We have raised several batches of chicks now, but so far have not got one to the table, mostly because by the time they got to table age they have either been hens (therefore kept for eggs) or bantam roosters (not worth plucking!). Although we do currently have a grow out pen of 8 or so roosters [...]
We ended up with 11 chicks hatched from the first lot and seven from the second lot and they are all now happily growing up in a re-furbished broody box. From the second lot, none of the purchased Auracana eggs hatched, only one partially developed which was disappointing. All of the others were from our [...]
Well today is hatch day here at Eagleburra…well technically 21 days was up at 7.30pm last night, but after a power outage one night at the end of week one, plus the colder temperature only one chick (a Rhode Island Red) hatched yesterday at 4.30pm. After a very nerve wracking wait, two more chicks hatched [...]
We have two white Silkie cockerels and one grey (or maybe splash?) Silkie POL pullet. I had planned to breed them as they are a very cute breed, and the girls make excellent adoptive mothers, so I could do with a few more of them. The only thing is that they have black flesh and [...]
While up in Perth I purchased two 11 week old black Auracana pullets, two bantam Indian Game roosters (Blue and Jubilee), two POL Indian Game hens (Blue and Jubilee) and a 11 week old trio of dark Indian Game. The Auracana are for the egg layers pen (they lay a light blue-green egg), and the [...]
We also have a few Pekin Bantams that I plan to breed, some to sell as day old chicks or fertile eggs. Like the silkies, Pekins are very cute and make excellent adoptive mothers. As usual though, we have too many roosters (2) and cockerels(2) as we don’t have enough hens for them all. At [...]
Its a little frustrating having a pen full of chickens and still having to buy shop eggs! Although Corn Chip the gold laved wyandotte started laying again a couple of weeks ago and it looks like Coal the Ancona hen has also started laying, yesterday we picked up three 17 week old Isa Brown pullets [...]
After alot of research, I have settled on Indian Game bantams for breeding our table chickens, they lay quite well (or at least a lot more than their large IG or Cornish do) and improve the meat of any other breed they are crossed with. The cockerels mature early and can be processed at 5 [...]
We ended up with 25 hatched chicks, the remaining seven chicks died in the shell without pipping (2 of which I believed died around day 16). Of the 25, one had *sort of* splayed legs – I’m not convinced they were splayed at least not like the photos I have seen on splayed legs – [...]
Continue reading about Baby Chickens and the importance of healthy breeding stock
The first chicks hatched in our new incubator (a hexagonal Janoel) over the weekend. We rather unexpectedly started with 36 eggs, pulled four duds out during the week, all of the rest looked great bar two that did not take up all the room in the shell (but we saw one move). These were the [...]