Changes at the homestead

I guess I should start off with the name change of one of the breeds we offer. We were calling our green laying girls “Olive Eggers” the same as everyone else, but the chicks hatched from these eggs have the potential to not inherit the blue egg gene at all, and as such will be some shade of brown.

Olive Eggers are now AUTUMN EGGERS

Normally I’d remove the brown layers and only keep the green laying hens, however, the two brown eggs we are currently getting from these girls are too pretty to cull out of the program. Both have a nice bloom that causes one to look a little pink, and the other to have purpleish spots.

Not only that, but we have several blue laying Easter Eggers in with Goose, an Ayam Cemani x White Marans mix. This means the chicks may inherit a little bit of AC fibro, and a little bit of the Marans egg color to add to the blue that we *hope they pass to their chicks.

Ducky is our only Crested Cream Legbar on the farm, and she shares a pen with an Easter Egger that produces the most blue saturated egg we have here on the farm. Pics almost never do her eggs justice. Below is her egg alongside her daughter’s egg. Notice they both have the same matte texture? So pretty!

These girls are entertaining our Ayam Cemani roosters, Slater and Purple.

Now that the Ayam Cemanis are living with the Olive girls in the Hentagon, they’re slacking with their own girls.

We are going to look into adding blue egg genetics back into the flock soon as well. Hopefully we can get some from our EE girl before she gets too old to lay.

Wildcard Wyandottes

Ranger was sharing a pen with the black laced red and blue laced red hens, until I realized he was having an issue with his foot. As a result he was not able to perform his rooster duties. He was moved out to nurse his foot away from everyone else, and Twinston was moved over to the red girls. After a couple of weeks, I put him back into The Consortium, but kept him with the two black laced red hens.

Twinston is still with his blue laced girls, and Winston has his ladies, so that makes three separate pens for just the Wyandottes. Wildcard Wyandotte dozens will include eggs from Winston’s pen primarily. We are hatching Twinston’s pen right now so they will be unavailable until further notice. Same with Ranger’s pen. Until we get him back on his feet, both literally and figuratively, eggs from his pen will be unavailable as well.

Silkies and Satin feathered mixes

Since Satins are a recognized breed and we don’t know the actual genetics of ours, we have decided to call them Satin feathered Silkie mixes. The rooster carries the Silkie gene, but I don’t know on the 3 hens. They’re currently off the market pending fertility. Not sure what happened between the eggs that hatched the chicks pictured below just yesterday, but the eggs in the other incubator are almost all duds.

The Ayam Cemanis are also lacking in the fertility department, and only half the hens are currently laying, so there’s no telling when these will be available again. This is the most finicky breed I’ve ever worked with, I swear.

If you have any questions feel free to message the homestead facebook.com/gettimhomestead.