Bio-diversity

The latest issue of Backyard Poultry has a great article about how you can keep poultry for next to nothing in feed costs.  Homesteaders know this, it's the way our great grandparents kept chickens.  I really recommend this magazine to all backyard flocksters.  I've been taking it for awhile, and learn something new in every issue.  This particular article wasn't really something new for me, it just validated what I've been thinking all along.  It also gave me ideas for how it can be done with limited space and freedom.  As a gardener and nature-watcher, I understand how bio-diversity works.  It's the key to successfully raising chickens on a natural diet.  In this case, natural means for free.

I'm lucky that I have a lot of space and freedom.  So much that I can even support multiple roosters.  They have the room to work out their pecking order and room to avoid each other, and nobody cares if they crow.  A large part of the yard is fenced with 5' chainlink, and one of the reasons I settled on bantam cochins is because they aren't likely to fly over that fence.  As long as they stay inside the fence they're safe (nothing bigger than a rat gets in without Whipper knowing) and they have nearly unlimited natural food.  They don't need much from me.  I've set up roosts under the carport behind the rabbitry and that's where they spend the night, and they dash there when it rains.  There's several bowls of water around the yard, for the birds as well as dog and cat.  I do give them some daily feed.  This is either laying pellets or cheap mixed birdseed with cracked corn.  This is mostly as a treat to keep them tame and friendly.  They get more during winter when insects aren't available, but here in the south, there's always something green and growing, and many ground-dwelling organisms are active all winter.  My very 1st chicken was an obnoxious rooster who annoyed me so much, I quit feeding him at all in hope he'd just go away.  He thrived in beautiful condition through all seasons and was as ornery as ever.  I had to give him away to get rid of him.

So what's happening in my yard that makes it so perfect for chickens?  I'm a perennial gardener and have extensive gardens all over the place.  I've been landscaping since the day I moved here.  Literally.  I brought a lot of perennials from my MI garden, and they went in the ground almost immediately.  Natural habitat has grown up all along the fence, and I don't care that it's untrimmed and messy.  You can barely see the fence except at the gates and I like that.  The lawn is not manicured in any way other than mowing it, and it's made up of a lot of different native plants.  The gardens provide protective cover and shade for the birds.  I don't use any chemicals or pesticides other than Round-Up to keep garden edges neat and eliminate the need to trim hard to mow areas.  The diversity of plant life encourages a multitude of animal life...insects, worms, etc.  I dump rabbit manure directly on gardens which invites more life.  There's a lot going on in my yard.  It's highly bio-active, and chickens fit right in.

So how can a flockster (love that word, I found it in BYP) with less space and freedom provide more natural "free" food for their birds?  There's the obvious ways that can be found on most homesteading sites.  But if you're not a flower gardener or nature-watcher like me, you might not think about bio-diversity.  You should.

Someone in a limited situation might choose the chicken tractor method.  A portable coop that gives the birds fresh pasture on a regular basis.  This is a great option, but you have to think about the pasture underfoot.  Mowed lawn is not going to provide much more than entertainment for the chickens.  New grass, maybe a few bugs or worms but they will clean it out in no time, and if you leave them there long enough, you end up with a barren patch of ground that doesn't provide anything.  Instead, think about how you can allow some overgrown areas.  Let a patch the size of your coop go unmowed for a while.  It needs time to develop a mini habitat, including letting plants go to seed.  You could even seed the areas with self-sustaining forage such as grain or legume plants.  I suggest at least 3 areas per coop.  This works like a 3-stage compost bin.  There's the "new" part, the "cooking" part, and the "done" part.  When the birds have created a new part (depleted it), move them to the done part and let the others cook.  In fact, these areas could also be used for composting.  Throw all the things you would toss on the compost pile (including rabbit manure) in these areas instead.  Decaying vegetation provides a lot of animal life for the pecking, and the birds work the compost pile for you.

If you have a vegetable garden, it could be part of the layout.  Let some areas around the garden grow up, and do double duty as compost piles.  You could even fence each area so you can just put your birds in a done part.  You'd want to include shelter as part of a permanent layout.  And of course, the garden itself can provide excellent foraging.  You could build narrow runs that fit between rows and tractor them along.  The birds will do the weeding.  Toss the weeds they couldn't reach in the cooking parts.  After the harvest, leave the garden debris right there and let the chickens have at it.  Add finished compost from the working areas.  They'll turn all that into rich soil for next year's garden, as well as adding their manure to the mix. You might not even need to till it...it's all done and ready to go in the spring.  Free food for the birds, and other than moving the coop around, it's free labor for you.

Bio-diversity.  Think about it.  Chickens that are pastured to save feed costs need it.

tnt

7.24.12

I'll start off with rabbits.  I know, haven't talked about them much lately.  Not a lot was happening there and the chickens have been more entertaining.

I got a surprise in the nestbox.  I had bred the new Smith's himi buck to broken Baroquen.  I knew it was a risk because she carries himi.  I don't recommend broken x himi, but I'm prepared to deal with the broken himis that come out of it.  Baroquen herself was out of himi x broken.  I do it for type and at that time and this time, a himi buck had needful type parts.


So there are 2 kits, almost 3 weeks old.  A nicely broken black and what I thought was a siamese sable.  Didn't really expect that, but shaded from any of my lines doesn't surprise me.  As the kits grew, the sable wasn't looking right.  I realized it's a chocolate!  Now that is just plain strange.  Not strange from Baroquen, I knew she probably carried it, but how did the himi get the chocolate gene?  That's very rare in himis since they are usually herded with shadeds and shaded breeders avoid the chocolate gene (if they're wise).  Can't wait to tell the Smiths what lurks in that line.


One of my pet peeves is when clueless breeders label a brownish himi as chocolate when it's obviously a faded black himi.  Now I have an opportunity to actually work with chocolate himis.  Do I want to?  I don't know.  I have a few young does in the wings that will not be compatible with this.  I could cut the herd even harder to eliminate those other colors and just work the himis straight.  And maybe bring back the broken chocolates.  My foundation broken herd included chocolate.  I'll be thinking about this.  BTW, the little choc kit is looking promising.  That might have a lot of say.


In the weanlings, I ended up with way too many himi bucks.  Some of those are promising so we'll see.  There's only 1 himi doe in all those litters and she's looking broody, and maybe a black carrying himi.  Haven't sexed that one for sure yet.  One of the nicest bucks has me a bit puzzled.  One of his front feet is extremely light.  I've never seen that before.  His color isn't impressive to begin with but he's young and it's hot so I'm not worrying about that right now.  But one nearly white foot worries me.  I hope it's just a weird heat related molt thing.  And no, this one is not out of broken so that's not it.


It's interesting that most of the other himis are displaying pretty good color in this heat.  2 others the same age as that one have strong black points.  All the weanlings are still in the barn where it's much hotter.  Bruin (out in the Summer House) has suddenly begun to develop dark color.  He never had it before, his color was pretty lousy, and I assumed as good as it would ever be.  He's over 1 year old and just coming out of a hard molt.  It is cooler out there, but not that much cooler.  There's more to himi color than temperature.

Observations of chicken behavior: The Group Preen.

Every morning, they gather in the Porch View garden and spend a lot of time preening together.  As others join the gather, they immediately begin to preen as well.  I've also seen this later in the day and it might be in response to me.  If I sit down near them, one might begin to preen, and when one preens, the rest follow suit.  I think this is a sign of relaxed and content birds.  The morning preen happens to be when I'm sitting on the porch with my coffee.  They know I'm there and that pretty soon I'll head out to do the feeding chores.  While they wait on me, they might as well preen.  It's calming for me to watch it, too.

This is my view from the porch.

Of the 9 hatchlings, I have 4 keepers.  Maybe less.  1 blue roo (cool) and 3 hens.  The hens are white, black and mottled black.  I don't know if I'll keep the black and white, but I've really been wanting a mottled hen so she's not going anywhere.

They are getting pretty good at catching Japanese beetles on the fly.  It's hilarious when one catches a bug and then has to run to hang onto its prize.  The others are ready to snatch it if it's fumbled.  I'm trying to teach them to hunt slugs.  Whenever I come across one in a garden, I toss it in front of whatever bird is closest.  I wondered if the slime would turn them off (I know ducks eat slugs), but they've learned it's a heckova good snack (slugs get huge down here!) and gobble it right up.  Sometimes they have to dice the slug into smaller pieces before they can swallow it which is kinda gross.

tnt

More New

The same breeder who gave me Silky sold me a pair of young Barred Cochins.  Actually it was a trade.  These pix are dreadful.  They wouldn't stand still for a second.  Most of the shots were way worse.  This barred pattern is trippy with a motion blur!  I'll try to get better ones after they've settled down.

The pullet.  She seems really sweet and friendly.

The cockeral with Silky.  I wonder if she knows them.  She seemed very interested, more so than to my birds.  Maybe she'll bond with them.  His type is a lot like the buff roo that died out in the yard last month...bigger and leggier.  I was told he's pretty sweet too, except when it comes to his hen.

That's Poochy on the other side of the fence.  There was much posturing and strutting on both sides of the fence.  This will probably be a problem when I let these new birds out to free range, and the barred's larger size and seemingly extra testosterone worries me.

Yummm!  Corn on the cob!  The sweet lady who lives up the road from me brings me stuff.  These days it's sweet corn from the farmer's market.  It's more than I can eat so I give some to the birds.  Shhh, don't tell her.

It's an odd situation.  She sneaks up the drive and leaves it on my car hood.  She always manages to do this when I'm not looking or I'd thank her and let her know I can't eat all she brings me.  But I never catch her!  For a 75 year old woman, she moves pretty fast!  Whipper doesn't usually bark at people who come to the house so he doesn't alert me.  I look out and it has magically appeared on my car.  She often leaves magazines like Reader's Digest because a glitch in the subscription department sends her 2 copies.  I do like those.

Chickens are apparently related to vultures.  Wait, what?  Back up to a few days ago.  Until now, the white Japanese has been the underdog and outsider.  He wasn't allowed to play in any chicken games.  Suddenly something changed and he went after the alpha bird spot.  He and Poochy got into it real bad, and Poochy was not holding his own.  He came away covered in blood, which in the above pic has faded to yellow stains on his neck.  I put Pooch in the pen to calm down and recover a bit in peace, and kicked the Jap out of the yard that evening.  I wasn't having that, and I don't want him covering my hens anyways.  I actually took him "up north" (back of the property by the woods), but he came back down the next day.  He's currently living in the front yard.  As long as he stays there, I'm ok with that.  I set out a bowl of water for him, but he gets nothing else from me.  Didn't take him long to discover the bird feeders in the front garden provide quite a bit.

The vulture reference?  The cat left the remains of a rat in front of the porch yesterday morning.  Gee thanks, Abby.  I scooped it up and tossed it out into the front yard (the part where I don't go much).  Sometimes she finds it and finishes it off.  The Jap found it first.  I looked out later and there he was picking at it.  He spent quite a bit of time on it.  Yeah, he was eating carrion!  I saw him return to it throughout the day.  Who knew?

It cooled off nicely for several days and rained a lot all that time.  Now we're heading into another hot spell but so far not looking to be hot as it was.  The rain sure did kick up the humidity!

tnt

Something new

When one of the buyers came to pick up her rabbits, she brought me something else.  She had read here on the blog that I lost my little Silky pullet.  So she brought me one!  Thanks, Clarissa!

I never got a good pic of the other one but she wasn't anything like this!  This looks and feels like thick fur!  I had no idea they could be so soft.  This is another example of the difference between hatchery quality and breeder quality, like my cochins.   I'm not sure how to integrate her into the free rangers.  I was told Silkies are prone to predators, especially hawks, because they can't see past their topknot unless you trim it.  I can hardly see her eyes.  That pouf is half her charm so I kinda hate to cut it off.  She may just live in the Summer House permanently.  As I was trying to get a good shot, I realized a Silky might have been the inspiration for Sesame Street's Big Bird.  You see it, too, right?

I put the partridge trio in with her the first night.  I was hoping she would bond with them so she could go out.  Didn't see any sign that she would.  I imagine the cochins don't know what to think about this odd lookin critter.  My other silky seemed to be an outsider as well.  The next day, I found a teeny tiny egg, the smallest I've seen from any of my birds, in the nestbox.  It might have been one of the cochins, but I don't know for sure.  I was told Silky (yeah, that's probably her name) is about 5 months old, which is about what my hens are, and first eggs usually aren't full sized.

This is what greets me when I walk out on the porch in the evening.  Even though I was ready with camera in hand, I still couldn't get all of them in one shot.  They mob me that fast!  You see, they usually get their bird seed in the evening and they come running.  I can barely walk out to the pen where I keep it without stepping on them.  I feel like Richard Dreyfess in "Close Encounters of the Third Kind" when he was being escorted by the little aliens into the space ship.  Yeah, I know, weird thing to think of, but that's the picture in my head when I look down at all these little beings milling around my feet.

The birchens weren't in that shot because they were right at my feet already.  That roo is going to be so beautiful!

Hardy Hibiscus in all it's glory.  Those flowers are about 8" across.  This is seen from the window by the computer desk.  Nice view, huh?

tnt

The Plan

I know some of my followers were wondering what the heck was going on after I posted the barn reduction sale.  Several friends contacted me worried I was selling out.  I'm not selling out.

I've been working towards a much smaller herd for some time.  I simply don't want to manage a large number of rabbits anymore.  Most of the sale list was older stock I was done with and they were going up for sale anyways.  I'm not breeding for the rest of the summer so I don't need sr does right now.  I have several jrs that will take over when I'm ready to breed again, and I kept a few young proven srs as back up.  After I made up my mind to sell most of the Brush Clean System, the time was right to make it one big sale.  Rabbits were priced to move as quickly as possible so I could get to the next phase of the plan.


I've been so lucky that I haven't lost any to the horrible heat we've had, and I hate that they suffer so in the barn.  A strictly maintained smaller herd means I need fewer cages, and fewer cages means I won't be tempted to keep anything that won't further my goals.  This past year, I haven't used most of those cages at all.  I left all except the working does outside in the Summer House all winter.  That worked out well.  I kept 2 sets of full water bottles...1 in the barn where it's heated.  If the bottles froze, I just swapped them out and brought the frozen ones inside to thaw.  I can handle that, and the bunnies can handle occasional freezing weather.


The new plan will have 10 brood holes in the barn.  That will be the maximum I will have working at any one time.  Probably less.  I kept a 6-hole brood unit and have another to put back together.  That was the last one I built (I like its configuration better), and it used to sit in the middle of the floor.  Then I didn't need it so I took it apart.  When I put it back together, I'll tweak the design some more.  These 2 units will go on the right side of the barn as shown on the Barn page.  I'll use funds from the sale to build some more Summer House cages.  Haven't made up my mind about that yet, but maybe another 10-12 holes.  I need enough to move everybody out for the summer, and I'll be culling very hard to keep that manageable.  Only the best will stay.


So what will I do with the rest of the barn?  Workshop!  My "workshop" is a back bedroom.  Not ideal at all.  It's carpeted for one thing.  I keep all my tools and hardware there, and mostly do stuff there.  If I need to cut lumber I drag the tools out to the porch, but little things get cut or drilled inside and debris ends up in the rug.  I want an organized workshop where I can make a mess, and more storage.


BTW, even if someday I do get out, I will still have rabbits.  I'm a gardener and every gardener should have some rabbits.  I'd breed enough to maintain a small population.  Besides, I can't give up my beloved dwarfs completely.  I'll have some until my situation says I can't.


tnt

Coming Out Day

The rest of the birds were turned out today.  I just opened the pen gate and let them come out on their own. In the past, I selectively put them out.  I always clip wings before I turn them out, and I did that last night after they went to roost.  I don't think they will fly over the 5' fence, but better safe than sorry.

Integration went well.  There's was no aggression from the others that were already out.  Here, one of the Rhodies and a red greeted them as they trickled out.

These are partridges and birchens.  Or silver penciled.  I'm still not sure which.

I scattered some mixed bird seed/cracked corn to get them excited about foraging in the grass.  They love their bird seed!  In this shot, mottled roo, birchen hen and roo, partridge hen and roo, red hen, buff hen and a Rhodie hen.

Happy chickens.  Happy chicken keeper.  They should go through much less feed now.

It will be interesting to see which birds go roost in the pen tonight, and which go to the outside roosts.  I'm hoping they will split up but I'm sure the dynamics will change.

I was amused by a couple of the original free rangers chasing after Japanese beetles that are starting to emerge.  The guineas were masters at catching the beetles out of the air, but they aren't here anymore to teach the chickens. I'm pleased they figured out on their own that these big fat beetles are fairly easy to catch and make a good meal.  It's funny to watch a squat fluffy cochin waddling as fast as he can after the bugs.

Whew.  It was 101 again yesterday.  They're saying 100+ again for today, and it was 85 by 9am.  I had the chores done by then, and retreated into the house.  Sure hope this weather pattern breaks soon.

tnt