Hey.... Lets keep Chickens..!

lyndasharp

We've decided to get 3(ish) bantams, though not untill early April as that's after our honeymoon, so we won't need to find a chicken sitter ;-)

We've been looking through a book about the various breeds, and were thinking of Welsummers. Apparently they are friendly and OK with being handled (if used to it young enough), OK with being in a coop with run, and reasonable egg layers. Also fairly easy to look after. Has anyone on here got any Welsummers, and do you think that description is reasonable? Are they likely to fly off or do a lot of damage to the vegetable garden if we let them out to wander round sometimes? Are they good at eating slugs????

Frugaldom

PJ1 wrote: »

http://www.photobox.co.uk/album/285934674Hi Everyone,
Can anyone tell me how to put a picture into a post on here please. I want to put up a pic of my girls but can't get it work. Am I being especially thick?
PJ:o

Click on the icon at top that says 'insert image' when you hover over it (on mine, it looks like a tiny postcard of the pyramids) then insert the code for your photo, wherever it's loaded. This is the one I found on your link

Kimitatsu

lyndasharp wrote: »

We've decided to get 3(ish) bantams, though not untill early April as that's after our honeymoon, so we won't need to find a chicken sitter ;-)

We've been looking through a book about the various breeds, and were thinking of Welsummers. Apparently they are friendly and OK with being handled (if used to it young enough), OK with being in a coop with run, and reasonable egg layers. Also fairly easy to look after. Has anyone on here got any Welsummers, and do you think that description is reasonable? Are they likely to fly off or do a lot of damage to the vegetable garden if we let them out to wander round sometimes? Are they good at eating slugs????

We have had Wellsummers, very pretty birds, and any chook is friendly if handled enough. Our boys can often be seen wandering around the garden with either a chook in tow or one that wants a cuddle.

Great with slugs - I had a slug problem when I moved in but the chooks sorted out the back garden and the hedgehogs eat the rest As to the veggie garden it depends if they are allowed free rein and how much other stuff there is for them to eat. Mine cleared the patch for the veggie garden in the autumn before I planted it up and when they started it was a minefield of weeds (we do have 12 though!). If you fence the veggie patch off you should be fine I would think

Good luck and have a lovely honeymoon

ljonski

I've just had a quick check on what cat litter might be made up of. Some is made of clay or paper/wood pellets, neither of these would stay solid enough to grind up food in the gizzard. Other litter contains silica which absorbs moisture and could be harmful to chickens.

It seems a very bad idea to encourage chickens to ingest cat litter. Why not give them grit instead, it's available from most pet stores.

thanks -you post got meworried so i checked the cat litter ingredients and found it was just clay-phewww.
i do however take your point about it not being solid enough to grind upfood in the gizzard -thanks

beautiful_ravens

You can make grit from eggshells, you have to bake them til properly dry and then grind them up small [I have an 'egg tin' in the bottom of the oven at all times, they get a quick bake everytime I cook something!]. Good way of recycling the eggs theyre laying and youre eating, and apparently the calcium in the shells is good for the egss they make, too.
But they musnt be able to recognise it as eggs or they'll start pecking at the eggs they lay.

lvu

Ducks Bullying Chickens - What to do

I have 2 Loeham chickens (girls) and 2 Aylesbury ducks (1 boy, 1 girl) all living in the same coop and playing out in the same run, we got them all at the end of autumn when the chickens were 18 weeks old and the ducks 4. They have previously lived happily together however this last week we have noticed the ducks pulling out the chicken's feathers , we have only caught them doing this a couple of times however when we let them out on a morning both ducks have feathers stuck to their beaks, (the chickens have started sleeping higher up in the coop where the ducks can't go). Also the male duck is getting very randy.

Has anyone else with chickens and ducks noticed this type of behaviour and if so how did it end?

jexygirl

Hey all!
I am sooooo excited! After 3 days out in the wind and rain, our chicken coop / run is now up and ready for my 15 girls that are arriving tomorrow :D:D
Having read this thread and tons of others, they are actually coming from my current free range egg supplier. I wanted PoL but the girls arriving are 18 months old so I am hoping they will settle.

The actual reason for my post tho, was to reply to the poster above regarding ducks and chickens together.
During my net trolling, I read somewhere that ducks and chickens cant be in the same run as duck poop can be toxic to chickens - I tried to find where I read it but cant. Please dont be alarmed, I am sure someone who is an old hand will reply with a more knowledge based answer!

Cant wait till tomorrow !!!! Pleeeeeeeeease let me post a pic!!!!
Jex

Frugaldom

I have both hens and ducks free ranging here and have no problems whatsoever. But the ducks are bigger, therefore they make it clear when there's food on the go that they are in charge. I don't house them together. Hens roost, so any mess dropped by them would land on top of the ducks and ducks are very messy, so the chances of keeping hen nests clean with ducks in their house would be almost impossible. Not a great scenario when both are kept for eggs.

Given enough space, they are happy to live side by side, so perhaps the problem is how many ducks and hens you have in the one area? What size is the coop and how much space do they have in their run? My ducks and hens sleep in different coops at night.

Frugaldom

lyndasharp wrote: »

We've decided to get 3(ish) bantams, though not untill early April as that's after our honeymoon, so we won't need to find a chicken sitter ;-)

I must have missed your post, this is great news! Only trouble I've seen with Welsummers is if you get an aggressive cockerel, as they're quite big birds, but I'm assuming you'll only have hens. All my broodies are Welsummer x Wyandotte bantams. All hens can fly some distance but a bit of wing-clipping can help. They'll demolish any garden they have access to but will eat every slug, snail, worm or creepy crawlie they find. I have my hens free ranging but the veggies need to be fenced in! :rotfl:

lvu

Hi nykmedia, thanks for replying but I can't see how it can be a space thing as they have loads of room.

Ducks and Chickens

The coop is home made, we have sectioned off the back of a shed so I would estimate they have a coop measuring 1m x 2.5m that goes all the way up to the top of the shed.
The ducks sleep in an old kitchen cupboard so their heads are covered, the chickens usually sleep in low bucket type things but have taken to sleeping up high on one of the many perches/shelves that we put in, and come down to the buckets to lay during the day.
The spends spend all day outside no matter how bad the weather is with the ducks spending most time on the pond. The run is big for only 4 birds taking up half the garden approximately 5m x 15m.
The only things that have changed recently is that the chickens used to mother/boss the ducks around however the ducks are now a lot bigger than they were. Also the male duck has only just begun to get randy.