Chick Emporium

I sell hatching eggs for my Buff Sussex bantams, but only having two hens coupled with their propensity to go broody means that accumulating many eggs for customers can be a little tricky. One lady was after 12 and the day after I had that conversation, Herbert went broody. Thankfully the lady in question was happy for me to incubate the eggs I had been able to collect and have chicks rather than eggs!

6 were already under a friend's Pekin as she was so resolutely broody I thought I may as well put her to work, and I put 6 more under the willing Herbert. The chicks would be a week or so apart which is not ideal but is do-able. 5 of the first batch hatched:

I'm awaiting the arrival of the next batch to see how many emerge, but usually hatch rates are good when they're in the care of a hen, and it's lovely for the chicks to have some time with their 'mother' to show them how to be a chicken. Much of their behaviour of course is instinctive but they learn important social and developmental lessons when they're raised by another hen rather than under a lamp.

I also purchased some day-old Rhode Island x Light Sussex chicks - this hybrid is sex-linking so you can tell the boys from the girls. These will be my replacement layers and I was thrilled to find someone who was selling these chicks as I take a dim view of the commercial hybrid industry (as per a previous post), especially as I only had to go 5 minutes up the road from my house to collect them! I also took the 4 week-old 'sister' from a previous batch and she seems to be coping with being the largest now that the chicks have stopped trying to brood underneath her....

They are in a puppy crate in my study overnight and go in an admittedly tiny run during the day. I'm expecting their new ark to arrive this week so if it stays mild they can start being in there full time as the young ones should have most of their feathers. They have an infra-red lamp on for an hour or so to calm them in the evening and I then turn it off once they're asleep.

I also have 8 eggs in the incubator which were given to me by a friend - they acquired them in France while they were on holiday so I've no idea if they'll hatch but I'll candle them at the end of the week and see what's going on...

Swarm-a-thon

It's that time of year again - I seem to spend most of my day in a bee suit but it's been great to pick up some prime swarms to add to my colonies. Two have been from my hives and the rest from fairly local hedges! All are laying and building and doing what swarms love to do, and the weather has been warm and sunny (in between the odd day of torrential rain, hail and strong winds) so the foragers have been busy on the remaining hawthorn. I did feed one small swarm with a frame of stores poached from a stronger hive as they had been in the open for 3 days. One swarm decided to make their new home in a roof unfortunately but we are going to investigate to see if the bees have access to the interior of the house; if not, there's not really much point in faffing about trying to remove them.

I used small rectangles of foundation (approximately 2 x 8cm) affixed at the top of the frames this year as I read/heard/dreamt? that bees fix comb more securely to wood than to wax and so far they are building lovely straight comb in line with the frames. I've sold one colony and the fresh combs survived the trip so it seems to be working. I find swarming in a controlled manner is great for bees and brood as the varroa load is lessened during the break, and they start their colony life in new, bee-built comb to their own specifications. I'm not sure how many cast swarms I will get, but I'm rapidly running out of room!

First Lot of New Chicks

Beatrice the bantam has been sitting calmly on her 5 eggs - she only got up twice but I did give the eggs a spray with lukewarm water on a number of occasions to increase the humidity. All went well and the eggs hatched so I have 3 Welsummer (or at least meant to be!) and 2 buff Sussex bantam chicks. One is actually Beatrice's chick, the other being Herbert's.

I put the eggs from my new Welsummer hens to hatch on the basis that they would be Henry's offspring but they aren't looking very Welsummer-ish, although I'm not sure how variable the colouration is...according to Google Images they're meant to be really stripy but two of them are golden. I thought/read that hens can be fertile for a week after they've been mated so a new cockerel needs over that to ensure any eggs are indeed his. My friend said she thought it was ten days, and I read in another book that it can be a month!! So, I'm not sure who the hens were running with before I bought them, or maybe Henry isn't a pure Welsummer after all. Sadly my new hens were taken by a fox so unless I raise some more from hatching eggs I'm a bit stuck with breeding more.

Anyway, after the sadness of losing hens, chicks are always a welcome sight! Cue lots of pictures of the little angels:

Incubator

I have always been fortunate to have a procession of broody hens with which to hatch eggs for me - they love it and do a brilliant job so have always been rather relieved that I've never had need of an incubator. However, I have just acquired a Brinsea Mini Eco from Flyte So Fancy as I have a rather sad reason for hatching some eggs. 

At the allotments, my plot runs alongside the boundary fence, and opposite me is a field with some beautiful Vorwerk chickens that I admire whenever I'm up there, a cockerel and four hens. The girls noticed one of the chickens was 'lying really still' and unfortunately the cockerel had died, having apparently been fine that morning according to one of the other people up there. 

Knowing that eggs remain fertile for about a week after the hens have been mated, I took 7 eggs and ordered an incubator, as of course there's never a broody hen when you really need one...

I did also think it would be good to have one as a precaution and also to compare natural hatching with artificial. The chicks will be about ten days behind the ones currently under my broody Buff Sussex bantam but will be able to run together in a brooder once they've grown a bit. 

So, fingers crossed for a decent hatch. I met the gentleman who owns the hens and he's very happy to exchange the eggs for a cockerel, which is a great deal as far as I'm concerned as I've got quite a few cockerels already. The hens are beautiful though so I'm looking forward to seeing how they get on. 

Meanwhile Beatrice is sitting patiently with the odd hour off for a preen and a bathe and a peck of grass.

New Hens

After a few abortive trips to poultry shows and sales to source some traditional utility breeds, I found a place in Canterbury, Kent, who could supply me with some new birds. It was only a two hour drive and the weather was kind so apart from a few erm, domestic issues it was a pleasant journey through the Weald.

Perched on top of the North Downs, the farm had over 300 breeding birds of all different types, but I chose 3 Welsummer hens (2014 hatch) and 2 Buff Sussex pullets at 8 weeks old. The hens look a bit ragged having been in the breeding pen for the last couple of months but I'm hoping that with some grass and sun on their backs (that won't happen today, looking out of the window!!) they'll feather up and get some colour back. Henry the Welsummer cockerel seems rather nonplussed at his sudden increase in harem, especially as he seems to have the hots for nextdoor's Amber Star hybrid who shamelessly flirts with him through the fence. Anyway, I'll be looking to hatch some eggs as soon as I have a broody hen so that I can sell the pullets or keep some as replacements. Eventually I'd like to have only traditional breeds rather than hybrids so that's the master plan. I also collected some Light Sussex pullets and a cockerel for my friend who lives up the road so there is the potential to swap boys to disperse the genetics a bit.

Buff Sussex pullets in the puppy crate

Welsummer hens

Fermented Feed for Chickens

Recently I've been discovering the benefits of cultures and after reading this blog - naturalchickenkeeping.blogspot.co.uk - I thought I'd expand the fermenting residents of my kitchen to include some corn and mash for the hens.

Basically, I had a couple of spare calf buckets (I have an obsession with buckets) so I put a couple of scoops of mixed poultry corn in one, standard layer's mash in the other and filled them up with tap water. I gave them a good stir about 5 times that day. The following day the water was cloudy so I gave it a stir whenever I walked past and by the fourth day the corn and mash buckets looked cloudy and foamy respectively. Both smelt vaguely sweet and sour which is the classic lactic acid bacteria aroma so I felt confident that the buckets were preserving the contents well.

Using a plastic sieve for each feed, I use a portion of the mash in the morning, mixed with dry layer's mash to form a crumble, and in the afternoon I feed a portion of the fermented mixed corn again, mixed with a bit of dry mash to soak up the excess liquid:

Mmmmm (if you're poultry)

Well, the hens go mad for it! They are tucking in really well in the morning and afternoon and are rather snooty about eating the pellets which I give them in between times for ease and in case someone else needs to feed them (should I do something radical like go out for the day) so I've been really pleased. I top up the buckets with corn or mash and water and the mixture perpetuates itself. As long as there's always a layer of liquid over the feed it will not go off as the population of good bacteria keep the bad ones in check.

A word of warning: I discovered my dog rather likes the liquid so I have to keep the buckets covered with an old plate rather than the tea-towel I was originally using as he could push that out of the way and get his nose in.

I also feed it to the ducks and although they don't quite know how to handle mash as they dabble in their water bowl then back to the feed bowl and I end up with two bowls of slops...

The next thing I want to try now that the weather has warmed up is some sprouted greens as being on mulch the hens are reliant on their daily leg-stretch in the garden for some greenery.

Mouse Nest

Rodents are proving to be a bit troublesome this year. It was warm enough (about 15°C) to properly take the lid off of the hive with the mouse nest and remove the squatters. They'd made a lovely cosy nest on top of the crownboard in the WBC:

Two mice were in there but they skidaddled off having given me a bit of a hard stare for destroying their home. The weather is good enough now though and there are plenty of other places for them to live so I wanted to see what damage they'd done, having not had this issue before. Thankfully they don't seem to have ravaged their way through the hive:

The bees didn't seem remotely perturbed by the mice and apart from giving me a bit of a talking to about taking the hive apart they carried on calmly. I've clearly forgotten how to keep a smoker alight  over winter which didn't help! Having left all the honey on after taking a  bit in July, there was still loads of food which was great to see and hopefully will give the colony a positive start to the season.

I blocked the entrance with some bits of frame that were lying about (doesn't pay to be too tidy) but I'll get some proper blockers for this hive. The bees happily carried on bringing in pollen so I'm hoping the mice won't take up residence again...