Hi Everyone Mr Eq here. As things have slowed down in the garden now - ground cleared ready for ploughing thought I instead of Mrs Eq would write something.

How time flies, we have now been here in BG for 4 months and most of the important stuff sorted out, residency, car registration, some pressing stuff on the exterior of the house sorted (windows painted as house was empty for 6 years) and more importantly wood delivered chopped and stacked (although the last 6 cubic metres was already chopped).

As Mrs Eq has mentioned before she has concerns of me keeping myself occupied over winter and that I needed a project, well here goes a quick outline of what I have started.

As many of you know I used to work in a zoo as quarantine manager and record keeper, seems like it has followed me to Bulgaria!!!!
My project may not involve tigers, orang-utans or any other endangered wild animal, but the Shumen.

What is a Shumen I hear you say?


Well the Shumen is one of two breeds of native Bulgarian poultry (Black Shumen and Red Stara Zagora) of which the Shumen was close to extinction 3 years ago and only 100 birds existed. Since then with the efforts of the Bulgarian Poultry Breeders Association the breed has been saved from extinction. Also work has commenced breeding a blue variation ( as normally only occurs in black colour) by introducing Australorp blood into the breed and then out breeding it again. This was done with Siamese cats by bringing in red (ginger tom) into the breed and out breeding to produce Redpoints.

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I do not know a huge amount the breed, but it is likely that it had gone out of favour as a breed due to being replaced by higher meat and egg yielding birds like the Orpington and Marans although they do lay plenty of eggs (medium size).

Anyway through contact with members of the BPBA, I managed to procure a trio, a blue male and two black hens at the end of July.



They are a fast maturing breed which was an advantage in helping bring it back from the brink of extinction and as both hens were adults (bred last year) our first chick (Solo) hatched out by the end of August. She was named Solo as due to problems with the incubator only one egg hatched, although more eggs were due to hatch a week later. To provide her companionship we placed a mirror in the pen with her until more eggs hatched.

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A week later three more chicks hatched (two blues and a black). Males are easy to identify as soon as they hatch as the distinct comb seen in adult males is evident as soon as they hatch. The photo below shows the developing crest of a male (blue bird in centre) at three weeks of age.

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And then yesterday I had my final eggs for this year hatch (Mrs Eq calls them 7 little black bumblebees).

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So in three months my flock of Shumens has increased from three to fourteen. To say that I am chuffed would be an understatement not only as these are the first domestic poultry that I have ever bred (bred budgies, canaries etc as a kid, but never chickens), but more importantly that I am helping to save a rare breed of native poultry and that I have a project.

One of my old zoo bosses had a saying "
you can't make an animal keeper you are born an animal keeper"
so it seems the animal keeping along with the conservation trait in me will be with me until I die.

Hey Ho - Now what native breed of goat and pig needs saving from extinction!!!! [You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

Mr Eq

I'm not into goats or pigs, but I sure would like to get my hands on a Shumen rooster if you could bear to part with one Dave.
As a youngster, my Mother and I used to breed, budgies, finches and canaries..and chooks of course, but that wasn't really our doing as we always seemed to have a broody hen sitting on a clutch of eggs and mother nature would take her course.

Very interesting post, by the way.

bgbazz wrote:

I'm not into goats or pigs, but I sure would like to get my hands on a Shumen rooster if you could bear to part with one Dave.
As a youngster, my Mother and I used to breed, budgies, finches and canaries..and chooks of course, but that wasn't really our doing as we always seemed to have a broody hen sitting on a clutch of eggs and mother nature would take her course.

Very interesting post, by the way.

Re: rooster - will reserve one for you bgbazz and bring it over when we bring your rhubarb in the spring.

Regards

Mr Eq

That's very kind of you Sir!

Equinus wrote:

Hey Ho - Now what native breed of goat and pig needs saving from extinction!!!! [You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]
Mr Eq

Congrats on your hard work in breeding the almost extinct Shumens Dave. As you know we have been over to you and seen the Shumens that you are breeding and they looked really great.

It would not surprise us to see you attempting something a little larger than a chicken and I am sure in time that something will pop along into your garden.

As you know we have a field rather than a garden and we would be interested next year to either rehome a mule or a horse that deserves somewhere safe to live with plentiful grass to ensure it's health and happiness. My equine knowledge would be really useful in keeping the animal in good health, but of course if there is any endangered species of mule or pony/horse that needs to be saved we would be most happy to participate in any scheme that you may know about. It's a shame to see the grass doing nothing and me trundling around the field with the ride on mower when an animal could benefit from the space we have here.
Eric

Fabulous post Mr Eq - certainly one of the most interesting I have read on any forum for a while!

Couldn't help think about this advertisement currently doing the rounds online though with all the chicken talk: [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]
sns=fb

I never knew this about chickens!

LOL.

Thank you all for the nice comments. Chicks are doing really well, very active. Sara is enjoying cooing over them while they still look like bumble bees, in a few days they will be growing feathers and not so 'cute'.

itchyfeet wrote:

Equinus wrote:

Hey Ho - Now what native breed of goat and pig needs saving from extinction!!!! [You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]
Mr Eq

Congrats on your hard work in breeding the almost extinct Shumens Dave. As you know we have been over to you and seen the Shumens that you are breeding and they looked really great.

It would not surprise us to see you attempting something a little larger than a chicken and I am sure in time that something will pop along into your garden.

As you know we have a field rather than a garden and we would be interested next year to either rehome a mule or a horse that deserves somewhere safe to live with plentiful grass to ensure it's health and happiness. My equine knowledge would be really useful in keeping the animal in good health, but of course if there is any endangered species of mule or pony/horse that needs to be saved we would be most happy to participate in any scheme that you may know about. It's a shame to see the grass doing nothing and me trundling around the field with the ride on mower when an animal could benefit from the space we have here.
Eric

I don't know much about Bulgarian horse breeds Eric, only what I can find on the internet. There is one that is very rare but it is a wild one, not domestic. But really, unless you were given a horse, the cost of fencing your field, along with the winter feed and housing costs, worming, hoof care etc it is cheaper to ride your mower! It's easy to forget what a drain they can be on your resources, I know I had when we got Murphy. If you have good grass in spring maybe Bernard will know someone who needs to make hay.

You may come across a donkey in need, but again the winter would see it needing a stable as they don't have a waterproof coat. (Presume you meant donkey, not mule. As you know mules are infertile crosses so can't breed so can't be rare. Slip of the finger.) And you know how you hate the cold....all those early morning wading through snow to get to the stable! Brrrrrrrrrr.

As for something larger turning up here....never say never but I would have to get it past Dave first!

Take care. Sara

How are the chucks getting on now, I should think they have grown quite a bit by now.

therowfamily wrote:

How are the chucks getting on now, I should think they have grown quite a bit by now.

They are doing great thanks. I am astonished at the rate they develop, they are already growing feathers. Because they are a bigger group they are more amusing to watch. The other day one managed to get a spider and was being chased by the other six. It wasn't going to give it up though! Still really cute.

The big class are testing their flying skills, luckily there is a window in the door so we will be able to see if any are out before opening it. They are getting good at catching flies when out in their run. The boy is quite feisty!

Solo, the only chick with a name and the first ever to hatch, has developed a twisted toe, rather like our huge hen, Silver(house hen, not Shumen). She will manage OK on it, and is going to be a lot lighter than Silver, but she is staying with us anyway. No idea what happened, she was OK for her one week photoshoot. The only problem with Silver is she can't run faster than Sevi who is a lot lighter. And she perches on her own as is easily pushed off if she tries to squeeze on with the others. She's my favourite.

Sara

Equinus wrote:

I don't know much about Bulgarian horse breeds Eric, only what I can find on the internet. There is one that is very rare but it is a wild one, not domestic. But really, unless you were given a horse, the cost of fencing your field, along with the winter feed and housing costs, worming, hoof care etc it is cheaper to ride your mower! It's easy to forget what a drain they can be on your resources, I know I had when we got Murphy. If you have good grass in spring maybe Bernard will know someone who needs to make hay.

You may come across a donkey in need, but again the winter would see it needing a stable as they don't have a waterproof coat. (Presume you meant donkey, not mule. As you know mules are infertile crosses so can't breed so can't be rare. Slip of the finger.) And you know how you hate the cold....all those early morning wading through snow to get to the stable! Brrrrrrrrrr.

As for something larger turning up here....never say never but I would have to get it past Dave first!

Take care. Sara

You have just reminded me of the hard work I did when I had a livery and riding stables 25 years ago, but of course I was younger then and it didn't seem a problem. We have to fence the field properly so the big dogs can run around and enjoy themselves and let off some energy, some will be done this year, but the majority of it will be done next year. Of course a stable will have to be built, another learning curve I suppose, have never built one of those before, repaired many, but never built one from scratch. Our neighbours appear to get as much hay as they need and investigations will have to be made on the availability and cost thereon.

I have to walk Louie and Sofie out in the snow and most of the time I look like Shackleton wandering down the road desperately trying to stay upright, but when it gets a metre deep it might give more of a problem.