Top of Site Garvin Mesa Weather Desert Weyr: Our Farm Sales List Black Welsh Mountain Sheep CMK Arabian Horses Geese and Chickens Hops Variety Research Project Desert Weyr Blog General Sheep Info General Horse Info Personal Gordon-Van Tine Kit House Restoration Hummer Information Ken & Oogie Colorado House Project Mount Lamborn Picture Gallery 16870 Garvin Mesa Road Paonia, CO 81428 (970) 527-3573 FAX (815) 572-5360 8am-8pm Mountain Time Email at sales@desertweyr.com

2004 Poultry Project Results 2004 Geese 2004 Chickens 2004 Losses Show Chickens 2004 Results 2004 Geese I initially ordered 4 Buff and 4 Pilgrim goslings. They were all due to arrive the week of 10 May 2004. Later I changed my order to be 8 Buff and 8 Pilgrim but I was not clear on the delivery requirements. Our first batch of 8 goslings arrived on 11 May. They are all doing well. This batch is all spoken for. The second batch of 8 arrived 26 May but one died the first day. It was not looking good on arrival, probably shipping stress. Everything was going fine until 30 May. That morning, all 8 older geese were gone. No indications of predators or feathers and we searched high and low but could not find any traces. I quickly called around but no hatcheries were still hatching Buff or Pilgrim geese. I was able to get 8 replacement Toulouse geese from Ideal. These new goslings arrived 4 June and are growing very well. The Goslings 25 May 2004 Buff and Pilgrim Geese 11 July 2004 Buff and Pilgrim Geese 11 July 2004 Buff and Pilgrim Geese 11 July 2004 Toulouse Geese and Goose House 11 July 2004 Toulouse Geese 11 July 2004 Toulouse Geese 11 July 2004 2004 Chickens The Chickens 25 May 2004 Our first batch of chicks arrived 23 May. There were 32 chicks sent. According to the packing slip one is an unknown rare breed chick and the other 2 spares are an extra Buff Orpington and an extra Buff Rock. So far all 32 chicks are doing well. On 1 June one Buff Rock developed crusty eyes and is currently in the house in a cat crate with a Campine hen as a buddy. We are washing out the eye with saline and it is doing well. This chick went back out into the main group after a couple of days. As of 11 July we can't tell which one it is so it recovered well. The next 2 batches of chicks arrived, one on 14 June and the other on 18 June. One batch had pasty rears, I think they were too cold, or got stressed during transport. We've been washing chicken bottoms and they are all ok now. Go To Top Predator Loss and Fence Problem On 5 July I went to lock chickens up for the night to find that 17 of the young birds and 1 older one were all dead. One of our guard dogs had jumped the 5 ft fence and decided to attack the vicious sheep eating chickens. The dog is now on a chain as it's clear he will continue to range to protect his sheep and he is too big to confine with the fencing we have. On 7 July I found one Toulouse goose tangled in the electric netting fence and dead. From the looks of things it got caught on the wrong side and the older geese chased it. It got tangled and I didn't find it in time. Go To Top Show Chickens The neighbors kid wants to show chickens at the county fair. She already helps me show sheep each year. So we built a chicken tractor, I picked out 2 acceptable Buff Orpington hens to show and they are over there being cared for and trained by the kids. It should be fun to get them all ready to show. Chicken Tractor at Neighbors House Chickens in the Tractor Go To Top Go To Top