Everyone is now over 500g!
It's such a pain trying to catch them now. I'm wondering when I will stop doing this weighing thing. Perhaps when they start laying eggs?
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| Bubbles has put on 75g this week (down from 88g last week). Bubbles feathers are not smooth like the others - it makes me wonder if she has some frizzle in her genetics. No signs of a triple pea comb yet! Here's hoping! |
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| Cacciatore has put on 76g this week (down from 79g last week). She is skittish when approached suddenly but once you have food out she will happily climb on you. At least the kids can still pick Cacciatore up. |
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| Mary has put on 90g this week (more than her 88g last week). She eats really well. I've seen her using the Dine-a-chook very well, and she spends more time eating than I've noticed any of the others. She is also the easiest to pick up and has to put up with the kids constantly carrying her. |
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| It is such a chore trying to catch Spot, who has now passed the 3/4 kg mark! He has put on 114g this week (down from 123g last week). Spot is quite a good looking chicken, I think. He hasn't yet started crowing, but he will be cracking the 1kg mark in a few weeks. I am thinking about getting a crow collar on him so I don't have to eat him. |
Unfortunately for me, they were not very interested in the sprouts I gave them. However, I shall persist! I noticed today that they devoured zucchini when it was chopped very finely. Perhaps that's what I need to do for all their kitchen scraps.
I took pics of the grains I was sprouting. I used a mixture of wheat, barley and oats, and if you ask me, it looked like the only thing sprouting was the wheat! It's really easy - soak overnight, then put them into a container with some holes so it drains, and place that inside another container to contain the water that leaks out. Rinse it twice a day to stop the mould growing and that's it! They don't need sun or anything, I just left them on the washing machine or the kitchen bench.
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Perhaps I need to starve them a bit so they eat it. Or perhaps it's too big for them. After today, I noticed they liked their food chopped up as fine as crumble so that might what the problem is.
I was concerned lately because they hadn't been doing dust baths. I kept checking the chickens for tics and mites and so far they seem good. However, today I saw Mary dust bathing in the dirt outside the pen, and Bubbles doing it inside the pen. What a relief.
If I had paid attention, I would have realised they had been doing it already! Here are Spot and Cacciatore soaking up some sun.
And the bottom two photos you can see some depressions which is where some chicken has been fluffing around in! Look at my uprooted veggies in the other one!
Next step - train them to use the treadle!
You have two reports for Bubbles and none for Mary. It only took me a second look, but you might want to correct it... for posterity. I find it funny to hear "Crow Collar" instead of "No Crow Collar". That shortening is probably common, but I hadn't heard it. Oh! There's a pun in there somewhere... Or maybe it's how flammable and inflammable both mean the same thing?
ReplyDeleteHey Kal thanks for pointing that out! Fixed the Bubbles mistake. And yes, it should be no crow collar! And I see that pun you did there :D
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