This week put many poultry keepers on alert when an outbreak of the Avian Flu was discovered in a Tyson plant in Tennessee. This was the first time this Virus has been detected in our state although there were outbreaks in other states in the country last year. The virus can be catastrophic […]
Flying Predators and your flock
We’ve just weathered another storm! Anytime you have chickens or any type of bird you will always have to contend with predators. We thought we had a fairly safe set up. We have smaller wire at the bottom of the pen and electric wire running across the top. I am constantly monitoring for anything […]
Cleaning the Coop
One of the jobs that may be considered unpleasant to some chicken keepers but an absolute necessity is the cleaning of the coop. I try to do two deep cleanings a year, with some smaller freshening up cleanings in between those two. I usually do it in the Fall and the Spring. It’s a good […]
Adding ducklings to your flock
I decided this year that I wanted to add some ducklings to our little place. I had never raised ducks, only chickens but I didn’t think they would be all that different. I am in the midst of learning just how different they really are from each other! As always, I don’t claim to be […]
Poultry care: Handling predators
This is a timely topic for me this week because we lost one of our new laying hens. Oh, my goodness there’s nothing worse then going to the chicken yard and seeing one of your beloved hens laying there dead in a very unsightly way I might add. After the initial fury and then sadness […]
Chicken Care: Combining flocks
If you are raising backyard chickens there may be several different scenarios that would cause you to have to introduce other chickens to your flock. I am trying to keep my egg production up so I am constantly adding new chicks as I am able and rotating some of the older ones out of my flock. […]
Are you sure you want to raise chickens?
The day is bright and sunny. You saunter out to your beautiful back yard and take a peek at your chickens. You throw out a little seed on the ground and grab a hand full of gorgeous clean brown eggs to make for breakfast that morning. You watch them play and chase bugs around for […]
Shortcuts to raising chickens
We’ve been recently upgrading things around here. We got some new Amish built chicken coops and put up a very large pen for the chickens this past Fall. While we were making all of the changes we decided to try to solve a few problems to making keeping the chickens a little bit easier. Here are […]
Help! My chickens quit laying!
You’ve had some good trusty hens that are providing you with some wonderful eggs and then all of the sudden the nesting boxes are empty! Here are four possible reasons your egg production may have come to a halt and some tips to try to help get your girls back to laying!! 1. Let there […]
The Saga of Boots and Pearl
If you’ve spent anytime at all around a barnyard you’ve probably noticed that animals form bonds much like humans. Chickens are really no different! These two birds are our first Light Brahmas. They are a gentle giant that I attempted to try to start raising for the ability to have a “dual purpose” bird. The […]
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