Learning is the only way to ever get smarter!  If you think you KNOW something, then challenge yourself by learning MORE if for no other reason than to confirm you are right.

I’ve been so busy lately studying up on genetics and chicken nutrition or poultry nutrition in general.  Throughout the avian world, different birds have different needs; a fact I was very surprised to learn.  I figured a bird is a bird is a bird, but no, afraid not.  Depending on their function, their diet, their size, their heritage, they all have varying needs albeit with many similarities.   Take Lysine for instance, if you remember in Jurrasic Park (the first one) there was a brief discussion about the “Lysine Contingency” which simply referred to the fact that without the provided Lysine by the park operators, all the dinosaurs would die off slowly but surely.  Chickens are the same way!  Without their Lysine, they have very little ability to absorb protein, without protein.. well you know how important THAT is, what with our hens popping out little hard shelled protein balls almost daily.

Anyway, the nutritional study came about because of my birds molting.  I wanted to make sure that I was providing all the correct nutrition, to be sure they not only progressed well but didn’t dawdle while doing so.  What I learned is, that my chickens, while healthy and beautiful looking, aren’t getting a very nice diet.  Since I started I have come to the following analogy to help others understand…   SURE, you can eat Special K Cereal 4 times a day for every meal and a snack, it’s packed FULL of all the vitamins and minerals you’ll need and with a 1/2 cup of milk you’ll also receive much needed protein to round out your diet, HOWEVER, how long before your tired of Special K?  A week?  A month?  A Day?  Seriously, day in, day out, same old cereal.  And then what if you have a craving for something salty?  So you eat Special K, because that is all you have.. but it doesn’t really do it for you.  What about something savory.. nope.. Special K isn’t going to cover that either.  So you’ll just keep eating the cereal but never really be satsified, not to mention being completely bored with your food!  And all the while eating a ton of calories they didn’t really want or need in the first place…  sound familiar?

There are literally dozens of ideas for feeding plans out there.  The trick I think is to assimilate the purpose of each method, at least the ones that make sense to you, and then attempt to provide whatever you can based on availability or budget to provide balance & variety.  That is why I’m in the process of converting our feeding systems to accommodate a variety of options for all of my chickens.  Now, don’t panic, I’m not saying that YOU SHOULD do this too!  But since it’s my blog, it’s only right to keep you in the loop.

Starting this week, we are going to a 5 feeder system.  Yes 5.  Seriously… I know… sounds like a TON of work, but 5 is the magic number as far as I can tell from my own notes.  Of course with practice comes more experience & learning so I’ll be sure to keep you apprised of our progress.  Here is how the 5 feeder system breaks down:

1.  Granite Grit – To help grind up any non pelleted feed stuffs
2.  Oyster Shell – For shell production
3.  Balanced Pellet Ration – Layer ration or Flock Raiser
4.  Whole & Cracked Grains – Wheat, Oat, Corn, Safflower, Sunflower Seeds, Flax, etc
5.  Greens & Sprouts – Garden greens/weeds, kitchen scraps, alfalfa, clover or plant pellets & sprouted beans & grains like peas, lupins, sunflower seeds, wheat, corn, etc.

Feeders #1 & #2 are usually typical in a coop but not something I’ve needed to have yet.  #3 is the standard feed ration most of us give our chickens. # 4 is more like what chickens would find if they were foraging through decent pastures, same with #5 really, greens that should be available year round.  Now, if your chickens range everyday or get a good deal of time with a nice variety of forage, then you have nothing to worry about.  However, on THIS mini/micro farm, we have only our own front yard and a little downhill for them to roam, most of which is weeds or in-edibles.    But getting out of the coop is ALSO about exercise, so even if you have little forage like we do, it’s still a great idea to get everyone out & running around.

The new system is going to require a few more minutes work each day, but all in all, I expect it to be well worth the trouble.  What really broke my heart while researching is when I read that if you feed pelletized feed, a complete ration, and your chickens need more calcium, they have to eat more pellets.  If they want more corn, again more pellets.  If they want some grains, more pellets… the problem is, they are consuming all those extra calories eating the whole pellet when they only want a small portion of what is IN the pellet.   Not to mention that apparently chickens, like humans, are VERY intuitive and know what they need nutritionally.  That if given a choice, they will consume what their body is needing or lacking to round out the balance.

How could I walk away from that information, and just continue to toss some pellets into their pens everyday?  I can’t, so I’m not going to.  I’m going to set it up so that they have the choice to eat what they feel they want, and leave it at that.

Also, since I’ve done all this studying, speaking with lots of long time chicken breeders, my local feed store lady & I have come up with a few supplemental rations that I am going to work on packaging & selling for a little side money.   I’ve been feeding my chickens these snack rations for a few weeks now, and they LOVE it.  More on that coming next week, as I get all of my supplies in and a few formulas ready to go.

The First 14 to hatch

Great news here on the homestead.  20 of 23 hatchlings emerged over the course of 2 days, including about 13 black, maybe 6 blue and 1 splash.   When they are wet it is sometimes difficult to tell if they are dark blue or black and then under the red brooder light, it’s even harder to tell.   The Splash chick came last from the tiniest egg, I honestly didn’t expect anyone to hatch from that egg but he/she sure did.    The splash chick is a little weak, I think from being in that tiny egg too long so we’ll see how he/she improves over the next few days.

More photos to come when they’ve gotten a little bigger, maybe next week.

My eggs are due next week, so I candled last night & removed what wasn’t developing.  It looks so far like the new Blue Orp did a pretty good job, but not all the hens would let him mate with them.  I removed about half of the eggs from the Blue hens and just a few of the eggs from the Black hens due to lack of development.  I haven’t cracked them open, but they look just infertile with the light.

I also received an extremely pricey book on Chicken Genetics, and in it, I read that in order to get ALL blue offspring, I should mate a Splash rooster with black hens!  You know, just as soon as I think I get things figured out, I get it wrong.  I need to do MORE research because I THOUGHT that Splash Roo on Blue Hens would yield all Blue Offspring, and now I read it’s Splash to Black!  Sheesh!   So now I have 24 eggs left in the incubator, 7 of which are Blue on Blue.

Here is what I’ve found:

Blue X Blue = 50% Blue, 25% Black, 25% Splash
Blue X Splash = 50% Blue, 50% Splash
Blue X Black = 50% Blue, 50% Black
Splash X Black = 100% Blue
Black X Black = 100% Black
Splash X Splash = 100% Splash

So from my 7 Blue eggs I can expect around 3 Blue, 2 Black & 2 Splash
And from the remaining 17 Blue on Black Eggs I can expect around 8 or 9 Blue and 8 or 9 Black.

Now the only thing to figure out next is, how to arrange my breeding pens for long term.  I want a pen that yields all blue and one that yields all black.

Well, I have to get going.  A gentlemen from nearby Sevierville is on his way to pick up a couple of White Orpington pullets and I should be ready when he gets here.

I can’t believe that September flew by so quickly.  I remember periods of my life where time seemed to move at a slow crawl, but now the days, the hours, they seem to get away from me.

We’re busily trying to get the house & property ready for an appraisal tomorrow, these low low interest rates are very interesting to us.  We would like to take advantage of them if at all possible, but who knows where the market has left our home value.

Today we purchase a length of railing to use as a new front gate.  I was going to build something special, but honestly, I’m tired and have very little time.  So this will make it so much easier, and allow for us to move on from our temporary gate which doesn’t really allow us free passage in and out of the yard!   But hopefully before the offspring comes home today, we’ll have a decent gate for her entry.

This last week I was SO busy baking for the ROTC Fundraising booth at the Newport Harvest Street Festival, that I hardly got anything done, except for tons and tons of dishes.  So this week, I’m looking forward to getting many things done around the yard and with the chickens.

I’ll update you all again before long!

See you soon!!!

Hello Everyone! I originally installed a nifty guestbook so you could leave your comments, and upload a photo of your chicks! Especially if you’ve hatched eggs from our farm! Unfortunately, the SPAM was really getting out of control, multiple times every day I would get posts reflecting this pharmaceutical or that new cure for ‘whatever’ might ail you!

I switched to this format because it allows me to approve comments before they appear online. Take THAT spammers! 🙂

I hope you’ve enjoyed my website, and please, let me know if I can improve it!
Thank you for visiting. 🙂

If you would like to post a photo of your chicks or chickens, email me info@dawnonthefarm.com and I’ll add them to your post/comments!

I recently put the new Blue Orpingtons from Gilman Farms in with my Black Orpingtons from Small Acres Poultry.   The goal here is to obtain a cross between the lines resulting in all 3 colors; Black, Blue & Splash.  Why cross the lines you ask?  Well, frankly I feel it’s necessary!  The Gilman Blue Orps are really nice looking, REALLY nice looking, but already they are late layers and I find they have little to no instincts.  I couldn’t get them to peck at the ground, perch on anything and to this day I’ve still not seen ANY of them (Gilman White’s included) dust bathe.  I hope that by crossing in Small Acres lovely Blacks that we will not only get beautiful offspring, but will also gain back some of that natural instinct.   Once the Blues moved in with the Blacks, they did start perching with them, so I do have hope for everyone perhaps learning by example.

Back to Black/Blue/Splash.  What is Splash?  It’s mostly a white bird with “splashes” of blue & black here and there.   I’ve never had a single request for a Splash Orpington, but they are extremely useful if you ever want to breed Blue Orpingtons full time.  You see, when you pair Blue hens with a Splash rooster, ALL the offspring are Blue.    Blue is a color EVERYONE wants, probably more than any other color, and so I’m working my way to consistent Blue offspring for its marketability.  Now ideally, you would want to mate blue & blue to get blue offspring, but it just doesn’t yet work that way.  Someone should work on that, I believe that I read in The Orpington Fowl, that it COULD be done but would take generations and generations of breeding Blue on Blue while culling any Splashes.

But MY goal, is to have a Blue Pen & a Black Pen for next spring for predictability in the hatches.  And so I can accomodate egg orders for those wanting one or the other.   I already have two orders for Black & Blue pullets this fall, and have several orders waiting for eggs in both colors.  Right now though, the Blue hens are not yet laying, so I can only pull fertile eggs from the Black hens who are being mated by the new Blue Roosters.  He’s still young, but so far he’s good looking and I can trust he’s from good lines, so I’m taking a chance going forward.  One really SHOULD wait to see what the rooster looks like before deciding if he’s a good breeder, but time is NOT on my side, neither are numbers!  I only have 1 Blue Roo, 1 Black Roo.. I need more in order to have choice!  So my goals for this year were to expand my numbers to get choices, and I’m well on my way!

The same is also true of my other pens, White & Buff, but I have to find good sources of each.   I have a friend named Bill, he’s working tirelessly on some great looking buffs.  One day soon, he’ll get the mix JUST right and share some eggs with me so that I can expand that pen too.  Whites are nearly impossible to obtain, so I will be looking to my hatchery whites to see if any of those girls stand out and look better than another.  Hopefully I can get at least one out of that group to add to my Gilman Whites, to create some diversity, and again gain choices.

Well.. the sun is out today so I have to get going.  I have to finish a blog for one of my clients, www.LakefrontCabins.com and then i can get outside to deal with some more of the rain effects of yesterday.  There is fuzzy mold building up in some of the dark & damp areas.  It needs raked, dried & disinfected, preferrably by sun exposure.

Yesterday, our neighbor’s adult son paid us a bit of an angry visit.   The first time we met I believe he came over asking if we had seen any of his chickens running around in the woods between our properties.   He doesn’t actually live on that piece of property, his family rents THAT house, but across the street is his mothers horse pasture & barn and apparently he was keeping some bantam games there and the new tenants dog chased them all off into the woods.    I figured they were all dead by now if he hadn’t seen them in days, how could some tiny bantams survive those terrible woods unprotected after all??!!!  He asked us to let him know if we see them roosting anywhere or hear them and he’d come on out and catch them.  I never did hear or see any until a couple weeks later, when I saw a whole bunch of them roosting over the pig pen at that rental house.  By this time, he already knew they were there and I supposed that he was looking after them.

Yesterday though, he came over to let us know that he was upset because some neighborhood dogs, including our Angel, were terrorizing & killing his chickens.   I say that is purely ridiculous, but of course don’t want to be one of “those” people, you know the ones, who don’t think their dogs can do any wrong.   But our Angel, ganging up with some local strays and attacking the neighbors livestock?  Angel is not the neighborhood stray, she rarely leaves the porch, and with her gimpy leg she’s hardly a threat.  Her temperment is cool and even for the most part, and in her old age, nothing is of any real interest to her.  She’s never made a move at any of our chickens, but does always look like she might pounce on some of the little ones if given a chance to.  Even with all of that, I STILL don’t believe he sees OUR dog anywhere near that property unless we’re with her.  It very nearly turned into an argument as he threatened to shoot her and informed us that he has the legal right to do so if she is attacking his poultry/livestock.  Spouting nonesense about the sheriff & the animal shelter, blah blah blah.  They really are no help, since funding and public opinion really aren’t on their sides.  Well, mostly he was full of hot air because he’s preaching to the choir!  I too wouldn’t hesitate to shoot any dog trying to eat/attack or damage my chickens or pens, but I highly doubt he’s even talking about our dog.  He’s just venting to the only people answering their door or willing to claim their own dogs!

He warned us that he was putting out some poison and would shoot if necessary.   And my husband reminded him that he wasn’t talking about our dog, so he should just move on and do whatever he needs to do.  Even though we feel very strongly about it, there are still no reasons to take chances.  If he did leave some poison out, I sure don’t want her finding any of it, so in the end we did what he asked.  Kept her locked up last night, and today we worked on stretching out some much needed fencing around the perimeter of the property.

Fencing our yard sounds simple, but it never is.  Awkward lines, poor planning, mishapen fence and/or posts mostly because what we use is flimsy & temporary.  Exactly what you WANT to use when your not sure what your doing, and can’t afford a few extra thousand for a perimeter fence of any quality.  We started years ago with a small area of the yard off the front porch and 50′ of fencing, upgraded to another 50′ and so on.  At some point, we put in a gate and made a nice front yard for the dogs.  THEN we got the chickens, and subsequently an 90lb dog that LOVES jumping our fences!!!  That was ok until the neighbor complained he was running her horses, and so we tried, and tried, and tried to contain him with our lame fences.  But we never could so onto a cable tie he went.  Of course, the ONLY place to anchor him to, and allow him still on the front porch AND to patrol the coops, meant that part of the fence was in his way.  And he insisted on jumping it, then progressively tearing it down big by bit everywhere in his way.  Really, there were tons of things in his way, fire pit, fences, flower pots, big logs, all sorts of stuff.  So we finally cleaned it all up in the last couple of weeks and now he is free to roam almost a complete circle on a 30′ cable tie.  And THAT is why the front fence was down allowing the little dogs to get loose & terrorize 😉 the neighborhood.

Well, most of the perimeter is now fenced enough to keep the little dogs in, improvements need to be made naturally, but it all went up in a couple of hours this evening.  We had to make some compromises, settle on some decisions for the future and just knuckle down and get er done!  We have no gate, no way out of the front of the yard at this point really, but will work on that over the next couple of weeks.  In the meantime, we’ll use the backdoor for the largest portion of everything.  A large portion of the fence line is now black chain link, very nice stuff, my husband brought home from the wind tunnel scrap piles.  I couldn’t believe how well it went up and how good it looks, I feel silly for not making it a priority sooner.   Again as with any of our projects, there is still much to do to really FINISH it, but I think, for tonight, we can rest easy that Angel will not be visiting the neighbors.

WHEW!  It was a LOT of work and I just wanted to tell you all about it!
🙂

I sat inside this morning looking outside as if it were some sort of abomination.  Buckets, truckloads, and two Olympic size swimming pools full, fell upon my small piece of the Smokies today, and there was nothing to do but watch in disbelief mixed with sorrow.

I knew that the tarp roof over the chain link dog run wouldn’t hold in a big storm, but I always think that I’ll get around to making it storm worthy before it needs to be.  But storms, unpredicatable as they can be, always seem to miss us and so I don’t take it as seriously as I should.  Today, an exception was made, and it appears we are the ONLY ones to get dumped on in the immediate area.

I planned to run out in between downpours and get them some assistance, drain the tarp which was already heavy with rain when I went out to fill feeders.  Unfortunately, before I could drop off my feedbucket & get some supplies it started again.  I could only stand there and wait for it to drop off some, there was no way I could go out in that!  The lightning was frightening, the rain so dense I couldn’t see the Hen House from the front porch!  Half an hour…  Fourty five minutes…. time passed so slowly, the water pooling everywhere.  Before I could get back the tarp pulled free of it’s anchors and flooded them with what must have been 20 gallons of water plus the ensuing downpour.

The rain let up enough that I could see, so I grabbed some zip ties, a pvc pipe w/cap & a bucket and made a dash for the back part of the yard.  Halfway there I could hear this chick just CRYING outloud… I stopped to glance at Lexi’s bantams, two of whom are in dog crates right now (boys will be boys) to see that one was SOAKED and crying frantically out of the side of the crate.  I ran over to see that she forgot to put any rain protection on him and he was swimming around like a duck in a few inches of water.  I opened the crate with my free hand, grabbed him and continued onto the dog run.  When I did make it to their coop, they were safely on the perch under their only solid roof waiting for rescue.  I’m afraid I didn’t offer a lot of relief, what with a strange set of tools and one bantam cochin under one arm.  I did the best I could to hold the roof into place as another cell burst over head, manually draining the puddles with one arm, calming a frantically soaked cochin in the other.   After another 10-15 minutes of holding the tarp my fingers were starting to cramp up so I had to abandon my efforst and find a safe place for the little guy I was holding.  I apologies to the Wyandottes and told them I would be back with a solution!

I dashed off back to the house, found a tub with some straw in it, popped the little guy in, and put a baby gate over the top to keep him in.  I ran back to the dog run, warmed my fingers and began the process of zip tying their tarp back on and figuring out a way to prop it up in the center to prevent any further puddling.  It wasn’t easy, but it is done for now.  The sun is out for the moment, but the radar still threatens more downpours.  I don’t look forward to being soaked to the bone again in this cold rain, so hopefully I can get things reinforced before the next one hits.

I’ve had enough time to dry off and get some coffee, and out I must go again to try & dry or drain out what water is left everywhere.

Sorry for the ramble, it’s been quite a day!  Until next time….

The cool nights have been a wonderful treat, the chickens are all happy & doing well.  We are battling a bit of a mild mite problem, we are in the home stretch of that month long battle I should hope and are winning for sure!

The first merge has begun with the Blue Orpingtons who are 21 weeks old today.  They moved in with our Black Orpingtons and Miguel our Black Rooster has moved out.  At first, the older hens were afraid but after only 1 day they seem to be getting along fairly well.  That first day though.. the black hens REFUSED to get down from the perch…  so much so that they dropped an egg FROM THE PERCH!  Hilarious.. it didn’t crack of course, the sand floor cushioned it perfectly! 🙂

Pierre & his ladies have a new home not too far down the road.  Unfortunately, they haven’t gone yet due to the mite problem, as I want to make SURE that we do not spread this issue to anyone.  So I am waiting until we have 2 whole MITE FREE weeks before they move to their new home.

I also gave in an ordered some chicken saddles, the professionally made kind…  I’m excited to get them in a few days.  While the washcloth could work, and one does, the other is much too loose and I just don’t want to worry about it.  I’m paying $16 including shipping for 4 lovely saddles.. you just can’t beat the price.  I didn’t pick the fabric, instead I gave her a range of colors & things I like, with explicit instructions for NO CAMO! 🙂  Not my thing.  I’ll post them as soon as I get them on my girls.

More later….

Chicken Saddles or Hen Aprons

These are handy little items that I’ve been wanting to aquire for some time.  I dreamed of ordering some from a chicken owner who sells lovely sewn ones with patterns & embroidery.   I waited a bit too long and the price went up, and a couple of my hens were in desperate need.  I’ve been hesitant to cut up fabric, again not wanting to waste anything, but I finally had to give in.  I recently purchased this large pack of washclothes from WalMart and while folding some, I realized that they are JUST the perfect size!

So.. I took out the green one above, put it over the hen, cut some holes for her wings & tail and tried it on.  It was a little too loose for her, because when I turned them this way they stretch really well.  So in I went to cut a second one, the white one.  They both are working really well so far as they are! I put the green one on a Buff Orpington hen, and it fit perfectly!  The white one is on one of my Gold Lace Hens.  Both look rather spiffy!  I didn’t cut the top corner off, that’s the part that is right at the back of their heads, it kinda looks like a hoodie sweatshirt 🙂 but we just tucked it under and it seems to be just fine.

Simple & cost effective, my two favorite things!

Why would you use one? Well.. in my case, two of my hens have been ridden BARE by their roosters, they need the added protection so he can’t hurt them and to give their feathers a good chance at growing back.  Other reasons might be an injury you want to protect, or even just because it’s something cute!