Summer is Here 2023

 So this week, the majority of the pullets are 19 weeks with a few that are 20 weeks. We had one pullet start to lay fairy eggs a few days ago, but has since stopped laying. The three older girls continue to produce well, and are close to 12 months old now. The two Comets produce extra large eggs and are a hit with our customers. The one remaining Black Copper Marans is only laying about three eggs per week that are medium large... a little larger than medium but not quite large. 

The ducks are over 12 months old and also are producing very well. The eggs are mostly large, with an occasional medium and an occasional extra large.  They like to hide their eggs in the tall grass so it feels a bit like an Easter egg hunt every morning. 

Weather has been typical June. Some rains, some thunder storms, but mostly sunny days with temps in the 80s.  It's been very nice. 

Garden is started albeit very minimal.  Not sure we will get much this year, but better than nothing, I guess. I have planted about half of what I planted two years ago.  Didn't do a garden last year. Less work, I guess, but that means less produce, too.  

Two years ago, we planted 50 Christmas trees out in the back part of the field. Only three survived the drought.  I didn't have any watering system set up.  We are going to install a drip system this year. I purchased 600 feet of hosing to get the water all the way from the house to the trees this year. So far, so good.  This year, I only purchased 25 Norway Spruce starts and plan to purchase 25 White Pine next year.  The three starts that did survive were White Pine.  Mowed a path between the two rows of trees but, the grass is so tall now, can't really see the trees.  They are marked.  The pink and white ribbons are the Spruce while the white only are either the remaining Pine, or will be the Pine next year. A lot of work goes into planting them, and to end up having 95% of them die last year was disappointing. Anyways, we will just keep adding 25 each year until we have a decent area covered and the wild life will have a bit of extra protection. 

Until we have the drip system install, I walk out across the field to water the trees.  While I'm out there, I look for nasties... lupin and ragweed.  I pull them and I am hopeful that one day they will be totally gone. The ragweed is the worst 'cause it is sticky and makes me itch. 

April's Cold Start turns to Summer Temps in the End

The April temps have fluctuated downward then upward over the month.  We should have three days in 80 degree (F) temps then back into the 60s.  Personally, I like 60 degree temps. I can get so much more done on those days, as long as it is not raining sideways or thunder storming with hail. 

So we are finally dwindling our 59 chicks (which all survived) down to 12. We still have 18 pullets today. They are 10 weeks old.  Two will leave this weekend (Silver Laced Wyandotte and Easter Egger), and four more (2 Barred Rock, a Silver Laced Wyandotte, and an Easter Egger) will leave later next week. 

We don't have a Tiny this year, but we do have two runtish pullets that need to have special care at the moment. Those two are in a safe-zone in the big pen. The "smalls" can fit through the larger openings on the dog crate while the bigger girls cannot. So those two are, at least, outside with the pullets, but still safe from the "mean girls."  It took almost a month for the feathers on the Cuckoo Marans to "start" to grow back. The Rhode Island Red was not picked down as much on her back or neck. But, yah, they are a duo and do everything together. They do venture out of the crate, but don't go far.  Keeping food and water in their crate is necessary.  They are sleeping together on the roost in the crate while the big girls all sleep up to the house, overhead.  So this is going to take some adjustment time where they, eventually, can sleep with the bigger girls. 

When it is all done, we will have the following pullets/breeds:

• 2 Rhode Island Reds (1 smallish)
• 2 Splash Laced Red Wyandottes
• 2 Black Australorp
• 1 Silver Laced Wyandotte
• 1 Easter Egger
• 1 (small) Cuckoo Marans
• 1 Lavender Orpington
• 1 Olive Egger
• 1 Cream Legbar

Once we have the sold six sent off to their families, we will start to integrate our three remaining hens into the pullet flock. We have two Gold Comets, and one French Black Copper Marans hens that are doing a decent job supplying us with eggs. For now, the pullets are enjoying the weather before their numbers dwindle again.

Last weekend, we had one bird get returned as a rooster. A Lavender Orpington came back to us as an obvious Roo, so we had to part with one of the remaining Lavendar Oprpingtons as a replacement, that I was hoping to hang on to.  Big Sigh.... But I think this is our only roo.  If the one gal who took 15 two weeks ago has a roo, I'm thinking it might be an Easter Egger, which is another breed that is difficult to "gender" at hatch. But the family is likely to keep that roo as flock protection since their birds free range on their farm. But, at most, I think we only received two roosters out of 59 day-old chicks.  That's much better than last year! Last Spring and Summer, out of a total of 50ish chicks, we ended up with three rooster, several of the chicks died before maturity, one (Tiny) was severely deformed and was not able to survive the winter cold.  So the better ratio this year of survivals and roos is a "feel better" start to the year. 

We are done starting chicks for the year.  No chick plans for the summer and we can focus on hens, eggs, and garden. 

The New Chicks Are Coming, The New Chicks Are Coming!

Just now starting the new chicks for spring, 2023. I did some special order chicks in addition to the ones that I ordered from the hatchery a couple of months ago.  I picked up a couple Olive Eggers, Cream Legbars, and four Lavender Orpingtons. With the temps still fluctuating in the garage, we decided to start the chicks in a large box in the house. We have two more large boxes ready to be used when the other chicks arrive next week. Normally, I use a smaller red water base (non-drowning) base, but I didn't have ready access to them and needed to get water going.  These little girls have done just fine with this base. 

The chicks are now three days into being at the house, and seem to be doing well.  They will be a week older than the rest of the chicks that arrive next week.  We will merge them based on the situation and health of the newer chicks.  If the newer chicks bounce back quickly after they arrive, we will quickly merge this little group with the larger group.  On the other hand, if the new chicks don't bounce back quickly, we will assess the strongest chicks that we can merge with the first batch and work to nurse the weakest back to health as quickly as possible. 

Am very excited to learn more about the new breeds that I requested.  The chicks that I listed for pre-sale were reserved very quickly this year. Now to just wait and see what arrives. 

The meat (Cornish Cross) chicks won't be arriving until April 12th. I was much more careful about timing this year so that we have plenty of time to ensure that all the layer chicks can go outside before we start our batch of meat chickens. The only bad factor here is that these chicks will need to go outside while there is still the chance of freezing temps near the end of March. I try to ensure that the temp in the garage is kept a bit cooler so that they will feather more quickly this year. 

Pullet Pecking Order Dysfunction

Well we have two spare Barred (Plymouth) Rock pullets that we thought we were going to sell, but have decided to keep. They are about three weeks younger than our Rhode Island pullets. We figured, "how hard can it be to integrate them with our slightly older Rhode Island Reds?" Well, we found out that it won't be quite that easy.  Right off the bat, it is obvious that the BRs were going to be the underdogs. They are about half the size of the RIRs.

We put the all the pullets into a newly cleaned coop that none of them had been in before. We moved them into the coop that I call the "hoop coop" which is large enough for eight standard sized chickens and the over-sized hoop run. I wanted to make certain that there was plenty of adjustment room which is like twice the actual space they need for their current age. We set up extra feed and water stations,

Initially, in the coop, they seemed fine, the two BRs on one end of the roost with the RIRs on the other end. The various pullets would hop down and explore then return to their own little flock. I thought, "so far so good."  So as the day warmed up, we opened the coop into the run.  Still okay, sorta. The RIRs explored the run while the BRs stayed inside the coop. 

By the end of the day, the BRs were so distressed, they were flying into the wire, trying to get away from the RIRs that were tormenting them. So we locked the two bully RIRs inside the coop at dusk and watched.  The BRs were still stressed with the two remaining RIRs even though those two were not tormenting. It was obvious there would be no way that the BRs would be allowed to sleep in the coop by the two bullies.  I scooped up the two BRs and put them back into their pen in the garage.  Then, I scooped up the other two RIRs (not the bullies) and added them to the BRs' pen.  It was obvious, right away, that the RIRs in that strange pen was not going to be the dominants, not with the pen still smelling like the BRs' house. The BRs immediately hopped back up on their roost, and no longer made their little distressed peeps. The RIRs hunkered down in the back corner of the cage and seemed quite subdued and confused. When I checked on them a few hours later, all four pullets were sleeping snuggled together on the roost. 

The next morning, still fine. No squabbles and no wounds. Although this pen is only temporary, it will hopefully give these four time to begin their own flock with a more gradual pecking order.

In a few days, I will take this same cage and put it into the run.  I will put the two bullies into the cage for a couple of days without cleaning it.  It will have the BR and now the less dominant RIR smell in it. I will use the same feeder and waterer too, (with fresh food and water) just to make certain that the bullies know that they have been demoted. The BRs and the less dominant RIRs will have free reign of the coop and run, while the bullies will be caged to cool their heels and watch the others having fun. 

After a day or two of this "bully demotion" I will let those two RIRs who think they are hot stuff back out and we will see what comes of that. 

I recognize that RIRs and BRs are both territorial breeds, but who would have thought that they would be this mean this early in life?!  I'll try to remember to update this post as we keep working on this new flock integration process.  I'm sure we will find a  solution.  Especially since we want to integrate the older RIRs with the younger flock later this summer.

Update May 25, 2020. 
We left the BRs with the cage with the two calmer RIRs. They were actually quite content as a small flock.  So we put them into the Coop together on May 22.  We put the large cage (actually too large for the run, but will deal with it).  We covered the cage to protect it from the elements a bit more and put the two dominant RIRs inside the cage with food and water.

The then caged RIRs were not happy with the fact that they could not tear into the other RIRs and BRs. We still kept two feeding stations in the run, just to be safe. The mean girls slept in the cage over night and stayed in there on May 23 as well.  The small semi flock were functioning well together and went to roost on their own on the evening of May 23.

At some point in the night, one of the mean girls found an escape route through the top of the cage and was sitting on the cage when we came out to release the others from the coop.  She took right after them to show that she was still the dominant one, but then calmed down a little. We left them all running loose in the run, keeping the cage in there in case we needed to cage back up the BRs.  There were still some scrimmages going on, but nothing too serious. As night fell, they all, four RIRs and two BRs went to roost in the coop.

Today, it was obvious that the RIRs were now blocking both feeding stations, keeping the BRs away. We set up a third feeding station inside the coop.  We have a dropdown (sliding) door on the coop.  We raised it just enough to allow the BRs out of the coop (and back in) but not high enough for the RIRs to get back in. Leaving the feeding station #3 in place for now.  When the RIRs get distracted with each other, the BRs come out and either get into their old cage, or go eat at the 2nd station. But as soon as they feel threatened, they run right in to the coop away from the mean girls.

Update May 28, 2020.
We have taken the large cage out of the run now. On May 26, the BRs and one RIR slept in the cage all night, basically refusing to go into the coop. So we locked them into the cage and the three RIRs in the coop. Last night, none of the birds could get into the cage because the door got bumped shut. So the two BRs tried to sleep on top of the cage.  After the four RIRs were in the coop, I put the BRs into the coop, closed it up, and they found a spot on the roost to sleep.  Tonight, the BRs were already in the coop and on the roost at dusk.. I lifted the door and the RIRs, one at a time, filed into the coop and hopped up onto the roost. Although the two BRs are able to move around and do their thing, a couple of the RIRs will show dominance and the BRs will run back into the coop during the day.  On occasion, one of the less dominant RIRs will try to get in the middle to calm things down. Since the RIRs can't get in the coop during the day, this actually gives the BRs an opportunity to eat and drink without being bullied or blocked from the feed stations located in the run.

This situation is not ideal, but with the BRs being so small, I don't think we have much option until those two mean RIRs have it figured out that these BRs are part of their flock. Interesting thing is that, at this point, the baby pullets that are currently six weeks of age (as about three weeks younger), are, essentially, the same size as the older BRs in our little flock. However, the younger BRs are not as feathered nor have the same sized combs. I truly do think we have two bantam BRs. I'm both intrigued and annoyed, but that's what happens when dealing with some of these "hobby" chicken breeders.

Update June 2, 2020.
The Rhode Island Reds are becoming more tolerant of the smaller Barred Rock.  The photo below shows them chill'n in the run.  We did not block the RIRs from the Coop today and it seems that the two feed stations now, are all that is needed. There's still some occasional chasing going on, but the BR are quick and seem to be able to dodge the brunt of the altercations.

Final Update June 8, 2020.
Finishing up the third week and the pullets are all settled into their pecking order.  The Barred Rock have figured out how to work around the Rhode Islands Reds, and are even actually playing (or perhaps toying) with them. In the coop, there is very little chittering. The Barreds have their space on the long roosting bar while all the Rhodes huddle together at the other end of the roost.The Barred Rock are still quite a bit smaller than the Rhodies. They are still about half the size of the Rhodes. So, I still don't really know what to think. If they do turn out to be bantams, I will likely sell them in September unless their egg size is medium since I would prefer not to have to deal with a bunch of small eggs.
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Pix of the Barred Rock alone, looking all tall.  But next to the Rhode Island Reds? Well, I have to wonder if the BRs might be bantams.

Barred Rock at six weeks

Barred Rock 7 weeks & RIRs @ 9 weeks

Rhode Islands 9 weeks / BRs 7 weeks

Rhode Island 11 weeks / BRs 9 weeks