This Sustainable House

Archive for the ‘Chickens’ Category

A couple of months back I wrote a post about the setting up of a new incubator, built out of an old fridge. The basis of the incubator is an old fridge, which had stopped working sometime ago, donated by a member of the Canberra Freecycle group. To this I have added an automatic egg turner, a fan & heat source, and thermostat. At the time of the last post I was still waiting on the thermostat but it has subsequently arrived. The video below has more details of the construction.

So early last week I finished wiring the device and today it lurches into life! This morning I set 34 eggs, from my wonderful hens, and over the few weeks I will follow their development via this post. Watch this space…

UPDATE -- Well approx 5 days ago the chicks in the incubator began to hatch. We had 11 chicks hatch successfully but many more pipped but ultimately died in the shell. I think the reason for the poor hatch were two design problems both of which I’m working to correct before the next run.

The first problem is that I think the humidity was a little high during the incubation period. This is the most likely cause for the results we received, as the eggs don’t lose enough water during incubation and the chicks actually drown inside the shells after pipping but prior to hatching. I did have a humidity meter in the incubator, which suggested all was good, but I’m wondering if it’s accuracy was somewhat lacking? This can be easily fixed by regulating the open water containers as well as replacing the meter.

The second problem was the fact that the hatching tray may have been a little too close to the heat source leading to the eggs receiving both convection and radiant heat when in the hatching tray. This has been corrected by better ‘gapping’ the hatching tray from the heat source. (see photo to right)

So it’s now time to rejig the unit, and set another batch of eggs to see if we have worked out all the wrinkles.

As some of you are aware, my last incubation attempt was a total failure! Unfortunately my incubator’s thermostat, a still-air foam model (which will remain brand-less), failed causing an unacceptable temperature spike. This spike killed the majority of the developing embryos resulting in a hatch of only 6 chicks (from 28 fertile eggs). This is an appalling hatch rate.

So I have decided to build my own cabinet style incubator, complete with digital thermostat. This ‘model’ will be capable of setting up to 132 eggs at a time (in the auto-turners) or 44 eggs at weekly intervals. It will also have a dedicated hatching tray, to facilitate cleaning, and the ability to use it during winter to whip up the odd brew…

I’m achieving all of this by using an old fridge, no longer in working order, as my cabinet. This has the benefit of being incredibly well insulated and easy to clean.

I’m adding to this a fan, a heat source, and my egg turners.

At this stage the prototype is undergoing initial trials with different heat sources and this clearly demonstrates the potential efficiency of the unit. Below is a picture of the measurement apparatus. You can see that the temperature inside the unit is a cosy 35.7 degrees celcius and is exceedingly even (hatching tray is located on the bottom of the unit, egg trays half way up). Of course, the current temperature isn’t quite high enough to incubate eggs but that temperature has been reached with only 48 watts of power (considering both the fan AND the heat). I’m guessing that a total of 60 watts of power will be necessary to run the unit, equating to a cost of ~$0.36 per day to run… Not bad when you consider it could have 132 eggs in it at the time.

Anyhow, this is just an initial post and I’ll return to this project in a week or two when it is fully operational to show you the ‘finished’ product.

Just a few hours, if that, old...

Approx 21 days ago I placed some 40 chicken eggs into the incubator comprising 22 pure breed eggs that I purchased, and another 18 eggs collected from my own hens. Unfortunately, during the incubation process, candling revealed the purchased eggs to be of a very poor quality and 12 of the eggs were subsequently discarded as totally infertile. However the eggs from my hens proved to be more fertile, with only 2 eggs having to be discarded during this process.

As you might know, chicken eggs have an incubation period of 21 days so this evening I returned home to the comforting sound of the peeping of chicks coming from the office. Both Kailash and Tara seem bewildered, not quite sure what to make of the sound, and definitely unwilling to leave the door. They are ragdoll cats.

So please welcome the first 5 chicks hatched at TSH… hopefully only the first 5 of some 26 but time will tell.

Update – Well ultimately 15 chicks made it through the hatching process with almost all of the chicks from my girls making it through. Unfortunately, of the bought eggs only 2 hatched, and one of those died soon afterwards. Poor little thing…

The incubator is fired up again though, this time with Guinea Fowl and, hopefully soon, some Araucana’s and Welsummers.

Chicks in Brooder - About 1 week old

In 2003 Joel Salatin, of Polyface Farms, wrote an article of the above name. The article was written for Acres USA and can be found here. As much as I dislike ‘stealing’ his title (or is that research under the western academic system?) I have to admit that I haven’t yet come up with a title that sums this topic up more appropriately. My apologies Joel.

The point of this post is the raft of beaurucratically inspired idiocy that seems to pervade the ‘lucky country’. This is all the legislation, guidelines, audits, notifications, regulations, inspections, disallowable instruments, and general silliness by which the paternal state ‘protects’ our food supply. But who is this really protecting? The Consumer? Or vested interests in the industry? I am beginning to think it is the latter rather than the former. Read the rest of this entry »

One of the major tasks on my plate at the moment is to clear a section of scrubby land for use as paddocks for cattle, and perhaps free-range chickens. When I say I need to clear the land, I’m not talking about wholesale tree removal, rather I’m looking at clearing the area of debris to allow the natural grasses to establish.

A decision that had to be made in this instance was to burn or not to burn….

Traditionally a farmer would get all this scrappy stuff together and set it on fire. This would turn most of the wood to gas (releasing it to the atmosphere) and the remaining ash would be scattered over the paddock area. Doing this has the advantage of dealing with this debris rapidly, leaving a nice clear paddock.

However I feel it has two important disadvantages, the carbon that has been locked up by the plants is lost to the atmosphere (rather than being broken down for inclusion in the soil) and this material offers some very useful ‘stuff’ to form a mulch layer.

So at TSH the majority of this debris has been put to use as a mulch in the tree corridors between the paddocks.

The video below explains the concepts involved, and provides a sneak peek into how these paddocks will be managed. Enjoy!

One a recent post I mentioned that I have just reintroduced chickens into the permanent run. These were hybrid girls, and I was looking for a handsome Rooster to join them. Well the ‘prayers’ were answered…

Today I picked up a pair of very handsome Australorp roosters from a local breeder. It was pure luck, or not depending on your beliefs, that I found a breeder literally around the corner with a few ‘boys’ available.

I collected two boys and they are now living with their little ‘harem’ in the permanent run.

Picture of one of the boys and his girls

Well it has been a couple of months since my previous flock of chickens had met with a grisseley end, but in that time I managed to fix a few problems and anticipate a couple more. So the time came to get some more chickens.

The girls came from a breeder in Hill Top, and they are a motley crew of Hybrids. It’s different having hybrids, I’m usually a pure breed kind of guy, but I do have to admit that the mixture of colours and personalities is rather nice.

They arrived approx 3 weeks ago, and are settling in rather nicely. Mind you, a handsome rooster amidst their august company wouldn’t go astray… Anyone have a lovely boy they are looking to re-home?

The next step is to get them into the chicken dome for spring? And then to turn the permanent enclosure into a grow-out area for meat chickens.

There’s always something to do…