Eggs

[sean donato]

It sounds like she made a good choice, nearly 1 a day.

We are really missing not having fresh eggs. We've had only 2 laying hens since Thanksgiving weekend when a mink got in through a soffit vent and decimated our flock. When the weather turned we got 10 laying ducks to shake it up a bit. They are likely 3-4 weeks away from laying yet.
Then we came across a dozen silkies in need of a home. They are actually pretty personable. Like the ducks they are amusing to watch, for different reasons. Guessing they are 4-8 weeks away from laying yet. We were told their age when we got them but they sure don't seem to be growing much, even for being a smaller bird.
Did I say we are missing the eggs?

The coop, and current run is all done in hardware wire with 1/2" squares. So I'm assuming something tried to grab her when they were out, just odd as most the predators we have around Gere would just kill the chicken and take off with it, or are too small to worry about.
They do get the run of the place when we're home so anything is possible.
We love the eggs, but honestly it's too many for us. We give a lot of them away. Older neighbor across the lane from me gets a bunch of them. I don't know what their financial situation is, but they told me they emptied out their retirement to buy and renovate the house. She still works, but he doesn't due to really poor health. Take them a few dozen every other week or so. Whenever we start getting veggies we'll take a load of it over to them as well.
Even so, we're still giving a few dozen away every week. Which is fine, I didn't get them to make money selling eggs lol. They are the kids and wife's pets.

 

[sean donato]

It's definitely happened a few times. Just last year, Nov 22, activists let loose over 10k of them outside of Toledo. The farmers said most probably died within a week from starvation or exposure, they are bred and born in captivity and have no experience hunting aside from instinct. With nobody to show them how to hunt like a mother would in the wild they were very helpless.
Silly activists, they actually thought they were doing them a favor.

Mink may be more common in your area than you realize. According to ODNR they have established populations in all 88 counties in the state. You just rarely see them as they are incredibly evasive and mostly nocturnal.

Wonder when the tree huggers and animal rights nuts are gonna realize they don't have a clue?

 

[sean donato]

Still averaging about 3 eggs a day off 9 hens. Best day was 6 and sometimes only 1 or 2. Just enough for me and the wife. bIL offered me 10 ISA Browns, said he was taking them to the sale if I didnt want them. I thought about trading my 9 for his 10 and letting him take mine to the sale instead. I didnt feel like the drive to cleveland tenn to make the swap. I have noticed my girls have slowed down eating. I provide free feeding so they get all they want. I provide whole corn as well as layer pellets. Some times they only eat the corn and other times only pellets. I guess they know what they like. They really like picking in the lawn, but they also like the flower beds and that aint working for the wife. I now just let them out for a couple hrs in the late evening. Letting them run loose late in the evening sort of keeps them close to the coop.

Honestly I don't think that's bad for a small family. Plenty to eat.

 

[Stonesforbrains]

First poult hatched this morning! Early, of course cause I wasn’t quite ready. Wife named it EB for early bird. Got another trying to peck out of the shell right now. Of course my son is at school and missed the first hatch, this was his idea and he’s missing it.

 

[muddstopper]

Honestly I don't think that's bad for a small family. Plenty to eat.

We can eat 3 eggs for breakfast, so just enough until the wife bakes a cake. I have managed to be able to give away 2 1/2 doz this spring, so we dont eat them all, but I wouldnt mine a few more for boiled/devil eggs and tater salad every once in a while.

 

[olyman]

We can eat 3 eggs for breakfast, so just enough until the wife bakes a cake. I have managed to be able to give away 2 1/2 doz this spring, so we dont eat them all, but I wouldnt mine a few more for boiled/devil eggs and tater salad every once in a while.

mmmmmmm, moms warm german tater salad!!!!!!!!!!

 

[Stonesforbrains]

Went and picked my some up as the fourth poult was starting the hatch and we got back home in time. He was pretty amazed and super excited that he got to see a “wonder of nature” as he put it. I am glad he talked me into buying an incubator and trying to see if we could hatch some poults. He’s excited about trying to keep them alive and growing way more than he was when we got the turkey poults in the mail last year. It’s a good day!

 

[wampum]

Foxes and bears here.

We also have foxes, coyotes and bears. I did not mention them because I cannot recall losing birds to them. Bears down in this area are few but in our mountain areas there are a lot. I built a new coop last year and have about a 30x15 run. I did the best I could to make it as predator proof as I could. We put the birds in it last July so far we have not lost a bird. We did 125 meat birds last year and are only doing 50 this year. We put them in a large horse stall. Where we thought a predator might get in we added wire. The meat birds only go about 10 weeks which limits their exposure.

 

[wampum]

It's definitely happened a few times. Just last year, Nov 22, activists let loose over 10k of them outside of Toledo. The farmers said most probably died within a week from starvation or exposure, they are bred and born in captivity and have no experience hunting aside from instinct. With nobody to show them how to hunt like a mother would in the wild they were very helpless.
Silly activists, they actually thought they were doing them a favor.

Mink may be more common in your area than you realize. According to ODNR they have established populations in all 88 counties in the state. You just rarely see them as they are incredibly evasive and mostly nocturnal.
They are blood thirsty like a vampire. Won't even eat the meat from their kill. They'll bite into the neck suck the blood out and move onto the next kill. They'll wipe out your whole flock if given the opportunity.

You are probably right about not seeing the mink. But so far no damage. You are also right about those activists.

 

[wampum]

Grizz, another guy I forgot about and so far have not seen Is a bobcat. Our property runs up against an ATV trail called Mines and Meadows. My best friend works over there every day grooming trails. He has spotted a bobcat at least 3 times this year.

 

[JRM]

Grizz, another guy I forgot about and so far have not seen Is a bobcat. Our property runs up against an ATV trail called Mines and Meadows. My best friend works over there every day grooming trails. He has spotted a bobcat at least 3 times this year.

How about black bear? They have been getting more prevalent here. ODNR says they are spreading out from PA.
It would be neat to take a real tour of the Mines at Mines and Meadows.
Not the public tour they take you on the atv's either....I bet there is some neat history down there.

 

[grizz55chev]

Grizz, another guy I forgot about and so far have not seen Is a bobcat. Our property runs up against an ATV trail called Mines and Meadows. My best friend works over there every day grooming trails. He has spotted a bobcat at least 3 times this year.

Their bigger cousin mountain lions are seen here a lot, they love chicken also. A neighbor lost a horse a few yrs back. The wife , mil and grandchildren and I were on our way home from an evening in town that yr when we spotted that big cat rounding a hairpin curve a half a mile from home, he was in the middle of the curve as we rounded it and laid right down on the side of the road for what seemed like an eternity! He was just 8 ft from the passenger side of the car, we all watched in awe ( windows up, of course ) of the rare event, then he was gone in a flash.

 

[sean donato]

How about black bear? They have been getting more prevalent here. ODNR says they are spreading out from PA.
It would be neat to take a real tour of the Mines at Mines and Meadows.
Not the public tour they take you on the atv's either....I bet there is some neat history down there.

I live in a rural area thats not super far from town, we've been getting more and more reports of people seeing bear around town. I mean what did they expect? All the farm land and woods are getting taken over by developments.

 

[wampum]

How about black bear? They have been getting more prevalent here. ODNR says they are spreading out from PA.
It would be neat to take a real tour of the Mines at Mines and Meadows.
Not the public tour they take you on the atv's either....I bet there is some neat history down there.

I worked 35 years at Medusa Cement company. Before it was Medusa it was Crescent Cement, after Medusa Cemex. Crescent mined under ground for limestone. The area mined is about twenty feet high with support columns of natural limestone left there for support. It’s doesn’t matter the outside temp it stays about 55 degrees year round inside. Mines and meadows has a small portion of the mines. But still it is a fairly big area to ride. The Wampum Underground has a huge storage area that you can drive semis unto. They store a lot of government stuff and people store their boats cars and campers in there.

The land above the mines is where you ride in what I assume they call the meadows. I hunted that area all of my life. We rode our dirt bikes on there 50 years ago. It was more fun back then with out groomed trails. It was also more dangerous Because of several high walls from when it was stripped for coal. Those high walls are all graded slopes now.

We do not get much activity on our side very often. A couple of times a year they come to our side to take out an injured rider. They have at least 2 camp grounds about 4 miles from us on the other side. My buddy has been working on a new campground where the Medusa Mansion use to be. That Mansion was huge like a southern plantation and the plant manager lived there. It burnt down about 35 years ago and part of the barn burnt that nite.

A couple of years latter I was given permission to tear down what was left of the barn. I got some nice chestnut beams and other useable lumber out of there.

 

[Bill G]

I had to put one of the girls down a while back. Don't know what happened, but something tore into her butt. So down to 21 chickens. Still getting 16 to 20 eggs a day. I surly wish the wife would have picked birds off of laying habits and not the chick's look pretty.

They all look pretty to some

 

[sean donato]

They all look pretty to some

Yeah, I guess, they all look like chickens to me lol. If I would have known she was going to bring 20 chick's home I would have asked her to get a duel purpose breed, not those looks pretty heavy egg layers. Darn things don't have much meat on their bones...

 

[husqvarna257]

I had to put one of the girls down a while back. Don't know what happened, but something tore into her butt. So down to 21 chickens. Still getting 16 to 20 eggs a day. I surly wish the wife would have picked birds off of laying habits and not the chick's look pretty.

Good luck on that. I forget al the names my Wife's Americana's get. Comets are the best layers I ever got. They are small and lay jumbo eggs almost every day when young. They are mean birds though, any bird injured or a new comer get beat up bad or get killed.

Wonder when the tree huggers and animal rights nuts are gonna realize they don't have a clue?

Talk about bird brains. Birds may have more brains then they do.

Cleaned out the two coops and got 13 or so big wheelbarrow's of poo. Put in our hoop house to cool off until the fall and add it to our garden.
We had a bear break into a coop a few years ago. tore off vents and OSB. Killed 2 roosters and my favorite Orpington hen, she was broody and had raised 3 broods. She even took in chicks we had in the incubator. Never found the bear but a neighbor had a "gun cleaning mishap"
Got the nipple water system up and going. A 30 gallon rain barrel fed by a roof gutter water for the 2 coops so they don't drink the nasty water from the water tubs full of poo.

 

[JRM]

I mean what did they expect? All the farm land and woods are getting taken over by developments.

I don’t think that's the case here.

I worked 35 years at Medusa Cement company. Before it was Medusa it was Crescent Cement, after Medusa Cemex. Crescent mined under ground for limestone. The area mined is about twenty feet high with support columns of natural limestone left there for support. It’s doesn’t matter the outside temp it stays about 55 degrees year round inside. Mines and meadows has a small portion of the mines. But still it is a fairly big area to ride. The Wampum Underground has a huge storage area that you can drive semis unto. They store a lot of government stuff and people store their boats cars and campers in there.

The land above the mines is where you ride in what I assume they call the meadows. I hunted that area all of my life. We rode our dirt bikes on there 50 years ago. It was more fun back then with out groomed trails. It was also more dangerous Because of several high walls from when it was stripped for coal. Those high walls are all graded slopes now.

We do not get much activity on our side very often. A couple of times a year they come to our side to take out an injured rider. They have at least 2 camp grounds about 4 miles from us on the other side. My buddy has been working on a new campground where the Medusa Mansion use to be. That Mansion was huge like a southern plantation and the plant manager lived there. It burnt down about 35 years ago and part of the barn burnt that nite.

A couple of years latter I was given permission to tear down what was left of the barn. I got some nice chestnut beams and other useable lumber out of there.

Seems all the good places to ride are long gone. When I was a kid we used to be able to ride the shore line (Lake Erie). We knew all the good little sand bars and hang out spots. Pack a little food, start a Fire with driftwood and have a cookout and swim and hang out. Then ride home usually long past dark. Can't do anything like that anymore.

 

[husqvarna257]

We took a hit this week, Lost one our older layers. Something took her out of the coop and ate her right there. The chicken wire roof was chewed open. I put up wire fence over the roof and ran barbwire loops all along the top edge. I had been out the night before to check because the dog went nuts. I had the .22 with a green night flashlight and counted birds and saw nothing, next night was quiet. Just figures my wife came home to the 3/4 eaten bird but she put it in a trash bag and went to the dump

 

[GenXer]

We took a hit this week, Lost one our older layers. Something took her out of the coop and ate her right there. The chicken wire roof was chewed open. I put up wire fence over the roof and ran barbwire loops all along the top edge. I had been out the night before to check because the dog went nuts. I had the .22 with a green night flashlight and counted birds and saw nothing, next night was quiet. Just figures my wife came home to the 3/4 eaten bird but she put it in a trash bag and went to the dumpView attachment 1089623

I lost my rooster here a few days ago. The next day the one chicken went back into brooding mode. Hope one of the 6 that hatched 7 weeks ago is a rooster. I have no idea on sexing young chick's.