Living With Backyard Chickens: Choosing Breeds, Raising From Chicks and Introducing Them to the Great Outdoors

I have chickens living in my backyard. It took me years to talk my husband into keeping chickens. "You'll have fresh beautiful eggs" I told him. "They are noisy" he countered. "Chickens are quiet" I said. "They only make noise when they lay an egg, you'll never know they are down there." Right. I kinda lied. I didn't mean to, I just wanted chickens so badly, I started believing my own propaganda. Then one day my dear husband acquiesced. Oh happy day, I won! I think...

Three days old!

Choices, choices, choices

Having done extensive research, I knew what chicken breeds I wanted. So when spring came I was ready. My local feed store received deliveries of baby chicks 3 times a week for several weeks. All I had to do is look at their list and choose the day that the chicks I wanted were to be delivered, arrive bright and early to assure my picks. Not so fast! The feed store's combination of breeds did not coincide with mine. Apparently you have to get chicks exactly the same age or the older ones will use the younger ones as pin cushions. Chickens can be bullies. Where do you think the term "pecking order" came from?

All grown up & enjoying a yogurt treat.

Temperament, consistent egg laying and egg colors were important to me. Based on that I chose 2 Ameracunas, 2 Cuckoo Marans, one Buff Orpington and one Andelusian. Along with these day old chicks, I needed a heat lamp, food and water dishes, food and a cardboard "brood box" to house them. All in all the chicks were by far the least expensive part. So far.

The where and the when

I kept them in my dining room for a few weeks, I don't recommend this unless you like massive amounts of chicken dust on every surface. Chickens and birds in general produce this dust as their feathers grow in. I learned the hard way. Chicks grow out of the brood box quickly and will need to be contained. You will need something large enough to house your chicks until they no longer need the warming light. Mine lived in the potting shed with a plywood barricade. Just like plants, the chicks will need to be hardened off before you place them in their permanent home. This is done when they have all or most of their feathers. You do this simply by moving the heat lamp further away from them and lowering the temperature in their enclosure daily until they are ready for the great outdoors. 

Cute has a shelf life

It is important that you handle the chicks daily, right from the start. I didn't do this enough. I broke my ankle three weeks after bringing the chicks home. Guess who had to care for the chicks while I was laid up? Yes, I do have a wonderful husband. But there was no way he was going to chase these little guys around just to hold them for a while. As a result my Marans are less than social. Being a naturally shy breed, they avoid me at all cost. A friend of mine attributes their "stand offishness" to the fact that they originated from France. Fancy French birds. 

Next time I'll talk about chicken coops and runs, plus my ongoing experiences.  In the mean time, if you want more information I recommend the book "Free Range Chicken Gardens, How to Create a Beautiful Chicken Friendly Yard," writen by Jessi Bloom. Also an excellent website for just about anything chicken related, backyardchickens.com. I also welcome any comments or feedback you may have. Bon Jour, for now.

Did you know that the Contra Costa Master Gardeners have a Help Desk where you can have your gardening-related questions answered? Well, we do! Our Help Desk is staffed every week, Monday-Thursday 9 a.m.-Noon.  You can:

• Visit us during Help Desk hours at 75 Santa Barbara Road, 2nd Floor, Pleasant Hill, CA 94523.
• Call us at (925) 646-6586.  If you call outside Help Desk hours, please leave both your phone number and email address so that we may respond to you in a timely manner.
• Email us at ccmg@ucanr.edu.   Please use email if you want to submit photos along with your question(s).

As part of our effort to help educate the public, we are going to be sharing some of the interesting problems that other CoCo County gardeners have been having, and share the advice and solutions that our Help Desk volunteers have come up with.

Here is our first installment, on staking young trees for proper support.

The Client's Problem: Lazy Trees!

In September of 2011 the client bought three Pistacia chinesis trees. In September of 2012 the client planted the trees, but found that when the nursery stakes were removed each tree leaned over, almost to the ground. The client added two stakes to support the trees. In April of 2014, the client removed the stakes and found that two of the trees still leaned over about 45 degrees, and the third still fell almost to the ground (see pictures below).

So of course, the client's question is why is this happening? And what can be done to help the trees stand up straight and support themselves?

The Solution:

From the description and photos it looks like the trunks of your Pistache trees have not developed enough strength to stand on their own properly. There are a number of factors that can contribute to this condition. When you purchased the trees they were most likely staked in the pots with a single stake and closely tied to this stake, as a temporary measure. This was done by the nursery for ease in their operations and is not helpful to the tree long term.

Proper Staking

Staking of trees is undesirable in most situations and should only be used when absolutely necessary.  When staking the trees it is important to use two stakes placed on either side perpendicular to the prevailing winds and not too close the tree (just outside the root ball zone). You will need to tie the tree to allow some movement of the trunk. Tree trunks develop their strength by bending and swaying in the wind very much as we develop strength through exercising our limbs.

For more information on staking, please refer to the following University of California website: http://ucce.ucdavis.edu/files/filelibrary/5253/16819.pdf

"Lollipop" Trees

Your trees also look a little top heavy which may contribute to their problem standing up in their weakened condition. Often nurseries sell container trees with large tops ("lollipop trees"). These trees have usually been "headed back" and have many branches arising from the same point. This is a sign of poor branch structure for the tree in the long term. Young trees should have branches along the length of the trunk as this provides food for the tree and shade protection for the young trunk. You can thin the canopy to help reduce the load but never remove more than one-third of the branches when doing so. Take care with pruning as some types of pruning can trigger the tree to grow many more branches, especially dormant pruning.

For more information on selecting and planting landscape trees please refer to the following University of California website:  http://ucanr.edu/datastoreFiles/268-234.pdf

Girdled Roots

Another possible contributing factor to your trees not establishing themselves is their root structure.  Often, when landscape trees are purchased from the nursery, they may have been growing in a small pot for an extended period of time and the roots have circled the trunk in the pot. This condition results in twisted and girdling roots which hampers the trees ability to take up nutrients and anchor itself in the ground.

Before resorting to digging up these trees, though, the client could make sure that the trees are properly staked, and continue to check on the trees' ability to stand upright every three months or so. However, in the end, the only solution to this client's problem might be starting over with new trees that were better pruned from the start, and were planted more quickly into the ground to prevent root girdling. 

__________________________________________________________________________________

Editor's Note: Each month the CCMG Help Desk's Quality Assurance Team selects responses to county residents' Help Desk questions that produced informative responses that are either unique or unusual, or provided updated information that would be informative to all gardeners, or are of general interest, especially of seasonal concerns. We are highlighting these responses in the HortCOCO blog so all interested Master Gardeners and the public may utilize the information.

The CCMG Help Desk is available year-round to answer your gardening questions. Except for a few holidays, we're open every week, Monday through Thursday from 9:00 am to Noon at 75 Santa Barbara Road, 2d Floor, Pleasant Hill, CA  94523.  We can also be reached via telephone:  (925) 646-6586, email: ccmg@ucanr.edu, and we are on the web at http://ccmg.ucanr.edu/

As we move into August, with its typical dog days of summer, we always need to make sure that the plants in our gardens, edible or ornamental, get the water they need.  After back-to-back years of winter droughts in much of the west, it is more problematic this summer.  Most California water districts, including EBMUD, have asked everyone to cut back on residential water use by at least 10%.  

There are several things that a gardener can do that are fairly painless, and most are not too expensive, to help keep your plants, and your local water district, happy till the hoped-for rains begin later this Fall.

Saving Shower Water

Most home improvement/hardware stores carry five-gallon paint buckets. These work well when placed at the bottom of the shower, for collecting water as it is heating up for your shower.

Water Storage  

• Bucket: You will likely go through the captured water in day or two, so you may not need more than a couple of buckets for storage. 

• Trash Cans: For storing larger quantities of water, a clean 32-gallon trash with lid, is a good vessel for this.  The lid is important because you don't want mosquitos to use your saved "still" water for laying larvae, and without that lid, they will.  A new 32-gallon can with lid is available at home improvement stores for under $20.

• Wine Barrels: For more attractive water storage, though more expensive, buy a used wine barrel, which holds 55 gallons.  You can by one on the internet or contact local wineries to purchase a barrel that they are "retiring".
  
  The wineries will usually sell a used barrel for around $40. You will need to get a plug for the bung hole, the big hole at the belly of the barrel which they use to fill and taste the wine (in the picture to the right you can see the bung hole on the right-side of the barrel). Alternatively you could make a lid out of one end if you cut the top of the barrel off.  To make it even fancier, you could add a spigot near the bottom. Or put the barrel on its side, and use the bung hole to fill and syphon water, just keep the plug in to prevent mosquitos.  

Drip Irrigation

Drip Irrigation, particularly a with "Smart" Controller is ideal for conserving water for vegetable gardens, perennials, shrubs and young trees. But if the smart controller proves too costly, you can create a drip system that you use manually.

Fertilizers and Mulch

• Use organic fertilizers rather then synthetic fertilizer.  It improves the quality of the soil, enabling the water to better move through it to the plants where it is needed. 
• Adding mulch around shrubs and trees will help prevent evaporation of water from the soil, requiring less frequent watering.

Happy Watering!