LogRite's new project

[Tamiam]

this weekend we inherited 16 hens, 1 rooster and 5 chicks.

Any advice would be appreciated except the part about eating the chickens, I don't have what it takes to kill and clean a chicken.
I searched for raising chickens because I know alot of ff members have their own chickens but came up with nothing.

We have had them for just over 24 hours and so far they have given us 18 eggs.  Is this normal?  The way I figure, someone is laying more than her share.  If this is right we will have to ship eggs with our tools and there will be no more LogRite brownies  I'll have to make Logrite omelettes for the pigroast.

Tammy

[Dan_Shade]

chickens are pretty easy...

give them some food, a draft free, yet ventalated coop, a nesting box per every 4-5 chickens (that you can get into from the outside of the coop), and they'll give you lots of eggs.  a chicken typically takes 25 hours to "make" an egg.  if the shells are thin, get some oyster shells for them to pick at for the calcium.

not sure of the aerial threats in your area, but chickens are very defenseless, the rooster will help with that, but they're still pretty helpless.  I lost a pullet last week to a hawk.  Now they're locked up on the covered coop.

if the eggs are running away from you, you can cook them and feed them back to the chickens (shells and all)

what kind of chickens are they?

[Tamiam]

Dan- thanks for the advice.  so far I think we are doing okay.

We have hawks so we put a roof on the yard for them.  I have oyster shell to give them.  I have 5 nesting boxes put I can't get at them from outside.  their environment in draft free.

I have no idea what they are.  Most of them have these very pretty feathered feet.  One is a polish hen with a lot of feathers on its head.  the rooster is small and pretty quiet which works out well because the neighbor that complained about the sawmill and is the reason logrite brownies came about (I'll have to find the post about this) is real close to the barn.
http://www.forestryforum.com/board/index.php?topic=7147.msg98613#msg98613


I have 2 brownish ones that lay this greenishgray colored egg. 

I'm more worried about when to let them out of the barn and into the yard.  They don't appear to be very smart as yesterday they were able to go through the little door and walk down the ramp but they were not smart enough to go back up and we had to catch all 22 of them and put them back in the barn.

The women who gave them to us kept them as pets.  she let one of them in the house and it appeared to be housebroken, never had an accident.  i wouldn't think birds were trainable.  Anyway, at one time she had 60 chickens but she would let them free range and a fox was taking them out.

I'll have to get a book to help identify the chickens.

[Dan_Shade]

put up some pictures, the murray mcmurray site has pretty good photos of chickens.  there are a few other sites out there too.

chickens aren't brilliant, but they're smarter than a lot of people I know, at least they don't think they are smarter than they really are 

they'll go back in when it gets dark after they know where home is.  keep them locked into home for a few days and they'll reprogram.  they can be nasty too, roosters can be dangerous to pets and children, mean roosters make good stew (I can walk you through that when the time comes, or maybe best let me talk to kevin!).

herding chickens is best done by the sun

[Captain]

Sounds like you've got some "Silkies"  We've got a few.

Call Mrs Captain, you two can share hen stories.

Captain

[Furby]

Here's a link to the thread I started when we got ours.
Might be of some help.
http://www.forestryforum.com/board/index.php?topic=11636.0

[Tom Sawyer]

I had an old cuss of a rooster once who used to attack me from behind whenever I had my back turned.  I started carrying a stick in with me when I went in to feed the hens to protect myself.  One day I turned my back, but kept watching him from the corner of my eye.  As soon as he came at me I swung the stick, intending only to deflect him away from me.  Unfortunately I hit him squarely on the side of the head .  He went down and didn't come up.  He was just kind of laying there twitching.  I thought I had killed him and went to get a knife to finish the job.  When I got back he was walking around again and so I put the knife away.  He didn't attack me ever again after that   When I finally did decide to remove his head from his neck, he was so tough that I just boiled him up and fed him to the dog.

Tom

[Dan_Shade]

my fledgling chicken enterprises have been the source of some personal amusement and "lessons of life"

the roosters always end up the same way:  start off pretty funny sounding like a party whistle, then getting slightly more annoying, then crowing at EVERYTHING, and then working over the hens something fierce, one of my hens this past year had all her feathers on her back and head gone from him.


and it goes like this:

I kinda like him (party whistle)
I'm gonna keep him (slightly annoying)
I gotta do something about this (crowing at EVERYTHING)
Making chicken salad (Working the hens over something fierce)

for me, by the time they get that aggressive, i havne't missed them at all   and they sure taste good!

[Norm]

I'd get rid of the rooster right away. A sharp rap on the backside of his head with a peavy handle will put him down humanely. They are hard on the hens and serve no purpose unless you want more chicks.

We feed ours a prepared layer mix and leftovers and they do fine. You will need to keep them in a varmit proof pen at night as almost every animal likes chicken as much as we do. During the day a covered pen will help keep the climbing and flying pests away. After a while they can be let loose in the yard but we keep them penned. They find my flower beds and garden fair game and the dog thinks their delicious also. I think Scott free ranges his so maybe he can give some tips on keeping them alive.

I thoroughly enjoy our hens and find they are very little work for the fun and eggs we get in return.

[Dan_Shade]

I think the only tips to keeping free range chickens alive is having a BUNCH of them, and locking the coop up at night.

[Tamiam]

Okay,  I tried to take a picture of their stall in the barn and their pen outside.  Sorry the one inside didn't come out.  But the hen and her chicks came out.  Check out the pen, it was engineered and built by Kevin and all the wood was cut on a woodmizer.

By the way I got 10 eggs this afternoon.

 

 

I have one hen that is missing some feathers on her back - you say that's from the rooster.  I can't get rid of the rooster one of the local guys around here says my eggs aren't complete unless you have a rooster.

Tammy

[Don K]

The only thing uncomplete about a roosterless egg is that It won't hatch another rooster. A hen lays a egg whether it is fertilized or not. This is the time of the year when some breeds molt their feathers. Some are worse than others. Mine have just got all their feathers back.

Don

[Dan_Shade]

my redstar is bald right now, i feel sorry for her

[Part_Timer]

nice looking fly way there Tam.  We had hens with no rooster for two years.  Lots of eggs.

[Don_Papenburg]

What are those pigeons doing inthere with the hen?

[Furby]

They aren't pigeons, but they kinda look like a game bird, not real sure.
Most chicks would be close to full growm by now.

We don't have any roosters and we have a couple without feathers.
The hen house is full of loose feathers.
Yup, like the others said, lose the rooster unless you want more chicks.

[Dan_Shade]

if you're getting green or blue eggs, it's either an "easter egger", an americauna, or an araucana

http://www.feathersite.com/Poultry/CGA/Arau/BRKAraucanas.html

those look like half grown chickens to me, do you know when they hatched? 

[barbender]

they look like our amerecanas, the true aracanas don't have any tail feathers from what I've read. Tammy, your chicken coop looks way nicer than ours. My grandma whose raised layers for years scolds me every time she looks at my coop.

[Norm]

That's a real nice coop, good job! We raise mostly aracanas now and the true ones have little in the way of tail feathers. They can be cross breed and still get the colored eggs though. Ours have really let up  on the laying right now, we get a couple of eggs a day which is about right for us. Chickens will molt starting their second year of age if I remember right. They also will get a mite on them that causes this.

Tammy the neighbor is wrong about the rooster, I find they actually lay better without a rooster pestering them. Put him down skin him out and make stock out him or if the ground isn't frozen there he'll make good fertilizer for the garden.

Now if you want to do something with the extra eggs my favorite is egg noodles. They can be frozen and used at your convenience.

[Tamiam]

Thanks for all your help.  Furby, I began reading the link you posted and found lots of info there too.

Yeap third day and we got a lot less eggs.  15 on day 1, 9 on day 2 and only 5 on day 3.  Are they stressed from the move?  do they produce less when it gets cold?  The temp here dropped but the chickens don't seem cold they aren't huddled under the lights or anything?

Norm - you make your own egg noodles?  Is it hard?  got a recipe?

I don't know when she hatched the chicks and your right they look big to me but the mother hen still keeps them altogether and gets nasty if you try to touch one.

Thanks for all the advice.
Tammy

[Dan_Shade]

chickens are light sensative, they slow down during the winter when days are shorter.

my mom made egg noodles with egg, flour, water, and salt.  that's all I know, and all I want to know!

[Furby]

Ours stopped laying a month or two back.
I set their light back up on the timer, but I'm figuring they probly won't lay again until spring.

[Dan_Shade]

are they molting, furby?

they also slow down after they get a little older.

[Norm]

Tammy I make my own egg noodles and it's very easy. A small batch is 5 fresh eggs and a tablespoon of good olive oil beaten with a whisk to mix thoroughly. Whisk in flour, I use bread flour but a/p works fine, until you get a smooth dough that is almost too thick to use the whisk on. At that point I pour it onto a floured surface and work more flour in until I get a dough that is about like what a normal bread dough is like. I then cover it with saran wrap and let it set an hour or so or it can go in the fridge for a day to be used latter. After sitting I take it and work enough flour in to be able to roll it out to whatever thickness you like your noodles to be. I use a pizza cutter to cut into strips that are approximately 1/2" wide by 2-3 "s long. They can be used immediately or frozen for up to a month. I've gotten to where I never buy prepared egg noodles any more as these are just so much better and after you make a few batches they are pretty easy to turn out.

Ours have almost stopped laying with the cold weather and shorter days. We keep a light on but they do not like the really cold nasty weather we've had lately. Can't say as I blame them.

[Tamiam]

this not laying in the cold weather might be a problem.  See during the winter I can give away a lot of eggs - the whole boys gymnastics team that my son is on.  But during the summer when you say my chickens will be producing we don't have as many people to give them to.

The boys will have to set up a fresh egg stand at the bottom of the driveway.

I can't wait to get 5 eggs to try the noddles.  Thanks for the recipe Norm

Tammy

[Furby]

are they molting, furby?

they also slow down after they get a little older.

They were, but I think they are done.
They were slow all summer, and normly slow way down in the winter.
They are getting a little age on them now as well.
We have lost two in the last year, leaving us with four chickens and the duck.

[scsmith42]

Norm, thanks for sharing that recipe!  I'll have to try it out next week.

Tammy, welcome to the neighborhood of having your own fresh eggs!  Once you get used to having fresh eggs, the store-bought ones really pale by comparison.

Lots of good advice already shared by others; I'll add a couple of comments.

First, when it comes to free-ranging, expect to lose a percentage of your hens to fox, hawks, stray dogs, etc. during the day.  If you lock them up at night you can prevent losses to raccoons, more foxes, and owls.  One benefit of keeping a rooster or two around is that you can raise some of your own chicks to help take the place of those layers lost, but you really don't need more than one (unless you have a LOT of hens).  McMurray's is a great place to buy chicks as well.

We keep food out for ours, but let them free-range as well.  In our opinion, you get a more natural egg that way.  Certain feeds and lighting will help encourage egg production, but we've found that it drops off by 65% or more in the wintertime.  The Doc likes to feed them a mixture of Purina Scratch Grains, Layena, and occasionally some Show Chow.  We have some parasite problems here, so every few months they will get a weeks' regimen of medicated feed to keep them healthy.

We save our egg shells and toss them out into the yard for the hens - it's a good source of nutrients for them.

It is interesting to note that on the first day that you got the chickens they were laying at about 100%, and then it tapered off.  If you talk to the person that you got them from, I'd be curious as to what they were feeding them and also if they were in a heated house, special lighting, etc.

This past spring I built a farm stand out by the road, with a small building that we call "the egg shack" on it.  We have a refrigerator inside, and sell eggs on the honor system there.  Within 45 days of opening we were selling out every week, and still do.  Production varies between 2 - 4 dozen per day, depending on the time of year and the foxes.

In the spring expect your production to increase to 80% or more (meaning getting 8 eggs for every 10 chickens). 

Here's a photo of our egg stand:

Scott

 

[ely]

scott, it is good to hear of someone who lives in a place like that. congrats

if i tried that here someone would take the eggs and the fridge.... probably burn the shack too.

[flip]

We get our chicks at Mcmurrays also.  I think Martha Stewart buys from them too. My last batch of birds is about 2 months old, guess I have to wait til march for more eggs.

[neslrite]

Scott,

We took her chicken stall apart and rebuilt it in our barn.  We took her nesting buckets, heat lamps, feeders everything.  so everything is the same.  Her barn was insulated and ours is not so it might have been warmer.  Two days after we got them the temperature dropped here considerably.  the hens won't go outside at all.

they are consistantly laying 8 eggs a day that means only 50% are laying everyday. 

My chicks are giant already.  they almost look like the hens.

Tammy

[Tom]

...........or that they are all laying 1/2 of an egg a day. 










If a chicken and half layed a egg and a half in a day in a half, how many would one lay in a week?

[Furby]

I actually found a fresh egg yesterday.
They are all feathered, but at least one is still molting.
In the summer, we normally will get 50% of them laying on any given day.
Sometimes they all lay, but more times then not, we are getting less.

[Tamiam]

I've been doing some reading and it says it takes 25 - 26 hours for a chicken to produce one egg.  That means it is impossible to get 1 egg a day from every hen.

The article also explained how to get a fertilized egg.  My poor rooster could no way keep up with the 16 hens.   So much for complete eggs.

The last few days one of my hens has been laying little mini eggs.  I haven't cracked one of the minis to see what is in it, but I figure if I mix it with one of the oversized eggs I keep getting it will average out to be 2 medium eggs.

After all this time I think they are getting used to me.

Tammy

[Dan_Shade]

i'm sure that rooster will keep up just fine with 16 hens...

the small eggs are pullet eggs from pullets just starting to lay.  they're fine to eat, sometimes there will be a small blood spot or "meat spot" in there, you can pick it out, or just cook it up and eat it. 

[Norm]

i'm sure that rooster will keep up just fine with 16 hens...

I wish him all the luck in the world.

After the pullets get a little older you'll also get double yolkers from them occasionally.

[Furby]

In a 24 hour period, we've gotten one or two eggs MORE then the birds we have.

[PC-Urban-Sawyer]

In a 24 hour period, we've gotten one or two eggs MORE then the birds we have.

Furby, I suspect your chickens have not read the article that Tammy mentioned 

[Furby]

You might be right, think I should let them