly red right now.

Bird is the word!


Edited: the little birds were tufted titmouse. Or do you say titmice?
Re-edit: black crested titmouse

I have been fortunate and have never dealt with Marek's in my flocks however they say it's getting everywhere and eventually we all may be dealing with it. So it never hurts to vaccinate. Do your homework on using the correct stuff, how to store it and the best time to give it.

Oh the Black Crested Titmouse is a cute little bird! They don't range this far west, however we do have the Juniper Titmouse here. Same look just all grey. They nest in one of my nest boxes outside every year, some of the best bird parents I've ever seen nest! Let me see if I have any photos....

I have since moved this box to a higher location as I worry about predators. I have a total of 4 boxes, the other 3 get Western Bluebirds, Bewicks Wrens and Ash-throated Flycatchers.

Sounds like you had a wonderful day at Palo Duro Canyon! I will have to research that and see where that is. I love nature and enjoy going to beautiful places.

Stay warm out there!

 

[WilderSkye]

I have been fortunate and have never dealt with Marek's in my flocks however they say it's getting everywhere and eventually we all may be dealing with it. So it never hurts to vaccinate. Do your homework on using the correct stuff, how to store it and the best time to give it.

Oh the Black Crested Titmouse is a cute little bird! They don't range this far west, however we do have the Juniper Titmouse here. Same look just all grey. They nest in one of my nest boxes outside every year, some of the best bird parents I've ever seen nest! Let me see if I have any photos....
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View attachment 4038658
View attachment 4038659

I have since moved this box to a higher location as I worry about predators. I have a total of 4 boxes, the other 3 get Western Bluebirds, Bewicks Wrens and Ash-throated Flycatchers.

Sounds like you had a wonderful day at Palo Duro Canyon! I will have to research that and see where that is. I love nature and enjoy going to beautiful places.

Stay warm out there!

I love your bird houses! You are so lucky to get the variety of songbirds you get. We are in the high plains, and not much scrub or riparian areas for them. We lived out in the boonies near Ft Davis, TX some 27 years ago. We would see the bluebirds there. I will have to look up the Ash throated fly catchers. Growing up we had scissor tails and I loved them. We get nesting pairs of Western Kingbirds and I mark my calendar for our little breeding pair of barn swallows to show back up. They are summer time joy, nesting up in under the patio and running off anything that comes up under here that flies. Sadly, they have had a hard time last couple of years raising a nest of babies. We usually get two nests or even three a summer, and last two years they have managed to get a baby each nest fledged. I don't know what is going on but the babies that dropped out the nest had lice. I don't know what we can do about that. We seem to get the same pair for about three years and then a new one comes in.

Well....I went ahead and ordered six Alchemist Blue females to add to our flock. It was really starting to keep me up at night worrying that a rooster with only two or three hens would mate them to exhaustion and death. We are getting really stoked about this. The Eglu, while seeming like a great easy option is simply ridiculously priced for the larger Pro unit. And we have the empty shell of the greenhouse to work with. We have a lot of work to do.

The cool thing is, when the Blues start laying, and if we want to hatch chicks (which will probably be incubator as they are low broody hens) those chicks will have olive eggs. That would be fun to tinker with, egg color and breeding.


Spent a glorious afternoon in the garden getting ready to plant. Which meant spending a lot of time, enjoying some home grown and contemplating out there what we want to do. Thank you New Mexico for that little joy in life, to grow our own medicine. Something new, after years of growing, we are going to grow a super charged CBD outdoor crop this year.

Staying off the news, only watching gardening and chicken videos on YouTube. Plan on eggs, what we don't sell we will take the LIghthouse that serves meals and Food Bank or for SNAP group. We feel like we have been super selfish people last few years, cocooning and healing. It is beyond high time we give back. If we never sell a dozen eggs but gift them I will be a happy camper but hey, why not try and get a little back to pay for next years garden.

Fun times! In spite of all the chaos going on in the world, I am so happy to have this project to work on.

Skye