You sneaky linkers you!!! I found Legbars courtesy of SOMEone's linking (can't remember who) and now I am in loove. Seems almost impossible to get them here in the States. Love the idea of a creamy colored bird with blue eggs, been wanting those anyway.
Oh, well -touch pitch, get chickenitis!!
Developing chickenitis!!!
he he he, I am alomost over my chicken-itis, was asked to go to an animal auction on saturday. I said heck no I dont need anymore chickens, let alone anything else they would have.
I love the idea of breeding with a specific result in mind but when I think of how I would have to control my birds -confining this one with that- I get cold feet, sorta. Have one nice sized enclosure for chicks which might do, but I'd have to hold off hatching or raising more chicks until I had enough eggs to try incubating. Hmmmm.
Oh dear, I hope I wasn't contagious....
Could be....;-) How would we do an e-quarantine anyway?
I know I know I know, a RU
e-quarantine?
RU?
K been a long day / week. Not all here. Dumb question, I don't get it. What do you mean???
Cheryl - Pea
Actually I've been puzzling the RU a while... the E-quarantine was to prevent Claire's passing chickenitis to me and others through Electronic mail, media or DG postings.
Kelly
Rutherfordium?
Further explanations for the clueless?
I think she's saying we need to do a Dave's Poultry Round-up.
Aww - now it's beginning to make sense. L2G2, is that what you meant? Also, you hear from ladybugsabound lately? glad you are still around, but miss her too......
miss the 2 of yours back n forth posts :-(
This message was edited Aug 8, 2008 9:28 PM
that is what a RU is. No I have not heard from her. I miss her as well.
grownut, get the patch and hurry-hide from the chicken fairy
My full strength patch is working very well. Has nothing at all to do with I have right at about 300 birds that are quickly out growing their brooder. My dear loving hubby SAYS he is doing the coop today. He says he has a plan. He is the type of person to sit in the lawn chair for 3 to 4 hours drinking beer looking at what the project is then works on it in the heat of the day. Good thing today is only going to get in the mid 80's.
No chickenitis for me right now, but wait until the spring. I want to get turkeys and ducks. hubby says the turkeys will be mean. Yea and they will be in the freezer real fast if they are.
So l2g2, you get that coop started today? Or more relaxing in the lawn chair looking at the plans? I feel your 'pain'. I finally end up doing it myself & it looks like a kid slapped it together! Remember the 'he mans woman haters' clubhouse of Spanky, Alfalfa & the gang? lol - that's some of my buildings!
Hope those turkeys don't go in the freezer before they are nice & fat! So better not be mean
l2g2, I too resorted to making my own makeshift chicken run today... had the baby chicks in the house and man oh man can 4 lil chickadees stink up a house real fast! lol!
DH had to go to the cabin this weekend to do work, so I went out and bought material and built it myself....lol! when he called last night and I told him what I was doing...could of heard a pin drop on the phone line! lol! stuttered something about saws and electric tools and I jsut told him, I already used the saw and still have ten fingers! lol!
We did get is started, hubby took down the one me and my daughter built last year. Now we have all the holes dug and the posts set in. It will be 25 by 16. That is the coop and the day yard. We will make the day yard bigger as they get bigger. We will put the metal and wire on today and build 2 people and 1 chicken doors.
It is so funny, we would go up to the house and get wood and about 80 or so chickens are following behind chattering, what ya doing down here, OMG there is more bugs down here. They follow us every where now. The brooder is about 300 feet from the coop, and I was worried I would have to carry each one to their new home. Not going to have that problem now, they will all follow their feed can. They know where I have their feed.
Glad to hear, l2g2. Hope you get quite a bit done this weekend. Would be nice to get them settled in their new home..
LOL .... found chickens will follow their feed to the ends of the earth - provided no other food along the way. Even go 'hang' around the bins, when they see you coming. Funniest thing I ever saw was a big ole leghorn roo running straight at me fast as ever only to stop on a dime right in front of me waitin for is food.....lol Anyone else might a thought he was gonna attack 'em - naw, only wantin the feed bucket!
I have one who always waits patiently behind me til I've fed the others so he can feed daintily, directly from the coffee can. If ever I neglect to give him his personal serving he gives me the look - like a morally offended butler who has caught someone being exceedingly gauche.
that is great, Tia! yep, nohting more delightful than turning around to see y our "following"
oh! I cant wait til my chicken pen is big enough for me to go in there! I want them to follow me :o) lol!
anyone out there have small dogs and chickens?
I have a teacup poodle... wondering when I should introduce the poodle and datzie to the chickens? I dont want the dogs to bark and scare the babies... should I wait til hens are older?
poodles are bird dogs... but my bird dog is only 4.5 lbs! lol!
start with the poodle right away. i would be concerned about the other...
ya... already concerned about digger -possum eating datzie! ugh!
Definitely introduce right away... I'm happy to say that its going well with us and the beagle. At first he wanted to chase. Then he wanted to only chase if they ran. Tonight they were all three (2 pullets and a beagle) begging around the outdoor table as we were eating dinner!
We were just talking about how lucky we were to have such a well behaved dog... bring in rabbit and it'd be a different story tho! ;)
Yes I have a party poodle, he is about 9 lbs. Yes he did kill one or two chicks, he was playing with them he didnt eat it. Now he will barely look at them. He got taught the hard way not to touch my babies.
well they are in a pen and the dogs cant get into the pen... I am just afraid that dogs will bark at the chicks and scare the daylights ouf of the chicks!
Try showing the dogs who's boss. I forgot to mention that when my dog, Charlie, started to try to chase, my DH immediately called Charlie over and had him roll over onto his back (submissive position) and made Charlie stay there for a minute or two while the chickens went back to pecking the grass around him. Hey, it worked! ~:-D
Good idea Tia....for sure don't go to an auction if you are not wanting anything more and are not sure if the 'critter fever' has passed. Go ahead.....ask me how we have ended up with way more than just chickens............ : 0 Sorry you lost a couple of chicks to the dog....we have had that happen too and ours had to learn the hard way too. They have to learn somehow, huh?
grownut....our plan is to have separate breeding pens and I know what you mean about cold feet. If things work out though, we will be doing that in the late winter to get ready for incubating in the early spring. We just finished (for right now) incubating eggs that produced some pure breeds as well as 'mixed mutts' and that is a lot of fun and very interesting. We still have a couple of chicks where we are guessing what breed was the hen and the rooster. The only bad part is when you get a mixed one that you have never seen before and end up loving the way they look......and not knowing for sure how you got the mix so it could be done on purpose...hee hee. Yep, we have some head scratching chicks but we are never bored with them!
Lazy_Lady....I'm wondering how you didn't end up with the pullets on the table trying to help themselves? : ) When we eat outside our critters don't seem to really know yet that we are eating.....the dogs on the other hand hang out around the table....just hoping that someone will drop something. It's funny when someone does!
AnjL....Does your little dog bark very much to start with? We have had a lot of dogs in the last year with all kinds of chicks at different ages and I don't thing one of them has barked at them. I've always been way more worried that a new dog would grab one up and kill it. Maybe you could slowly introduce the chicks from a distance to your dog? Just a thought......the sooner the better though.
Christy (sorry post is so long....trying to catch up!)
I think I'll try it tomorrow with the poodle only. he isnt very agressive unless datzie there to back him up! lol!
walks in a HUGE circle to get around the cat...unless the datzie with him...datzie will chase cat...so when hes around poodle will bark and chase cat! lolol! but solo...he's usually just a sweet heart ...I'll try that first.
datzie IS a HUGE Barker and chaser... really worried about him around the chicks!