Quite Simply, Chook Chat

[jessmorris]

I am off to a local auction with four of this years hatches next weekend (2 white silkie pullet growers, and a lovely red/blue Wyandotte grower and a gold roo grower with a blue tail as a pair).
This will be my first attempt at selling through an auction - I'm quite excited!
Girls are easy to sell through feed stores - I'm interetsed to see how an auction compares with this!
Jess

[RichmondHens]

Don't you worry about who might buy them at an auction? After the trials and tribulations of getting chicks up to POL I like to know what sort of homes they are going to, ideally someone I already know who will look after them well.

[jessmorris]

I take your point RH but its always going to be a lottery really isn't it? Unless I actually go and inspect where the birds are going to live, I can't really tell even if I do talk to a buyer in person. The nicest and most reasonable sounding folk can have a daft set-up, forget to give them water on a hot day or not be able to identify red mite.....

[RichmondHens]

Don't know how it happened, but found a trio of Minorca growers in the back of my car yesterday ................ They must have snuck in somehow when I wasn't looking! They are now in the quarantine pen and enjoying fresh green grass. Having just worked out the autumn reshuffle with all the new youngsters to accommodate, I now have to remake it. And I have some exchequer leghorns due to hatch Wednesday.........

[Munch]

Minorcas have a habit of doing that, one jumped in the boot of our car as we were driving away from the auction that we didnt buy 3 pekins from!

We have just had a massive reshuffle too, taking on a friends "odd coloured" orpington this week and have 11 eggs hatching on Thursday. Still have the 4 Sebrights in the brooder too!

We are going to a smallholding fair on Saturday (HFW will be there ) I just hope they are not selling chooks there.......... it could be dangerous!!!

[RichmondHens]

Uh oh, we were at our Smallholders Group annual show yesterday ............. so it could so easily happen Munch. Keep your boot locked!

[petal]

erm, and I have just bought to chickens whilst on holiday- a new buff orpington and a salmon faverolle cockerel!

[Suechooks]

erm, and I have just bought to chickens whilst on holiday- a new buff orpington and a salmon faverolle cockerel!

On the norty step Petal!

[jessmorris]

I'm quietly proud. I despatched my first cockerel yesterday, not easy or pleasant but not as bad as I had expected. Crossed that bridge at last and long overdue.
Tomorrow I'm off for some blue laced red and lemon cuckoo wynadotte eggs for the last hatch of the year, knowing I can sell the girls and cull the boys.
Phew.

[petal]

last hatch of the year?! won't that cost a bomb in electric for light and heating? or do you have permanently broody silkies like we do!!!!?

[its hilly]

My inci costs around £1.50 per week (and can take 50 eggs, so not a bad cost per egg) and the heat lamp a bit more £1.75 ish. Easy for me to know as we have a pay meter.
Will the Cumbrian chooks be able to talk to your suverners Petal? DO chooks have regional accents I wonder, songbirds do apparently.
Just seen an advert in my local feed store for Old English Pheasant Fowl, anyone got any? Are they actually numerically rare? I hate the new RBST website as you now cant see which poultry breeds are really low and which are just on the list cos they are British breeds.

[petal]

It is very difficult to know if something is truly rare. I suppose all pure breeds are rare compared to brown hens! After a weeks isolation these 2 of mine from cumbria have been integrated- the buff orpington cockerel(George) immediately liked his new wife(Mildred) but the light sussex(Snowdrop) hates her! Our faverolle girl (Hedwig) is completely ignoring her new boyfriend(harry) he is trying everything to woo her.

[jessmorris]

Hi Petal,
I have 4 broodies at the moment, and one is a big fluffy silkin so I don't think the eggs will get cold (fingers crossed!). I've tried an incubator but I think it was too small to work properly and the chicks came out too big...
While we are on the subject, can any folk who are on the western seaboard of the UK, ie where its damp, tell me if they put water in their incubator or not? I've heard that we have it wet enough not to have to bother, and that in fact it can be bad for the chicks......
There are Pheasant Fowl for sale at the auction on Saturday IH....

[RichmondHens]

Don't use incubators much but didn't spray my last lot of eggs (under a hen) as the weather was pretty damp here and I decided to leave them alone. They hatched ok. And I'm in the driest part of the country - supposedly!

[Munch]

I have just candled the 3 hubbard eggs that have not hatched, to be fair they are not due until today but as their sibling hatched 2 days ago and the 4 Orpingtons hatched yesterday I got impatient.

2 of them look not much futher developed since when we candled at 8 days and the other I reckon maybe died about a week ago (ish).

Does anyone know what may have caused this?