Posts Tagged ‘chickens’
Timid Start
Given how bold the chicks seemed to have become since gaining familiarity with their coop, we half expected them to leap at the chance to escape and explore once we opened the door for them.
They “chickened” out. Despite plenty of gentle coaxing from their chick-momma, it took manual transferring to finally get their feet on real ground.
Even with that, we only got 10-of-12 to come out and explore the fenced run we installed for them. That was good enough for us on their first day under the open sky.
More time was actually spent under the safe cover of the coop itself. The three adult hens wandered nearby, showing occasional mild interest in the new feathered chirpers. I got an impression from the Australorp that she was looking for an opportunity to give a few of them a piece of her mind, as she stalked in close a couple of times to see what the young ones were up to on the other side of the netting.
One of the Light Brahmas decided to sprint back up the ramp shortly after the excursion began, but other than that, just as I suspected, none of the others made it easy to get them to return indoors for the night.
We’ll increase the time they can be outside a little each day for a few days to a point where the door can stay open during daylight hours and they can come and go as they please. Based on how voraciously they chomped grass blades and green leaves in the short time they were out, I suspect they will eliminate anything growing green within the run in a matter of a few days.
I don’t expect they will be timid about coming out of the coop for more than another day or two.
I’m as eager as ever to get them melded as equals with the three adults so we can remove the barriers splitting the coop and give them the full space to share. It will make a lot of things easier about cleaning and feeding when we get back to our normal way of doing things. But with an interest in avoiding a failed attempt, we are going to be very patient about waiting for obvious signs the time has arrived.
It’s still our first time dealing will all the intricacies of introducing new chicks to existing adult hens and we want to give all parties involved the best chance of having the introductions proceed without any “unnecessary-roughness” penalties needing to be flagged.
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Summer Growth
We’ve got beans and peppers coming in from Cyndie’s first produce garden ever!
Last night for dinner we ate cauliflower from the garden, too. We’ve eaten some beets, potatoes, and carrots. Cyndie has used celery from her garden in a stir-fry and sandwich spreads.
We are enjoying bountiful summer growth.
Meanwhile, the fledgling chickens are growing into their half of the coop with ease. They wasted no time making their way to the two main roost branches where they happily perch on the same level with the three adult hens who come inside every night.
Last night we finished securing a fenced run that will allow the younger chickens to venture outside for the first time. This afternoon we will begin the exercise of establishing their pattern of being outside during the day and returning to the coop at dusk.
Based on previous experience, it involves a fair amount of chicken-wrangling the first few times that I’m not very excited about. Here’s hoping they figure out the drill as quickly and easily as they have mastered everything they’ve achieved thus far.
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Always Hope
It is a time of speeches for democracy in the US this week and hearing the intelligent oration of our previous (44th) President last night was incredibly refreshing. After enduring years of the undoing of countless protections to our environment, the destruction of our country’s reputation across the globe, disrespecting our allies and coddling our adversaries, and repeatedly trashing our precious freedom of the press, the campaign for an alternative is finally stirring hope for a better future.
I sure hope our youngest eligible voters will show up like never before to exercise their right to have a say in who our lawmakers and policymakers and leaders will be for the next term, all the way down the ballot.
If our chickens could vote, I think the twelve young ones would choose to have the net removed so they could take over the whole coop.
The three adult hens might not be ready to accept the kids yet, though. Tuesday night, I think they thought the kids had locked them out of the house. When I arrived to close the chicken door for the night, to my surprise, the hens came running to meet me.
“What are you guys doing up still?!” I asked in amazement. “You’re supposed to be in bed already!”
Then I noticed their access door was already closed. Poor things couldn’t get in.
It was as if they were running toward me to tell me all about their dilemma.
When Cyndie got home later in the evening, I asked if she knew any reason why the door might have been closed. The realization flashed and she moaned in woe. She had closed it earlier in the day, in case any of the young ones hopped over a barrier while she was pulling out the poop board to clean it, and forgot to slide the door back open.
The young chicks have quickly gained full confidence for climbing to the big roosts and will make big leaps and flap wings to reach places we’d rather they didn’t, like the slanted surface above the nest boxes.
But their confidence and aggressiveness give me hope they will be up to every challenge that lies ahead while maturing into adulthood.
It feels good to experience a little boost in hope. For our chicks, yes, but more importantly, for our country.
It’s been a really long stretch of little to none in the hope department.
This serves to remind me to always hope, regardless of how gloomy the prospects might ever appear.
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Successful Relocation
The chicks are in the coop!
Among the changes the chicks are dealing with, a bedding of sand instead of woodchips appeared to be the primary focus of their initial impressions.
It didn’t take them long to push the envelope of their abilities in exploring the new levels available. It was cute to watch them consider a leap multiple times before actually launching from one perch to another.
It got chilly last night and exposed the youngsters to cooler temperatures than they were used to in the brooder. Cyndie ended up lowering the heat lamp a little to ease their adjustment to this new world.
When we went down to close the chicken door, it was sweet to hear the three adult hens soothingly cooing while calmly perched on their side of the roost. They appeared unconcerned about the twelve new coop-mates that suddenly appeared during the day.
The chicks seemed just fine with the situation, as well.
The newbies will spend a week or so confined to quarters to establish the coop space as their current and future home before being granted brief, but expanding outings in the fenced front yard we will be installing today.
All these steps are designed to keep them safe while they are maturing toward a time when they will be merged with the adult hens and granted the full rights of free-ranging the property to the delight of us all.
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One Month
Our little babies are a month old now and outgrowing the space in their brooder. They are adding feathers and sprouting tails, each at their own pace. The poor early developers stood out as unwelcome attention-getters. All the other chicks giggled and poked fun at their odd protuberances, until suddenly they got them, too.
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We are planning today will be the day to transfer them to their half of the recently subdivided coop. I think they will like it.
It’s a bit like they are transitioning from elementary school where they are totally confident to the high school where everything will be new and intimidating. Cyndie’s a former principal so she knows how to create a safe and welcoming space for first-year classes.
These kids will quickly become masters of their new domain. After they reach a size compatible for mingling with the 3 adult hens, it will be the elders who we will be curious about, as they will be outnumbered four-to-one all of a sudden by these unfamiliar new breeds.
Feathery feet! Oh, my!
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Close One
That was a close one. Yesterday afternoon, our crew of one, Matthew, who is brushing on a fresh coat of sealant on the logs of our house, was taking a break for lunch when he spotted what he calls our “yardbirds.” He was watching our three chickens moseying their way through the trees between the house and the barn.
Then, he caught sight of a fox!
The report I received was that he rushed toward it and started screaming like a madman. Cyndie said he came to the house to tell her there was a fox in our trees. When she arrived on the scene, all she found were the black feathers of our last Australorp. A LOT of black feathers, spread across a significant distance.
About that time, I received a text message indicating we had lost a hen to a fox.
A couple of hours later, my phone rang with a call from Cyndie with a correction to the previous message. The Black Australorp was still alive!
She had returned to the coop where Cyndie found her nestled into one of the nest boxes. Given the near-death experience, Cyndie granted the hen a free pass to stay in the box for as long as she wanted. There were no visible signs of trauma.
Much later, at dusk, I checked on the three chickens while closing the coop for the night. Much to our surprise, I found the Australorp perched on the roost beside her trusty companions, looking fit as a fiddle.
In addition, I found she had laid an egg while recovering her wits in the nest box.
That’s one tough hen.
Logic tells us that fox will return, so we may need to confine the birds to quarters for a while until we figure out some kind of plan.
We were already intending to install a fenced-in run area outside one of the coop doors in preparation for the new chicks. They are due to arrive today and will spend their first month or so in the brooder with supplemental heat, so we thought we had some time before needing to reconfigure the coop.
That schedule will change now that the fox is paying visits in broad daylight. Free-ranging may need to be curtailed for a while until we build a protected space where they can do some not-as-free-ranging.
Meanwhile, we have returned to arguing with ourselves over whether to get a rooster for protecting the hens, or not. That is an unlikely solution for us, but we occasionally revisit the idea to make sure we still feel the same way.
Our precious layers deserve some support in terms of protection, so if not from a rooster, we’d like to figure out a viable alternative.
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Paddocks Reclaimed
Mission accomplished on Sunday in my effort to reclaim the paddocks from the unchecked growth of grasses and weeds, some of which had risen to over a meter tall since the beginning of this year’s growing season.
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I got in there with the big diesel tractor pulling the brush cutter and successfully avoided destroying any fences while maneuvering in the confined spaces.
Before the cutting started in earnest, Cyndie and I made a pass through, digging up “sour dock” weeds (that’s the local name for Rumex Crispus or some variation thereof) in hope of reducing their propagation.
We used to get sour dock mixed in bales of hay we bought for our horses and they were not fond of it. Ever since, we’ve framed it as an undesirable weed, despite evidence there are some medicinal and edible features to it.
Then it was off to the mowing races.
It’s always a little unnerving to be mowing blindly over such thick and tall growth, not knowing if I might run over a misplaced tool or any variety of wild critters that may have made themselves a home there. As it was, while walking through the higher-than-my-waist jungle of growth I figured I was wandering in a snake pit, much to my discomfort.
Luckily, no snakes were encountered over the entire duration of this project. A lot of toads and a couple of field mice were about the extent of sightings.
At one point in my hunt for stalks of sour dock hiding among the tall grasses, I came upon a bird’s nest with a lone egg in it. With a total absence of any upset flyers winging their way overhead, I concluded this poor egg had been abandoned.
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Now there is a blanket of cuttings covering the ground in the paddocks. That’s enough for hundreds of nests.
I noticed the three hens wandering around in there right after I finished mowing, picking at the wealth of opportunity, but I don’t think they will make a dent in cleaning up all the deadfall.
We’ll simply leave it to dry up and break down where it lays.
Maybe that covering will slow new growth so I won’t have to mow it more than one more time by the end of the summer. I don’t enjoy operating the diesel tractor so close to fences, especially inside the corners.
The paddocks almost look like we have horses again!
That’s so much better an impression than the neglect all that wild growth has been emanating.
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Dramatic Downpour
Holy cow, did we ever get a dose of dramatic weather last night. The rain came down so fast and hard we had over 3-inches within about 45-minutes, much of it during the time when the weather service had declared a Tornado Warning for our county.
Cyndie’s garden went from being a little too dry to a lot too wet.
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We ate home-grown peas from the garden for lunch yesterday! No pesticides, no chemicals, no shipping required. Just pick, wash, and eat.
Everything in the garden got washed last night. The path from the house down to the chicken coop became a river.
Cyndie went out to close the chicken door when it seemed like there might be a break in the downpour intensity, but the hens weren’t in yet. They were huddled underneath the coop and didn’t want to move. The pause in the rainfall rate was short-lived. By the time she got geared up to make her dash, it was already picking up speed again.
When she eventually returned to the house, there was standing water in her boots and she was soaked through all the way to her underwear.
That was definitely one heck of a downpour.
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Officially Summer
We have reached the longest day of 2020. It’s the latest hour when we tuck the chickens to bed in the coop for the night. Our fraction of a flock who have survived free-ranging among the wildlife that roams our countryside look a little lonesome snuggled up on one end of the roost.
Nonetheless, they seem happy as ever with their lot in life and explore a broad swath around the barn and their coop, heroically controlling the fly and tick population. Their egg production is enough to keep Cyndie’s and my demand covered. We just have less home-laid eggs to share with others.
Cyndie’s garden(s) are growing by leaps and bounds. With her away for the weekend, I fear the leafy things may be a chaos of excess by the time she returns tonight.
Summer would normally mean I am on a bike trip or we were going up to the lake a lot, but this year is anything but normal. At the same time, life at home is about as normal as can be. The weather has been on an amazingly even keel, perfectly balanced between hot and cool days with a mix of sunny, breezy, reasonable thunderstorms, gentle soaking rain, and calm dry days.
At the solstice, we are in the middle of this summer-ness. We can enjoy more of this for a few weeks and then begin the slow slide to earlier minutes when the hens return to the coop.
I’m willing myself to soak this time up in the fullest sense possible, in hopes of storing the memories as complete as possible for reference during the opposite time period six months from now. For those days when we go close the chicken door to the coop around 4:00 p.m.
Those days when they don’t bother laying any eggs.
Here’s to all these hours of summer sunlight!
Happy Father’s Day all you dads and children of dads! And moms who put up with the dads.
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Breakfast Buddy
It was only a short time ago that Cyndie was visited for a day by a wild roughed grouse while gardening. A couple of days ago, we had a wonderful sighting of a brightly colored oriole in a pine tree outside our window, which is a rare event in the more than seven years we have been here.
Now, we have an iridescent blue-black starling with a very yellow beak who, for the past two days, is showing up to have breakfast with our chickens.
Arriving this morning in a branch overhead, and then making its way down to partake of the grain in the pan on the ground, the chickens only mildly appeared to question the return of this unlikely visitor.
Maybe birds are picking up on these unprecedented extraordinary times of the pandemic and seeking to make an extra connection with others around them.
Wouldn’t surprise me a bit, except for the fact the birds probably aren’t aware the novel coronavirus COVID-19 is infecting humans around the world.
Maybe it has more to do with people slowing down enough to take notice. Who knows? It could be a little bit of both.
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Relative Something 