June 24, 2024

Condition Birds For Show-Part 2

Show Notes
Transcript

In this episode of the Poultry Keepers podcast, Mandelyn Royal, John Gunterman, and Rip Stalvey discuss the intricacies of preparing poultry for exhibitions. The conversation covers essential practices such as conditioning and show training, the importance of reducing stress in birds, and techniques to make birds show-ready, including handling routines, dietary controls, and grooming details like cleaning scales and trimming beaks and spurs. The hosts also discuss the different aspects of show environments and offer tips on managing birds’ reactions to changes. Additionally, the episode touches on strategies for hatch timing to ensure birds are in their prime for shows.

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WEBVTT

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Hi, I'm Mandelyn Royal, and I would like to welcome you to another episode of the Poultry Keepers podcast.

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Joining me in the studio are John Gunterman and Rip Stalvey, the rest of our podcast team, and we're looking forward to visiting with you and talking poultry from feathers to function.

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If they were overcrowded or whatever, and they were stressing out because they couldn't get feed, you're going to see these little tiny bars of purple going across the feathers.

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So you have to really work hard to make sure your birds are not stressed.

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That's a whole new level of attention to detail.

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Yeah, it is.

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And honestly, John, you bring up a really good point.

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The people that are the best exhibitors.

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are the people that pay the most attention to the little details.

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Guarantee you.

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That makes sense.

00:01:00.057 --> 00:01:03.237
Most people think that conditioning is something you do in two weeks.

00:01:03.237 --> 00:01:12.466
You bring them in, you put them in this small show type coop, and that's what I refer to as show training, not conditioning.

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And in show training, what you want to do is you want to get the birds, number one, used to being handled by people.

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Number two, You need to be able to control their diet, they need to be used to strange sounds.

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And what I do to do that is I bring them inside in my shed, put the birds in there, and I'll play a radio 24 7.

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So they're hearing sounds, they're hearing people talk, they're hearing music, something they don't normally associate with when they're out in the field.

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Okay, I will have some friends come over and pick the bird up, handle it, just like a judge would, and I'll show them how to do it.

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But it's not me always the person doing it.

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I want it to be new people from time to time.

00:02:05.096 --> 00:02:05.956
That makes sense.

00:02:06.016 --> 00:02:08.167
That's a little bit of chicken psychology right there.

00:02:08.247 --> 00:02:08.947
Absolutely.

00:02:09.597 --> 00:02:10.296
Absolutely.

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I want to make sure that two weeks before the show, I've got my birds on electrolytes because that gives them a little bit of a boost.

00:02:18.877 --> 00:02:32.076
And let's face it, birds may be crowing and they may be, the hens may be singing and doing that, but that doesn't mean they're not experiencing some degree of stress and electrolytes can help with that stress.

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Do you give it to them when they're at the show too?

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I do.

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I start two weeks before and I'll run it a week after the show, after I have them back home.

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Oh,

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okay.

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And that brings up another good point.

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You go to a show, a lot of shows provide feed, Okay, and that's really good.

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Most of the time it's just scratch grains, all right?

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But nine times out of ten, it's probably not the same brand of feed that you feed.

00:03:05.007 --> 00:03:06.817
I don't know how I would feel about that.

00:03:06.977 --> 00:03:14.127
Yeah, I don't like that because anything you do to change and upset their routine, so to speak, will stress them out.

00:03:14.627 --> 00:03:15.787
Can I leave a note on that?

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Card that says do not feed.

00:03:18.141 --> 00:03:18.757
Yeah, I'd do that.

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Take care of it.

00:03:19.306 --> 00:03:19.917
Okay, cool.

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Yeah, owner will feed and water feed and water.

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Great.

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And I bring feed from my house.

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And water.

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And water.

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Yeah.

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'cause water can vary.

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Oh man.

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Can In the region.

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Yeah.

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Oh,

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County to county.

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Just something to think of.

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And a lot of times it's well around here, a lot of times when the show folks feed the birds.

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They'll go by, particularly if they're feeding scratch feed, they'll just throw a handful of scratch in the bottom of the coop.

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That's one of the reasons.

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The other reason is, we've all seen chickens scratching, picking up stuff in the yard.

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What do they do?

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They scratch for their feet, and then they back up.

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Oh, and their tail hits the wire.

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Exactly.

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You just cram that tail into the wire of the coop.

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I always put my coop cup in there.

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I even brought my own coop cups hang it in there, put feed in there, but I didn't put it down low.

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I raised it up.

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You're at the proper.

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You do that because You can adjust how the bird looks, all right, by where you put the feed and water cups.

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If you have a bird that tends to stand a little bit too tall in the front, hang his feed and water cups down a little bit lower.

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Sneaky.

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One that kind of walks stooped over all the time raise his feed and water cups up a little bit.

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So we train them, I always, Jeff got me.

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Always keep it at, the same level as their backs.

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And

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normally I would.

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And then when it's showtime, you can

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tweak it.

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You can vary that a little bit, yep.

00:04:54.557 --> 00:04:55.137
Okay.

00:04:55.877 --> 00:05:07.516
And another thing when I'm training my birds and getting them ready for a show, is one of the few times that I will religiously use treats.

00:05:08.317 --> 00:05:16.867
Particularly live mealworms, because when I walk up to a bird's coop, I want that bird to come up to greet me, all right.

00:05:17.666 --> 00:05:24.507
I want that bird to stand a particular way, so I use live mealworms, and I keep my birds just a little bit hungry.

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I cut their rations back a little bit because of this, but if you stand there with a little mealworm wiggling back and forth, Between your thumb and your finger, you will have that bird's undivided attention.

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Do you want the side profile or the front profile?

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Side profile.

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So you're doing it from the side of the cage?

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I feed it from the side of the cage.

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99 percent of the people don't do that.

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Just because they haven't been taught or haven't learned that little trick.

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So when I come up to a show come up to a bird in a show, I look for birds that come up and then turn sideways to give me the best view of the body.

00:06:04.567 --> 00:06:05.507
That makes sense.

00:06:05.807 --> 00:06:12.706
It was probably you that told me that, to treat them from the side so that they develop that habit to turn and present that view.

00:06:13.507 --> 00:06:14.757
And that's the reason I do it.

00:06:15.557 --> 00:06:26.836
And that's why I use, you could get a bird to stand up and down and do flips and flops just by what you did with that mealworms.

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This is true.

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And I did apply that little technique of let them get a little bit hungry and then they'll put a lot of focus on you.

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And so I was applying that with older growouts where I let them get just a little bit hungry.

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And then, when I would go and I filled their feeder, they all gathered around it all at once, and I could get that top view of their body width and see them all together.

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And I will do that when I have people come over.

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I'll get them, I'll show them how I want it done, and I'll let them hand the treat to a bird, okay?

00:07:02.807 --> 00:07:06.396
Because they do have a little bit of a natural stranger danger, like they learn from you.

00:07:06.627 --> 00:07:12.166
I want the birds to associate people with something good, not with something bad.

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So by having a stranger do that, once I get them to the point where they'll come up and turn sideways, they'll do it for the judge.

00:07:21.336 --> 00:07:23.086
Waiting on the mealworm that never comes.

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That's right.

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Actually what I've been known to do is after a judge finished up the class my birds were in, I'd go in there and give my birds a little mealworm treat.

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But just to let them know they did good.

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Always positive encouragement.

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And this is also the time, that two week period is also the time I'm going over birds to make sure the scales on their legs are clean.

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Do you take a toothbrush to it?

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How do you clean them?

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You can use a brush, depend, but if there's a lot of dirt crammed up under there, you want to use a toothpick to pick it out.

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And I know this is a pain in the rear to do that because they got nine jillion little scales on those legs and feet.

00:08:04.927 --> 00:08:12.737
Yeah, I know, and to go through and outline each one with a toothpick, what if you soaked their feet in a bucket and then brushed it to loosen it up?

00:08:12.737 --> 00:08:17.656
You can do that some, but if it's really bad, you're still not going to get all of it out.

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I know some of the old timers used to make a paste out of olive oil and finally ground pumice.

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And they would smear that and rub it on the legs and use that to help clean them.

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So if you were going to take 25 birds to a show to fill up a whole row of your own, you're going to be grooming birds every day for

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A while.

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That's the reason I quit taking so many birds to a show.

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All the while you're grooming them, you're also looking for defects or disqualifications and going, Oh, maybe this bird's not as good as I thought it was.

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Yeah.

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You're also trimming the beaks to make sure the top beak is not too far overgrown.

00:09:01.846 --> 00:09:03.706
I'm also trimming toenails.

00:09:04.506 --> 00:09:10.256
I was going to ask about that because that's been a common question, Trimming nails, just foot care in general.

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Trim the toenails on males, I'll look at the spurs not because I'm afraid a bird is going to want to fight a judge, but because I know from having it happen to me, reaching in to pick up a bird, I'll also, sometimes I wind up jamming the bird's spur into my hand.

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I'll take the Dremel kit.

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And if it's long, I'll shorten it up, smooth it.

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I don't want a sharp point on it.

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I like a little rounded point.

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But you leave the spur mostly intact.

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Yes.

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And if it gets really excessively long, you can remove that spur.

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You can actually twist it off.

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I've heard of that, but I've never done it.

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Folks say grab it with a pair of ice grips or pliers and give it a little twist pop.

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I usually use dog nail clippers and I just trim it back.

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That leaves it a little bit too blunt.

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I try to make the bird look as natural as I can.

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I don't like spurs that are trimmed off blunt.

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I don't like beaks that are trimmed off straight.

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Now I'll trim them off straight, but then I'll Pick a round at it a little bit.

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Add a little

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rounded.

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Yeah, round it off.

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Make it look natural.

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Cause I know when we were showing dogs and we were primping them for show we were doing a lot of grooming.

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So for the birds, like for the combs and wattles, do you put a little sheen on those?

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Do you grease them up a little bit?

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I do.

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I'll take when I'm washing a bird.

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I'll take a really soft toothbrush and scrub the comb and the wattles real good, because they get all this dead skin on them, and they just look weird looking.

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So I'll clean them off, and then when I get them to the show, I don't do this beforehand, but when I get them to the show, I'll take a mixture of olive oil, and equal parts of alcohol.

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And I've got a little dropper.

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Put a little dropper in there and I shake it up and I put a little bit on my finger and I rub it on the comb.

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I rub it lightly on their face, stay away from the feathers because they look nasty when you goop up all the feathers on their face.

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And then I rub it on the wattles.

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The oil makes it shine.

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The alcohol makes it redder.

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Without drying it out because the oil's there.

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I know some people have used, and I've even done this too, when it was cold weather.

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Instead of olive oil and alcohol, I would use mentholated petroleum jelly because the scent that they're breathing in off of having that petroleum jelly, it helps keep them open and unplugged.

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Maybe like a little Vicks Vapor Rub.

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I was walking an aisle at a show once and I saw styrofoam.

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In the cages from a particular exhibitor.

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What's that about?

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They usually put something in there to keep the males from fighting.

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So a distraction, because I've seen cardboard in between cages.

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Yep.

00:12:06.011 --> 00:12:06.231
Yep.

00:12:07.032 --> 00:12:14.152
Okay, so you can do some things to mitigate how they react to their neighbor, because chances are they're going to end up next to a bird they don't know.

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I've used feed bags, anything in a pinch.

00:12:17.581 --> 00:12:25.091
The best thing to use to separate the birds is clear plexiglass sheet, rigid plastic, clear plastic.

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Put it to fit down inside the cage.

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The birds can still see, they can't fight.

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The problem with using solid separators, cast shadows invariably.

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And the lighting in most show halls is not all that great to begin with, and you take a bird that's standing in a shadow, it's going to throw the entire look off.

00:12:48.596 --> 00:13:02.746
I always wondered about that at the shows where they'll do double decker cages, birds on top of birds, and I noticed walking down looking at that bottom row, A lot of them almost came up with a hunched look, like they were cowering from what was above them.

00:13:03.236 --> 00:13:08.866
All right, we were talking about Sue's Sue Dobson's Rhode Island red male that she won with in Ohio.

00:13:09.667 --> 00:13:16.917
If you looked at that bird, most of the time, he had never been trained to realize what that was.

00:13:17.447 --> 00:13:21.716
So he stood, neck drawn down a little bit, and the tail drooping.

00:13:22.476 --> 00:13:24.447
Yeah, like they're trying to fit underneath.

00:13:24.726 --> 00:13:25.356
Exactly.

00:13:25.907 --> 00:13:26.496
They crouch.

00:13:26.496 --> 00:13:29.246
They don't, they're not used to having something over their head.

00:13:29.596 --> 00:13:30.677
How do you get around that?

00:13:31.476 --> 00:13:33.846
Put a piece of cardboard over the coop you've got them in training them.

00:13:34.647 --> 00:13:36.397
Yeah, okay, so train them for it.

00:13:36.486 --> 00:13:36.826
Yeah.

00:13:37.326 --> 00:13:42.226
Train them how to greet the judge, train them how to be in that environment.

00:13:42.407 --> 00:13:42.616
Okay.

00:13:42.616 --> 00:13:42.657
How to

00:13:42.736 --> 00:13:45.657
play nice with others, be good little boys and girls and

00:13:45.667 --> 00:13:55.037
So if you have multiple pens, you can almost pick off birds that you know don't know each other and put them in a row next to each other and teach them it's okay to be next to a bird you don't know.

00:13:55.652 --> 00:14:05.461
If I had a bird, if I had a group of birds that I was working with in my conditioning house, I would change the location of those birds every day.

00:14:06.312 --> 00:14:10.981
I want by a different bird every day, just for that reason.

00:14:11.782 --> 00:14:13.851
That's a good tip that I've never heard before.

00:14:14.121 --> 00:14:21.152
And I've been to a couple of shows, but I haven't taken birds to them yet, but I'm getting close to where I think I can.

00:14:21.432 --> 00:14:22.422
You need to do that.

00:14:22.631 --> 00:14:24.261
You need to do that in Ohio.

00:14:24.341 --> 00:14:27.951
That's a good place to get Bresse out in front of the public.

00:14:28.442 --> 00:14:29.682
And it's your home turf.

00:14:30.001 --> 00:14:30.542
That's right.

00:14:30.881 --> 00:14:32.942
Ohio is very much a chicken state.

00:14:33.741 --> 00:14:36.881
Ohio is one of the biggest, if not the biggest shows.

00:14:37.682 --> 00:14:43.532
And there's a couple other big ones, especially when you get down in, what is that, Oklahoma and Texas, there's a couple more big ones.

00:14:43.542 --> 00:14:43.692
Oh

00:14:43.692 --> 00:14:45.231
yeah, they've got a big one in Shawnee.

00:14:45.772 --> 00:14:53.302
And I don't know, I know you've been in a building with 15, 000 birds in it, but it is not a quiet place to be.

00:14:53.361 --> 00:14:55.861
No, and I was talking about playing a radio.

00:14:56.662 --> 00:15:19.797
Another thing you could do, I found this online, I was looking for it the other day, and I don't know where I stashed it on my computer, but I found an audio recording done inside a show, so I thought, huh, and so I put that on a CD, and so I could download it to my computer, I can download it to the radio, and so they're constantly hearing the sounds, From a show hall.

00:15:20.596 --> 00:15:24.697
Oh, see, I was using talk radio as a predator deterrent in the barn.

00:15:25.317 --> 00:15:26.746
So that isn't great for that.

00:15:27.256 --> 00:15:34.567
Yeah, so my birds always got, the only thing that was always talk radio was NPR, so I apologize to them a little bit.

00:15:35.366 --> 00:15:35.976
Good for you.

00:15:36.777 --> 00:15:40.716
But no, I want to, I want them used to what goes on at a show.

00:15:41.517 --> 00:15:44.797
And Walt Leonard, his birds were almost shockproof.

00:15:45.586 --> 00:15:48.591
I'd see him at a show and nothing seemed to surprise them.

00:15:49.432 --> 00:15:51.971
I said, Walt, how do you do that?

00:15:52.442 --> 00:15:55.081
You're obviously training these birds in some ways.

00:15:55.086 --> 00:15:55.682
He laughed.

00:15:56.121 --> 00:16:08.956
He said, I got a little wooden dowel about eight inches long, and in my conditioning house, I've got all these cages lined up, and I walked down from one end to the other, just dragging that dowel stick across the front of that cage.

00:16:09.076 --> 00:16:09.236
Cl.

00:16:10.037 --> 00:16:10.287
Oh, probably

00:16:10.336 --> 00:16:13.476
90 percent of my birds would bounce off the back of that cage.

00:16:13.527 --> 00:16:14.626
Yeah, anybody's would.

00:16:14.917 --> 00:16:15.756
But not Walt.

00:16:15.767 --> 00:16:18.616
You could have set a hand grenade off in there and it wouldn't have shocked them.

00:16:19.417 --> 00:16:21.236
He probably didn't have game birds, did he?

00:16:21.897 --> 00:16:22.466
He did.

00:16:22.937 --> 00:16:23.006
What?

00:16:23.716 --> 00:16:24.246
Yes.

00:16:24.547 --> 00:16:29.527
He had Ko Shamos he had old English, large fowl, bantam, gosh, he had everything in the world.

00:16:29.697 --> 00:16:30.437
Waterfowl.

00:16:30.517 --> 00:16:31.596
That's amazing to me.

00:16:31.596 --> 00:16:38.417
You can completely change the frame of mind of those birds just by putting them in that environment and training them to it.

00:16:38.616 --> 00:16:38.897
Yeah.

00:16:39.336 --> 00:16:41.496
Chickens are smarter than we give them credit for.

00:16:41.547 --> 00:16:42.386
Absolutely, they are.

00:16:42.626 --> 00:16:43.866
They're just like us.

00:16:44.116 --> 00:16:50.057
If we go into a store or something that we've never been in before, man, we're on high alert.

00:16:50.067 --> 00:16:50.657
Where's the buys?

00:16:50.677 --> 00:16:51.417
Where's the good stuff?

00:16:52.216 --> 00:16:53.376
Or what's wrong with this?

00:16:53.376 --> 00:16:53.746
What's wrong?

00:16:53.826 --> 00:16:55.006
We're always on alert.

00:16:55.086 --> 00:16:56.116
Chickens are the same way.

00:16:56.287 --> 00:16:57.147
They're not any different.

00:16:57.947 --> 00:17:04.237
I bet they're even more alert than we are because their level of predation is higher than ours.

00:17:05.037 --> 00:17:10.336
They're, they got that predator prey thing going on and they're constantly alert.

00:17:10.346 --> 00:17:11.477
They don't miss anything.

00:17:12.277 --> 00:17:13.057
At least not the good ones.

00:17:13.856 --> 00:17:15.846
They're not around for a lot, otherwise.

00:17:15.846 --> 00:17:29.826
I was outside the other day, and I heard the turkeys throw up their alarm call, and then I heard a couple of boys pick it up, and I'm looking around to see what they're doing, and every single female bird booked it right back into their respective building.

00:17:30.257 --> 00:17:33.876
And I'm still looking around at what it was, and it turns out it was an airplane.

00:17:34.196 --> 00:17:39.497
But they still got themselves to safety, all as a group.

00:17:39.626 --> 00:17:43.717
So when you put them in those show halls, there's a lot for them to adjust to.

00:17:44.106 --> 00:17:46.497
How many weeks do you want to train them on that?

00:17:46.497 --> 00:17:48.288
Is it two weeks or is it a month?

00:17:48.288 --> 00:17:51.767
No more than two weeks because you can overdo it.

00:17:51.767 --> 00:17:53.207
It was like that.

00:17:53.967 --> 00:17:54.317
Yeah.

00:17:54.557 --> 00:17:56.247
Too much of a good thing's bad for us.

00:17:56.606 --> 00:17:57.457
Same thing with them.

00:17:57.757 --> 00:18:06.297
Okay, I was going to ask, because we're always cautioning people not to overhandle their chicks, because that can lead to aggression later on.

00:18:06.656 --> 00:18:11.826
Yeah, if they lose total fear of you, some of those boys can't manage their hormones, and if they don't fear you

00:18:12.626 --> 00:18:20.636
When I'm getting birds ready for a show, they're already mature, so I don't really worry about that the way I do with youngsters.

00:18:21.106 --> 00:18:35.287
If you're raising up a batch of chicks that, you're hoping to show, are you going to give them any additional care or treatment or grooming along their lifetime, or you just raise them like chicks and pick the best and take it to the show?

00:18:35.547 --> 00:18:37.047
Just raise them like chicks.

00:18:37.896 --> 00:18:41.457
You want an honest representation of your breed.

00:18:42.257 --> 00:18:47.297
You can't do that raising them in these artificially sterile environments.

00:18:47.942 --> 00:18:50.001
I don't want anything to sneeze on them or anything.

00:18:50.271 --> 00:18:50.971
Doesn't work.

00:18:51.771 --> 00:18:56.422
I guess what I'm seeing is maybe kind of two mindsets going into a show.

00:18:56.432 --> 00:19:06.721
One is I'm trying to collect points to, achieve a title or some prestige versus I'm going to a show to get constructive feedback about my breeding program.

00:19:07.521 --> 00:19:08.301
That's pretty much it.

00:19:08.821 --> 00:19:09.592
And I understand.

00:19:10.291 --> 00:19:16.832
People are competitive by nature, and I understand grabbing those points are really important, but the other thing to

00:19:16.892 --> 00:19:20.612
take to show, because I can be a compulsive person, but

00:19:20.662 --> 00:19:27.362
maybe that's part of your own evolution within the hobby, though, because when you go to your first show, you shouldn't expect a ribbon.

00:19:27.701 --> 00:19:30.311
You shouldn't expect to win the whole thing.

00:19:30.817 --> 00:19:39.826
If you do, amazing, but chances are that first season or two or three, you're there to get that feedback.

00:19:39.826 --> 00:19:41.477
You're there to learn the ropes of it.

00:19:41.477 --> 00:19:51.586
You're there to make your connections and contacts, maybe find your mentor, but that first entry in you're learning, but then later that probably.

00:19:52.362 --> 00:20:05.132
Very easily turns into your own competitive streak and then you start running with the big kids and then Like it's probably a natural evolution over time as you figure out how involved in it.

00:20:05.132 --> 00:20:05.951
You're gonna get

00:20:06.751 --> 00:20:07.741
yeah, I would agree

00:20:07.741 --> 00:20:08.071
with that

00:20:08.122 --> 00:20:08.422
Yeah,

00:20:08.852 --> 00:20:21.507
I would think just accidentally along the way it happens If you go to enough shows you get enough exposure enough experience you start collecting points you start You know, being recognized in the world.

00:20:21.517 --> 00:20:22.287
How many points

00:20:22.287 --> 00:20:24.307
does it take to become a master breeder?

00:20:25.106 --> 00:20:27.807
I think it was like a hundred or something like that.

00:20:28.576 --> 00:20:32.477
But now here's the kicker to those master breeders and master exhibitors awards.

00:20:33.277 --> 00:20:37.146
What do you think of when I say I'm a master breeder?

00:20:37.946 --> 00:20:41.646
I would think they know their way around the bird and their varieties that they're working with.

00:20:42.446 --> 00:20:48.477
Most people do, but there are those out there who are master buyers.

00:20:49.277 --> 00:20:50.616
They don't raise those birds.

00:20:50.686 --> 00:20:51.856
They don't breed those birds.

00:20:51.856 --> 00:20:52.747
You can earn a master

00:20:52.747 --> 00:20:54.777
breeder through purchased birds?

00:20:54.836 --> 00:20:55.507
Absolutely.

00:20:56.307 --> 00:20:58.289
Oh, I don't know how I feel about that.

00:20:58.289 --> 00:21:00.576
So you can buy a bird and bring it to a show and not even raise it?

00:21:01.376 --> 00:21:05.576
See, I feel like there should be a distinction, like you can be a master exhibitor.

00:21:06.376 --> 00:21:07.257
Yeah, same way.

00:21:07.366 --> 00:21:09.557
Wait how early before the show?

00:21:09.557 --> 00:21:10.790
That really implies you bred that bird.

00:21:11.590 --> 00:21:16.810
John, to answer your question, how early before the show, APA says 30 days.

00:21:17.191 --> 00:21:18.540
Okay, there is a But in

00:21:18.540 --> 00:21:21.570
reality, how do, how does a judge know?

00:21:21.590 --> 00:21:22.980
How does the show management know?

00:21:23.161 --> 00:21:24.510
It could be 30 minutes.

00:21:24.780 --> 00:21:27.221
It was in the sales floor 20 minutes ago.

00:21:27.221 --> 00:21:28.760
Now it's not, and it's over here.

00:21:29.560 --> 00:21:31.201
But who's going to check?

00:21:31.280 --> 00:21:32.580
Who has the time to check?

00:21:32.760 --> 00:21:34.151
When I'm judging a show.

00:21:34.951 --> 00:21:42.171
And I know I'm a slow judge, but I also believe in giving the bird his due chance to show me what he's got.

00:21:42.971 --> 00:21:52.951
But I was expected to judge starting at 9 o'clock to 5 o'clock in the afternoon, somewhere between 300 and 400 birds in that day.

00:21:53.750 --> 00:21:57.691
I wanted to ask how much time can, do you spend with each bird?

00:21:58.240 --> 00:22:06.230
Just on your first assess, first, so is it like a first assessment and then you come back and say, this one, and this one stood out and spend more time with them?

00:22:06.925 --> 00:22:08.215
About a minute total.

00:22:09.016 --> 00:22:09.425
Okay.

00:22:09.645 --> 00:22:17.746
What I'll do is I'll walk down a row and you may see me tapping on the bird's cages to get their attention to let them know what's going on.

00:22:18.486 --> 00:22:25.576
And I'll evaluate those birds just using my eyes and the birds that catch my attention, I'll turn the coop tag up.

00:22:26.105 --> 00:22:35.516
Then I go back and I'll still handle every bird in that class, but I'll spend more time evaluating the birds that caught my attention.

00:22:36.316 --> 00:22:37.046
I don't know.

00:22:37.046 --> 00:22:43.145
I know we're getting close to our timeline here, but have I answered your guys questions or at least the most of them, I hope.

00:22:43.756 --> 00:22:45.006
Yeah, but I still probably have 15 more.

00:22:45.006 --> 00:22:45.955
Yeah, you've

00:22:45.986 --> 00:22:47.425
prompted so many more.

00:22:47.615 --> 00:22:49.885
Luckily, we're just at the beginning of season two.

00:22:50.236 --> 00:22:50.615
Yeah,

00:22:50.726 --> 00:22:52.756
It's, we're coming up on show season.

00:22:52.895 --> 00:22:53.566
Said, it's just

00:22:53.576 --> 00:22:55.135
started prepping for it last year.

00:22:55.935 --> 00:22:56.846
Sorry to hear before.

00:22:57.266 --> 00:22:59.145
Oh, there's something I want to talk about.

00:22:59.145 --> 00:23:00.445
You started saying prepping for it.

00:23:01.246 --> 00:23:03.675
When we talked about having birds in condition to show.

00:23:04.476 --> 00:23:09.695
You can do that to a certain extent based on when the bird was hatched.

00:23:10.496 --> 00:23:10.865
Okay?

00:23:11.665 --> 00:23:12.726
My Rhode Island Reds.

00:23:12.846 --> 00:23:17.756
I know that it takes me about six to seven months.

00:23:18.290 --> 00:23:28.471
To mature a female, all right, it takes me a solid 11 months to get a male mature enough to show.

00:23:29.270 --> 00:23:44.221
So if I wanted to show in December, I know that I need to hatch my males at least by January, but by then those females are going to be out of condition, they're going to be past their prime, so I need to hatch them late May, early June.

00:23:45.000 --> 00:23:46.530
How do you know when they're in their prime?

00:23:46.540 --> 00:23:50.471
What are you looking for specifically that tells you they're in their prime?

00:23:51.270 --> 00:23:54.060
This is going to sound like I'm dodging the issue, but I'm not.

00:23:54.861 --> 00:23:57.721
When you see a bird that's in its prime, you'll know it.

00:23:58.520 --> 00:23:59.830
They'll have a nice red face.

00:24:00.625 --> 00:24:04.826
The feathers will all look very nice, very shiny, very smooth.

00:24:05.625 --> 00:24:06.826
Completely grown in.

00:24:07.115 --> 00:24:08.205
Completely grown in.

00:24:08.556 --> 00:24:10.976
They'll look alert, they'll act alert.

00:24:11.776 --> 00:24:17.205
And if you can have them lay an egg, and this, the only way you're going to do this is just by sheer luck.

00:24:17.905 --> 00:24:29.560
But if You can have a bird lay an egg, a hen, I say a bird, you want it to be obviously a hen, but you can have those females lay their first egg at the show.

00:24:30.361 --> 00:24:34.351
They'll never be in any better condition than when they are at that moment.

00:24:35.780 --> 00:24:43.490
So if pullets are six months to one year old and then they become hen and they show in that hen category one year and beyond that.

00:24:43.961 --> 00:24:48.901
But if my pullets are dropping their first egg at 19 weeks, that's below the six months.

00:24:49.471 --> 00:24:53.221
No, then you hatch your birds 19 weeks before you want to show them.

00:24:53.290 --> 00:24:57.480
I was just using that six months and 11 months as a point of reference.

00:24:58.086 --> 00:25:04.935
So they don't actually put a specific age of entry, because how do you even age a bird accurately, really, besides fur growth and

00:25:05.596 --> 00:25:14.476
I can pretty well with males, with females not so much other than just going by the look, so to speak.

00:25:15.276 --> 00:25:16.195
But males, I think

00:25:16.195 --> 00:25:27.776
I thought my birds looked the best really at about between 30 and 34 weeks, 32 weeks, I think is their biological prime, has been my observation, at least in my flock.

00:25:28.486 --> 00:25:30.306
Yeah, I was going to say for your breed, probably.

00:25:31.105 --> 00:25:40.776
One thing you can do I've had people when I was judging cockerels, anything under 12 months, males.

00:25:41.576 --> 00:25:48.086
And they will put a young cock bird in there, because they're usually finished out better than the cockerels would be.

00:25:48.726 --> 00:25:49.726
And they'll try to show it.

00:25:50.526 --> 00:25:57.945
A Cockrell, and if you ever see me judge a class of birds, you'll see one thing that I do when I'm going through the male birds.

00:25:57.945 --> 00:25:59.476
You'll see me as I'm holding the bird.

00:25:59.476 --> 00:26:03.726
I'll take my thumb and put it against the end of the spur and try to wiggle it.

00:26:04.526 --> 00:26:07.695
If it won't wiggle, it's a cock bird.

00:26:08.496 --> 00:26:10.145
Oh, if it wiggles, it's a cockrell.

00:26:10.655 --> 00:26:14.631
It takes a little bit more time for that, spur it.

00:26:14.635 --> 00:26:19.205
It may be starting to get long, but it may not be attached to the bone in the leg yet.

00:26:19.365 --> 00:26:24.175
But once it, oh, once it det attaches, it is not a cockerel

00:26:24.195 --> 00:26:29.006
I'd be waiting around a while on my boys for the tails to come in.

00:26:29.806 --> 00:26:37.695
My girls are pretty well grown fairly early, but those boys, they'll drop that tail down at five months and I have to wait until the new one comes in.

00:26:38.175 --> 00:26:39.226
I'll tell people this.

00:26:39.590 --> 00:26:43.550
And they always want to know, but how do you know how far in advance to do it?

00:26:43.901 --> 00:26:47.145
Because I go to so many different shows, yada yada, I said, look.

00:26:47.596 --> 00:26:53.086
Don't you need a pretty good little stagger going on and hatch for the shows you want to go to and have a couple of different ages?

00:26:53.086 --> 00:26:53.605
The big shows,

00:26:53.655 --> 00:26:54.586
I hatch for that show.

00:26:54.895 --> 00:27:00.965
If I was taking birds to Ohio, I would specifically hatch birds with the Ohio show in mind.

00:27:01.766 --> 00:27:09.445
But Kenny Bowles, who was an old breeder of Rhode Island Reds, He actually, and also originated in New Hampshire bantams.

00:27:10.246 --> 00:27:18.226
Kenny told me one time, he said, if you want to have birds in good shape to show, hatch a few chicks every other month.

00:27:19.026 --> 00:27:22.816
And then pluck out who's ready to go and leave the others at home.

00:27:23.135 --> 00:27:23.726
Exactly.

00:27:24.526 --> 00:27:25.056
Exactly.

00:27:25.855 --> 00:27:26.826
That makes sense.

00:27:27.625 --> 00:27:30.246