Author Topic: picked up 8 ex bats today (Read 2565 times)

marigold · « **on:** November 14, 2009, 07:16:04 pm »

Went down to Callander today and rendezvous ed with the BHWT folk to pick up my ex bats. Brought them home dusted them with red mite powder and put them to bed.
I am so looking forward to seeing them in the morning.
Are yours laying Annie?

doganjo · « **Reply #1 on:** November 14, 2009, 09:15:42 pm »

Just getting one a day but that's more than a few weeks ago. I think it's teh same hen as they are odd shaped at one end. Hope yours settle in fine - look forward to pictures now and in the future.

marigold · « **Reply #2 on:** November 14, 2009, 09:57:57 pm »

Will post pics next weekend. They are in better shape than i expected. Jim Duff said that this is quite a healthy batch. It was still a shock though to see so many scrawny raggedy hens. My lot seem to have most of their feathers but the feathers look like skeleton feathers. There were 600 picked up this run and that was out of 6000 being cleared out of the factory. It was truly shocking. It was Simon's birthday today and he came with me - he isn't often over interested in hens as long as they give him the eggs but he came away saying that perhaps we should have taken more and thinking about how many we could take next year. I don't think he'll be knowingly eating battery eggs again.

doganjo · « **Reply #3 on:** November 14, 2009, 11:36:44 pm »

Yes, the other 5400 will be in tins of dog food by now I expect

novicesmallholder · « **Reply #4 on:** November 16, 2009, 10:49:46 pm »

We went down to Coventry and picked up 16. Must say they looked sorry for themselves, but a couple of days on are looking a lot more confident and alert than I dared expect - (do hope I haven't spoke too soon). Also had 9 eggs a day off them when I thought we would onl;y get 1 or 2. How much room on an enclosed run would you expect to give 16 hens. We brought a house and run off a company with a link for the BHWT website ( as complete novices thought this would be the best way to start) - house looks big enough, but the run in my opinion is too small (approx 3ft x 6ft).

Cheers,

Mark

doganjo · « **Reply #5 on:** November 16, 2009, 11:09:13 pm »

Good grief, that's far too small. You are absolutely right! Do you have space to build them a bigger run - or better still free range?

novicesmallholder · « **Reply #6 on:** November 16, 2009, 11:20:02 pm »

Yes,

will be building an extension to their run next weekend - I was thinking of giving them 4 -5 times the space for now.(have to do the day job

)

When we plant the orchard and fence it off (approx 1/2 acre) we will let them free range,but for now we have to go with the run as we are not down at the field all the time.

doganjo · « **Reply #7 on:** November 16, 2009, 11:52:13 pm »

When you think about it they have no more space than when they were caged - 3 x 6 = 18 square feet - 16 hens a foot square each that's 16 square feet! I'm surprised the BHWT approved that!

Rosemary · « **Reply #8 on:** November 17, 2009, 09:03:53 am »

They may not approve it - links from a website don't always imply endorsement especially if they are google ads. We have the same problem with TAS. We don't put on links unless we have used the product but google ads are a differnt matter.