Poultry Keeping General Discussion #2

[Dansta]

Aww your perkin reminds me of a girl i lost over summer 'bandit'.

My two ducks are going well. They get so excited when they get fed!

Chooks are good. Lostva chook tonight dunno why.

But no eggs mine have esther gone off the lay or laying else where...

[Bella29]

Oh no! Poor bandit. I think I recall hearing you mention her. . We have a dingo hanging about. I haven't seen him on our property, but the neighbors on three sides have seen him. So he is probably out there waiting a chance. Touch wood so far we haven't lost any to foxes or dingos. Well I say that, but we lost two ducks to something in feb. no idea what. When we locked the ducks up at night we stopped loosing them.

[Jennifer13]

Been a while since I popped in.

The ducks sound adorable, Dansta.

Our new chicken we bought last month started laying last week and she's encouraged the others to come back into the coop. So after weeks of nothing, had enough eggs finally!

Our new chicken also thinks she's a dog, she's so friendly it's ridiculous. I've tripped over her several times already. She loves being stroked and patted. She follows me around as soon as I go out the front. After a few days they all settled in pretty well together.

[Bella29]

I got 6 eggs yesterday and two today. Pretty happy with that! Can't wait till I have enough to incubate! Yay!

[Dansta]

No eggs for me! Lol

Only had a dog and a hawk take some chooks and a,rat too. Seen one fox but he bolted im contemplateing looking into a firearm licance for such pests lucky for me the dog seems to keep them safe. Our chooks n ducks are locked up each night

[Bella29]

Danita, ours are locked up each night too. Right now we are dealing with rats eating holes in our cages. Plenty of room for snakes atm . I caught three baby rats in a live trap last night. Gonna see if there are any more in the am. I suppose that means I have to drown them tho. That seems to be a sad choice. But what else can you do? They have started breeding like crazy, and you can tell the ducks prefer outside rather than inside atm.

[Dansta]

my ducks have a "run" atm until we get our veggie patch happening and fenced right in -and pegged down. then they'll have the space to roam in there.. and they're crazy. its like 0ºc outside and they're sitting in their water?! crazy. I have a white girl and a boy with a green shiney head (clueless as to breeds ha much like chooks...they're all "mungrel" chooks at my place)

With the rats im tempted to ask a friend if he and her hubby will come around and let some ferrits go in the shed and find them - the dog can smell them but cant find them KWIM? I'll have my boofhead by my side when i move some tin.. i think they hide under there...thats where boof caught one mid-run.

AFM : my chooks are annoying they are NOT laying >.< i want eggs for scrambled/fried eggs on toast!! cheeky things. they get grain/layer pallots and the ducks get layer pallots and house scraps. but i know my little scarlowy duck is too young to lay - she's not quite got a red bill yet and wouldnt even be 6 months old yet. but they're cute i empty out their water once every two days and they get soo excited by it!! cant wait till we have a bigger water space of them - figure i can fill the bath (that i hope i can get lol) up with water and then every 3days use the contents of it to water the veggies and fill it up again for the ducks..

[~ Zarava Flutterby ~]

You learn something new every day.... Seems my boy patch is doing his job.
Shane I don't have a broody yet!

[BellyBelly]

Help! We added 3 new hens to our current 4 about 2-3 months ago and they are still getting badly picked on. Like grabbing the wings and hanging on to them. Aggressive pecking. Besides two seperate coops, any ideas?

Not much laying going on here either with the cold. Usually one egg per day, 2 if lucky.

[Bella29]

Help! We added 3 new hens to our current 4 about 2-3 months ago and they are still getting badly picked on. Like grabbing the wings and hanging on to them. Aggressive pecking. Besides two seperate coops, any ideas?

You could try taking the dominant hens out for a day or two and then reintroducing them. Sometimes works. Needs to be 24 hrs plus. I would take out anyone who is picking on

[Dansta]

any one else use ivermectin 5% topical solution (cattle pour on, brand is topshot) on their chooks?
Im going to tonight but it says drops...i dont have a dropper all i know is is 1ml per 10kg live weight.

so im going with .2ml for my birds (around the 2-3kg mark) and .5ml for my ducks. lord help me with the ducks i baught some garding gloves to catch them and do it... but its gotta be done, thanks to fowl ticks; again! and bloody lice too! argh.

[Dansta]

any one else use ivermectin 5% topical solution (cattle pour on, brand is topshot) on their chooks?
Im going to tonight but it says drops...i dont have a dropper all i know is is 1ml per 10kg live weight.

so im going with .2ml for my birds (around the 2-3kg mark) and .5ml for my ducks. lord help me with the ducks i baught some garding gloves to catch them and do it... but its gotta be done, thanks to fowl ticks; again! and bloody lice too! argh.

[Astrid]

We use Cydectin, pretty much that same as you. Worked out the ml per weight. We did have a dropper though, just used an old kids medicine one. Just waited till evening and dosed them on the perches.
DH also made up a spray solution to spray the perches.

Do you also plant herbs that lice etc don't like? Wormwood, tansy and rue are good ones.

[Dansta]

I found a dropper... My chooks are easy...the ducks erg not so much...

[black_rose]

Just reviving this thread to see if anyone else has chickens? We got ours yesterday still feeling like a newbie with them that's for sure!

[Doing my best]

Yes, we have 4 chickens. 2 of them we have had since December 2012 (we got 3 at that time, but one passed away from an abscess infection), and we got 2 more point of lay a few weekends ago.

I find they have a great personalities. Ours don't get locked in the house at night as we don't any predators here, and as I lay in bed in the morning, I can tell which one is 'talking' while wondering around the yard.

[Jennifer13]

We have our three girls still and they're getting a fancy new coop on Saturday.

[black_rose]

We have a fairly big area for them to roam in during the day but we have been warned about foxes so they are in a dog run on a cement base at night. Day two and I can see their different personalities already. We don't have nesting boxes yet but they are a few months of laying apparently.