Backyard poultry

[Shaunc]

It's summer in Australia and the vegetables patch is starting to look ok. Tonight for dinner my wife cooked an omelet. Besides the ham which was left over from Christmas everything else came out of the backyard. It's a good feeling knowing that the soil and the weather looked after us tonight.
We had financial problems at Christmas with our back deck collapsing and needing replacement. Throughout the year I've bet on horse and greyhound racing and had to raid my tab account to pay for it all. My wife was telling a friend of hers that the horses paid for it and my 6 years old daughter over heard her and said "that's because they're all gods creatures ". Mother nature to the rescue again.
Regardless of anyones religious beliefs I urge you all to do something to try and be close to the plants and animals on this planet. It really is good for the soul.

[Makoiyi]

I've 35 chooks and each one is friendly and well handled. My kids make sure that they are well handled from the beginning, there so used to getting cuddled that both the Hen's and the Roosters ( all my roosters are friendly n quiet, they don't stay here if the aren't) wait there turn to come over for some fuss and cuddles with my daughters.

It's just patience, spending quality time with them, being quiet n quietly talking to the chooks that's calms them down. The guys here are just really laid back but a little bit of grain to scatter helps as well.

Makoiyi

[Shaunc]

35 is a lot. I've got 11, but 2 are old and not much good anymore, but they were good hens once. I live in town so no roosters are allowed. The 2 old ones are very placid , one of them will follow you around the yard like a dog but the 9 cross breed pullets I got fairly recently are the flightiest birds I've had yet.
They've all been treated the same way so I'm putting it down to their breeding. I've never had birds like this and over the years I've had a few different breeds. Austrolorp, Plymouth rock, langshan and hi-brid. The hi-brid were by far the most placid but they're very short lived but great layers. The austrolorp were pretty good too, their downfall is being heavy eaters .
One of the white crosses will eat out of my hand if she's hungry enough the rest are still flighty although not bad layers

[Makoiyi]

There were 50 odd birds here until New year 2015 when a family pack of foxes dug there way under the fence that was buried 4 ft and killed all 20 birds in the coop and run.

These were mostly the old retired birds, the ducks n kids Pet chooks plus one complete breeding flock of the rare breed birds that I raise. These were all going to be moved into a stables the next days as we'd just emptied out for them because of the constant rain, bad weather and floods we've had here . Needless to say the kids were devastated as some of these pets were there fave birds.

I raise and breed rare breed Chooks that I sell as young birds or as hatching eggs, hence the number as I have several different types and breeding flocks.
The eldest bird we had was a pure bred Speckled Sussex hen who was 11 yrs old. She still laid the odd egg once in a while.

Makoiyi