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I thought it might be handy for others if I do a vlog of my new girls settling in. This is them in the old run (which comes out of the garage for introductions), and an intro to the older hens. More on Friday or Saturday... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oH6j79OjLrQ&list=UUDzuaANtugRgkose-kSTdvg

Pondering getting two new hens, one being perhaps a brown partridge leghorn (from here: http://www.jessieshens.co.uk/Our-Hen-Range.html) Had two leghorns previously, both white. Lizzie laid five or so eggs early on, mostly soft shelled, and went into the house every day thereafter to lay a...

Hi all, haven't been around for a while (too much to do!) but thought I'd check in to say hi. Lost a couple of girls from my flock recently - Jane, my shoutiest chicken, a bluebell who came back from infection last year, came down with a similar malaise this year. Seemed to be something that...

Anyone used rubber pellets in the outdoor run? Some of my hens LOVE mud, so I won't deprive them of outdoor wet areas entirely, but I'd like to cover part of the open area with something a little less soggy. They've got the covered are area too of course. Pondering on putting some mesh down...

I've got an Iranian friend who has fallen in love with the idea of keeping hens after spending time with mine. And she's particularly keen on some breeds that are common here but unobtainable in Iran. She's especially keen on getting silkies and possibly cream legbars. Import to Iran is going...

Matilda (rhode rock hybrid) was POL when we got her at Easter, and has been a good'un producing eggs since a fortnight afterwards. Took a couple of weeks off with being broody, she was a persistent broody for a hen so young, but she's been a really good layer all year. She's stopped over the...

We have a spare hen house and run in a friends garden. Its used when we're on holiday (our girls go over there). Today it has another inhabitant... Was contacted via. twitter by a mutual friend of someone who lives down off Hills Road, one of the main roads through the middle of Cambridge. She...

My better half got home before I did this evening, and the first thing she told me was not to worry. But I'm a little bit worried. Charlie our leghorn, still a youngster (been laying since we got her in September) laid an ostrich egg. Its 100g in weight, comfortably bigger than anything else...

Since Edie my cream legbar has been laying, I'm getting a green egg maybe five days out of every six, she's been a good 'un since her first egg on Christmas Day :) Now the physiology of green eggs seems quite interesting - according to an article in Your Chickens there's a deposition of brown...

Edie my cream legbar presented us with her first egg this morning, a lovely little green one :) https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BcVM4bjIUAA_KIz.jpg

A friends boyfriend was raising turkeys in his garden, lovely looking creatures and she kept showing me footage of them on her phone. So, naturally, I have procured one for Christmas :) Just picked him up (five miles cycling in to a head wind, five miles cycling back with a tail wind and a...

I have next to me some water glass. In a bottle. Also known by the less lovely name sodium silicate. How does one use it to preserve eggs? How much do I dilute it? I get that you keep the solution, with clean, freshly laid eggs added, somewhere cool and dry. I get they should be intact and...

I like the chicken run to be dry, and unlike many I line it with compost. I tip bucket loads of very well rotted stuff from the heaps on the floor, let them play in it, let them eat the bugs, and dig it out again (enriched with poo!) and its like rocket fuel for my allotment. But I also like...

...I want to get off. https://www.omlet.co.uk/shop/chicken_keeping/chicken_clothing/?aid=POULTRYK

There was a rat smell in the garage this morning, which is a new one for us. We get the odd mouse in there when the weather turns cold, but we keep on top of that with little mousetraps (and on one occasion letting a couple of hens into the garage... Better mousers than any cat I've met). So I...

I gave the two new girls a couple of hours with the older girls this evening. Didn't go bad, they've been looking at each other for a fortnight and they didn't immediately go for each other. I gave them a break of another hour apart before bed, then squirted with perfume and put the youngsters...

We picked up two new hens on saturday. As this is only my second time integrating birds into an existing flock there are a couple of things I'm still working out. So I thout I might seek some opinions here, if that's okay with you lot. Firstly, one of the new girls just isn't an outdoor...

Just picked up our new girl. White leghorn 19 weeks old, cream leg bar slightly younger. They're in the old run and house that we keep in bits in the garage for introducing new girls. The others were a bit squawky but settled down, we'll give them a few days to get used to each other. I've let...

So if my sick bluebell doesn't pull through, and I choose to pick that moment to also replace my leghorn who's clearly never going to lay, what shall I get? Got an old speckledy (four years old, boss chicken, but a really gentle old hen), a goldline (who doesn't care for pecking order...

I've got a bluebell hen called Jane, who has always been a little cracker. She'll dash across the run an jump on to my arm on the off chance of treats, full of beans the whole time, and a smart one too, always getting more than her fair share of anything by putting her body between any treat and...