Tuesday, October 23, 2012
SUMMER ENDS WITH A BANG AND A POULTRY SHOW
Saturday, July 21, 2012
SUMMER UPDATE
Tuesday, May 15, 2012
THE LAST STRAW (of the season)
Sunday, March 4, 2012
CHESTER, THE NEW YARD ROOSTER
The roosters that I have bred, while I like their looks a lot, don't have quite enough chest to be winners (except for one that I bred and discovered early this spring, which surprised me. He'll go to the show for sure). So I purchased a rooster late last fall that I think will help with the chest problem. Hence the name Chester. And this is his picture. Today, after giving him a bath and cleaning him all up for introduction to the ladies , he had his first day out in the sunshine with thirty hens.
Friday, February 10, 2012
AN ASSESSMENT
At the beginning of each year, or at the end of the last one, it is a a natural thing to do to ask yourself to sort of assess the old year before the new one moves on. It is February now and I find myself analyzing my Serama chicken project.
Even though I enjoy going to poultry shows and try to breed good type Serama chickens, that is not my main pleasure. I just enjoy my chickens, mostly my favorites: Queenie. Ms. Chockolatte, and Blondie. Those are my favorite hens. I don't have any favorite roosters though, but I especially care about the ones I use for breeding. The problem is that my breeding project is getting in the way of my pleasure.
When I started, my goal was to breed good type chickens and very small ones. I guess that is still my goal and this year I find I have some really good roosters, about four that are show quality, and some very small ones all of good type too! I have some small hens A type, and one hen I consider show quality. So perhaps my original goal is being met, but is it too much work and not enough pleasure? At the end of this year, I might have an answer.
MY PLEASURES
Mother Nature Wins & Hawk Has Serama Dinner
We had a series of high winds come through here before I got the tie downs I ordered. I would read the ten day weather report to see if there were any more high winds expected, and if there were I would take the tarp off the pen. If not, the tarp would stay on. But a high wind warning, I found out, can only be given a few hours before the wind hits, so reading the weather report didn't help. So when a high wind warning would come through I would run out and disconnect the tarp covering three sides of the rooster pen and leave it attached in the back, and throw big rocks on the tarp to keep it from blowing. Then when the wind was gone I would pull the tarp back over the pen and attach it with zip ties. The tarp was to protect the roosters from the heavy rains which came with the winds so what this meant was that there was no protection for the roosters from the heavy rain when the wind came. I got tired of attaching and disconnecting the tarp. You have to get a picture in your minds eye of the muddy slop you're feet would sink into after these heavy rains. Clear up to your ankles!
Reattaching the top meant dragging a ladder around the pen and pulling the tarp over the top, attaching with new zip ties. Then I thought I had found a good solution. I attached the top with bungee cords - they were easier to disconnect and reconnect, and I tied a long piece of poly twine which came off the straw bales I buy, through the middle tarp grommet and tied this down with plenty of length and then I could pull the top over the pen by placing the ladder in just one place. This worked well the first time, It was so much easier to put the ladder in front of the pen, pull the twine which brought the tarp back over the top and then refasten with the bungee cords. In fact it worked so well I attached more twine to the grommets at each end
of the tarp, and tied the long end pieces of the twine to the pen so the twine wouldn't blow over the top.
The wind is really frightening. It sounds like a freight train is heading right for your house, getting louder and louder, during the night you listen for sounds of your house coming apart and trees falling, stove pipes blowing away, etc. The first year we lived here the wind pulled off the twelve by fifty foot patio roof and tossed it up in the air and it came down on our house and through the roof. That is why there is a nice skylight in our bathroom!
The next high wind warning I was ready, and went out and disconnected the bungee cords. I went to bed not worrying. The wind would blow the tarp over and off the pen, and according to my plan, when the wind was gone I would go out and pull the twine to get the tarp back on. In the morning when I looked out the bedroom window, I thought Oh! Oh! I couldn't see the top of the pen sticking up from behind the fence, so I went out and the whole pen was trashed and the roosters were happily wandering around the yard. A red tailed hawk nabbed one as I was contemplating the scene.
What had happened was the wind tangled the bungee cords with the the twine which was tied to the front of the pen and the wind had blown the tarp which had pulled the whole thing over and really broke the back aluminum kennel rail in about five places. It was a tangled mess.
The little hutches never moved though, they were really heavy and close to the ground, and the roosters were dry and happy!
The next day my tie downs arrived and the wind apparently was through for a while. So my broken pen is tied down awaiting repair!
The roosters are still in there wishing they could be out! I wish they could too!
Wednesday, January 11, 2012
Roosters, Roosters, everywhere!
When breeding chickens, the problem is what to do with the roosters. Assuming that you get about as many roosters as hens, people, whether breeding for show or pets, mostly want hens. This year I have had a super abundance of chickens but managed to sell almost all of my hens, which leaves the roosters. Because roosters fight, and I have rescued several very bloody losers, I realized that I had to keep the roosters separate. In the past I have tried to sell all the roosters off after the spring show. Those that I can't sell at the show, Craig's list, or my web site: sunsetseramas.com, I take to auction. But last year, after the fall show, and after posting some on Craig's list, I didn't want to take the roosters that remained to the auction because in the fall they don't sell well to the general population. I hate to keep chickens in cages inside my shop, but that is the only place that I have to keep the roosters separate. And so they lived through the winter in my shop.
To get them outside this winter, I purchased several small chicken tractors, or pens from Craig's list. But that only took care of about five roosters, ( these small tractors did work out for breeding pairs and broody hens though). Then I read that you could put roosters together and they wouldn't fight if there were no hens around. So I thought I would try that. The picture above shows my "Rooster Yard", and its true, the roosters don't fight. So all the roosters went into that pen. Then the roosters that I wanted to keep I put in another tractor. And then there were some roosters that were raised apart from the others and they went into another tractor. And I have some in the shop also; a new rooster I bought, and the rest were my "best" roosters, that I didn't want to lose in case of terribly inclement weather, or accidents, etc.
After putting together my "rooster yard" I was ready to put the roosters in it the coming weekend. Before that happened we had a terrible windstorm with very high winds which picked up the ten by sixteen foot rooster yard, spun it up in the air and crashed it about forty feet away in the corner of my lot and trashed the whole thing into a crumpled mess. The tarp was still attached and filled up with water as we had
an almost record rainfall that twenty-four hour period.
That was really discouraging. My son came and helped me cut the tarp loose and straighten out the bent pipe and we placed it back in the same location and put it together again. Why the same location you ask? That is the only place I have that is somewhat sheltered from the winds, and high winds like that are not uncommon, but I did not expect the whole thing to blow. I ordered some shed tie downs that I am hoping will help keep the pen in place but I think that the tarp will act like a sail, and the tie downs will not help. The only thing I can think of is to tie the tarp to another set of tie downs in the ground, instead of to the pen. and then if the high winds come just the tarp will blow and not the pen. The wind is always a problem here. That is the one thing I don't like about living in this beautiful place.
The chicken tractors have been moved into the natural shrubbery and were not affected by the wind. The one that is placed out into the windy area is a great pen and I wish I could get someone to build another one for me (I tried to find someone but no one is interested). You can see that it is covered by a clear tarp and it is very warm inside, sort of like a green house, and the tarp sort of clings to the shape of the pen, it is tied down with zip ties. There is a roost and a nest box in the back.
The roosters in this pen seem very satisfied.
I wish I could let my roosters roam but I have two terrier type dogs that are always intent on getting the chickens, and there are always owls and hawks, so unfortunately the roosters have to be caged.