Chickens

I love my chickens.  I have wanted them ever since we lived in Fremont 

and I found out you could keep chickens in Seattle.  But, it wasn't until my sister got some, that I decided I could handle them along with all my kids.  

Last year we got 3 chicks.

We named them Black Rose (black australorp), Fancy Pants (ameraucana) and Sunflower (buff orpington).

They were adorable little puff balls and grew quickly.

Black Rose is a week younger than the other two.

They love raspberry leaves.  Even now they love to be in the raspberry patch.  It is a good thing they are short, or they would eat everything in it.  Yesterday, I saw Sunflower (who is now much bigger) jump up to try to pick a berry.

 We soon had to build them a coop, 

since they were out growing the box in the garage.

The kids helped paint it.

They also love to perch in our rhododendron by the front door. 

 The day Z was born, we got our first egg.  With in a couple of weeks they were all laying eggs!

The big one is Sunflower's double yolker.  When she first started laying, she would give us one about once a week.  The dark one is Black Rose's and the cream one is Fancy Pants' (she was supposed to lay blue eggs, but didn't, in fact, she stopped laying after 2 months).  They started laying when they were about 6 months old and Travis put a light in their coop, since it was November/December.

I never knew before that chickens just lay eggs.  There doesn't have to be a Rooster around at all and if there wasn't anyone to eat the eggs, they would still just lay them.  They are the perfect food.

 Black Rose is our best flyer, as far as chicken's fly (which isn't much).  But she can perch on anything she wants and can fly from one side of the driveway to the other.

 They love to take dust baths and I have a hard time keeping any small plants growing because they get dug up and layed on.  They are as bad as a dog that way.

 Fancy Pants is very sweet and friendly.

 Sunflower is the boss chicken.  She turned out to be the biggest and now I know what they mean by "hen pecked" and "pecking order".  But, she knows that I am really the boss and she will let us sit and hold her.

Most days we let them out of their coop to free range in the yard.  It is really fun to watch them when they get out.  They run and flap their wings, sometimes getting a few feet off the ground.  Sometimes they jump on each other (usually when they were younger).  One time, I was herding them back to the coop (don't try to catch them, it is a lot harder) and Sunflower and Fancy Pants were in the above mentioned rhodedendron.  Sunflower jumped down first and when Fancy jumped down she landed on Sunflower's back and rode her for a few feet before she got down.  It was really funny.

 They are such great chickens, we decided to get more.

This year, instead of getting them at DeYoung's, we ordered them on the internet from www.mypetchicken.com.  After going to the fair and seeing all the chicken breeds, it was fun to get to pick out just which breeds we wanted and order them.  In March they came in the mail in a box.  We went to the post office to pick them up.  

Here they are in the brooder.

 They are Summer (welsummer), Lacey (barnvelder), Ginger (red star), Bunny (easter egger).

They grow so fast that they change almost daily.  

Ginger

 Lacey

Summer

 Bunny

I love watching the new feathers sprout.

These little girls also grew fast.  Soon, they were out foraging in the yard too.  They have very good camouflage.  Below are Bunny, Lacey and Ginger behind Summer.

We added an addition on to the coop that was separated from the big chickens, but later can be opened up for free access through out.  

The big girls did not take to well to these little ones and Sunflower would hunt them in the yard, following them around and pecking them, to let them know that this is her yard and she is the boss.  

I usually would only let the little ones out when one of us was out to watch them, since they were so little and helpless.  Once they were a little bigger (2 months), I let the little ones out unsupervised for a while.  But they were not big enough and when I came out Lacey was being attacked by a crow. 

 I scared the crow away and Lacey ran into the open coop.  Then I noticed that Summer was laying unnaturally on the ground and not moving. 

 I couldn't see any of the other chickens at all.  I eventually found Sunflower in the nest box.  Ginger hiding in the other nest box and Black Rose and Fancy Pants had found an opening in the fence and were in the lilacs on the other side.  I couldn't find Bunny anywhere.  I looked all around the yard, but couldn't find her.   I was so upset that I called T at work.  I then had to explain to H what had happened (the little kids were sleeping and the big ones were at school).  I told him that I didn't know where she was and that maybe a bird carried her away or she had gotten out of the fence somehow.  I was so sad to have lost 2 of our chicks.  We said a prayer and then looked around the yard again.  We found her in the corner, in the compost pile, under an old pizza box.  She had been hiding and still and silent for over an hour.  Chickens are not usually silent.  They were all nervous for a few days after that, but seem to have recovered.  Bunny is still very skittery.  I don't know if it is her nature or if it is from the trauma.

We waited for about another month before letting them out unsupervised again.  Then they were much bigger than a crow.  They are now 4 months old and almost as big as the big girls.  Fancy Pants has accepted them, she was the lowest of the pecking order before.  I opened the door between the coops wide enough for the little girls to get through, but small enough the the big girls can't.  Sometimes when the big girls were out, the little ones would explore the whole coop.  

 I knew that Ginger is a hybrid and bred for laying. 

 She probably would start laying at about 4 months.  So I needed to figure out if the two flocks would become one, or if I needed to make another nest box and put it in their side.  Since Ginger is maturing, she is less cowed by the big chickens.  She doesn't stand up to them outright, but she doesn't run away like she used to and she will go into the big girls side of the coop and look around, the others follow her.  All of the chickens are getting along better.  They occasionally will all be in the same area of the yard at the same time.  And sometimes they will be in the same areas of the coop together. The other day I heard Ginger making the "I layed an egg" bock, but I couldn't find the egg anywhere.  I looked all around the coop and yard.  A couple of days later I found two eggs.  They both were on the floor under the perch, like they had just fallen out while she was sitting on the perch.  Both of them had shells that weren't fully developed and were more like papery sacks.  After 6 days of no more eggs, this is what I found in the nest box.  Ginger's is the small one.  

 

I am glad she figured out where to lay it.

 Ginger, Lacey and Bunny

Black Rose and Sunflower

Fancy Pants