Keeping hens and ducks chat.

crv1963

Great pics!

edwink

Hi everyone, thank you all again for your support whilst going through this difficult time following the fox attack.

The fencing is finished....yay!
What a mammoth task that was but it did make sense to renew other fencing whilst renewing the fox damaged areas. So that's over 200ft of fencing erected in individual slats and posts in just over 8 days. We knew we would need to replace some fencing in a couple of years time so it made sense to replace that now too. That's that major expense out of the way at least for another 15 maybe 20 years.

Sort of happier now with Pingu and Hoppys safety here but still on the look out for the fox all the time. The main fencing is 6ft 6 which is the permitted height and one wide area at 7ft now but that is not on any of our boundary lines although it still shouldn't be that high. Hopefully we will both settle and not worry so much but it's still hard knowing the fox can leap a 6ft fence. Still have not left Pingu and Hoppy unsupervised though so I can see netting being added before long

Just got to move the 3 greenhouses and build 4 very long raised beds for veg growing. Will post pics hopefully with Pingu and Hoppy in them as sure they will be as they are always round our feet trying to dig for worms when in our allotment area, bless them.

Hope everyone and their feathered friends are all doing well.

Edwink

edwink

Pyxis wrote: »

As the colloquial Welsh for jellyfish is pysgod wibbli wobbli, (where pysgod means fish), my weird brain reckons that, instead of soft-shelled egg, it should be called wibbli wobbli egg. Please take note, inwardly digest, and implement!

By the way, can wibbli wobbli eggs be eaten? Or is that not advisable, due to the risk of them being contaminated?

Love the photos, Edwink! I see you have quite a collection of chickeny, ducky things!

Ok Pyxis they will now be known as wibbli wobbli eggs. You got that Cheery ?.

In theory they are in fact proper eggs but without their protective shell. But it's not advisable to eat them due to their shells being so thin as bacteria could easily transfer to the inside. We used to make scrambled eggs out of our wibbli wobbli eggs and give that as a treat to the hens after being thoroughly cooked. They absolutely loved it and scoffed the lot in minutes.

Yes we do have a lot of chicken and duck ornaments in our kitchen Probably around 100 of them in total all dotted about :eek: I'm a car boot fanatic and bring them home, put them in the dishwasher or washing machine and then they sit on any space available. Only ever had one chicken come out of the dishwasher without its painted face as it was washed off sadly We have them in the kitchen, living room, hall and cloakroom with none upstairs at all. You know me I am a bit nuts about hens and ducks. Have even got some fabric ones sewn on to what was a plain pair of dungarees and they are one of my favourite pairs. Oh and I'm a bit nuts about dungarees too but I won't disclose how many pairs I have of those :dance:

Edwink

edwink

All going well here with more netting fitted thankfully. Been really busy as in the process of sorting out the huge hedge that the fox leapt through. He hasn't made a complete hole in it as he actually struggled to get through it when hubby chased him out. We are going to use some of the old fencing that was taken down last week and fit it to the chain link fencing that is next to the very dense hedge, then we are going to fit chicken wire over the top of the fencing. This section is just over 60ft in length so a lot of work securing that area.

We have kept hens and ducks here for 10 years now and at one time we had 30 in total and never had any problems what so ever. We had seen foxes in the woods but looks as though one of them has found us now. Can not see any evidence of him coming in lately which is good but we are always on the look out for him and are still supervising Pingu and Hoppy whilst they are out of the coop and relaxing by the pond.

Our close neighbour had two dogs and had recently moved so it appears that the fox became brave and decided to take a chance and get in to our garden on much more than just one occasion. We are now just hoping that any new neighbours have a huge dog with a huge bark. We would like a dog ourselves as feel that would possibly help to keep the fox out but we are not ready to get one yet. We want to be responsible and know we are able to afford to keep one first. We have had 2 large dogs at separate times in the past but not whilst living here although we do have some friends dogs that stay with us from time to time.

Anyway we are still doing all we can to keep Pingu and Hoppy safe and that's all we can do at the moment. It's all just so time consuming sorting the boundaries out to make sure he can't get back in.

How is everyone else? All hens and ducks happy and healthy I hope.

Take care all.

Edwink x

crv1963

Hi edwink

We have two dogs and a couple of years ago despite being in their run a fox got in and killed our 3 hens, taking only one away to eat.

Our new run is covered but we have the problem of our Border Collie ripping the wire netting and going in and sitting with the hens! If she can get in then Mr Fox could! Tried heavier gauge wiring and blocking access but she still finds a way in!

edwink

crv1963 wrote: »

Hi edwink

We have two dogs and a couple of years ago despite being in their run a fox got in and killed our 3 hens, taking only one away to eat.

Our new run is covered but we have the problem of our Border Collie ripping the wire netting and going in and sitting with the hens! If she can get in then Mr Fox could! Tried heavier gauge wiring and blocking access but she still finds a way in!

Looks like you will need to use chicken wire around the boundary of their coop if all else fails and your dog keeps getting in. That's what we have done here plus we cemented part of the lower half of the wire in to the ground and covered that in bricks/rubble before cementing it. That was all done as a way to protect ours at night. Unfortunately the fox that recently killed 9 of our girls and boys did so in daylight about an hour before their bedtime when all of them had reached the coop for the night. They all used to go up early as they were elderly and it took them a little longer to get there than it used too. If it had of been during the night when they were fully locked up the fox would never have got to them.

Sometimes it is difficult to know what to do for the best though isn't it?. There was a lot of work involved with cementing everything in as our coop is 24ft x 16ft but we are pleased that we took the time to do this as 10 years on it is still solid so there is no way the fox will get to Pingu and Hoppy at night when they are fully locked up. We are still supervising them during the day whilst they are out and in their pond even though we haven't seen the fox or any evidence of him gaining access to our property lately. We still don't trust him though because they are not known as sly for nothing.

Another idea is to lay paving slabs all the way around the boundary of their coop to stop anything digging under the sides, must be heavy ones though. But, if it still happens you can always lay another lot of paving slabs further out from the others you have laid and so on. Eventually it will be too difficult and too far away from the coop for a fox or dog to dig a tunnel under to get in.

Hope the above suggestions are of some help to you.

Edwink

Cheery_Daff

Pleased to hear your fence is nicely underway edwink :j :j

Good luck with your dog crv1963. No suggestions from me I'm afraid Our run was originally covered with very heavy duty either 1 or 2 inch square wire stuff that nothing would have been able to rip (not remotely flexible) - but then a stoat got through that and into the hen house and killed 2 of our hens, so now op top of that we half quarter inch wire mesh as well - I imagine a dog/fox would be able to rip that stuff on its own, but the combination of the two should keep everything bigger than a woodlouse out (I hope :eek: )

All good here, although the hens are NOT impressed with this soggy blustery weather :eek: I've started giving them chicken porridge again rather than dry pellets - it's only dry pellets mixed with water, but they seem to eat that FAR more willingly than the pellets so with the extra small effort. They weren't bothering with the pellets much, I'm not worried about them starving as they're completely free range in the day, but we've had a few soft shelled eggs lately and I wanted to make sure they were getting the proper nutrition.

So chicken porridge it is, and as I say they're far more willing to eat that, and if there's leftover stuff in their run in the evening, they tend to eat that with more excitement than the corn that they usually get in the evening as well. So hopefully that will sort them out, and I've been mixing ground eggshells into it as well (I was mixing that with a separate bowl of grit - but given that they largely ignore the bowl of grit in favour of bits of stones etc from the drive and that they find in their foraging, it seemed safer to mix it into their food instead for a bit more calcium).

Sorry, that was very waffly :rotfl:

Had a little exciting trip last night, stayed over at my boss's house as we were at a work function til late so got to meet her chickens and ducks this morning :j She has four very pesky running ducks which keep escaping into next door's garden :eek: and four chickens - two big fluffy ones and two little fluffy bantams. Very cute - but not half as friendly as my lovely ladies and mostly ignored us.

I was planning on cleaning the hen house out today but I'm afraid the ladies will have to wait until it's stopped raining - I confess I am quite hungover today and the thought of being on my hands and knees in a soggy chicken run scooping out old bedding is not filling me with joy :rotfl: One more night won't hurt I'm sure!

edwink

Cheery_Daff

Ooh, missed your picture there edwink, how lovely!

All cheerful here :j the ladies were not impressed to be shut back in their run at 11.30 yesterday morning and left there til this morning :eek: but we had to go to another city and weren't back til nearly midnight so no choice really. I did remind them they used to be confined to tiny cages and that their run is palatial in comparison and contains everything a chicken needs...

Anyway they were fine this morning, and the sun is shining so they are out and about already :j

Rusty disgraced herself yesterday by doing a giant poo on the sofa :eek: :rotfl: it was bound to happen eventually ,she stands outside the front door and squares, and Mr Cheery let's them into the living room, and has a soft spot for her so let's her up onto the sofa to eat a bit of apple core...

Well, she's now had her sofa privileges revoked :rotfl: :rotfl: in fact they've all had their carpet privileges revoked :rotfl:

Oh, and Mr Cheery found their new nesting spots the other day.... 10 eggs in a pile in a different bush (I"d been checking the old favourite) and another 15 in an outbuilding :eek: so today"s job is to wipe all the mud off and check for freshness and then I suppose have omelettes for every meal for the rest of the week :rotfl: :rotfl:

edwink

Cheery_Daff wrote: »

Ooh, missed your picture there edwink, how lovely!

All cheerful here :j the ladies were not impressed to be shut back in their run at 11.30 yesterday morning and left there til this morning :eek: but we had to go to another city and weren't back til nearly midnight so no choice really. I did remind them they used to be confined to tiny cages and that their run is palatial in comparison and contains everything a chicken needs... :j

Rusty disgraced herself yesterday by doing a giant poo on the sofa :eek: :rotfl: it was bound to happen eventually
Well, she's now had her sofa privileges revoked :rotfl: :rotfl: in fact they've all had their carpet privileges revoked :rotfl:

Oh, and Mr Cheery found their new nesting spots the other day.... 10 eggs in a pile in a different bush (I"d been checking the old favourite) and another 15 in an outbuilding :eek: so today"s job is to wipe all the mud off and check for freshness and then I suppose have omelettes for every meal for the rest of the week :rotfl: :rotfl:

Ah but Cheery did you spot the duck in that pic?. I put a spot the hen on here quite a while ago but have been trying to find that pic to put on here again.

I am sure they are quite happy in their coop Cheery. I know myself what it is like to get them out of a morning but need to put them back in for their safety if we were due back late. At least you know they are safe in there and you can go out and not have to worry about them. Mine used to be so naughty I had to bribe them back in with sweetcorn and cucumber then get out and shut the door quick :rotfl:

Aww bless little Rusty, I'm sure she didn't mean to do it. Probably was so comfy on the sofa she didn't get off quick enough :rotfl: Believe it or not we have never had a present left on a sofa, the floor yes but the sofa no. We don't have any carpets on the ground floor so can easily be cleaned up and then have a mop, thankfully :rotfl:

Blimey that's a huge haul of eggs to find, no wonder you are eating them for breakfast, lunch, supper and midnight feasts

Edwink