At least, they’re stupid when they were supposed to be girls.
Little Hermes has decided to be a rooster. Not just physically male, but he’s already getting the mentality. He’s started to try crowing in the morning, just a little “rr-rrrrrrr” but you know it’s just a matter of time before his voice changes. And he’s challenging us – this little half-grown banty. He’s pecking at our hands and feet if we get too close.
Sucky thing is, this means that the pair of them have got to go. They’ve been at close quarters since they were days old, so I don’t want to separate them. That means losing the hen as well, but it just wouldn’t seem right.
So, if you know anyone in the Eugene/Springfield area who wants a pair of young chicks, lemme know.
The new chicks finally have names – the larger (black sex-linked) has been named Inkblot, the bantam non-frizzled frizzle is Hermes, named for her winged feet.
I decided that they were getting too big for their small cage, even though they use it for sleeping. I set up the dog house I’d used for the older ladies when I first brought them home, and put the exercise yard around it. As soon as I took the cover off of the smaller cage, the ladies threw a hissy fit. Guess I won’t be integrating the flock any time soon.
Twinks, on the other hand, thinks that the new setup for the chicks is fantastic. She has a much better view now, and a more comfy spot to watch from.
I was able to let the new chicks outside for a while today, even though the weather didn’t cooperate. I put them in a large dog exercise yard, then scattered corn and egg for them to share with the older ladies. They seemed to enjoy it, after they realized the ground wasn’t going to eat them or something.
When it was time to come in, they weren’t ready. They didn’t show any sign of distress at all…until the rain started. Then they seemed quite happy to go back under their heat lamp.
Today marks the first 6-egg day of the season! That means that all 6 of my ladies gave up an egg today! Good job, Turka, Princess Buttercup, Houdini, Sprinkles, Henery and Not-Henery.
I went to the local Wilco the other day…shouldna. Chick Days are DANGER. I came home with not only cat food and foxglove seeds, but two more chicks.
Cute, huh? I’m not even sure what kind the larger one is. He had “Pecked Hieny Syndrome”. It’s sadly common in the big stock tanks they keep the chicks in, and they are careful to keep an eye out for it so they can separate the wounded. I happened to be there on a day, at a time, when there was a little black chick with a red, bleeding butt. I pointed it out to the lovely lady working that area, and seeing as we know each other, struck up a deal. Something like, “You want it?”, “Sure!”. Of course, she knows that I can’t get just one, and she knows that I already get my feed and everything there…so her $2.50 loss will probably end up making her a bundle off of me. Starting with a frizzle bantam as a buddy, and a bag of baby chicken feed.
She had me spray the wounded area of the chick with Blu-Kote, and off I went. I think the roommate was a bit miffed, and I haven’t exactly told the landlord…but since I don’t even know if I can keep them yet, I’ll worry about that later. Since I don’t remember which bin I plucked the hurt one from, I don’t know if that batch was straight-run or what. If it’s a boy, I’ll end up finding new homes for them both. I’m pretty sure, judging by wing shape, that the banty is female, but not the larger one there. It was already getting “real” feathers in when I got it, so…no telling.
The slow-down season, that is. The ladies are starting to take turns molting, and egg production has slowed somewhat.
The first year I had them, the molting came as a surprise to me – I’m not sure what I expected, but that wasn’t it. This year, I’m a little more prepared. And amused.
Houdini (Barred Rock) went first and has no tail feathers left. Not-Henery is almost done – but she’s got that one last hanger-on:
The next step will be cleaning out the coop for the winter, getting the heat lamp set up and hunting down a way to keep their water from freezing. I’d read about using bird bath heaters for smaller waterers, I may try that. It’s much cheaper than the heaters made for actual stock tanks, and I really don’t need anything too powerful.
I also will be trying to weatherize the coop a bit more. The door that is now attached leaves an 8-inch gap at the top, which was fine during the summer but will leave them with a large draft once the weather starts turning. I really am considering doing the unthinkable the next time tax-returns roll around: buying an actual coop. Maybe not my dream coop, but something that is a little more right-angly and less drafty.
I’m ashamed to admit that I gave in and went with the kid to KFC last week. I’ve been sort of avoiding them, because of all I’ve heard about their crappy oversight of their suppliers, who apparently treat their chickens poorly. I’m not a vegetarian, but I just don’t think it’s necessary to be cruel to the animals before you eat them. Whether or not we consider them intelligent isn’t the issue; they can still feel pain, and they can still be distressed by living in crappy conditions.
Anyway. I was punished – the food wasn’t even that good.
In fact, I can honestly say that I can do a bucket of chicken much better than the Kolonel could ever dream of.
Today, some Egg news and a silly little chicken video.
I have six hens, and they have been pretty consistant layers. Every now and then one would skip a day, but no big deal. Recently though, I’ve only been getting 4 eggs a day, every day. For about two weeks this happened. Part way into it I realized that one of the “missing” eggs was actually being laid soft-shelled, and was sat upon by a hen and squished into the bedding. Sad little eggy. The other, I don’t know.
But today, all of my brown eggs where there – including one very odd shaped egg. I’m used to getting the occasional double-yolker, but today it was not the size but the shape that made me go, hmmm.
The odd egg, shown here with a typical egg.
As you can see, it’s not a normal egg. My heart goes out to the chicken who laid it. It can’t have been comfortable. It’s got me wondering now though…I saw a video once where they had an egg inside an egg. Maybe that’s what happened! I supposed I’ll have to have eggs tomorrow for breakfast…and have the camera ready just in case.
Now for the silly chicken video. Every time I go out back, the chickens come running. And if I wander around the yard, they follow me. So today, I walked backwards, camera in hand, to show the world how cute my ladies are. Turken is missing, she was busy having an egg.
That’s a short trailer for a full-length video, which I’ll likely be ordering on DVD. It’s for a good cause!
The website associated with this is pretty clever – and as we know, if it’s not clever, it won’t get much attention. The Chicken Revolution
Now, where I live the laws are a little…ambiguous. I’m in unincorporated country territory, between a 2-hen city and a completely unknown quantity (chicken-wise). I’ve attempted to look up the rules for this area, but there is nothing that makes sense that I can find. A very old zoning ordinance says that I’d need something like 4000 sq ft. per chicken – my kid doesn’t even get that. In fact, she doesn’t get 1/10 that. So why would a chicken need that? They don’t, but as you can see in this blog, that’s likely not the point.
No livestock, but large pets are acceptable. Reason: Ostensible reasons are health based, a few even broadly grounded in fact, real reason is that pets, which have no purpose other than companionship and cost money, are broadly a sign of affluence, while livestock are a sign of poverty, because they provide economic benefits.”
It’s kind of crazy. I imagine that if my neighbors have a problem with it, they’d say so. But so far, after having 6 chickens in my back yard for more than a year now, I haven’t heard a peep. Hell, they didn’t even complain when I had the rooster.
It’s not because I’m such good friends with my fence-neighbors, either. I don’t even know their names. We don’t get together and BBQ, or have block parties, or gossip about the other neighbors. I know they have some dogs, because we share a fence. I know they have a couple kids, because they found our bunny and brought it back one day. So really, there is no reason for them *not* to turn us in, should they desire to do so. I haven’t even brought them a dozen eggs! I should do that, now that I think of it.
I figure that chickens are a pretty good type of “pet” to have, actually. They keep decent hours, go to bed at dark and get up at daylight, they aren’t noisy, no barking, no worrying about finding them roaming the streets at all hours terrorizing small children and old people (like my cats do). They’re pretty easy on the neighborhood.
Point is…well, I guess it’s that there aren’t any good reasons to not allow them, legally. Like I said, the town next to us has a 2-hen limit, which is ok, but really, why not 4? Or 6? My 6 ladies are terribly happy in my back yard, having the run of it with the cats and dogs. Depending on their moods, I get between 4-6 eggs a day, which is enough to feed us plus have plenty left over for bartering. It’s how I paid to have my leaves blown in the fall, and the nematodes spread in the spring. It’s age-old – remember, Mrs. Ingalls used to pay Doc Baker in eggs sometimes!
Anway, support your local chickens. I won’t deny that there should be limits, just like on other domestic animals, but c’mon, why should we not be able to keep a couple chickens, give us that one area where we know where our food comes from?
Chickens not only can eat green tea grounds, but they benefit from it. They have fewer parasites, which leads to healthier chickens and therefore healthier eggs.
“So what?”, you might say…but think about this:
Green tea grounds come from making green tea. Green tea can be used to make Thai iced tea. So, it stands to reason that for the sole benefit of my lovely ladies, I must consume more Thai iced tea.
The chicken gods are smiling on us, this day.
I’ve been buying instant Thai tea in single-serve packets, and thought I’d save some money by getting a larger packet instead. I didn’t pay enough attention though, and ended up with just plain ol’ Thai tea.
Fine…I did some googling and found that it’s not a complicated thing, making your own Thai tea. I made it stovetop this time, but I’ll probably try making it in the coffee pot next time, see how that turns out.
Anyway, I made a big batch and stored the resulting tea in a 1/2 gallon mason jar. That did leave me with a large mess of used tea leaves, and what the heck do you do with that?
I’ve somehow turned into one of those people who actually care about food leavings. Probably the chickens did it to me, because every time I have scraps I think, “garbage, or chickens?”. With tea I wasn’t sure though. I have been tossing out a bit of coffee grounds for them, maybe once a week, but I had no idea about tea leaves. Google again. And here is what I found: Green tea can help the immune system of the chickens.
Fantastic. Now, I can drink my Thai tea, usually a special treat, as much as I like. And I can feel good about it. My chickens will be better for it, and that makes me happy.
Now, if only I could find a study that tells me that chickens benefit from eating chocolate wrappers.
