vituperation

Is it past the time of year for the chickens going broody or is it more of a random thing?

I don’t know for sure, but it seems logical that it would be tied to day length, much like egg-laying is. I pulled that out of my butt, but it makes sense to me.

I wonder if the Amish chicks are not too inbred?

That’s the exact thought I had. Since my last entry, I had to put down three more, but the 11 left seem to be doing really well, knock on wood.

Just wondering, with the current events (financial crisis) if you might not be a “closet survivalist?”

You have no idea [insert evil grin here].

Speaking of sounding like a survivalist, I got a new toy last week for when society collapses in a big penniless heap. Big gun go BOOM.

We have what appears to be infectious bronchitis making its way through our two flocks (chicks/adults) right now. Fortunately, it appears to be a mild strain, unless they’re all about to die from kidney failure and I don’t know it.

It started in one of the roos about 10 days ago, with a sneeze that make him sound like a squeak toy. He never went beyond the occasional sneeze for several days, so I wrote it off to dust (it hasn’t rained here, no kidding, for about 6 weeks).

Then it just sort of exploded in the chick flock…but I think I may be responsible for that. We got nine new chicks at Dog Days last week, and I put them in with our existing chicks. Symptoms showed up in the Dog Days chick that very afternoon.

Warning: I’m not in the mood to be lectured in the comments about introducing new chicks to a flock this way.

The Dog Days chicks were sneezing and gasping a lot, and VERY wheezy, but other than that they didn’t seem sick. Over the last week, some of the other chicks picked it up. They didn’t really ever get lethargic, except for a couple of the Amish chicks, and even then only for a day.

Every afternoon when it’s warm I bring the chicks out of the brooder into an 8×8 section of the chicken yard that I fenced in with chicken wire. We call it their ‘playpen.’ As soon as the chicks exhibited symptoms, I moved the playpen out of the chicken yard and to another part of our property, to minimize the spread (bearing in mind that one of the roosters was sneezing before the new chicks showed up). I put the chicks on Terramycin, and wormed them on the advice of the poultry specialist at Auburn, who thought the chicks might have worms because their crops seemed big to me. I think now it was just part of the bronchitis, or general pigginess.

The bronchitis spread from the rooster to some of the other chickens in the adult flock. Egg production didn’t drop until today (we’ve been getting 14-17 a day, and today I only got 10), and the only adults that seemed particularly affected were the roos, who lost the ability to crow because they’d gag/sneeze when they tried.

The bronchitis did not affect their sex life.

This morning, one of the roos was once again able to half-heartedly crow, though he sounded a lot like he did back when he first started. Nothing’s quite as funny as a roo’s first crow attempts. When I was out with the chicks earlier, I only heard one sneeze. Unless there’s an issue with their kidneys, which is a possibility in the small ones, it looks like we’ve made it through my second disease with no losses.

A couple of weeks ago, I built the cats a lounging platform on top of a fence post that was in the middle of the back yard. I built a winding staircase up it out of 2×6 pieces, and the cats have enjoyed snoozing and wrestling up there.

This morning, I set a second post and made a catwalk (!) over to a second platform.

It seems to be a hit.

In other chicken news, we’ve decided to move the chickens to a bigger yard. A much bigger yard. I spent yesterday setting posts around the perimeter of the back forty, which is about two and a half acres. The pigs get roughly a fifth of that, and the rest will be the chicken yard. I’m going to expand our back yard to take over part of the current chicken yard, so the cats will have more space, too.

Never let it be said we don’t care for our animals here.

We dithered for a long time about putting the chickens (and some turkeys) over where the garden is now, and converting the garden shed into a new coop. I even went so far as to till a new garden in the middle of the back forty (as you’ll see in the pics below). But, on Friday, we decided to leave the garden where it is, keep using the shed I built, and give the back forty to the chickens.

I’m simultaneously excited and worried for them. Excited, because I’m looking forward to seeing them roaming around out there. Worried, because I know we’ll lose some to hawks. Just yesterday one swooped through the existing yard, which has plenty of trees to block the view from above. Everyone got under the coop, but if someone’s in the middle of that field, there’s no cover at all. The field is wide open, with trees around the perimeter (and some big ones in the area where the coop will be, to provide shade). I imagine the hawks just sitting in those perimeter trees, waiting for a dumb chicken to wander just a little too far. We’re going to plant some trees in the middle, but they’ll be small for years.

The coop should be roughly where that red gate is laying.

Chick pics:

Rhode Island Red, or so we were told. I don’t remember the light-colored
head on the ones we have now.

Unknown breed; this is one of the nine we got last week. Mighty purty, though.

The silkie continues to look evil.

Amish chicks.

One of the hen-hatched chicks, about 10 weeks old now.
They like to sneak under the fence and forage up by the house.

The Buff/McLovin girls that ended up looking like orange buffs are gorgeous.
I love the fact that their head and neck are darker than the rest of them,
and the little spray of black specks.

One of the roosters, whom we call “No Tail.”

Another flavor of the Buff/McLovin cross, these guys look like
Ameraucanas or Golden Campines.