I love how the keeping of poultry often comes hand in hand with opportunities to help other people. This has been the case this past week when I had the opportunity to buy some new chickens for my flock, whilst at the same time, helping out a couple of other poultry keepers. The first, was the person who owned the chickens I have bought. This man has been struggling with a serious illness for some time and has not been able to keep up with caring for his large flock of poultry. The time had come for him to downsize.
I bought five beautiful little bantam wyandottes from him.
The second opportunity to help someone came when I decided to sell my Australorp rooster and pullet to another poultry keeper who had recently lost most of his flock to thieves!
Selling the australorps helps me, because I now don't have to worry about trying to handle birds which are too big for me, and it helps the buyer to replace some of his stolen flock.
That's the way things seems to work in the 'poultry world' and I wouldn't have it any other way.
Our young chicks are continuing to grow at an incredible rate. They're eating everything in sight at present, and love their greens, unlike many other youngsters I have known.
A few weeks ago I went to the Reject Shop and picked up a couple of Bra Savers. Not that I have any lingerie that really needs any special care, but when I saw these on the shelf, I had an immediate idea for another way to use them!
The latest batch of chicks are growing and developing a lot faster than our first batch did. I have to wonder if this is because they are hybrids as opposed to pure bred. Yesterday, we placed a small branch from a tree into the corner of the brooder and it was not long before one of them was up on it, showing off her superior balancing skills!
I am not the first person in my family to take to the practice of keeping and raising my own chickens to provide eggs for the table and enjoyment in the garden. When I was small, my father kept a flock of white leghorn laying hens and would often either hatch chicks under a broody hen, or bring home day old chicks to slip under a hen so she could raise them.
The first time I recall Dad bringing home some day old chicks, he arrived home one afternoon and got out of his car carrying a small cardboard box, about the size of a shoe box. As he walked into the house, the box was cheeping and chirping.
Being a curious seven year old, I asked him. "What's that you've got, Dad?"
"A box of whistles," he replied.
Later, he showed me how to give the 'whistles' to the broody hen and she went on to raise them quite happily, into productive members of our flock.
On the Tuesday before easter, we hatched six tiny new chicks and thus became the owners of our very own 'box of whistles.'
We got six chicks from 7 eggs which is a very good hatch! For now, their names are Prima, Seconda, Tierza,Quatra, Quinta and Sesta.
They are hybrids. Two of them are Australorp X Light Sussex (They are the larger, bluish coloured chicks) and the rest are Australorp over Commercial Australorp. They are good, strong, healthy chicks and I look forward to adding them to our laying flock, or selling them on to others for laying hens.
Good Friday, however came with its own set of challenges, which I will post more about later!
I've been thinking about putting my Australorp pullet, "Chica" up on the show bench to get some feedback from a qualified judge about her type and form. It's a little daunting to think of this, but she is a very nice looking pullet and I feel she is quite close to the standard for Australorp hens.
Here is a photograph of "Chica" that I took yesterday. It is a little bit grainy as it was snapped through the livingroom window, which just goes to show how long it has been since I cleaned the windows! *blush* Please ignore my housekeeping and look at the fowl. :)
Of course, given that I hatched and raised this little girl by hand, I am possibly biased about her looks, although I am trying to look with clear eyes and put the rose coloured glasses aside.
The only real way to be sure, is to show her and find out.
Chica is 22 weeks old, not quite fully grown as yet, and still needs to feather out a bit more, but she has the shape of an Australorp to her and the lovely compact tail of her breed.
I've been doing some reading this morning on what it takes to prepare and train a young bird for show and I think I might begin prepping her at least. Getting her used to handling, and being penned in a small show box would be one way to start. I can also begin to condition her legs and comb and groom her feathers with a silk cloth. All of that will at least start to tame her down and get her used to being examined and judged.
The local "Agricultural Show" (similar to a county fair) is in June and I think I could have Chica tamed and trained in plenty of time for it.
Those who follow this blog regularly will know that I hatched three chicks
back in October of 2011 and that I then spent the past 5 months or so raising
them to maturity.
My hope in hatching them had been that I would get replacement hens for my
laying flock, and also some breeding stock towards my dream of breeding
Australorps for fun and possibly for show. Well, I got one pullet from the
hatch, and two roosters. Out of a dozen eggs, three chickens. Not a huge return
on my investment, but the enrichment that these youngsters brought to our lives
was worth more than money. In my opinion, anyway!
We had three darling little walking pompoms which we dubbed "Chick 1, Chick
2, and Chick 3" initially. Not the most creative of names, I know, but when you
don't know what gender is hiding under all that soft, downy fluff, what can you
do.
Being complete novices at the hatching business, we
still had no clue, even at four weeks of age, what gender birds we had, but
expert opinion from more experienced poultry fanciers put odds on that Chick 1
was a girl whilst Chick 2 and Chick 3 were both boys. The reasoning behind this
is because chick number 1 (left of photogaraph) has a smaller comb and no
wattles, and her feathers are more developed over the wing and back. the other
two chicks, have larger, redder combs and the beginnings of wattles under their
chins. Indeed, that's exactly how it did pan out in the end.
We had one blue cockerel, one black cockerel and a
black pullet. Yes, I knew, even back then, that Cockerels grow up to become
roosters and that roosters like to crow first thing in the morning, and second
thing, and third and...so on.
What I didn't know, was that Roosters would crow
loudly at all those things of the day. Still, I had at least 6 months
before the crowwing would start, didn't I? So I could just ignore the problem
until I couldn't ignore it anymore, right?
As it happened, our two cockerels, whom we named
Boom and ChopChop hadn't read the Handbook for Young Cockerels in the
Field, and they thought that it was entirely appropriate for a young
rooster to start testing his vocal chords somewhere around 8 weeks of age! At
first, it was cute... sweet, soft little, wobbly arrrrreeeeeaaaarooo!
noises greeted the dawn, and they soon ran out of breath and didn't try again
for hours. Not so bad, I thought. We can live with that!
Practice makes perfect, though and pretty soon,
Boomer (renamed because of his voice!) was starting up at 4am with an
increasingly loud and strident AAARRRRRRR-OOOOO-AH-OOOOOH! He discovered he
could crow and he decided he liked to crow! There was one day in
particular when his new, brassy trumpet of a voice split the air at least five
times every two minutes! I was going nuts, my neighbour was going nuts, and I
think, even the hens, and ChopChop were going nuts, listening to him!
I really loved Boomer, but I knew that his luck
would have to run out sooner or later with the neighbours. Tolerant as they are,
even I could tell that the noise would eventually get on their very last
nerve.
I made up my mind to give him away, then I made up
my mind to keep him, and then I made it up to give him away and that time I got
as far as posting an advertisement online about him. I was still hesitant, but
that evening I had an email from a lady who was very interested in having Boomer
for her breeding program. I decided to sleep on it. The following morning, after
inspecting the hens, and having a last little chat with Boomer, cuddled on my
lap, I made up my mind that he should be given the opportunity to go and live in
the country, before someone decided to demand his carcass on a platter!
I felt at peace after talking on the phone with the
person who had inquired about him, and I made one last video of my beautiful
Boomer-ang and then boxed him up and put him into the car for the drive to a
town halfway between our home and Boomer's new address.
When I met Boomer’s new owner, and she met Boomer, I knew it was a
perfect match! She fell in love with our boy at first sight, and he
seemed pretty happy with her as well. We chatted for a while about our
shared love of all things chook and then I told Boomeroo to be a good
boy in his new home and we waved him off on his way to the big farm in
the country where he has a harem of ladies all his own just waiting
until he is out of quarantine.
We still have Boomer’s brother, Chop Chop here, and he is a sweet,
gentle little boy who is quite a bit quieter, so far, than his
bigmouthed brother was.
And today, my neighbour came over with a suggestion for a rooster box for Choppie to go into at nighttime.
Yesterday while I was drinking my morning coffee, I could hear a faint sound which I couldn't quite decipher coming from the direction of my chicken coops. I couldn't decide, sitting in my study, if it was a hen announcing the arrival of an egg, or some other strange commotion. I decided to get up and go to the back patio to listen more closely.
I didn't actually make it out to the patio, but froze, listening just inside the back door with a big, sloppy stupid grin on my face. Yes one of our young cockerels has come of age, and was letting the world...well, the backyard at least know about it with a soft, rusty sounding "Err-uh-errrrrrr!"
I don't know which one of the boys it was. When I went up to the grower pen to ask who was crowing, I was met with sealed beaks and innocent looks while the young pullet softly suggested a solution to the 'problem.'
"Chop-chop!" she clucked under her breath. "Chop-chop-chop!" She is always suggesting that her brothers should get the chop! She's such a meanie.
All of the other hens, both my own, and the guest hens we are chook-sitting were in a state of high excitement, calling out to let the 'man' know where they are.
So, our 'babies' are all grown up. 12 weeks old, today and I am already starting to plan for next season's hatch. I love the rhythm that these lovely birds have brought to my life. Yes, they're hard work, but they repay my efforts in eggs, and more than repay it with the enrichment they bring me.
A few photos I snapped around our yard, today. Some of them are a bit fuzzy, (namely the ones of the chicks) because of fast moving subjects!
Our blue Australorp chick, "Boomer." I think that this one is a cockerel. He has the facial markings, the stance, and the body conformation of a rooster, to my untrained eyes.
This is a closer view, same bird. He is developing wattles and has red earlobes.
This is the only pullet of the three, I think. You can see her body shape is much softer and rounder and she has a smaller comb and barely any wattles at all. Her earlobe is darker coloured. This chick feathered up faster than the other two, which I have been told is one way of telling pullets from cocks.
I think this is the girl...I find it hard to tell because of the glare from the flash on her face.
The two boys together black boy named NotChick in the front. Again, he has the more pronounced facial colouring, larger comb and wattles and the body shape of a cockerel.
A clearer shot. This is soooo a boy! Would be happy to hear opinions from anyone about them.
And finally, this is one of a pair of Jabiru who have been hanging out in our yard the past few days. They tend to avoid me when they see me, so I had to be patient to get this pic.
