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This wasn't exactly an impulse acquisition, but I had the opportunity to snag a small group of Muscovy ducks yesterday, so I went ahead and got them. We're about half ready, but we have enough for immediate needs and the rest will be done this week. I'd prepared and read, but I've never had...

I'm no stranger to brooding chicks outdoors. I ordinarily hatch March -September and the chicks go outside around 7-10 days old. With the uncertainty of Covid, this year I decided to continue hatching through the winter, albeit less frequently. I have a batch of chicks that are now three...

This has been a terrible summer for my broody hens. I have never had more than two at a time and the past few weeks I've dealt with four simultaneously. Hatch rates have been horrible. The first hen hatched a single chick. The second and third hens, who were sharing that original hen's...

So this was one of my gifts this morning. Yay! I keep my flock's food in their original sacks and inside a large deck box that protects them from the elements. The flock is large enough and my storage space is small enough that food here only lasts a week or so before being used. I know...

Just an idea I've been hooked on, not looking to make any new acquisitions or changes until next year, but I'd like to take my flock in a new direction. Two of my very best layers are Orpington/Ancona mixes. Given that there was only one BO rooster and one Ancona hen in the flock where they...

I have a 10-week-old mixed breed pullet who I believe has gone blind. I had an older pullet, already laying, who seemed to have been stung on the face by something. The skin around her eye swelled until she could not see, but there was nothing else wrong and given a couple weeks, she...

I was helping someone fill a minimum at the store and came home with two chicks that are just slightly older than a batch I already had in the brooder. They are ten, maybe 11 weeks old now. The one appears to be a welsummer pullet, she’s in the second picture. The first chick is making me...

What is she? 10.5 weeks old in the picture, mostly white with small black splashes and a single comb. She’s like a sphynx chicken sitting among her peers.

I’m in the process of selecting a new flock rooster from five unrelated (to my flock) young cockerels. I know breeds for two of the five, but the other three all look like this. Any ideas of breeds that might be involved? Legs are yellow. The third cockerel is white with toasty red leakage.

For space and timing reasons, I am currently sitting in front of my 2’ by 7’ outdoor brooder, where I have just combined two three-week-old turkey poults (I suspect male and female) who had been living in a dog kennel inside the run with the chickens after the female poult was scalped by a chick...

This guy came out of a set of mixed hatching eggs and I can’t be sure what he is. I had him at a swap yesterday and heard lots of ideas. He got enough compliments and no sales interest (besides eating him) that I’m thinking of keeping him. What do y’all think?

Okay, so maybe not bad, just not the bird you want to guard and breed your flock. Assuming physical characteristics are equal, what are early behavioral signs that tell you a cockerel is not going to make the cut? I hope I'll come home tomorrow without our red Polish cross. His behavior...

I apologize if this isn't quite the right place for this; the swap and sales portions of the forum seem to be for actual swaps and sales, of which this is not one. I'm new to selling my birds. I'm having some frustrating experiences and I'm hoping those of you who have done more of this can...

It seems to be today, with many topics on the subject, so what’s one more? This one has been driving me crazy. In the last seven months, I’ve raised six accidental bantams alongside my large fowl chickens. Five of them have been boys. As the hope for a pullet waxes and wanes, I wonder...

It has been an eventful 48 hours here with several firsts. I had a customer wipe me completely out of eggs for the first time and I also got my first double yolker and my first shelless egg. My question pertains to the shelless egg: is it safe to eat? I wasn’t planning to eat it myself, but I...

I only recently learned that there is a Rural King about 45 minutes from me. I’ve already been and, since they beat the pants off of TSC, I’ve been again. A friend asked me to pick up four chicks on my second visit. They have a six chick minimum. I didn’t know that, but I wasn’t surprised...

This chick hatched in the last 24 hours. Now that it’s dried off, it appears to have bald spots on either side of its head, just behind its eye sockets. They are on both sides and rather symmetrical, so I’m not thinking of pecking or an accident immediately. The chicks are all in an extra...

I obtained a dozen eggs from a local farm. I told them I wasn’t picky about breeds, so that meant I was given no info about the eggs and the handover didn’t happen face to face, so ... I got two of these. Any ideas? I’ve not seen a chick with coloring like this before.

I have some random, funky boys who have received their eviction notices, if anyone is interested in some funkiness for their flock: https://roanoke.craigslist.org/grd/d/fun-roosters-for-sale/6525034824.html

I would appreciate some interpretation of an encounter I had yesterday with two cockerels. I have never kept a rooster past the age of five months or so. These birds are 18 weeks old. Right now I have 18 pullets and hens, three months to a year in age, and eight cockerels, three to four...