Locking Bar Eglu Classic

[Space Chick]

 

I might just have to come for the experience but buy a couple of hybrids from my local supplier .

 

I think that sounds logical ANH, you can ensure you get year round layers that will have been vaccinated then

 

You really need to experience a show at least once

[Ain't Nobody Here]

My usual supplier only has the same breeds I already have so I've emailed Paula's Poultry in Jedburgh - fingers crossed .

[Redwing]

That sounds like a plan ANH!

 

Uma - the pens of sale birds at shows are mostly trios or pairs (cockerel and females) if they arent trios then they are usually all females of the same breed and colour and very few individual females

 

They wont be vaccinated, or at least 95% of them wont have been, its very rare to get pure breeds that have been vaccinated as most breeders breed for vigour and dont like to rely on vaccinations

[LolaLayla]

Do you think I would be best to wait for the local person I have found who will have in-between sized Silkies in the spring or hope to get 2 large fowl Silkies at the show?

[Uma]

Redwing- does that mean you can't buy single birds of one type? I would ideally be introducing two.

 

I don't really know what to think about vacination-surely their birds will come down with illness if they are not vacinated? I would have thought they would ensure they were more protected as they make their money from it?

 

Uma

[Ain't Nobody Here]

It doesn't sound like shows are ideal for the small hobby chicken keeper just looking for a couple of different types of hen!

[LolaLayla]

It does sound complicated if you don't know what you are doing. I could be sold anything

[Redwing]

The show is only a couple of weeks away now so I'd wait, take a look at what they have, if you dont find what you want in the sales section go and hang around the Silkies and see if you can strike up a conversation with a breeder

 

Have you tried the Exhibitionsilkies people? I am pretty sure they will be travelling up to the Scottish National

 

Its rare to see single female birds for sale at shows as the pens cost £5 each to enter but you do see a few, there were certainly some at the English National..

 

Re vaccination, many breeders believe that vaccination just covers problems and puts a weak bird in a better position, they will select for good health and vigour and weaker birds will be culled out to maintain the strangth of the line, the birds wont get ill normally, pure breed flocks are normally very healthy.

 

Breeders who breed birds which suffer from particular problems may vaccinate against just that - eg Silkies and Mareks disease, others will maintain that the only way to elimiate the illness is to select and breed from the strongest birds

[Uma]

Hmmm so that leaves me with a dilema. I would like some pure breeds in my flock, and there is no way I'm getting rid of my current girls, so I suppose I just get pure breeds and hope they are hardy-or that what we thought may have been IB was actually not, and that the peritonitis is just down to chance. Oh the dilemas of chicken keeping!

[Redwing]

It doesn't sound like shows are ideal for the small hobby chicken keeper just looking for a couple of different types of hen!

 

Some breeders are switched on to this, at the Fed for example there was a nice pen of birds three different breeds and all different colours, all female, all raised together - an instant garden flock for someone

 

Dont be put off, you just need to find those pens amongst the others, lots of people on here have bought pet hens at shows

 

There is a lot on the net about mixing vaccinated with non vaccinated birds which makes interesting reading, personally I ahve no problem mixing them and actually the only real problem I have had here was with vaccinated birds

[LolaLayla]

Thanks for your advice Redwing it is greatly appreciated I think I will try to go early on the Saturday if ES is available to take me. A slight problem is that I get asthma so I hope the large number of birds will not cause too much of a problem. I will just need to play it by ear.

[laurmurf]

I've had some signs of peritonitis in my birds in the past and it's always been in the hybrids. I don't attribute it to vaccinations or not, I put it down to the hybrids being bred to be laying 'machines' who don't get a few weeks off in winter to give their egg-laying tackle a rest.

 

I am convinced that the main reason pure breeds live so much longer than hybrids is down to their bodies not requiring so much of them to produce endless supplies of hundreds of eggs a year.

[Uma]

Laurmurf- Absolutely agree, which is another reason for me wanting to get a few pure breeds. The only reason I thought it had something to do with IB is due to one of the girls, who has now had peritonitis three times, was ill with respiritory distress during the summer and I suspected IB although it was never confirmed. Of course it could have been anything, but my girls free range and we do have a lot of very friendly wild phesants who mingle with them and share their food, so thought it could have come from there.

 

But yes, I feel so very angry that poor chickens suffer so much due to the way they have been breed