I've Been……..

Told off!   Sorry Simon!  I kept meaning to update my blog, but you know what its like tomorrow never comes does it?

Right, updates all round then!

The turkey poults are now 7 weeks old.  We sold some as growers, and have a few spares, but the rest are getting big now!  And the little devils have started to peck each other a bit.

I hung CD's up in their shed, but they only seem to like them when the sun shines on them!

This year, we've put a metal pet cage in their shed so we can segregate any pecked ones for a few days, but the others can still see them, so we don't have any problems when they go back together!  I either spray them with UKADEX, which doesn't seem to stop them, or vaseline with tea tree oil in.  that helps them to heal too!

The meat chicks are 6 weeks tomorrow and are all doing well.  I haven't lost one sickly one out of 100 chicks, so I'm quite pleased with that!  I think we got them a week or 2 early, but hopefully we will have some very large ones for Christmas this year!

Nearly all the pure breed chicks have gone to new homes, but we don't think we'll be doing many of them next year.  they don't seem to go very well around here.  The hybrids are much more popular, and this seems to be borne up by other local breeders and rearers I talk to.

People love to have chickens in their gardens, and hybrids can come in lovely colours, but people want lots of eggs too, and we haven't had loads of eggs from our pure breeds.  I'm only getting one, maybe 2 a day from the 4 Rhode Islands Reds.  The Naked Neck hasn't laid an egg for months, and my little Goldline who lives with Rocky the Rooster hadn't laid for months, then 2 weeks ago she laid an enormous egg, weighing 110gms, the next day she laid another huge one, the day after that a tiny one, then the following day a more normal sized egg, but I haven't had any from her since!

The Exchequer leghorns stopped laying 2 weeks ago when I put their daughters in the coop with them, and the silkies are forever broody!

Last week Brian culled and prepared 5 turkeys for a lady we know and 3 ducks.  All he asked in return was one of the ducks!  but she kindly gave us 2 of them, plus her 3 pure breed point of lays, a Welsummer, a Light sussex and a Buff orpington.  They re beautiful girls, but not laying yet!  she also gave us her pet cage and a rabbit run with an elastic netting cover.

I told her she was mad, but she said she is going to stick with the silkies and araucanas she had from us!

These are the girls she gave us!  Thanks Yvonne!!!

Last Saturday, we took 3 turkey poults over to a chap we know who grows our beef for us!

So we went to see our Dexter bullock and our pig that we are getting in October.  They are looking good.  We are lucky that we don't have to buy meat in the supermarkets!  Okay, it means we eat more chicken and turkey through the year, but its good for you!  Then during the winter, a nice bit of beef and this year pork too!  Yummy!