Texas

[Texasmja]

If anyone out here has some old rusted water troughs that are not usable anymore, I would like to have them.

 

[Chucklecluck]

I lost one of my bannie chicks yesterday morning. I think they got cold and one got squished had a similar incident with my quail the day before. unfortunately my brooder can't stay in the house so everyone is in the barn with heat lamps on high I covered it with a heavy towel and that seemed to help a lot.

 

[MapleLeaf86]

Loud crack of thunder work me up. We must be in for more rain. Hopefully it'll rain a lot this spring (but not all at once!) so folks across the state aren't put on water restrictions again.

 

[Cockle-Dood]

Been raining all nite long here...just kinda dripping at the moment, but forecast says rain rain rain

 

[yinepu]

I lost one of my bannie chicks yesterday morning. I think they got cold and one got squished had a similar incident with my quail the day before. unfortunately my brooder can't stay in the house so everyone is in the barn with heat lamps on high I covered it with a heavy towel and that seemed to help a lot.

I always use towels on top of my brooders during cooler weather.. by pulling them back a bit or covering them up a little more it's easy to control the temps inside

Just be careful that they don't get too close to the heat lamps if you have the lamp hanging above the top

 

[Kilsharion]

Anyone on this thread do trap nesting?

I'm thinking of doing it since I plan to keep my hens to 10-12 per pen with a single rooster. It seems it would be the easiest way to determine who is laying what. Mike says he can build a divider for my incubator, too, so I can hatch from multiple hens without getting them jumbled. I kind of need an option like this due to a limit in how much land I have making breeding pens for individual hens pretty difficult. It would be easier for me to have a bachelor pad and cycle the roosters between the hen houses. I dunno...hrm...trying to figure out the most space efficient way to get the most detailed results. It'd sure help me determine who was laying and who wasn't, if nothing else.

Just curious if anyone's used that option?

 

[yinepu]

Anyone on this thread do trap nesting?

I'm thinking of doing it since I plan to keep my hens to 10-12 per pen with a single rooster. It seems it would be the easiest way to determine who is laying what. Mike says he can build a divider for my incubator, too, so I can hatch from multiple hens without getting them jumbled. I kind of need an option like this due to a limit in how much land I have making breeding pens for individual hens pretty difficult. It would be easier for me to have a bachelor pad and cycle the roosters between the hen houses. I dunno...hrm...trying to figure out the most space efficient way to get the most detailed results. It'd sure help me determine who was laying and who wasn't, if nothing else.

Just curious if anyone's used that option?

You could put trios or even quads in a small coop.. and still cycle the boys between them.. then keep records of how many eggs (and which ones if you want to incubate or grade them) come from each of the hen coops.. that will help narrow it down if production slacks off.. then just check the individual hens to see who is laying and who is not. Every so often change the hens around and put the worst layers together is you are focsing on that and cull the worst producers

 

[Kilsharion]

You could put trios or even quads in a small coop.. and still cycle the boys between them.. then keep records of how many eggs (and which ones if you want to incubate or grade them) come from each of the hen coops.. that will help narrow it down if production slacks off.. then just check the individual hens to see who is laying and who is not. Every so often change the hens around and put the worst layers together is you are focsing on that and cull the worst producers

Yeah - but, while production is definitely important, I also want to know who is giving me the best results on my chicks (re: egg colour/foundations/feather colour/etc). You know? I'm not quite sure how to do that without keeping each hen isolated until I get a batch of her eggs to hatch out. With a trio, I'd have better odds of figuring it out, that's true; but - how would I know for sure?

 

[yinepu]

Yeah - but, while production is definitely important, I also want to know who is giving me the best results on my chicks (re: egg colour/foundations/feather colour/etc). You know? I'm not quite sure how to do that without keeping each hen isolated until I get a batch of her eggs to hatch out. With a trio, I'd have better odds of figuring it out, that's true; but - how would I know for sure?

test breeding... on occasion separate one hen with a chosen rooster.. give them a few weeks then collect eggs and do a test hatch.

 

[Texasmja]

test breeding... on occasion separate one hen with a chosen rooster.. give them a few weeks then collect eggs and do a test hatch.

I do test hatches because I want to know how each cross is going to look.