Brandy Bridge House Poultry

12/09/2022

Meet the latest addition of serama chicks that survived! The first chick were hatched on 4th September. Unlikely pairing of a massive Brahma breed taking on the adoptive mum role and proudly teaching them chicken behaviors out of the coop from day 4 and introducing them to the rest of the big flock. We weren’t sure she would be as a new, young mum (she had only came into lay a week before being broody) especially not of her eggs/breed but she had surprised us. She had done a great job so far from hatching and keeping them safe!

12/09/2022

Unlikely pairing but it shows it doesn't matter who your 'mum' is as long as she looks after you and in this case, hatch. Chicks are Malaysian breed serama, one of the smallest chicken breeds in the world whilst Brahma Llama (the adopted mum) is a Brahma, one of the bigger chicken breeds. She been teaching the chicks how to feed and scratch and showing off her chicks to the rest of the chickens. She had also had to chase some hens away, whom she thinks might harm the chicks like a good mum.🐣😍

14/08/2022

At noon, we’ve discovered one of our growers (18 weeks old) had joined chicken heaven under the coop in the shade.💔 The golden laced frizzle was fast becoming a favourite since 6 weeks old and as she matured, she just got even more beautiful and looking good for her type. Her chest marking was also coming along in the last month. She had been fine and only thing we could suspect was she succumbed to this extreme heatwave. We try to keep the chickens as cool as possible and we have noticed they all struggle in the last few weeks but unfortunately this was just bad luck.😢 Wished I had taken more photos as the most recent one of her was taken on 20th July.

07/07/2022

1 day old chicks exploring what’s beyond the heating plate… 😍

07/07/2022

Bittersweet feeling as the cycle of life begins. 🔄🐣 Meet our latest addition that hatched yesterday and 2, the evening before. They were eggs we managed to collect and incubated after the carnage fox attack. We were relieve as it looks like we have a couple of our lavender pekins because the fox killed the whole breeding flock together with our cockerel. 💔

04/07/2022

Bittersweet - Circle of life! 🔄🐓🐣 These are the eggs from all our chickens that were killed and we managed to salvage to incubate. 3 had pip this evening.🤗 Hopefully there will be some chicks when we wake up in the morning.🤞

4th of June was a horrible day for us as we had a call from the farmer down the road to notify us that we had quite a fox attack whilst we were out that we had to rush home from a meet and play picnic with some families from our daughter’s new schoolmates in September. We have lost 1 few days before and I managed to beat the fox with the bamboo stick and the victim survived at the start of that week but our luck ran out. The fox managed to cause carnage - we lost 10 hens and 3 we never discovered the bodies and a 7.5 weeks old chick. It also left our new Brahma addition paralysed and barely alive; I’ve had to tube feed for a day, then hand feed for 4 more days and she was much stronger. However, we had to despatched her as the vet confirmed she will never walk again and that was the kindest thing to do.

After the attack, we decided to collect all the eggs we could find and ones laid few days ago of the ones we lost in the hope they were fertilised and still viable as they were few days old. We sat on the idea of incubating them or not since we have no plans to incubate any more this season. Unfortunately the ones that was killed were ones with great personalities and full of character or part of our breeding groups, including the whole of our lavender pekin flock, bar 1. Some of them are nearly 3 years old and were hatched by us and also one of our first hatches. 14 eggs went into the incubator, 4 not fertilised which we discovered on Day 5 and at lockdown, the remainder 10 were still alive all the way through the process which is quite rare! We are hoping they will all hatch healthy, ratio for the hens will be much greater and a bonus if they have similar interesting personalities.🤞🙏

28/06/2022

Some of these fluffbutts are looking even more of a beauty as they get older.😍 We are really loving how the golden laced drizzle had turned out.🤗 They’re now 13 and 14 weeks old!

23/05/2022

Continuation of the Live Streaming of the chick hatching process. 3rd chick hatched just after 6.30pm today but was left in the incubator to dry up overnight and will be taken out early in the morning. 2 of the eggs had pip so here’s to hoping they will hatch overnight or in the morning… 🤞

2 chicks hatched on 23rd May and had been moved to a brooder. All 3 had pipped and 1 chick hatched around 6.30pm on Day 20 which had been left in the incubat...

23/05/2022

Early this morning, this little wee one hatched at the preschool!🤗 🐣 The other 4 have yet to hatch as but this little chick couldn’t wait to see the world a day earlier, so the others should be making their appearances later today or tomorrow morning.🤞

03/05/2022

Latest pekin chicks that are about 3 and 4 weeks old. How cute are they?!😍🐥 Soon, they will gradually be weaned off heat.

03/05/2022

Today, some of our recent hatched pekin chicks made a little trip to a local nursery to surprise a class of pre-schoolers. The children were really excited and curious despite some being nervous; especially when 1 chick decided to escape.😆 Our incubator was also being set up for them to learn the life cycle of chicks in an interactive way. We will be keeping our 🤞that most, if not all 8 fertilised eggs will turn into healthy chicks for the kids in 21 days!🐣🐥

02/11/2021

The chickens couldn’t believe their luck today!🤗 Thank you to the village pub, The George at Backwell for their kind generosity and donating their pumpkins for the chickens’ treats over the next few days.🎃

02/11/2021

The chickens had officially declared today, the start of autumn as the temperature dipped and we had our first morning frost. They must have been feeling the cold because they had refused to set foot on the grass even in the afternoon!😆

12/09/2021

Lesson of the day for these 2 weeks old chicks from surrogate mum (Hei Hei) was foraging outdoors. They’ve been thought how to scratch but it’s their first time being taught to forage for bugs, worms and eating grass. Hei Hei had been such an amazing and nurturing mum from couple hours after they hatched till today; even more surprising since it’s her first time. We couldn’t believe how lucky we/the chicks had been as she only started getting really broody couple hours after the first 2 chicks were born!

12/09/2021

These Malaysian type Ayam Seramas of show winners bloodlines are exactly 2 weeks old today and still super tiny! 😍

Being one of the smallest chicken breed in the world, they’re more susceptible to the cold and as they’re not completely fully feathered yet (still in their chick down), today was the first time they got to explore the outdoors in safe capacity. With it being a warm and sunny day, they were able to enjoy about half hour aclimatising gradually and did extremely well!

29/08/2021

First Ayam Serama breed from show line parents hatched this morning! It had an excited fan in the little lady and it was a surprise for us all as we were expecting another one to hatch as it pip yesterday and this one hadn’t. Hoping it’ll come out soon to join this little chick.🐣

25/08/2021

Hedgehog sightings seem to be more regular lately as they’re drawn towards the chicken feeds if we are late collecting it in. This one tonight got fed some leftover roast beef.😆

25/08/2021

Fresh free range eggs laid by our rare and spoilt hens available! Feel free to PM if you’d like a box reserved for you on set days or on a regular basis to ensure availability. We are based at 21 Chapel Hill, BS48 3PR.
https://goo.gl/maps/UVTrgCaTgJiLtYGS7

They come in various sizes and colours and prices marked on each box. Here are some that are available:

🥚 £2 for 1/2 dozen large eggs with potential double yolkers (Perfect for dippy eggs)
🥚 £2 for 1/2 dozen white eggs
🥚 £2 1/2 dozen rainbow colours/mixed eggs
🥚 £1.80 for 1/2 dozen Araucana blue eggs
🥚 £1.50 for 1/2 dozen brown eggs (various shades)
🥚 £1.20 for 1/2 dozen bantam/mini eggs (fun size for kids and usually more yolk than white)

27/07/2021

Can you spot the chicken? 🤪 👀

Not only does she thinks that she’s a house pet, she’s now setting up nests like a bird.😂 This sneaky little minx disappeared for over 24 hours and just not her usual characteristics so we were relieved when she mad an appearance and we followed her. Even then, we lost her as she went into the hedgerow and it took us nearly 30mins to spot her. I guess she desperately wants to be a mum as she’s been collecting her eggs and the day she disappeared was the day she decided to start sitting on them. We were impressed by her efforts in collecting and making her nest like the birds do!

22/07/2021

Mystery solved! So it turns out, Lacey have been super sneaky broody and good at camouflaging that we almost missed her. She disappeared again this morning for most of the day and we suspected she has gone broody. We watched for her appearance like a hawk to see where her nest might be but she refused to come out even when we tempted her out with treats a few times.

She finally came out briefly around 4pm and we watched to see where she would go. We couldn’t really see her despite knowing the direction she took until we cut down the weeds, grass and brambles and almost missed her even then. We thought at most, she’ll be sitting on 4 eggs as she haven’t laid for 2 days and had missed a few before. However, that’s not unusual for new egglayers - she was hatched on 22nd January so is 6 months old and we’ve had 6 eggs from her so far. Imagine our surprise at the stash she’s managed to accumulate! She’s been sitting on 10 eggs! We’ve had a couple broody bantam hens who are always desperate to be mums (Hei Hei the Ayam Serama, Ginger the Silkie and Millie the Pekins) but never one who disappears away. We are also surprised by how quick she’s got broody since she’s only just started laying and never showed any signs, even the disappearing act until last night!🙈🐓🥚🐣

22/07/2021

Meet Lacey, the bantam Penciled Laced Wyandotte, or perhaps we should change her name to Houdini or Lucky.🤦🏻‍♀️😂 She has no idea the hassle and worry she put us through last night and she showed up this morning just mooching round the field whilst the others were still stuck in their respective run, waiting to be let out.

We realised Lacey was missing last night as we were going to lock the coop up but we gave her the benefit of the doubt and checked the other flocks’ coops in case she decided to jump ship and even on perches, where she likes to stay when she prefers being high. No sign of Lacey and we started worrying as it was getting dark! The only explanation was she was hiding somewhere but as it was late, she’s probably already sleeping, took by some bird of prey that occasionally circle the sky and she is small and light enough to be swooped or she has gone through thorny brambles and hedges to go through livestock fencing over to the other side of our field to a ditch and another farmer’s field.

We thought we heard her make a few sounds when we tried calling and tempting her out with treats but couldn’t see her despite pushing through the brambles and stinging nettles. We even went over to the other side where the ditch was to try and look in case she got stuck and couldn’t come out. Unfortunately, we had to abandon our search 30mins later as it was too dark and hope for the best as the 🦊 do prowl around here regularly but prepared ourselves for the worse in the morning. With relieve, she was just wondering around drinking and foraging when we went to let the rest of the chickens out! She seems fine although perhaps a little more skittish but hoping she learnt her lesson and won’t go missing again seeing as we don’t really know where her hiding spot is. It is so hard to be annoyed with her when she looks so innocent and this pretty.😍

17/07/2021

Safe to say the watermelon went down a treat with all the chickens! So much so, they were asking for more to quench down their thirst in this 30c heatwave! 🍉

A few times throughout the day, I’ve been a bit concerned for them as they were panting heavily and having difficulty breathing in today’s weather despite staying under shade and shelter. More cold treats this week for them as the weather is meant to stay a scorcher.🥵☀️

01/07/2021

Chicken games… How many chickens can we fit under the the pallets for shade? 🐓🌞⛱

Flufferly did gave me a slight fright thinking she’s dead but as I approached her, she looked up and gave me this angry look for interrupting her sun(sand) bathing.🙈

21/06/2021

Our Pearl foraged a goodie treat and she has no intention of sharing!🤗 You’d think she had struck gold.😆

Pearl is a White Star leghorn which are also known as petite ‘Little Ballerina’ and lays the gorgeous large, snowy white eggs found in the egg boxes if you do buy them from us. This breed are very independent so you might find her on her own a lot more than the others and they make good foragers too. White Stars are inquisitive but are also very fast!

12/06/2021

The weather is warming up again hopefully 🤞, and the spoilt chickens are seeking shade under their trampoline! ☀️ 🐓

06/06/2021

The flocks had a new friend over briefly to say “Hello” this morning. A friendly (and lost?) squirrel 🐿.

22/05/2021

These 2 silkie pullets were inseparable today and so sweet!😍 Since they are always wrapped together, we decided to call them Yin and Yang.☯️ Yin is the white fluffball and Yang is the blue splash one.