how do you keep your chooks

[kindness]

Just wanted to get a bit of a snap shot of how any of you who have chooks like to keep em.

Do you have a permanent pen, do you let em free range and protect your plants? Do you tractor them?

Just wondering...

Mine live in a geodesic dome, similar to this one:

Mine is covered in bird netting, its a piece of piss to move around the yard and I then follow by planting the area the chooks have scratched out with veges and fruit/other interesting plants... it's a bit of a winner so far. Been using this system for about hmmm 3 or 4 months now and have so far created four 4m diameter circles to plant out

Happy days.

[psili sausage]

do you have somewhere predator proof to keep them at night?

I lost 6 chickens to a pair of foxes just before winter. Waiting until spring to get more... have to upgrade the coop too.

Edit: We were letting them roam free during the day and then locking them in the coop in the evening. It was fairly secure except for above the gate where the foxes got in. We didn't think there were foxes around here but they proved us wrong by breaking every chicken's neck and leaving them to die.

Edited July 4, 2010 by psili sausage

[incognito]

awesome meanines do ur chooks lay inside the dome? is part of it covered to protect chooks from the elements??

cant offer a pic, but mine live an a shed, half enclosed with corrugate iron, to offer protection.

under the corrugate i have just some plain roosts, just thick branches tied onto the corrugate. at the back i have my layer boxes(old wooden fruit boxes), which i fill with hay. i have a box of shell grit in there to pic at as well. the flooring is fresh woodchip, which i refresh when it gets stinky.

the rest of the shed is just chicken wire, i feed and water them in that part as well. I have dug in say 30cm of corragate along the side of theis part to stop foxes digging in, rest of corrugate is tied onto the bird wire.

i let my chooks out when i head of to work in the morning 0730 and lock them in when i get home around 1730.

i totally dig my chooks. i have rhode island reds, a dozen of them, which keep me and my folks in eggs.

i dont have a rooster but wanna buy one. seeing as im not gonna breed i wanna get one of those big fuc-off tyranosaurus fighting malaysian thingamebobs. only for the fact that they look way cool.

i think its good for the chooks to get a fresh pick and some freedom, plus it looks cool having chickuns running around the place.

i really wanna get a good dam dug soon so i can have some geese. maybee when i win powerball i totally dig geese. they look so cool. can u eat them or their eggs though?

im a poultry man from way back. wanna get some guinea fowl as well soon.

bit over ducks, they really just do stinky slimy shits everywhere, not that geese would be much different.

[Amazonian]

i dont have a rooster but wanna buy one. seeing as im not gonna breed i wanna get one of those big fuc-off tyranosaurus fighting malaysian thingamebobs. only for the fact that they look way cool.

 

I am sure you know how aggressive the roosters can get. Their spurs can grow many inches long and inflict nasty injuries but they do look awesome and protect their hens well. I am down to one bantam hen who thinks she is a rooster and tries to crow every now and then. She is a free range girl and sleeps on the dog kennel at the back door. If you forget to shut the door ,she will follow you into the kitchen pecking up crumbs along the way and leaving the odd turd behind. Chooks love to get out and scratch around so if they are let out 1/2 an hour (or so) before dusk ,this gives them time to forrage and will go back to roost in their cage before night falls. Chooks are great.

[kindness]

friggin' foxes. who said there wasn't a place for a .22 in the world? We are in town, a rural one, probably less than a km from paddocks etc so foxes could well be an issue - but haven't seen any as yet thankfully. Have definately lived with the fuckers before though and lost lotsa animals to em.

Yep, the chooks lay in the dome. I have an old bench set up in there that I have screwed an old recycling tub to sideways... on the front of that I have screwed some timber on to keep straw in... thats their nesting box. They pretty much sit on top of that or in that overnight.

I'm a pretty lazy gardener and animal keeper... really don't go to much beyond making it work as good as possible in the first place and then reaping whatever benefits I can from then on in with minimal maintainence. It's a bit of a hangover from growing up with parents who had way too many animals that took way to much caring for!

Cover for the dome is a tarp that is loosely tied to tent pegs or whatever logs or rocks are lying around near where the dome is... this is because if I tie it to the dome it becomes a sail!

And incog' yep you can eat geese and their eggs... I'd probably stick with the eggs though... They are fiesty fuckers too... they will totally go you! I think we used to keep them to keep foxes away, they have NO FEAR at all. I remember one of the ones we had totally smashed the top of it's beak off trying to honk / snap at our dogs who lived next door to their little yard... They also used to snap at all of us, biting my mum numerous times, (ah hah mum lol) and leaving serious bruises!

[Quill]

Geese are full on man. i have some serious mental scarring because of geese. A bunch of the fuckers surrounded me on a bridge at a mates place when I was like seven. I ended up jumping into the creek.

Chooks are great though. When i had some we let em go free range until six pm when they had to be cooped up to avoid being eaten by foxes. Chooks are top value, they eat food scraps, control the insect population and provide good manure. Oh and eggs as well

[shortly]

We used to let ours free range during the yard during daylight & lock them away at night & even the we lost a couple to foxes, then the foxes mysteriously started to disappear as well Luckily we don't have winged predators here as well.

I think its important that they can scratch about & feed on as wide a variety of things as possible, without me having to go to ridiculous lengths to supplement their diets.

Healthy diet for the girls = healthy eggs for us.

[Quill]

yeah you can totally tell the health of the chooks by the quality of the eggs. We had them producing double yolkers fairly regularly at one stage. i find that if they are kept in a cage and don't get a chance to forage for insects then the eggs will suffer (and the chooks too)

[incognito]

never lost a chook yet to a fox. touch wood.

ive heard those fighting roosters are also the most tame- toward humans and their hens.

i have rhode island reds, a favouite since i was a kid. am i weird for thining them pretty? probably lol

whats others favourite chook?? what are the best layers? the reds are pretty good. i get an egg out of each hen most days.

and yeah its true that if u have a rooster they lay more??

i know geese are gnarly, i just think they loo really cool.

was it the germans or someone who used to let a floc go ahead of them in a battle? the geese would always tae out one or 2?

my dad had a gander from a chic before i was born. it loved dad. followed him everywhere. when i was born and grew to a toddler, the gander hated me, because of the attention my dad gave me. i couldnt be left alone as the goose would just pound me if it got the chance. terrifying fucker. it got me one day, bite me right on the bac. i woulda been 3 or 4 but i still remember it. dad kicked it in the guts, and it was heartbroken. ditched dad and then befriended our horse. used to follow our horse like a metre behind it until the gander finally died. but yeah they are beautiful things.

im thinking about getting a baby alpaca to deal with foxes on my place, but yeah i dont want to many mouths to feed.

[Amazonian]

.

ive heard those fighting roosters are also the most tame- toward humans and their hens.

 

Well there ya go, I haven't heard that. I am going by my experiences with roosters that I have had. Some were soooo scary. Bastards. I found that the hens went broody more often when a rooster was present. The iridescent colors in some roosters is lovely.

Dr Harry from Better Homes and Gardens did a demonstration on reducing the spur size of roosters.He used an angle grinder,i couldn't believe it.One slip and you have got one legged rooster. The spurs are super hard to cut ,i think i used tin snips and then a rasp.

[incognito]

spurs wouldnt be a problem unless u had other roosters?? would they??

when i get my rooster im gonna get it as a chick. i spend alot of time with my chooks ;P so he should be all cool.

i usually sit down for an hour with a chai and watch them when i feed them. they r just soo cute

the blue shamo

cool chook.

[Amazonian]

I got a rooster as a chick. He wasn't too bad with me but in the end the kids couldn't go into the back yard. My Jack Russell had been attacked one too many times and decided that its number was up. I was upset and relieved. Roosters fly up at you and try to gouge you with their spurs. Its just their thing.

 

[Amazonian]

This is the last hen who thinks she is a rooster /dog.

spurs

This is him. he was lovely.

Edited July 5, 2010 by Amazonian

[shortly]

Don't believe it for a minute incognito, a rooster will use its spurs on a human just as quick as another rooster. It has everything to do with how the animal is raised, housed, individual temperament and to a small degree brood line.

The hard feather breeds often tend to be a bit more belligerent, which makes sense since many were bread to fight .

[Amazonian]

Don't be disheartened about getting a rooster Incognito. They are great to watch with the hens. Just be aware what they are capable of.

[kindness]

my hens peck me lol - they think my fingers are big fat worms.

I think it has something to do with them being bred to just pop out eggs... they aren't the friendliest or smartest chooks on the planet.

They do make a nice egg though.

[incognito]

wow, we had dozens of bantam roosters when i was a kid, the bantams kinda escaped and went wild and lived in the trees.

never ever been attacked by a single rooster. used to watch em fight though, they where so into it, but would end as quick as it started and they would carry on pecing at shit together. wow neva thought a rooster would attack a human.

[shortly]

We had quite a lot of Seabrights that were as placid as anything, never a problem. All the Barnevelder's bar one were too. The one rooster that wasn't was the nastiest thing with feathers, he would have a piece of anything that even looked sideways at his girls. He was a magnificent bird, in the end tasted great too.

[gerbil]

im thinking about getting a baby alpaca to deal with foxes on my place, but yeah i dont want to many mouths to feed.

 

Found a comfortable fox in a paddock with alpaca the other day

You can put a woolly coat on me and I don't mind what i get called.

Apparently donkeys will kick the shit out of coyotes, not that that helps ya...

Great idea meanies, really cool. Where abouts are you, southern NSW? All over the shop essentially, but that area looks like a fox haven, good luck with it.

Edited July 5, 2010 by gerbil

[kindness]

yep, it's pretty foxy where I am. I don't really know many areas that aren't that I had lived though. The picture above isn't actually of me. I am much fatter and older ;) lol

[shruman]

Heres 4 of our five chooks, we have another white one, usualy get about 4-5 eggs a day its pretty cold here of late so they've gone right off & getting 1 maybe 2 a day now.

Heres our three ducks, indian runner x something or other the guy mumbled under his breath... who knows?

Still have'nt gotten an egg from the ducks, dunno why, had em a while & they've just never layed, might make duck a l'orange

You can see the chook shed & the gate to their attached run but we let them free range during the day on our backyard a bit over 1/2 an acre & lock them up at night. Our 2 dogs are out the front in the day but we let them out the bck at night so foxes are'nt a problem. We do have them about though, Our yard backs onto a big empty crown land paddock & theres paddocks with horses just across the road.

Have a big 'feeder' in the shed I fill with grain about once a week, pretty lazy/easy.

Recently put in a deep litter system on the bottom of their run, with decomposing woodchips, privot leaves & small stems, spindly willow branches & iron & stringy bark I chopped with a hatchet. With the rain we've been having it would be one big mudslick but the deep litter system works very well. Just use straw on a dirtfloor in the chook shed. It has a concrete footing so foxes could'nt easily dig in though.

Yeah like a lot of you guys love my chooks, thinking about a rooster, how do you reckon they'd go with neighbors?, maybe rabits for meat?

[kindness]

We don't have a rooster because of being in town. Rooters also taste like shit IMHO - too stringy and not enough meat... actually that goes for most chooks I've eaten that have been home grown free ranged. I think I might be too used to store bought.

IME ducks don't lay much, they lay more realistically - like if they think it's a good time to whack out a smaller version of themselves, not like chooks who try and reproduce all the time weirdly, (anyone know why this is other than selective breeding by us humans over the years?).

A problem I have definitely experienced with rooters is that they root things to death. Be that hens or whatever else you have around... not saying that this is always the case or anything, all animals have different temperaments and all, but I have seen plenty o' chooks farked to death by rooters.

oh and ducks quite sad really - in the end we ditched the rooters.

That said, I also hear that for every 6 - 8 hens 1 rooter is a good thing to keep em happy and to keep you in supply of new chicks each year...

it's all a bit of experimenting though isn't it. I like the big ass feeder idea shruman, think I might have to take that one up.

peace and chicken love corroboree style

[incognito]

yeah u get more than one drake and it is quite savage. they are chronic rapists.

if u have ducks just have the one drake, for all that is good in the world.

[gerbil]

yeah u get more than one drake and it is quite savage. they are chronic rapists.

if u have ducks just have the one drake, for all that is good in the world.

 

Ah that's interesting, there's a mob of geese down at the river (someones pets who don't keep them on their fucking land! rant over) always seem to be raping the other members of the group, the only time i've seen it (multiple occasions) have been in the water where the male pretty much drowns the lady whilst having his way, quite a disturbing site to see ;) seems ducks are the same.

[kindness]

peg some rocks at the bugger