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Officialish Chicken Photo Thread!

186K views 2K replies 114 participants last post by  ChieTheRider 
#1 · (Edited)
Show your girls and guys!

Here are my RIR's (19)! Hatched September 25th, 2011. Today I got my first two eggs! I've had chickens since I was 20, even had two laying hens in my historic downtown apartment when I was in college! Spring 2010 I was out of town for two days and there was a horrible uncommon gnat outbreak. I lost my three laying hens. So now with an improved coop, and yard we are BACK in business! Please post your eggers! We just love ours!!





I have a running contest with my Co-op friend Mary to see who can keep their hens laying the longest. So far I'm the winner, hint it's all about fresh clover! Keep it a secret! LOL!
 
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#1,165 ·
OK, weird question of the night for you all: has anyone ever trimmed their chicken's nails?

I noticed tonight that one of mine has ridiculous dinosaur talons, they look much different from the others:

(she's just dirty from digging around)

She definitely gets outside and scratches around in the dirt and rocks like the rest, but her nails are still this long.


A quick Google search suggests some people actually do trim nails, basically like you would a dog.

But I don't know, that seems like a lot of work with an uncooperative chicken- definitely a two person job! And this chicken is 5, I'm assuming she's probably always had long nails and I just never noticed?
 
#1,166 ·
@egrogan I've trimmed spurs on my rooster before when they got really sharp, and it was a one-man job. It would have been easier with two though. Warning, the nails will bleed. They'll stop eventually and it's not too bad, so don't let it scare you. You can just trim them like you would a dog's.
 
#1,169 ·
I have to go inspect my chicken's toes, lol!

my chickens love fresh grass and like hay. I give them more hay in the winter, but feed it all year. They love to dig around in it too.

Need some advice...I have 6 hens, 2 Buff Orpintons and 4 Ameraucanas that are a year old.

Bought 6 straight run Bantam chicks this spring. Four look to be Cochins and two are little bitty ones, about the size of a sparrow.

Have a couple of questions:

Can I mix them in with my current flock at some point? They are 3-4 weeks old right now.

Won't be able to keep any roosters, so I'm not exactly sure yet how many of the bantams I will have, but maximum six!

Should I buy them their own coop? I've been looking online for coops and none of them look too good.

Any advice is appreciated
 
#1,173 ·
The Cochins seem rather feisty right now, especially the bigger light colored one. Maybe they will be able to mix in. My current girls do not seem very aggressive. Rose, the head hen is one of the Buffs and she seems mellow, but she has always been the friendliest.

Been looking at Bantam breeds and I don't see any that look like my little ones! Can't figure out what they are. Now I wish I had bought all four that were available, because they are so tiny and don't seem to be getting any bigger!

Going to try to get a little video posted.
 
#1,174 ·
Thanks @AnitaAnne. Would love to see video- I've never been around bantams.

My chicks arrive this weekend. Temps have dipped dramatically and are hovering around 32*F overnight, so looks like the decision about whether to put them in my garage or a pen within the run has been made for me- garage it is. I'm so excited for them to get here. I'll have 6 total, and have to admit I chose based on lots of feather color: 2 Speckled Sussex, 2 Dominiques, and 2 Silved Laced Wyandottes.
 
#1,176 ·
Took a little video of the new Bantam chicks today. They are three weeks old, possibly four weeks old. Bought them as straight run from TSC the day before the last batch arrived. The manager was not sure if they were one or two weeks old.

I've had them for two weeks now, so I'm calling them three weeks, lol.

I have no idea what the little brown ones are; any guesses?

Can anyone sex them yet?

 
#1,178 ·
Chicken themed selfies...



Luckily my husband was there with me so he was able to pry them off as they did not want down (they felt like they deserved their roost because they went through all the work to get up there). Fortunately none of them pooped on me, so there is a positive. I think the little buff orpington roo is a midget, he is less than half the size of everyone else. Started to cut back on my excessive number of chicks, 8 have gone to new loving homes (including the 2 roos that are going to be used for procreation) and 2 more are getting picked up next week. Now I just need at least 2 more roos to find new homes or they will become dinner which is a hassle to pluck and everything else before they get cooked. Getting down to just my 14 chicks will be nice, then this fall I will cut back 2 more roosters when my hubby chooses which buff based on feather quality and color he wants for future fly tying material in a couple years, 1 of the bigger ones is wanted by the gentleman who bought two of the other roos as he wants one for procreation with his buff orpington hens.
 
#1,182 ·
Just had to share that my robin is a mama :) Her partner has been hard at work bringing them big juicy bugs all day, and they were both just sitting on the edge of the nest providing dinner. I can't tell how many babies are in there as I don't really see any heads just yet, but they are obviously feeding at least something in there.


I feel like a little kid with my reaction, but I just feel in awe of the fact that these two tiny, fragile little wild creatures know what to do and seem to be doing it successfully. It's really fun to have a literal window on the next generation.
 
#1,185 ·
Chicks are here- well, 4 of the 6 anyway. I forgot the Speckled Sussex come this Thursday, so they'll be about a week behind these.

The Dominiques so far are the bravest and most curious:


They found the food and water first:




One is so tiny she actually slipped through the openings of the crate they're in, so I had to reinforce that already :)

And the Silver Laced Wyandottes seem a little more reserved so far:




This is an overhead view of my setup this year- a small dog crate and a rabbit crate back to back.

The little red "cave" in the back corner is the mama heating pad. It's a plush heating pad wrapped around a wire frame. It's nice and toasty warm underneath, sort of like being under a broody hen. Last night they were all snuggled up underneath it in a big happy pile. It's still cool here, only about 50*F right now, so they seem to be mostly staying under it vs. coming out to explore. But, it's going to be warming up to the 70s this week so hopefully they'll appreciate the warmer weather and get a little more active. They're up in the loft of my garage, which is significantly warmer than the first floor, so I think they'll do ok up there. After about a month, I'll move them with the mama heating pad out into a pen in my run to start getting them acclimated to the big girls.
 
#1,189 ·
@DreamCatcherArabians- I know it's kind of unconventional, but the idea behind the heating pad cave (or "mama") is that it replaces the heat lamp and acts like a broody hen. So they will spend a lot of time underneath for the first few days, coming out for short bursts to eat and explore, and then darting back under to warm up and sleep and do it all again. That's what I've seen them doing so far. So even though it's ~80ish degrees under the cave and colder outside, they seem to be doing good. I did cover the bigger crate with a quilt last night because we had pretty strong winds and I didn't want drafts coming through the back wall.

One of the Dominiques did come with pasty butt, so I've been keeping an eye on her. Her vent is clear and not crusted over, but her butt feathers are a bit messy and her little butt looks kind of raw, so I'm not sure what else I should do for her. Never had one with pasty butt before- any advice? I did add probiotics to their water today and made sure to dip her beak a couple of times, and she drank well.

Here are a couple more pictures (Dominque on the left, Silver Laced Wyandotte on the right)



 
#1,190 ·
I love little fuzzy wuzzies!

For pasty bottom, I would use an old wash rag and towel and dip the rag in warm water and soak off the gunk. Once she's clean, I'd wipe her dry (and use a hair dryer on low to make sure she's totally dry before you put her back)and maybe put a little Vaseline around the area to help keep her bottom dry and keep the stuff off of it. On my Cochins, I sometimes have to trim their vent feathers to keep them from getting icky.

If that doesn't solve it, add some scrambled egg to her starter feed and see if that does it. If it does, you might want to try a different brand of feed.
 
#1,193 ·
OK, thanks for the additional tips. She came out of the box with the messy bottom, so I hoped it would clear up after being in one place and am not thrilled to see it sort of lingering. The others do all seem healthy and bright- no other messy butts. All of them (her included) have nice clear eyes, clear nostrils, etc. so keeping fingers crossed they're all ok. Going out to check on them in a few minutes so I'll see if anything's changed.

PS- just saw your other post about the ant bites. Sending you soothing thoughts :)
 
#1,194 ·
Thanks! Yesterday was quite a day around this place. If she's eating, drinking and no runny eyes, nostrils, I'd lean toward stress. Did you get some Gro Gel when you got the chicks? That stuff is amazing. I use Gro Gel Plus and Quick Chik https://www.mcmurrayhatchery.com/vitamins.html?cl=crumbtrail. I sometimes do have chicks that still don't make it, when I order 50 I expect to lose about 5, but I've found that those 2 products will help any that are stressed but hardy.
 
#1,195 ·
So the little Dom is super cute from this angle:


But this is how I found her from the other end:

Ewww...it was white and, well...paste-y. So I got her cleaned off well with a couple of baby wipes, and she did poop a couple of times right away. I applied a little Vaseline all around the vent with a qtip. She was clearly very distressed at what I was doing, poor little thing. When I put her back, she immediately headed to the very back of the cave and continued her distressed chirping. I do have some powder that looks similar to the Quick Chik, so I can offer that.

I went to check on her again about 3 hours later, and she was still in the cave. The rest of them were out running around like wild things. They've discovered the ramp is fun:


And all that exploring makes them hungry!


So, I don't know if this little one is going to make it. I don't know if she's eating and drinking but I have not seen her do so today. Time will tell.
 
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