That Chicken is not Chicken!

As I mentioned I was in a business trip all last week.  I got home Friday late afternoon and let the chickens out to free range.  We do not let them out when we are not home to keep an eye on them.  We were all settling in to our normal routine when we heard the chickens having quite the time outside.  I happened to look outside, and that is when I saw a dog in the chicken run!  I yell DOG! and run for the mudroom to get my boots on and scramble outside.  My son and husband rally the weapons, ready to strike should this dog harm my chickens or me.  Outside I start yelling and waving my arms around like a crazy woman trying to distract the dog so the hens can scoot into the pop door and be safe in the coop.  It was a tense few minutes but I managed to scare the dog away, unharmed, and all the hens were safe and unhurt.  We did not make a big deal of it - we live in the country, dogs slip off their collars/leads....it happens, so we watched toe dog and learned who it belonged to and went back to our lives.  Fast forward to yesterday, we had the windows  open since it  was a nice evening.  We were just about to watch a movie when I heard the hens cry for help.  Apparently, the cluck line is out of order in the coop so they just yelled for help.  I will have to look into that.  I look outside and again see that same dog after my chickens.  I am very irate at this point.  I tell my husband to get the gun and run for my boots and out the back door.  When I rounded the corner of the house, there was a child in my yard watching the whole ordeal of this dog and chicken do a dance of death.  I distracted the dog and the hen got away.  The small boy was able to get the dog and drag it back home.  We later stopped at the family's house and my husband talked to the parents to reinforce that they need to keep their dog tied or inside because it now immediately comes to our yard after our chickens.  Hopefully that is the end of that situation.  No dog or chicken was harmed in these incidents....yet.

Yesterday I heard the girls having a fit and thought oh no not again.  I peeked out the window to see a hen on the roof of the coop!  This coop is 8' high at the front and it slopes down to about 6' in the back.  There on the top was a Whyndotte happy as you please.  She was probably the one that the dog was trying to get so she devised an escape route.  You know just in case it comes back.  Who said chickens were stupid?  ok they are pretty dumb but they learn and can be cleaver.

This hen hopped up on the feed barrels, then up onto the next box roof.  There she looked, paced, and planned.  Finally up she went to the roof of the coop!  What a goofy chicken.  Now if she can remember how to get up there when danger presents itself on the ground again will be the question.

Since the other seen this chicken who was not chicken to jump up on the roof, they all want up there.  I was in the coop filling their food and I heard this "THUMP!"  I walked out of the coop to see an Easter Egger on top of the nest box roof.  I said, "Get down from there!"  she she pouted and replied, "But SHE did it....!"  "Nope - get down"  and she flew down.  Then the Whyndotte was up there again.

Oh these chickens are something else!

Finally Getting Along

Well I think the worst is over with the hen pecking.  I still have one of the Wyandottes being a little mean but I think all will survive.  They all seem to be getting along better.  Some Still hang out with just their own kind.

Others will mingle with the old hens.  The reds seem to be generally pretty mellow about the invasion of the new hens.  They do get a bit territorial and possessive if I throw a tomato into the run for them.  I hav to make sure I toss in several so they all can share.

They are starting to develop their personalities as as they do I have started to name them.  This is Sally.  She is a Wyandotte that has a wonky toe.  It does not seem to bother her and she can move it so I am not worried about it being bent sideways.  Sally likes to talk and talk and talk.  Quite the gossip she is.

Fuzzy of course is one of my oldest hens.  She is one of my first Easter Eggers.  She got pecked some so I sprayed her butt with the purple spray then she just had to preen herself so now she also has a purple face.  Goofy chicken.

Honey is a sweet Easter Egger that is inquisitive.

I keep checking inside the coop every few hours for eggs.  A few of the new layers have caught on and are laying in the nest boxes while one insists on laying in the corner of the coop under the nest boxes.   So far I have 3 Easter Eggers laying.  I suspect it will be any day now for the rest of them to start.  They Wyandottes and Australorps are as big as the old Reds.  Any day now....

The grass is coming back nicely in the brooder run.  We plan on putting in permanent poles and extending the existing run out to include what was the brooder run to give them more room.

I try to spend time with the hens every day.  I spend time inside the run and coop with them so they get used to me and will come up to me.  Taming them will make thing easier if I have to doctor them in any way.  It also makes for a more fun flock.  I have two chickens now that will submit to me.  Fuzzy and now one of the Wyandottes submit to me by squatting in front of me and spreading their wings out inviting me to climb on as a rooster would do.  I generally just pat their back and pat them in the butt when they do this to me.  They seem satisfied with it - or disgusted with me that I have no clue how to hit home with this open invitation!  I am going to go with satisfied...yeah thats it.....  They shake and fluff out and go about their merry way.

Silly silly chickens.

Planting Chickens

When it is really hot out when we let the chickens free rage they like to run straight for the back of the house.  There they seek refuge from the heat under the back porch.  The back porch is more like a covered deck.  It is something like 12 x 40.  There is lots of cool dirt and shade to cool off under.  The chickens like to dust in the dirt and shale under the deck.  They look like I planted chickens in the ground!

Yep I am now growing chickens.  They are so silly.  They dig a hole and lay in it and kick dirt up under their feathers and then they roll around in the loose dirt.  This does several things for the birds.  One it cools them off.  Second it rids them of any excess oils their skin/feather accumulate, and third it rids them of any bugs they may have.  My chickens do not have bugs.  I can pet and get close enough to inspect them often enough to know.  This is something I look out for.  You do not want your flock to get bugs....not good.

They enjoy wallowing in the dirt nests and I like to take pictures of them wallowing.  :o)  They will even kick each other out of a wallow and take it over.  I guess some dirt is better than others...?

Hopefully my next post will be a fun one.  I had to go to Omaha, Nebraska on a business trip for a week.  I did manage to work my butt off and also have some 'me' time.  I took tons of pictures and had a really good time.   Stay tuned!

Chickens almost burn down the house

So about 2 weeks ago my dear hubby was shutting all the windows to go to town.  We always shut the windows of the house when we leave sine we have been getting pop up thunderstorms.  As soon as he gets all the windows shut he smells smoke.  He really did not think anything of it since we live out in the middle of nowhere with no restrictions so folks burn stuff - a lot.  However the smoke was coming from inside the house.  He quickly went down to the basement to find the brooder litter on fire and smoking everything up.

Seems the peeps managed to knock down one of their lights and being a 75 watt bulb it was hot enough to catch the pine shavings on fire.  He quickly extinguished the fire and made sure the peeps were ok.  He called me at work to tell me what happened and I rushed home.  Since he took care of the fire he went on into town for whatever he was needing.

When I go home I started getting things ready to move the peeps to the nursery outside by the coop.  We have a large black watering tub that I stuffed down the bilco steps and squeezed through the doorway.  At that time our son just arrived home from school and he helped me wrangle the chickens and put them into the tub and then squeeze them back up the bilco and out to the nursery.

From there I put each peep into the nursery and talked sweetly to them.  They were not buying it.  Some even tried to point out the perp that knocked down the light in exchange for being put back in the basement.  Nope - they all were paying for the ill behavior of one, not to mention they really needed out of my house!!!

The peeps did not know what to think of the grass under their feet.  They were scared and confused.  We left them alone to huddle together in their new digs, and lean on one another for comfort.  The old chickens were quite the nosey nellies.  The kept pacing back and forth along their common cage wall trying to get a glimps of the new neighbors.

They would cluck and purr at the baby peeps to welcome them and try to encourage them to come out of the nursery.  They were probably wanting to get a peck at the baby's small toes!  Older chickens are like that.  They think that peep toes are worms and peck at them.  That is why we have the peeps segregated from the older ones until they get bigger.

In due time the peeps have adjusted and are doing well in the nursery.  They seem to ignore the older chickens but since they can see and call to each other they will get used to one another.

As ever day goes bay the peeps are more and more confident.  They even started out door classes in the morning.  They have flight practice every morning.  They are too quick for me to get a picture, but they do both the running take off and the helicopter straight up and down maneuvers.  I thought I heard one yelling WOOO-HOOO this morning as she was taking her turn.

Once we got them all settled into their new home I went down and cleaned up the mess.  I shoveled all the litter out of the brooder.  My son actually took it all the litter down and dumped it on the compost pile.  We folded up the burnt/melted tarp and found that the light landed on the only plastic piece in the whole basement....the drain.  Sure enough the light burned the litter, melted/burned the tarp, and burned/melted the basement floor drain.  I poured baking soda on the melted mess to absorb the burnt smell until we can get it replaced.  We have decided that if we continue to add to our flock we will not put the little ones in the basement again.  We say that every year and we still end up doing it!

Building the nursery

The peeps have been in the basement way too long now.  I am going broke buying air fresheners!  They need out!  At has been storming every day around these parts so it has been difficult to get time to build the nursery for the peeps.  We finally found a small break in the weather and ran with it.   We let the big chickens run loose so they don't freak out over the construction going on beside their coop and run.

First we had to mow the grass where the nursery and run will go.  We could have left at as they will eat and trample it down to mud, but we did not want to loose them in the high grass.

Then we had to get down the nursery walls from where we store them up in the rafters of the barn.

Zip tie the wall together.

Add braces for the 'roof'.

Add scrap pieces of plywood for the roof, and the front with a hole cut in it for a pop door.

Cover the whole thing in a tarp and secure it with bricks.

Cut holes in tarp for the pop door and the sun roof/entry point.

Get the young strapping son to pound in the T Posts for their run.

String the wire around the run.

Add the netting and get me stuck inside the run.  I had to be quite the contortionist to get out once we had all the wire and netting on!  Good thing I am flexible!

Line the run with bricks and it is ready to go.  It is a little shorter than the permanent run but that is ok.  The peeps will only be staying in the nursery for a few months then they well be integrated into the big coop with the older hens.

About that time the storms were rolling through so we could not put the peeps in.  That would have to wait for another day.  The older chickens were right there to help us and lend they building expertise 2 cents.

We quickly cleaned up, put all the tools away and wrangled the chickens back into the their run.  We will have to check the weather to try to get a break from these storms to get the peeps moved.

Peeps are getting Big!

I had to clean out the brooder the other day.  I just could not stand the smell any more.  Having baby chickens in the basement is not the best set up.  Thankfully it is only for 2 months then we will move them out to the nursery outside until they are laying age.  Then they will be integrated into the coop with the rest of the chickens.

Cleaning out chicken litter from the basement is kinda tough.  I have to first open up the full brooder and shoo all of the peeps to the back new half, then block it back up while I clean out the front half.  To clean out the front half I have to use a flat head shovel and scoop up all the litter and put it into a big much bucket.  Then I have to carry the full muck bucket up the bilco steps and all the way down to the compost pile....again and again.  It took me about 4 or 5 trips back and forth to get all the litter cleaned out.

While I had the time I throughly cleaned the watering can while dear husband put down fresh pine shavings.  We added another set of blocks under the food and water to raise them up.  This will keep things cleaner for them.

We also added an 8 foot long perch for them.  It is a little high for them right now, but soon enough they will be all over it.

The peeps are growing like weeds!  The Easter Eggers are starting to get their fuzzy cheeks.

The White Lace Wyandotts are getting white heads and starting to lace out.

The Black Astrolopes are shiny and black.

I think I have figured out that the two mystery chicks are actually Red Laced Wyandotts.  They are pretty that is for sure.

The yellow/white peeps that I thought were the mystery peeps are turning out to be Easter Eggers.  They have the fuzzy cheeks like the rest of them.  It will be interesting to see what color eggs they will lay.  My last Easter Eggers both laid green eggs but one would lay an army olive drab egg while the other would lay a bright light green egg.  I hope these Easter Eggers have a range of colors and hoe to have a blue layer.

I think all the peeps are looking great.  Some will argue that they are ugly and look like little dinosaurs.  They are almost all feathered out and are getting more inquisitive every day.  They are starting not to run from me, and are actually starting to take an interest in me as I feed and water them every day.

Peeps See How They Grow

We had received a mail order box of live peeps April 4th.  In that box there were 27 day old peeps.  They are now 2 weeks old and my how they grow.  They are so fun to watch every day.  We have only lost 2 peeps - those died in the first 3 day we had them.  Over all that is not too bad considering these girls were shipped from Iowa to Pennsylvania in early April.

Here are some daily pictures.  It is amazing how fast they grow and feather out.

The white peep in the picture below is one of the mystery chicks.  They sent us two of these peeps.  We can't tell of they are male or female yet.  I have no clue what breed they are either. They are said to be rare and or exotic breeds from the farm.  I do know they are big birds.  They should do fine with the harsh winters we get here.....provided they are hens.  If they are roos I will have to get rid of them.

The feathering out process has got to itch!  The peeps preen themselves all the time and flap their newly grown wings.  They run/fly around the brooder from one end to the other.  We will soon have to take the  divider out of the brooder to give them more room.

They are starting to try to fly so we had to put the last lid piece on the brooder.  That is all I need, is to go down to the basement and have baby chickens running amuck!