Keeping hens and ducks chat.

Pyxis

I loved hearing about your chooks, Cheery!


Cheery's Chooks!


Hens watching video selfies! :rotfl:

Hens' footbath! :rotfl:


Great fun! I feel I can be a hen-owner by proxy! :rotfl:

We need pics, next! I'd love to see what quiet little Hermione looks like!

suki1964

edwink wrote: »

Hi Suki

That must have been quite a hard decision to make as I remember from some of your posts that you absolutely loved their eggs especially in cooking. If I remember correctly you were the one that posted the photo of that HUGE egg that beat all of mine hands down. Someone else posted a huge egg photo too but yours even beat that one hands down so what chance did I have? :rotfl:

I think you know yourself when you have to say goodbye to keeping poultry. I hope you have fun moving forward and manage to sit on a plane for many years to come. Enjoy tour travels.

Thank you for posting.

Edwink

Well a little update

John, the hen and duck breeder who we buy from came last night and took the ducks and all but three hens. Old Honey, who doesnt lay but is a stunning bird who came to us all bedraggled and was bullied mercifully until she built her way up the pecking order and became Queen Hen, and two youngsters who we have never named.

And after a lot of discussion, we are rejigging the garden, and restocking

Not so many this time around, will probably go lift five at the weekend. I don't want to get so many as there are breeds I do want to get next year but I have to travel up country to get and theres a wait list

Looks like travelling is going to have to wait a bit longer

With a smaller flock mum shouldn't have too many worries when we are away over night. Just an early morning feed replenish will do. And I have told Mr Suki, no more hatching!!!! This is where we went wrong ( I think) We ended up with having to cull the roosters and ended up with ducks which I never wanted. Whilst the ducks were comical and done wonders for the lawn, they needed so much space and work, forever having to hose down everywhere and clean their pond every day, it was all too much which really I think was the straw that got us to the stage of giving it all up


As an aside, as you all know I sell my eggs at the gate. Never had an ounce of bother getting them sold. Anyways a sign went up down the road, Free Range Eggs for sale 79p ( mine are £1.20) so I thought our days were numbered. Ive seen customers coming from his house with TRAYS of eggs and believe me, there are no commercial free rangers around these parts

Cheeky sod is selling housed hen eggs as free range !!!

Pyxis

Oooh Suki! That 'neighbour' doesn't sound good.

Could you prove they're not free range?

Trouble is, I think the term free range covers a wideish range of living conditions.

It might be worth looking into, though. There's nothing that annoys me more than animal welfare being watered down for profit.




And congrats on being a born-again hen keeper!
Great that you worked out what the problem actually was! :T

suki1964

Pyxis wrote: »

Oooh Suki! That 'neighbour' doesn't sound good.

Could you prove they're not free range?

Trouble is, I think the term free range covers a wideish range of living conditions.

It might be worth looking into, though. There's nothing that annoys me more than animal welfare being watered down for profit.

And congrats on being a born-again hen keeper!
Great that you worked out what the problem actually was! :T

Sod him, My customers know mine are the real deal, they even get to meet my hens

And anyone who thinks they are getting that many free range eggs at that price, need their head felt for bumps :rotfl:

Yes free range can be used for hens who are in houses that have openings to the outside but are too crammed in to ever get out

Seriously there are no small holders about here who have enough hens to be producing that amount of eggs running around. Biggest flock Ive known is 20 and even with 20 you wouldn't be producing trays of eggs a day at only 79p for half dozen.

John who is our hen breeder ( sells all over the North ) has vast amounts of eggs that he sells as farm fresh, as his hens are housed and are only there till sold on. Only his breeding stock have access to the outside

Still theres a market here for both of us so let him be. I won't be reducing my prices. I don't make any money at all. Bale of shavings is £10 a month, pellets are £8.50 a week and scalpings £5 every 4 to 6 weeks, then worming, oyster shells, lousing and vets, they just about pay for themselves and Ive not even added the cost of the bird :eek:

Still they give us great pleasure as well, cant price that

Pyxis

suki1964 wrote: »

Sod him, My customers know mine are the real deal, they even get to meet my hens

And anyone who thinks they are getting that many free range eggs at that price, need their head felt for bumps :rotfl:

Yes free range can be used for hens who are in houses that have openings to the outside but are too crammed in to ever get out

Seriously there are no small holders about here who have enough hens to be producing that amount of eggs running around. Biggest flock Ive known is 20 and even with 20 you wouldn't be producing trays of eggs a day at only 79p for half dozen.

John who is our hen breeder ( sells all over the North ) has vast amounts of eggs that he sells as farm fresh, as his hens are housed and are only there till sold on. Only his breeding stock have access to the outside

Still theres a market here for both of us so let him be. I won't be reducing my prices. I don't make any money at all. Bale of shavings is £10 a month, pellets are £8.50 a week and scalpings £5 every 4 to 6 weeks, then worming, oyster shells, lousing and vets, they just about pay for themselves and Ive not even added the cost of the bird :eek:

Still they give us great pleasure as well, cant price that

Yes, they are sort of pets with benefits, aren't they?

Any money you get from spare eggs is a bonus, I suppose!
No edible benefits from having a dog! :rotfl:

Although, I did get some edible benefits from one of my cats, many years ago, when she brought home a pack of Wall's sausages! :rotfl:
(They were my neighbour's, left on her doorstep by the milkman with her milk! They got returned to her, and as she had cats herself, she didn't mind the few teeth indentations in the plastic!)

Cheery_Daff

:rotfl: pyxis :rotfl: my sister's cat brought home a slice of ham he'd been given by a neighbour (after she'd repeatedly asked her not to feed him). Ham got posted back through neighbour's letterbox with a stern post it note :rotfl: :rotfl:

What a rotter of a neighbour you have Suki! Most vexing. But as you say your customers know you - no earthly point you reducing your prices to try to compete - that way madness lies.

Is it slightly ridiculous that I'm fretting about my girls while I'm at work? this is the first day I've been out all day (and evening) and not bern able to pop in to see them every couple of hours. Hope they're not bored Or haven't killed each other while establishing pecking order :eek:

At least (fingers crossed) I know the stable is fox proof :eek: although I don't want to tempt fate! :eek:

Can't decide whether to go and check on them when I get back at midnight and make sure they're all in their little house or leave them be til the morning don't want to wake them up switching the lights on or messing about with a torch! :eek:

edwink

Hello I am back:j.

Funeral was in North Wales. As we live in the South it took us 6 hours to get up there on Monday mainly because of road works. Funeral was on Tuesday and we travelled back today. Only took 4 hours coming back after having coffee with his wife because less traffic and road works. So pleased we made the effort to say goodbye to a dear friend. His wife was over the moon that we took the time to travel up there. Was a very sad day as he was a lovely, lovely man.

My hens were spoilt and very well looked after whilst we were away. Our hen sitter really looks after them well and spoils them like I do. I leave chopped home grown cucumbers for her in the fridge in daily pots to give to them. Plus kale leaves which are growing nicely at the moment. Oh and some apples and plums which they love.

Looks as though our hen thread has been pretty busy which is really nice. Off now to catch up on everyone's posts to see what you have all been up to.

Edwink

CAFCGirl

I think i slipped through the net.

Any advice on chickens who have developed the habit of eating the eggs. Never their own but they each other others.
They dont lay at reliable times of days, or every day so catching the egg before they get to it is becoming a nightmare. I've become an unwilling vegan chicken keeper!

Pyxis

CAFCGirl wrote: »

I think i slipped through the net.

Any advice on chickens who have developed the habit of eating the eggs. Never their own but they each other others.
They dont lay at reliable times of days, or every day so catching the egg before they get to it is becoming a nightmare. I've become an unwilling vegan chicken keeper!

I'm sure Edwink will give you the advice you need once she's caught up with all the posts. :cool:



See next post in the meantime......

Pyxis

Re. Hens eating eggs......... to be going on with, I found these posts about hens eating eggs..........

Happygreen wrote: »

Hello and good morning!

Today my girls will get a different kind of treat - a mustard filled egg - in their nesting boxes. One of them has been naughty and eating her own eggs...this trick worked each time so far, fingers crossed!

Usually it's the wild bird seeds they go crazy for

suki1964 wrote: »

What's a mustard egg?

Happygreen wrote: »

It's an egg where the contents have been carefully removed (blown out as if you'd want to decorate it for Easter after ) and then filled with mustard through a syringe. Looks like egg yolk should they peck at it but doesn't taste the same. This way the hens can unlearn that eggs are nice to eat.