Add to Favorites As the weather warms up, increase your vigilance for signs of slystrike. Story by Tove Danovich. Reading Time: 4 minutes AS SOON AS I PICKED her up, I knew something was wrong,” said Kristi Pritchett, who keeps roughly 15 chickens at her home in Pennsylvania. The smell gave it away even before she found the source of the problem. Sussex was a hen whom Pritchett had gotten from Craigslist and was never in the best health. Pritchett had thought the hen was egg-bound, but when she started the examination, she realized that one of the most unpleasant ailments that can befall poul ..read more

Add to Favorites As you prepare for new chicks, read about feed ingredients carefully. Story by Sue Norris. Reading Time: 5 minutes EACH BAG OF FEED you buy should have a paper tag affixed, and this tag will tell you the nutritional content of the feed. The label is divided into two parts: guaranteed analysis and ingredients. The chemistry and equations used to calculate the contents of a bag of feed are quite complex, and poultry feed companies spend millions of dollars each year on research into how to best feed all types of poultry efficiently and cheaply. Although many people do mix the ..read more

Add to Favorites Predators can’t be avoided, but coop doors can help. Story by Carla Tilghman. Reading Time: 4 minutes IF YOU’VE HAD CHICKENS FOR VERY LONG, there’s a good possibility that you’ve lost at least one or two birds to a predator. Losing a favorite hen is never fun, and unfortunately, sometimes the first sign of predator problems is when we lose that first bird. While there’s a long list of predators that would jump at the chance for a good chicken meal, there are a handful that you’ll be most likely to encounter in your chicken-keeping adventures. Raccoons Raccoons are a common ..read more

Add to Favorites Chicken and egg shortages around the world Due to the bird flu chicken and egg prices are increasing and this is causing farmers and hobbyists to scramble for meat and eggs. According to data from the USDA, there have been at least 58 million birds culled in 47 states due to the influenza virus. According to another report from the USDA in the past 11 years egg consumption has increased by 17%. With more demand and less products, consumers are considering raising their own backyard poultry. In addition to a shortage of laying birds, animal welfare laws are also contributing t ..read more

Add to Favorites Poultry know-how from experts Marissa Ames and Carla Tilghman. Turkey wounds, waterglassing, guinea eggs, incubation, and more. Reading Time: 9 minutes Cherie’s tom Turkey.Dried blood always makes wounds look extra nasty, even when they are healing. TOM TURKEY My tom turkey has a rather large patch on his chest. It is thick, black, and very nodule-like. His feathers are coming out very easily. He’s eating and acting normally. Please give any info on this. Cherie Hernandez Cherie, That looks like a callus or infected skin from a wound. Maybe he scraped it, or he was attacked ..read more

Add to Favorites A Norwegian custard bread. Reading Time: 6 minutes By Cappy Tosetti IMAGINE A STUDENT’S SURPRISE opening their lunchbox to find a delicious, custard-filled skolebrød bun topped with vanilla icing and grated coconut. Such a discovery would delight any youngster, especially knowing the homemade dessert was not just something served for a special occasion. The yummy treat has been a regular item on cafeteria menus for many schoolchildren in Norway beginning in the 1930s, though some locals say it began in the 1950s. But, like many regional stories, details tend to vary as time ..read more

Add to Favorites Poultry know-how from experts Marissa Ames and Carla Tilghman. Reading Time: 9 minutes Cherie’s tom Turkey.Dried blood always makes wounds look extra nasty, even when they are healing. TOM TURKEY My tom turkey has a rather large patch on his chest. It is thick, black, and very nodule-like. His feathers are coming out very easily. He’s eating and acting normally. Please give any info on this. Cherie Hernandez Cherie, That looks like a callus or infected skin from a wound. Maybe he scraped it, or he was attacked. We’d recommend you apply a wound-healing and moisturizing solutio ..read more

Add to Favorites News of the now, strange, fun, and all things poultry. Reading Time: 4 minutes By Kenny Coogan and Carla Tilghman Duck Changes One Man’s Life “The first thing that I missed when I became homeless was having a pet,” Dave Hughes told NPR news. Hughes had become depressed and unhoused at the beginning of the pandemic. After being robbed twice and threatened multiple times he found a community under a bridge crossing Brush Creek in Kansas City. A Muscovy duck amongst a sea of Canada geese stood out to him. And the duck, who soon was named Ahmed, started visiting him under the bri ..read more

Add to Favorites Reading Time: 5 minutes BREED: Sicilian Buttercup chickens, also known as Flowerbirds or simply Buttercups, are a heritage chicken breed renowned for its unusual crown-shaped crest and unique coloring. ORIGIN: Farmyard chickens with cup-like combs have been known in Sicily for centuries. Their plumage varied as farmers were more interested in their laying ability. Similar combs had been noted in northern Africa, particularly in the Berbera and Tripolitana landraces. Around 1600, Italian naturalist Ulisse Aldrovandi described similar birds, which also featured in European pain ..read more

Add to Favorites Reading Time: 3 minutes Farming Rice with Ducks in Vermont Traditionally thought of as a warm-climate crop, Boundbrook Farm, located in Vergennes, Vermont is raising rice and ducks symbiotically. Known as “aigamo” in Japan this method of having flocks of ducks in rice fields help control weeds and pests organically while at the same time fertilizing the crops. Since rice is a slow-growing crop, the ducks assist the rice by eating its competition. According to their website, “Since 2010, we’ve been working towards an adaptive model for heavy soils and a shifting climate and ha ..read more