The weather has been so very mild the last few weeks, and it’s continuing on.
The current 15-day Outlook is giving us another week or more of this mild weather, with colder temps then coming in, but still only down to the mid-low-30’s at night, and into the low-50’s for day.
Last year we didn’t have any January ICE storms. They came in February, which was odd to us here, living here since late 1996 we hadn’t seen such a thing. So it goes that we don’t know WHAT will happen in January 2005, but that to the middle of the month there is likely no ice or snow. Or freezing of much of anything either.
I saw on the Weather Channel, on TV, earlier that the North and West are being hit with lots of snow, ice, mix, rain. We here are just mild. Low 70’s yesterday, supposed to be that again today. Friday is the day temps go down for a day or so, then back up again. Lows in the 40’s or 50’s is fine with me. I mean, I don’t mind Winter all THAT much, but I don’t mind being able to get out of bed sockless and feel fine either. 🙂
We haven’t had the use of any heating elements for days continuing since I last mentioned [in any post] that phenomenon.
So with this weather I have been outdoors happy. Going out to check the hens frequently, as if it was Spring. :rolleyes: I’m hoping for some eggs from any group of the hens. They are looking close to laying. All of them to one degree or another.
I have a wild urge to garden, but I’m submerging that inside me, it’s just too early for that.
It’s not too early for the hens to lay eggs though, since they’ve had “Off” for so long now.
The Australorps and Wyandottes (including Hawklady the not-real-W) are together in the A-Frame now. It was Friday I guess when I put them together. Fighing between one A and Trinity the W. broke out very soon. They were fighting for top pecking order I figure. They weren’t trying to injure each other. It’s amazing to see such fights. It’s incredible really. I saw the Leghorns do this once, I wrote about it I think. It’s a silent wonder really. A chicken can get REALLY big, tall, immensely ethereally magical looking.
So with that happening with two hens in the A-Frame, I stuck the dog carrier into the unit, which effectively cut the pen in half with the only passthrough being on one side. When I say “effectively cut the pen in half” I don’t mean equal halves, it was angled. What transpired then was that the Australorps kept to the small side, which was under the nest box loft. The three W.’s had the run of the other side of the pen, much larger in area. No more fighting occured, they sectioned themselves off.
The next day I took the dog carrier out. Some pushyness occurred from Trinity towards the A.’s but not fighing as before. Obviously she had won top ranking.
So that day the hens stayed segregated mostly , with Trinity being the police woman and pushing the A’s back if they strayed out of “their area” for more than a second or so.
Since then they do mix, but the A’s are hestitant around Trinity. That’s not such a big deal now either, it seems, just an every-so-often kind of thing.
I’ve also found that one A. and Hawklady are able to get into the nest box easily. They both have visited me while I had the door open. Hawklady three different times, in fact. She’s the one that I had put into the A-Frame alone before. The A’s were pecking her and got her ear bleeding, so I took her out and kept her in the cat carrier in the house for some days. The A’s obviously didn’t like something about her, and it’s interesting that when she went back into the A-Frame with her W. buddies no one bothered Hawklady at all.
In the nest box loft when Hawklady was in there, an A. did come over and stand in front of the area and reach up and “peck!” at Hawklady, whom was sitting quite forward and nearly sticking out of the box. I guess that could be the A. that likes to go up there now. Or maybe it was any of the 4 A’s that pecked at her before, and figured with her up there with no W. protection, she was “fair game” for a peck or two. It wasn’t nasty, at any rate.
I knew someone had been sleeping in the nest box, due to poopy remains in there in the mornings. It must be Hawklady, and I think at least another bird, but maybe not.
At least some of them are demonstrating that they can get into the nest box easily. So now I’m just anxious for an egg or two in that box, or more. There’s a total of 4 A’s and 3 W-types. That’s a possible 6 brown eggs, and 1 green egg. In the Leghorn pen, they are in the SuperYard now, we moved them to it last week, there are 8 hens and they are getting redder wattles, and their combs are just not completley red, waxy yet. Looking close though. So that’s a possible 8 white eggs there. All these are possible egg totals in one day, of course. 50% production would be very welcomed. That’s a great score if you are talking baseball hitting stats. It’s great for egg laying too, just not the best, and totally they are capable of 70 or 80 percent production more often than not, IMO. Well the Leghorns we don’t know what size their eggs would be if they’d lay. Nor how often they’d lay. Older hens lay less, “they say” and so far they are doing that, none at all. They aren’t so old that they can’t lay. They are just now 2 year old, and a couple months from their Two-year-First-Egg-Laying Anniversary. So they’ve only had two egg laying cycles, which is enough for most birds, but they are capable of doing more. Old softie that I am.