|
I was watching chickam outside but I came inside and put it on my TV instead. 
|
#
?
Oct 15, 2023 20:46
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 20, 2024 07:15 |
|
|
|
|
#
?
Oct 15, 2023 21:34
|
|
|
^^^ LOL  ^^^Pearl *really* loved the pumpkin today. So much so, that she unwisely climbed in...and, well... https://youtu.be/ikita-hpUgI?si=0Q6uyeq7TSpaRjl6 ...it rolled away with her inside. She wasn't hurt, and Bobbie guarded her until the kid ran out and emptied an embarassed hen out of a pumpkin. She stayed away from it after that, though, silly chicken. Spork and Popcorn going spelunking inside the pumpkin:  Also, Eggroll is roostering out quite nicely, and is beginning to grow lovely saddle feathers and a proper dinosaur frill over his eyes. And a BIG deep voice, tho no crowing yet.  Still no tail...   And yes, we're keeping his crossbeak trimmed. As you can see, it doesn't interfere with him eating. Derp... 
|
|
#
?
Oct 16, 2023 05:12
|
|
|
Pearl! LOL Our mama hen is still on her eggs. They should begin hatching within a couple days so she got the pasta box today. It’s just the right shape to be accessible for mama hen and I can turn it around at night so any hatchers won’t fall out of the nest. When they are hatching I’ll move the whole shebang into one of the coops that’s more chick-accessible. 
|
|
#
?
Oct 16, 2023 15:07
|
|
|
We have chicks!
|
|
#
?
Oct 18, 2023 22:51
|
|
|
Joburg posted:We have chicks! Momma bird don't like you near the chicks.
|
|
#
?
Oct 19, 2023 00:09
|
|
|
Joburg posted:Pearl! LOL Great box for new babies! This weekend Oct. 21-22 during daylight hours (PST) we'll be running Chickam again, broadcasting the wonderful Wheel of Food! Join us as the flock stares in consternation at FOOD hung from a bicycle wheel so it spins when they peck it. What the heck is Wheel of Food? Here: https://jackshenhouse.blogspot.com/2015/01/wheeloffood.html Go here and click the Jack's Henhouse icon on the left above the description, Chickam will start around 8AM (PST) both days. https://www.youtube.com/cha.../UCr7ICWyIMhWSp0UUJpAeTCw/live
|
|
#
?
Oct 20, 2023 18:24
|
|
|
Chickam is live! Today we have Wheel of Food. Go here to watch, click on the Jack's Henhouse icon above the description, then click on the live feed: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xWFx0ZLMT3U
|
|
#
?
Oct 21, 2023 16:52
|
|
|
One of the roosters in the hen pen, Striper, just lost his goddamn mind and started scalping the girls, hurting about 5 in the course of 2 hours. He's never done anything like this before, so we're pretty dang stunned. Don't know what set it off but he is incredibly lucky that he's not the main course for dinner tonight. We moved him and Frankie out of the hen pen and moved Mouse, a younger, chiller, and prettier rooster, in to replace them. The injured hens are inside and only one is in dire shape, but we're keeping them calm, clean, warm, dry. Then we heard Tiamat making the weeeeep-weeeeeep-weeeeeep-weeeep alarm call and sure enough, a 3-4 foot black racer smelled the blood and was trying to get in the hutch. The snake was gently relocated. Zapdos, the senior rooster, marched along the walls of the run the entire time, keeping himself between the hens and the snake (even though there was no way the snake could get through multiple layers of hardware cloth).
|
|
#
?
Oct 22, 2023 22:33
|
|
|
https://i.imgur.com/K4urAgM.mp4
|
|
#
?
Oct 23, 2023 16:19
|
|
|
Dienes posted:One of the roosters in the hen pen, Striper, just lost his goddamn mind and started scalping the girls, hurting about 5 in the course of 2 hours. He's never done anything like this before, so we're pretty dang stunned. Don't know what set it off but he is incredibly lucky that he's not the main course for dinner tonight. We moved him and Frankie out of the hen pen and moved Mouse, a younger, chiller, and prettier rooster, in to replace them. The injured hens are inside and only one is in dire shape, but we're keeping them calm, clean, warm, dry. Update on this: The girls inside are all recovering well. S'Blood is almost completely normal, we think she may have bonked her head trying to get away from Striper. I don't think Windlord's wing is broken, just a sprain or something; some cage rest should set her right. Cinnamon Garbage's head wound was the smallest and she's totally normal today; just a few days inside for that to heal up so Zapdos or the inexperienced Mouse don't try to mate with her and inadvertently tear the skin on her neck. Voltrarr is pretty much the same but with a slightly larger scab. Peepachu got the worst of it with a partial scalping. Once she calmed down we were able to clean out the wound thoroughly and I knitted the skin back together with skin glue. She'll need to be inside for probably 2-3 weeks based on past injuries, but I'm pretty confident she'll recover fully as long as we keep it from getting infected. They're such fragile little birds, but they're also really resilient. No further drama outside since rearranging roosters. Striper and Frankie weren't mobbed by the other roosters (a legit fear since they were in the hen pen for having been scalped by the other boys), being removed from the ladies did the trick. Mouse is still a bit timid and uncertain, but Zapdos is a good rooster who hasn't messed with him. Honestly it's Trinket and Cheesy Gordita Crunch that gave him poo poo and pecked at him some, but that seems to have settled for now.
|
|
#
?
Oct 23, 2023 17:15
|
|
|
Dienes posted:One of the roosters in the hen pen, Striper, just lost his goddamn mind and started scalping the girls, hurting about 5 in the course of 2 hours. That’s just crazy. I’m glad things are settled now. Mama hen is now named Lucy and is in Mama jail. After a couple days in the pen to bond, I let her and the chicks out and she promptly took them to the edge of the woods and misplaced one… by the time I found it, probably a half hour later, it had given up calling for her and was just laying on the ground. It survived the ordeal and perked right up when it was back with her. So she and her chicks are back in the pen until they are a little bigger and can keep up with her. I sure miss having experienced mama hens who limited their wandering while the chicks were little!
|
|
#
?
Oct 26, 2023 00:02
|
|
|
Joburg posted:That’s just crazy. I’m glad things are settled now. Crikey, that was an ordeal for you! Glad tiny one is back home.
|
|
#
?
Oct 26, 2023 07:35
|
|
|
Doom Rooster posted:With winter coming up, how do y’all keep your chickens’ water from freezing? We got one of the inverted bucket looking one with an integrated heater. Seems to be fine, but it doesn't really fit up in their coop so I'm not sure how exactly to handle water in there, or if we even need to.
|
|
#
?
Oct 31, 2023 15:34
|
|
|
I have a plug-in warmed water bowl in the run and then a water bowl inside the coop on the sand near the warming pad. Speaking of the warming pad, I actually got my daughter’s old thermostat plug from her old terrarium out of storage this year so I can make the warming pad operate itself. Seems great so far even though they’d likely be fine just snuggling up on the sand inside without any heater.
|
|
#
?
Oct 31, 2023 16:07
|
|
|
I have some stuff coming today to heat our small coop as its forecast to drop to 30 F tomorrow night. Also:  In other news all 3 of our birds are now egg laying machines!
|
|
#
?
Oct 31, 2023 16:07
|
|
|
Elder Postsman posted:We got one of the inverted bucket looking one with an integrated heater. Seems to be fine, but it doesn't really fit up in their coop so I'm not sure how exactly to handle water in there, or if we even need to. freeedr posted:I have a plug-in warmed water bowl in the run and then a water bowl inside the coop on the sand near the warming pad. We ended up finding a big metal disc that’s designed to have a water bucket style fountain just sat right on top of it. It plugs in and is rated to 10f. We got down to 12f this week and it worked great. No idea yet how much electricity it’s using. It’s likely to get down below 10f this winter though, so we’ll probably end up moving it inside the coop, which stays much warmer than outside.
|
|
#
?
Oct 31, 2023 16:18
|
|
|
freeedr posted:Speaking of the warming pad, I actually got my daughter’s old thermostat plug from her old terrarium out of storage this year so I can make the warming pad operate itself. Seems great so far even though they’d likely be fine just snuggling up on the sand inside without any heater. I decided to go all in on some smart home bullshit for this - got some temperatures/humidity sensors and outlets coming today.
|
|
#
?
Oct 31, 2023 18:10
|
|
|
Elder Postsman posted:I decided to go all in on some smart home bullshit for this - got some temperatures/humidity sensors and outlets coming today. Smart plugs are great. When we have a long streak of super cold days and the chooks are stuck inside I light their coop from sunup to sundown automatically with a smart plug. I also have smart lights tending my overwinter plants I brought in.
|
|
#
?
Oct 31, 2023 19:25
|
|
|
how it started: how it’s going: 
|
|
#
?
Nov 3, 2023 02:11
|
|
|
That is terrifying! We tried to do something similar. This started out as your standard triangle-features jack-o-lantern: 
|
|
#
?
Nov 3, 2023 02:54
|
|
|
After finding two soft shelled eggs over the weekend, we got our first real actual egg this morning! Our birbs are 20 weeks old so we weren’t really expecting any until spring. Exciting!
|
|
#
?
Nov 7, 2023 14:59
|
|
|
Elder Postsman posted:After finding two soft shelled eggs over the weekend, we got our first real actual egg this morning! Our birbs are 20 weeks old so we weren’t really expecting any until spring. Exciting! They’re paying rent!
|
|
#
?
Nov 7, 2023 15:32
|
|
|
We have one hen who is apparently on strike. She hasn't dropped an egg in almost two months. She's the only olive egger, so it pretty obvious she's the one falling down on the job. She had molted back then, but has been re feathered for a month and a half. She's not the lowest on the pecking order, and there's little conflict in the flock besides an occasional "my worm! Beat it!" We did have another olive egger who had to be rehomed months ago. The other was really abusive to the lowest ranked hen, so she's now off living the life in the country with a bigger flock and roosters (before you say it, we have video of her new life!). All the hens were bought at the same time as chicks. Could she be missing the other olive egger? Everyone else is now in some stage of molting, so the run looks like a pillow exploded and everyone else's production is way down, but they still manage an occasional egg. Absolutely nothing from her. Any tips on what to do? Is there anything?
|
|
#
?
Nov 7, 2023 15:59
|
|
|
More bad news from our flock. We lost Gwaihir, the Windlord, on Sunday morning. We thought she had been turning the corner, but she passed peacefully not an hour after the last time one of us checked on her. She was majestic af, one of our largest hens by far. Peanut Hamper is the matriarch of the flock, but Windlord was one of Zapdos' favorite hens, second only to Lucky I think. We'll remember her every day seeing her nearly identical daughter: 
|
|
#
?
Nov 7, 2023 18:03
|
|
|
BaronVonVaderham posted:
MrUnderbridge posted:We have one hen who is apparently on strike. She hasn't dropped an egg in almost two months. She's the only olive egger, so it pretty obvious she's the one falling down on the job. I haven’t had an Ameraucana-based Egger for a while but I remember mine didn’t lay between Oct/Nov and springtime, and they were not great layers in general after year 1. If she’s a Legbar-based Olive Egger then I’d expect some pretty good laying but maybe she’s taking early winter off and will start again after the solstice. The other half of the Olive is probably a Maran and I don’t know how they lay over the winter. I doubt it’s related to the other hen leaving.
|
|
#
?
Nov 8, 2023 03:27
|
|
|
Not sure what her parentage is. She's pretty much all red, with orange/black hackles and a smallish comb. Edit: ok, looking at the breeds, she's deffo an americauna cross.
|
|
#
?
Nov 8, 2023 17:42
|
|
|
Gross https://www.cnn.com/2023/11/08/food/perdue-chix-mix-launch/index.html Chickens aren't vegetarians!
|
|
#
?
Nov 8, 2023 18:26
|
|
|
|
|
#
?
Nov 8, 2023 21:03
|
|
|
@HeneralPoppy I "domesticated" this big featherless in my market. He may have had a name but whatever. He drove me around on a Truck. Many adventures. Needed to be given constant directions and alerts. Some of the food offerings were tasty but I've had better.
|
|
#
?
Nov 8, 2023 22:05
|
|
|
If a pigeon can pilot a missle I guess a chicken can man a gun turret.
|
|
#
?
Nov 8, 2023 23:01
|
|
|
Of course the first chick of this hatching popped out while Dienes was on campus teaching. https://i.imgur.com/RnUlsL6.mp4 Welcome to the world, little one!
|
|
#
?
Nov 18, 2023 00:20
|
|
|
BaronVonVaderham posted:Of course the first chick of this hatching popped out while Dienes was on campus teaching. What a cute little baby! My babies are about 4-1/2 weeks old now. Mama Lucy is doing great, no signs of weaning them yet so hopefully she will continue mothering well into “winter”. (In the new zone map we are 9a, so we never get too cold.) Looks like we have 2 cockerels and a pullet which is fine by me. I’ll probably keep the boys as flock roosters for next autumn. 
|
|
#
?
Nov 18, 2023 16:23
|
|
|
Joburg posted:What a cute little baby! Oh they all are SO adorable!
|
|
#
?
Nov 18, 2023 17:55
|
|
|
It's the miracle of life! https://i.imgur.com/LyEAmIP.mp4 I happened to check on the incubator just in time to see this one was ready to bust out any time, so I was able to rush upstairs and finally catch a hatching on video.
|
|
#
?
Nov 18, 2023 21:05
|
|
|
Lost two of our girls, think a raccoon got them based on the camera footage. Afterwards:  So meet the newest additions: Garlic  Parmesan 
Mustache Ride fucked around with this message at 18:19 on Nov 20, 2023 |
|
#
?
Nov 19, 2023 15:17
|
|
|
Sorry for your loss Welcome Alfredo and Parmesan!
|
|
#
?
Nov 19, 2023 15:27
|
|
|
That sucks, Mustache Ride. I'm so sorry. Parmesan is a particularly gorgeous bird.
|
|
#
?
Nov 19, 2023 16:02
|
|
|
Thanks guys, we had some issues with possums coming into the roost to eat eggs and stay warm. They scared the girls who refused to go back in at night the following evening and I think a coon got them then. Never found one of them, might be in a neighbors yard. We tore the roost apart again looking for holes, and got some possum stakes installed along the perimeter to keep them out. But we didn't want to leave Sandwich alone for too long so a friend let us have Parm and Alf. We're going to keep them all locked up until they figure out the pecking order and then only let them out supervised moving forward.
|
|
#
?
Nov 19, 2023 16:10
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 20, 2024 07:15 |
|
|
One reason my girls are behind full-perimeter ½” hardware cloth any time I’m not with them
|
|
#
?
Nov 19, 2023 17:03
|
|