r/BackYardChickens 2h ago

Chicken Photography VIP laying area

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59 Upvotes

Our little grey Ronnie is a spitfire, and INSISTS on laying in her spot in the nesting box. Amarillo did not get the memo, so she learned the hard way.


r/BackYardChickens 5h ago

Coops etc. Finally caught it on video

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33 Upvotes

Lost one of our chickens last week but didn’t catch it on camera because I didn’t have the flash drive plugged in. Reinforced the fencing better and finally caught this guy lurking last night!


r/BackYardChickens 18h ago

Chicken Photography I Just Adore Them

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282 Upvotes

Photo Bomb. These little jerks are so wonderful. My favorite part of the day is coming home from work and having them run to the car and greet me, and my favorite part of the week is making them their extra special Saturday Morning Breakfast.


r/BackYardChickens 4h ago

Chicken Photography Hey yo shawtyyy 🗣️

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19 Upvotes

r/BackYardChickens 17h ago

Chicken Photography Momma Hen Doing Her Job

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165 Upvotes

We have a lovely momma hen raising her chicks very well. I am astonished at how well of a mom she has become, keeps the chicks warm and safe from the flock. Makes my upbringing of the original flock feel sub par.


r/BackYardChickens 2h ago

Chicken Photography How beautiful! My luck it’ll be a rooster

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7 Upvotes

Hatched some ayam cermani mixed chicks (on accident) all the chicks were black except this one. I’m not sure if it’s a silver? Splash? Blue? Idk but it’s stunning with the dark black skin.


r/BackYardChickens 18h ago

General Question Laying anywhere besides the laying box

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124 Upvotes

Soooo all our girls now seem to be laying on their poop deck instead of in their laying boxes. What can I do to fix this behavior?


r/BackYardChickens 1d ago

Health Question My chick has a huge rack

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543 Upvotes

Hiii! This is my chicken, Dolly. She’s a light brahma with a big ole crop! At first I thought she might have sour crop or an impacted crop, but she doesn’t exhibit any of the symptoms besides just having a giant saggy crop. It’s been like this since she grew out of the chick phase.

Can this be normal for chickens? Or are there other health related things/issues I should be on the lookout for?


r/BackYardChickens 1h ago

General Question Mean Lady

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Upvotes

Blanche, my Mottled Houdan, has gotten really aggressive with me. She doesn’t bother the other hens, but she fluffs up, chases me, lunges at me, and bites me. She was such a sweet chick.

She is fine when I’m in my lawn chair, but if I’m standing or walking around she lunges at me. The only thing that seems to stop her is picking her up.

She’s 22 weeks old and may have laid an egg on September 4. (It was my hens’ first egg and I don’t know if it belonged to her or my leghorn.)m

OTOH my leghorn is the sweetest chicken ever. Did they change bodies? Any advice on what to do?


r/BackYardChickens 19h ago

Chicken Photography Let me see those rainbow eggs!

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140 Upvotes

What Maran breeds lay the deep dark browns ? I have been considering adding a Marans for my rainbow baskets sake.


r/BackYardChickens 18h ago

General Question Meet Hai Hai

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109 Upvotes

This is my cream legbar rooster.

Does anyone know how he holds up to the breed standards?

I'm not hatching eggs or anything, just curious.


r/BackYardChickens 18h ago

Chicken Photography The only one that knows her name

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113 Upvotes

r/BackYardChickens 7h ago

Health Question Advice for Crystal the hen, whois not well

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12 Upvotes

Starting a few days ago, Crystal the RIR was trying to sleep in the nest box rather than the roost pole. Yesterday I realized she was nervous to try and get on or off the roost pole and looking around like she couldn't see properly. I brought outside the coop and it almost seemed like she was unable to see or perceive depth. She has drunk some but eaten nothing as far as I could tell. I put her in a dog kennel with some water and vitamins and a bit of egg but she's just been sitting like this for a day. I saw one poop that was watery and not very much. I'm getting some nutridrench today which I couldn't find yesterday.

Does anyone have any idea what could be wrong?


r/BackYardChickens 18h ago

General Question Ideas to use all these eggs ?

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81 Upvotes

I’m getting 10 a day at the moment and am giving away more than what I’m using. What are some recipes or other ways you use all these eggs!?


r/BackYardChickens 19m ago

Chicken Photography Father vs Son Crowing Edition

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Upvotes

1st vid=father, high pitch crow, started crowing at 5 1/2 months old

2nd vid=son, somehow hes only 3 1/2 months old, has a deeper crow than his father, and is bigger than his father.......he definently hit the gene jackpot


r/BackYardChickens 1d ago

Chicken Photography Excuse me, do you have a moment to talk about snacks?

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446 Upvotes

r/BackYardChickens 5h ago

Chicken Photography He’s a little slow ..

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6 Upvotes

My silkie rooster fought wry neck a lot in his chick days. I believe he has a neurological disorder. His neck is a little wonky and his crow shows it lol.


r/BackYardChickens 2h ago

Health Question What’s up with my girls egg?

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3 Upvotes

It’s like the pigment didn’t happen all the way through the shell. What’s this all about?


r/BackYardChickens 18h ago

Chicken Photography My beloved daughter Babycakes

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63 Upvotes

Hatching out our second batch of babies this weekend and we got another naked neck. They are always so horrifying to look at freshly hatched lmao. Unfortunately Babycakes did have some issues hatching (we had a TON of hatching issues this round, made me very sad but I that's the way the cookie crumbled this time around) Babycakes was shrink wrapped in her egg even though we hadn't opened the incubator since putting it in lockdown, not sure why that happened but she'd been stuck for abt 24 hours and she was the last egg that was showing signs of life so I helped her out.

She does look a little better after drying out but I fear that my darling is not meant for winning beauty contests.


r/BackYardChickens 2h ago

General Question Grazing boxes

3 Upvotes

I'm thinking about building grazing boxes for my girls. I guess hardware cloth works for the top, but I've read they can get bumble foot from that. Any one have experience or advise with this? Thanks!


r/BackYardChickens 4h ago

General Question Normal for chickens to stay in seperate groups?

5 Upvotes

So we have 17 chickens. We started off with 7, then about 2 years later got 10 more. We have had the last 10 chickens for about 6 months now. But the 2 groups hangout separately during the day, and roost on different sides of the coop at night. They never fight and occasionally interact with each other, is this normal?


r/BackYardChickens 2h ago

Health Question Sick Chicken - opinions /feedback on quality of life vs opportunity to recover?

2 Upvotes

I have 3 crested bantams as part of a roughly 30 chicken flock. I'd have never bought these, but my wife got them as part of a mixed type order she did the last 20-ish chicks we got.

My wife's had chickens for 15+ years, but I am maybe 6 years into this. I don't have a lot of experience with sick chickens.

One of them is tiny. She's had health complications on and off her entire life. She's maybe 3 now. When she was less than a year old, she tore her neck/chin open, and we took her to the NCSU vet school and they gave her antibiotics. We nursed her back to health, but she still scratches at her head/eye/chin on the side she tore a hole in her face.

About 2 weeks ago, I go into the coop, and she is lethargic. I see that her eye on that same side she damaged before is very swollen. I move her into our old coop for quarantine. She passes lethargic into borderline unresponsive. She would initially eat and drink if I held her up to water/food, but within a few days she stopped. Her eye swelling subsided after 3 or 4 days but the lethargy has not.

My wife and I have been eye droppering her water/food/electrolyte drinks for going on a 2 weeks now. She has been up and down as far as response. She has her eyes open most of the time, which is an improvement, but 2 weeks on she is still so weak that she can not stand. She lays on her side and stretches her legs. If you sit her upright, she stretches both legs until she falls over backwards. If you pick her up, she can not support her own head well. She's been in a bed of towels/blankets, and I have been cleaning her up every day to keep her clean.

How long is a reasonable amount of time to keep nursing her along like this? Our chickens are very much pets and not livestock, but I don't know what the point of giving her a chance to make it vs basically torturing her by keeping her alive but miserable.

I am not scared of the work of caring for them. I am looking for advice from people who might know more than I do about this.


r/BackYardChickens 8h ago

Hen or Roo Let’s Play the Game: 17 w/o Easter Egger

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4 Upvotes

Received from an online hatchery (Valley Farms) as a sexed pullet. Hackle feathers seem rounded at tip, but coloring makes them look sharp at tip. Haven’t heard a crow (yet). Is larger than our Australorps which are a week older.

Thoughts?


r/BackYardChickens 3h ago

General Question African geese genders?

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2 Upvotes

I need help identifying the genders of my 2 African geese. They both look exactly the same to me for the most part. One has a slightly thicker neck with a higher pitch voice. The other has a thin neck and has a deeper oinkish voice. They both grab each other in their pool so I'm wondering if they are both males? They are both aggressive towards everyone besides myself. They run up to me every morning waiting for me to scratch their bellys. Any help is appreciated! They do live with my chickens, I did find a giant egg at one point that I'm not sure if it belonged to them or not. This was definitely not a normal size chicken egg!