Broody hen

[The Mama Chicken]

My husband pointed out that bullets are cheaper than new chickens, but Bruno must have heard him because he runs and hides every time he sees a gun. Unless I'm holding it, of course, he knows that I'm not capable of shooting him. We've tried everything we can think of to break him of it. At this point he just isn't allowed outside unsupervised. I got Buff Orps because they aren't suposed to be able to jump over 4 feet, we fenced their run with 6 ft tall chain link, and they promptly flew up and over it. I'm just at a loss...

 

[Collector]

DW wouldhave an absolute fit if I shot our problem dog. Even though I broke my foot yesterday breaking up a dog fight in our kitchen of all things. Have you thought about clipping the wings of your birds?

 

[The Mama Chicken]

I couldn't watch my husband shoot the dog, but when I find a wing and a chicken head outside the back door I'm okay with it. I'm not a particularly sentimental person when it comes to animals. I haven't clipped the birds wings, my grandpa told me that if I did it wrong they could bleed out in a couple of minutes and I've been scared to try ever since. I'm at the point where I'm thinking that the smart ones will stay inside the fence and not get eaten, basically chicken Darwinism is going on here on the farm.

 

[Collector]

Well after awhile you might have some highly intelligent chickens. Be very afraid!

 

[nachoqtpie]

*waits for talking chickens from Mamas house*

 

[The Mama Chicken]

Well after awhile you might have some highly intelligent chickens. Be very afraid!

Shades of Animal Farm? ALL ANIMALS ARE EQUAL BUT SOME ANIMALS ARE MORE EQUAL THAN OTHERS!

 

[Collector]

Eggzackly!

 

[Chickie'sMomaInNH]

actually clipping their primaries should not cause them to bleed. with large fowl chickens you can safely clip about 2 inches from the tip of their wings on the outer 6 feathers. this is enough to keep them from getting enough lift off the ground. it sort of tires them out to fly with clipped wings. the reason they say that the birds can bleed to death is because if you look at the growing feathers they are filled with blood close to the shaft and near the skin. if there are any still growing they will look blood filled and shouldn't be clipped. you can look up clipping bird wings and it probably will bring you to sites on doing it with pet birds like parrots or parakeets. i learned how to do this when i was about 7 and had birds as a kid.
this might help but i usually don't like to cut as far down on the wings just for the same fear of having them bleed. http://birdmart.com/reference/wings.html

btw, i don't clip wings on my chicken but i keep mine in a covered over run since we have hawks and buzzards that would like to eat mine.

 

[The Mama Chicken]

actually clipping their primaries should not cause them to bleed. with large fowl chickens you can safely clip about 2 inches from the tip of their wings on the outer 6 feathers. this is enough to keep them from getting enough lift off the ground. it sort of tires them out to fly with clipped wings. the reason they say that the birds can bleed to death is because if you look at the growing feathers they are filled with blood close to the shaft and near the skin. if there are any still growing they will look blood filled and shouldn't be clipped. you can look up clipping bird wings and it probably will bring you to sites on doing it with pet birds like parrots or parakeets. i learned how to do this when i was about 7 and had birds as a kid.
this might help but i usually don't like to cut as far down on the wings just for the same fear of having them bleed. http://birdmart.com/reference/wings.html

btw, i don't clip wings on my chicken but i keep mine in a covered over run since we have hawks and buzzards that would like to eat mine.

We are going to be putting some kind of cover over the run soon, as hawks have been a huge problem this year. In a matter of days they killed 20 juvenile chickens, I even saw one carry off two at once. I'm just not sure HOW we'll cover our 75'x50' run.

 

[Chickie'sMomaInNH]

check out some of the websites for peafowl. they are really neat with how most of them make their huge flight pens for the birds! http://www.hopkinslivestock.com/Aviary Facility.htm
my favorite site for some beautiful flight/breeding pens! http://texaspeafowl.com/pens_ideas_equip.html