the crooked little chicken house

“yeah well if your dog attacks my birds, you deserve to be sick! LOL...

funny thing, the dog belongs to a cop.

Nice! I'd love to have some americaunas, got to solve my current bird issues first.

I can't go anywhere in those blue flippers, I should check and see if she can see colors or whats up.
she gets quite excited about them :)”

“LMAO .... "deserve to be sick", I her'dat!

I'm telling you, them baby Americaunas are too cute, like 2-3 days old, most have their beards and muffs!!!!! They're screaming up a dickens in our bathroom, lol!

Twig, more than one ole geezer farmer around here told me that if our dawg ever gets a chicken (dawg's a Brittany bird dawg), that we'd have to choose between chickens and our dawg, or else totally fence in the chickens. More than one has told me that you cain't even beat a dawg to not kill chickens once they get the taste or game of it.

I'm sorry to say you're gonna hafta take the offense agin that copper's dawg.







Just don't get cawt.”

“I haven't seen the dog since I spoke to its mamma...hopefully that did the trick. If not, next step is animal control, then whatever I choose. However, I'm pretty sure that if the dog is harming farm animals, it's in trouble. caught chasing deer means death.

I'm not in the country enough to not get caught, if I was, the damn city plant neighbors wouldn't have that street light they pay good money for. Then we could all see the stars better!”

“I borrowed an incubator. I really do not know what is up with that hen, but it's nasty out there. I haven't been able to find any info online either...”

“When the cop responded to a call for a "large, orange chicken running at large" in a residential lawn, he got his fireman friend to skewer Connie the chicken with a bow and arrow, police said.

http://www.philly.com/philly/hp/news_update/89974647.html”

“LOL!

I took the nesting box and chicken out of the brooder and shoo'd the hen away. The eggs are dirty and so is the nesting box. I just don't get wtf she was doing...”

“I read somewhere that you gotta keep an eye on them Yankee chickens.”

“Well, I'm letting her lay on them, but I'm not happy these days!

No eggs at all from anybody!!!”

“Apparently her butt cooled off and she is on the roost now. Eggs are just laying there, getting eaten.

I haven't seen Judy for two days.”

“Saturday I awoke to the rooster alarm, and looked out to see the damn dog racing toward Judy

this reminds me of the time i was doing some weedeating on my grandfathers farm...i had my black lab mix sammie with me...over the noise of the weedeater i heard the unmistakable loud sound of a chicken in distress...i looked up just in time to see a hen penned under sammie...she gave me that cocked head dog look of "whaaat?"...her tongue was out panting and it had a down feather stuck to it”

“Twig, what's the scoop on Judy?”

“Yesterday we went and picked up a 1 yr old gal Blue Heeler named Peanut (yeah we ain't zactly crazy about her name, but she's had it a year, we cain't really go and change it on her I guess). Right now we're doing the "chickens ain't food or chewtoys" lessons. If it works out, she's gonna be a dandy. Gracie, the small gray fox watcher, is going to my brother's family.”

“Judy is still gone.

Me and Ariana rode up and down the road and I called to her, but no Judy. Austin and I walked out back, found a Judy egg, but not Judy. We walked up to the bad dog neighbors house, but they weren't home. We haven't seen any signs of feathers, so nothing attacked her in the yard.

I called animal control, and after he stopped laughing, he said he hadn't had any calls about turkeys. :)

I'm thinking she went out into the field to lay her egg like she does, and either got frightened by something (maybe the dog barking) or wandered off and can't find her way back.

I miss her, she had a cool personality and was good company.
:(

Not to mention what a pretty girl she was...
http://community.webshots.com/user/twigeater?vhost=community

I still have hope that she'll show up...”

“no sign of my girl Judy, and we are missing another hen...”

“Yikes!”

“Dang it's almost been a week now huh? You should'a eat her up when you had the chance (just kiddin). I hope it ain't that damn copper's dawg!

Prolly a coyote, could be a fox tho. I'd say normally that it wouldn't be a fox, Judy would'a been pretty big for a fox. But missing feathers like she was, she'd look much smaller than with her feathers, so a fox might go for her. Both predators are dang shore sly! But if it's the nabe's dawg, you shore gotta can of worms there! Prolly more difficult than a fox or coyote.”

“She got run off by a wild turkey, Spring is here or trying to be at times.”

“I think the dog is still coming down...the hens are looking a little ragged, and it looks like something goes in the coop...

he does it fairly early in the morning when I'm not up...”

“started building the new chicken dome, but got rained in...taking down the fence that was so nasty to put up last year.

Thought I was missing the red hen, but kept hearing this chicken noise that I couldn't place...she was under the tarp that covered the bikes and kayaks. I just found her and an egg.

So glad to be getting eggs again, didn't realize how tasteless store bought eggs really are.”

“Hatched our own seven chicks, a mixture of Americauna, turkin, and one little Buckwheat, a baby Australorp. The mamma went back to the coop yesterday. 7 babies are in our garden tub w/ a heat lamp and toy turkey as a fake mom.

Did y'all know that a mamma chicken plucks it's belly feathers to keep their eggs and babies warmer on her direct skin?”

“cool! pics of the chickles?”

“Twig, yeah we have some, but I'm not what you'd call a hi-tech guy. Getting them from the computer onto here is beyond my meager means, sorry. Tho, I'll bet my 11 yr old can do it, I'll ask her.”

“Missed the boat ordering chicks, but did get in an order for turkeys...

And I'll get chicks tomorrow when the feed store tells me what they have for leftovers...”

“I love leftover chicken! ;-)”

“I was wondering one year why my Cornish X were taking so long to fill out. I believe they were California White's a egg layer not a meat bird that the feed store sold me. #$%@, took 3-4 months before I could butcher them.”

“One'a y'all got a decent incubator laying around not being used? I only have one mamma that will actually hatch out some babies, only ONE that will go broody. I ought to give her a rest, hehe.

If you don't want it gone, that's good too, I'll send it back! With some eggs if yawnt'em.”

“took me a minute to interpret what you said, ape...LOL...

I don't have one, but there are plans all over to make one...we were going to make one out of a large foam cooler we saved when my dad ordered from Omaha Steaks. Still might, but no need right now...

Just as I am celebrating getting 4 eggs a day again, the fox reappears...yesterday the neighbors dog chased him off, but apparently he returned...

Only one hen came to breakfast this am...I looked for carcasses, but found only a pile of butt feathers...”

“I wonder if he's got something against butt feathers?

LOL interpreting!

We're getting 3 to 6 eggs a day, outa 7 hens and one guinea. I quit doing supplemental light a few weeks back.

Incredibly, after all them coyote and fox prollems last month, I've seen neither hide nor hair of anything! We've replaced our Brittany with 2 bigger dawgs, a blue heeler gal and a Belgium malinois feller. I'm hoping this is the reason, and not that our local coyote gang are diligently doing recon for their next attacking maneuver!

Twig, did our dearest Judy bite the dust? And how about coppertop's pesky dawg?

Great idea building one! That'd be a great project for me and the kids.”

“I only grained them in the winter - feed them scraps and they eat whatever they can scratch up.

I beleive Judy was a nice meal, hopefully for a lot of critters...she probably dressed at 30lbs. I hate to think that someone made off with her or worse. We never did see any sign of critters, but you never know.

I called about broilers and am expecting to hear anytime, and have the 6 turkeys coming in June. If I can find layers at a price I like, I'll get more.”

“The rooster appeared Thursday night!

The neighbors kindly returned him...unfortunately, he was in a cardboard box and had no head...
It was a little freaky for Ariana, since we didn't get home from rehearsal until around 10pm...seeing a strange box in the yard in the dark creeped her out a little...I figured it was a chicken, seeing as the neighbor whos yard it ended up on works at a garage and it was a windshield washer box..

Apparently one of the hens is in another neighbors field being guarded from other predators by one of her dogs - course she's dead, but he's not sharing, not even with an eagle!

Called again about broilers, haven't heard back yet...”

“Picked up the 6 Rhode Island Reds and 6 Black Sex Links I'd ordered on Friday, and got talked into buying the 15, week old broilers they had.

Broilers are outside in the coop in Darryl's brooder, with a cement block on top to keep out predators. The other 12 are still puffballs, so are in the brooder in the house. Apparently one got stomped by the others, so I'm already down one Red. :(

Our last remaining Plymouth Rock hen (we call her chick-chick) is lonely...she keeps trying to come in the house...”

“A bear got my neighbors chick starter, we have been having bear problems this Spring. The one I saw Saturday night at 8:45 was pretty good sized, he looked at me then split after I rattled the small table on my deck. More noise last night at about 3:15, I couldn't see another after a quick trip down to the creek with my flashlight. The same neighbor had another bantie hen hatch some more chicks out in a hidden nest. How can one hide a nest in a coop?”

“I'm often surprised where I find eggs...once there were 4-5 in the shavings bag...

The broilers are getting too big for the brooder...guess I better get with fencing in the dome...”

“everybody's in the coop now...chick chick is stressing out about it, LOL...


two little chicks went to school today...

getting turkeys this week...”

“Grr, I needs to tell you the story of "preparing" #2 with the kids. Soon.

Today came our ebay Hovabator incubator!!!! Might hafta wait to put the eggs in, doing Myrtle Beach for a short stint coming up, need to figure out when to get them going, or just to possibly wait......”

“I don't even want to think about #2 with the kids.”

“LMAO, yah I guess that didn't "come out" like I intended!

#2 is one of our roosters, and "preparing" it was their first time ever killing it and dumping it's body into our freezer.”

“LOL...

The kids know which birds of ours are going in the freezer - and frankly, the broilers are cute for about a week. Ariana wouldn't even take one to school to show the difference in the chicks - same age, but one is ~10 times bigger. She says they are gross...and they really are...

Turkeys are in, I hope to pick them up today.

We are down another bird, only not a chicken...I left the window open (as I often do) with no screen, and the feeder that is attached to the outside of the parakeet cage was open when we got home. The blue male, Snowball, was missing. I hope he had a good flight before he became a nice meal for something...
:(”

“So...the feed store called me and said they had more broilers and were selling them for a bargain price...so add 12 more broilers...then, I was in Tractor Supply buying feed and shavings and they were advertising a chick swap for today. We had time to "stop in" and brought home 2 Americaunas, 2 Bantams and...a kitten.

So that's 27 broilers, 6 Black Sex Links, 5 Rhode Island Reds, 6 Turkeys, 2 Americaunas, 2 Bantams, and chick chick, who is pissed because she is banned from the coop.

Tommorrow maybe I'll actually work on some more housing for them all...”

“A kitten, huh? I hope it gets along with the rest of the zoo. And the neighbor's dog.”

“me too!”

“Maybe it should be a housecat. ;)

My brother and sister-in-law are almost done moving from Michigan to just north of Myrtle Beach, SC. The 4 labs are down there now, and one of the neighbors' chickens keeps coming over to visit. Apparently it really likes dogs. Fortunately for the chicken the dogs don't know what to do, and just ignore it. My brother really likes the chicken, and is now thinking of raising a few chickens of his own when things settle down. Like he didn't learn his lesson the first time around when raising wild turkeys for release back in the '80s.”

“Myrtle Beach huh? We'z gonna be there in another month, for a little sand and sun.

Speaking of kittens, our little preggers Punkin had 4 brand new little babies Sat morning about 8 am'ish. First time me and the kids have ever seen kittens being born .... kewl !!!”

“Ariana wants it to be an indoor cat. Good luck with that - I can't keep the chickens out of the house, how will I keep the cat in.

I spent most of yesterday putting the first row of chicken wire around the bottom of the dome and attaching it to the coop. My son cut a hole for a door in the side of the coop - it was painful to watch soemthing I built get cut into. I attached a wire walkway from the coop to the dome. When I realized that a lot of chicken wire was going to be wasted due to the slope of the dome, I put fence posts inside to make the walls less sloping. The dome will not be moveable anyway, and is anchored using tent stakes. They I worked on the "carpet" of chicken wire around the outside that is supposed to discourage predators from digging under - we'll see how that works out.”

“Yesterday I searched on automatic feeders/waterers - we're going to try and make one soon - I'm already sick of lugging water twice a day. Using the hose isn't much better.”

“You could hook up a water timer to a tap (like for irrigating a garden) and set it for twice a day. That would work.”

“I had to run a pvc line over to my chickens when I had them, found an auto waterer at the feed stove, the valve's inner workings are like the shraeder (sp) valve on a bicycle tube. You still have to clean the bowl, but I rigged up a hose bib right there too, so no running over to another faucet to wash the bowl out, handy.”

“thanks for the ideas!

I have another idea as well, am going to expirament this weekend.”

“Oh no! Please don't expire this weekend, twiggy! ;-)”