[karlooben]

i'm back , firstly i want a baby elephant      there used to be some in cherstey as well as camels as well. { all owned by a vet } .

i have heard so many reasons why the parakeets are here an the best one is they escaped from jimi hendrix's private collection many years ago an they have thrived .

your not weird rob your just u  :?  well sometimes

[poultrygeist]

It's only full moons when I become "someone else"  :shock:

But we don't talk about that :?

I suppose they live a good few years so could be from Jimi Hendrix's era. I like that story anyway.

[Stree]

I always find a preopened tin of 7UP and a packet of polo mints gets my poultry through those dark hours......
Along with little desk lamps and assorted reading materials.
and radio 4 on quietly in the background

Actually, I just leave water for the birds overnight, in fact all times in the hen house there is no food, just water. They have all the food they want outside during the day and it suits them.
There are two feeding troughs with overnight lids, one wheat and one Layers pellets plus I buy them a cabbage, a lettuce , cucumber, apples, whatever is going cheap at the shop when I cannot grow it,  every day or so, and they also get through about 2 old loaves a week. Just 7 birds so its ample.
They also have a good run so find plenty to eat scratting about as well,
As a previous poster said, the birds go into the house to sleep,  the water is there if they need it, they know the food is plentiful come the morning.......
Of course if the birds were half dead, then this  regime would  be dubious in terms of poultry health promotion, but as it is, they are  fine tough chirpy glossy  cantankerous unpredictable cheeky  brighteyed healthy alert birds, so I am sticking with the routine. Which of course means they are too !
Oh. Plus....... I have just bought the chickens a tin of Beef cat food. a teaspoonful of it a day is supposed to be a good  thing thing in wintertime.
and crushed garlic in the water as well in winter. If you know different or better, please let me know !


Stree

[WhatCameFirst]

We leave water in the hen house at night but no food.  

We also have parakeets, but no elephants. They are all over the south of England (parakeets, not elephants). Occasionally we used to see macaws too, but now Gatwick Zoo has gone we don't. Once we had a rainbow lorikeet in the garden!

[Bodger]

They don't need water at night. Just wake them up each morning with a nice cuppa tea and their slippers.

[Sassy]

We're supposed to have a large black cat ie of the jaguar variety living round here. Evidence some witnesses, injured cattle and not by foxes or dogs, dead sheep again not the ususal suspects. Who knows??

Haven't seen any elephants recently though

[Vickie & Richard]

I never leave food or water in the coop at night, i think bedtime is for sleeping and not eating.  I've never had any problems with my girls and still get 4 eggs a day from 4 girls, even in the winter.

[karlooben]

i got 18 girls so i cheat      . more like wake them up with thier wellies at this time of year bodger  

[meterman]

I always leave food and water out in the run and never close the poop hole a few nights back at 2330 as i locked up the chucks were makeing such a row. When i went to look they were all there eating and drinking as if it was a party.