June 2008 Archives

Linda said: How large will they get?

They are a medium weight chicken so not over 5 - 6 lbs at the very best in a big bird. They are nothing like my blue orpingtons. My rooster will top the scales at around 12 lbs or so at full maturity.

Kismet said: Doesn't it make you sad when the others don't hatch? There's a reason I buy my eggs from the store :)

No, it doesn't make me sad. Chicks that don't hatch usually have some deformity or internal injury that would prevent a normal healthy life. I am not interested in trying to save deformed or handicapped chicks. They have no quaility of life and will suffer and die if they don't have to be culled first. I would rather an chick not hatch than to have to cull one.

In the best of cases, it is nice when all egg develop and hatch. Not all eggs will develop in every hatch. While I would love for every egg to develop into a chick and hatch that is not the reality of the chicken world.

Even a grocery store egg has the potential to hatch. Lots of people buy eggs from the grocery and set them to hatch. They are usually leghorn or some cross bred brown layer. Health food stores will often have fertile eggs for sale. There is no difference in taste in a fertile or a nonfertile eggs. If you did not know an egg was fertile there is no way you would know it when you are preparing it for food.

Hens can lay eggs without needing a rooster. Roosters are only for when you want those hens to lay fertile eggs that have a potential to hatch. There is no worry about getting an egg from the farm or the grocery store and finding a partially developed chick in there. It doesn't work that way.

Fertile eggs require a specific incubating environment and must be cultivated in that environment for 24 - 36 hours for the cells tobegin deviding. Once the enviroment is altered the embryo dies.

Home grown, farm fresh, backyard eggs are healthier, are higher in Omega 3 fatty acids, have a much darker yolk and generally have lower cholesterol.

Once you have farm fresh eggs you'll not want the shallow image of the egg from the grocery store. As much as we would want to think differently grocery store eggs and chickens for meat are sub-quality. The chickens you buy for your family dinner is no more than 4 - 5 weeks old. Even those big ones are under 6 weeks old.

kristy said: When will you be able to tell if they're roosters or hens?

They will start showing their gender in a couple weeks. Not only are there characteristics to look for int heir body such as comb and wattle growth but males will have thicker thighs and legs and feet. Also some of those little boys stretch their necks up and try to crow at a few weeks of age. As they progressively grow and get more mature feathers the feather development is a dead give away for their gender.

Some breeds of chickens can be sexed by color at hatch. A well trained eye at raising good rhode island reds chicks can pick out females vs males at very early ages.

beahunter said: Are hens very protective of the young they hatch?

Initially they are. Over the next 4 - 6 weeks she will teach those chicks everything they need to know about eating, sleeping, roosting, scratching, and just being a chicken. At that point her maternal instincts turn off. She will start laying eggs again and those chicks will just be some other chickens. Not her babies.

This hen is very good with us. Even though she will give us a warning growl and let us know we are tredding on thin ice she still lets us look under her and handle the babies.

She managed to hatch 2 chicks.

The other eggs she was sitting on where obviously scrambled during shipping.

Mom and babies are doing well. She has them out of the crate and enjoying the barn, chick feed and cool clean water.

I got rid of my big rooster when he went after Steven repeatedly without being provoked. So I didn't have any fertile eggs at all on the farm. Then I had a hen go broody - meaning she decided she was going to sit on some eggs until they hatched. Doh!

So I got a nice lady in Alabama to send me some of her beautiful rhode island red eggs. I put my broody hen - a big fat white wyandotte (one of the Wanda's) in a quiet place and put the eggs under her.

21 days later - look what is hiding under her wing -

Life on the farm is super busy right now. I have so much to tell you!

She doesn't know it is a red headed stepchild. All she knows is that it is her baby. :)