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Post by desertwoman on Mar 1, 2015 20:41:20 GMT -5
Oh David, I wish you had a photo of that railway car/chicken shed!
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Post by mrsk on Mar 5, 2015 21:41:00 GMT -5
So I went to watering my girls and roos with nipples on the side of a bucket. For the winter, I am using a black rubber bucket, and it if it is sunny, it absorbs enough heat to stay fluid at 20 degrees above zero, and warmer. Below 20, and I am back to the small rubber bowls that I can stomp the ice out.
i have both the vertical and horizontal nipples. I don't heat my water, I don't have electricity to the coop. Chickens learned to use them in less than half an hour.
Mrs K
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Post by brownrexx on Mar 6, 2015 10:27:03 GMT -5
Does anyone have an idea for a feeder that he chickens won't dig all of the food out and it falls onto the floor? I'll bet we waste 1/3 of all of the feed we put out.
I have tried several different styles of feeders but we always end up with lots of food on the floor.
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Post by ncgarden on Mar 6, 2015 18:38:18 GMT -5
brownrexx - on the economy side, my friend takes a 4 foot piece of 4" pvc, and cuts 10" sections in half from the top. So you end up with what looks like half a pvc pipe with 4 "handles". The chickens have more than enough room to get their heads in, but not enough room to get in and scratch. He toe-nails a piece of 2x4 on each end so it is free standing on the ground. Works great! I use this one - when they were always free ranging I used the "hat" - but inside I do not. No feed scratched out, ever
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Post by brownrexx on Mar 6, 2015 18:42:09 GMT -5
Where did you buy the orange one? My girls don't scratch the feed out with their feet, they seem to push it out with their beaks. I had one like yours without the hat and hung it from roof with a chain and they dug out most of the feed onto the floor.
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Post by ncgarden on Mar 6, 2015 18:49:33 GMT -5
I am sure I bought it at Amazon
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Post by OregonRed on Mar 7, 2015 11:26:50 GMT -5
<<<< Red's over here trying to visualize the PVC pipe thing-a-mu-jig.....
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Post by mrsk on Mar 10, 2015 21:44:22 GMT -5
I double bowl mine, and save a lot of feed, not perfect, but a lot.
I use a large black rubber bowl, I will bet is 16-18 inches across the diameter. I place a smaller flat bowl in the middle. Every two days or so, I dump the outside bowl back into the middle bowl.
I don't leave feed out 24/7. Chickens do not eat feed in the dark, but rodents sure do. A lot of feed is lost to them too.
If the food bowl has feed in it at dark, I feed a little less the next day, if it is completely empty, I feed a little more. Works for me.
Mrs K
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Post by brownrexx on Mar 11, 2015 9:58:00 GMT -5
Might be worth a try. Thanks.
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Post by mrsk on Mar 22, 2015 21:05:50 GMT -5
I got a new rooster, he is a pretty boy, and the girls are in love, at night they try and get as close as they can to him.
He is a Bielefelder rooster. A multi colored bird with baring. I have decided that the more golden to red birds blend in better with the prairie. Hoping to be hatching chicks soon. He is a much higher quality bird than I have ever had. They are rather a new breed I think out of Germany, and the gal I got him from, paid $140 for a dozen eggs and hatched 4 roosters, no hens! So I got him for my little flock.
One of my pullets started laying that a broody hen named Butter hatched out in late October. She raised them in - 20 degree weather when they were less than 2 weeks old.
Mrs K
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Post by OregonRed on Mar 23, 2015 10:38:49 GMT -5
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Post by brownrexx on Mar 23, 2015 11:12:35 GMT -5
Those are really beautiful chickens. Thanks for looking that up Red.
Is anyone else finding blood spots in their eggs? I have been getting quite a few lately and I think that it may be from the stress of the really cold winter and being kept indoors but I am not totally sure. I never had much trouble with this before.
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Post by OregonRed on Mar 23, 2015 11:14:48 GMT -5
? blood spots is a bad thing ? (just learning here...)
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Post by brownrexx on Mar 23, 2015 17:34:34 GMT -5
They will not hurt you but they are very unappealing. It will be a dark red spot, maybe the size of the head of a pin floating in the white part of the egg.
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Post by OregonRed on Mar 23, 2015 17:37:39 GMT -5
yes, I've seen the phenomenon, just didn't know it was a 'bad' thing...
I've seen red spot in the yolk, years ago, and someone told me it meant it was fertile?
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