Ratty Four upgraded to Fair Four

This is what the Ratty Four looked like after I sprayed them off and put them in the coop.  4 days ago now.  Kinda rough.  And I bet the very kind farmers at the Mennonite Fowl Sale ( see Fowl Sale) were gently smirking at my purchases.  Cuz what do I know about bird quality???

Here is what they look like NOW.  Much better.  At least drier looking, anyway.  It turns out that the gold-ish one, even though she is the fattest, isn’t in charge.  The pecking order starts with the big white one; she is just crabby.  Maybe it’s the heat.  The two smaller while ones flecked with black just try to stay out of the way of both the bigger hens.  I don’t blame them.

Fair Four is a dumb name so don’t expect me to call them this next time.  You gotta keep up; the times keep changing.

Fowl Sale

So I’m talking to my neighbor in the back the other day. She’s driving her John Deere mower along her grass next to the dead-end road, and I’m drinking coffee catching up with her. I tell her my last two chickens died. Murdered. ‘I never closed the coop at night. My fault entirely’. She says, ‘yeah, the coon’s got ’em’. And then she looks at me like I should know better.  Which I do. I just got lazy.

She told me there is always a “Fowl Sale” up in Yoder, which is a nearby Amish/Mennonite community. She didn’t know when the next one was, but I gave her my number (to call me if she needed anything; she’s finally out of chemo and recovering from cancer). A day later she calls me – ‘the Fowl Sale is tomorrow. Friday. Here’s how you get there’.

I drive up there with a pet carrier on the off-chance I find some pullets or chicks or not-too-old hens. I want birds that will appreciate me and enjoy some leafy vegetables from me. In truth, the last two birds were jumpy and bitchy and wanted no part of my giving spirit. (But that’s not why I didn’t close the coop).

I walked into a yard full of cages – chickens, Guinea fowl, rabbits, ducks, geese, a few pigs, and even an adorable puppy. Here’s what it looked like:

I got a bidding number from the ladies in the office (a clean garage – one side the office and the other side was home-made foods. Yes, I bought some pie and cinnamon rolls).

The office:

 

It’s an auction!! Which I just love.  They started with one auctioneer and then added another auctioneer.  The perfect pullets I wanted went for $18 a bird.  WAY to rich for me. I eventually bid on two pullets (after I lost the bid – but that guy only wanted roosters), and two other single hens.  Again, though, I was second bidder to men who wanted roosters. Suits me just fine, I thought. I spent a total of $10.

I call them the “Ratty Four”. They had poop all over their feathers so I had to wash them off. They’ll look better tomorrow.

They are securely locked up for the night!  That’s my commitment to them.

A Little Respect, Please (said the chickens)

Remember when I said that the chickens hadn’t been laying? Except they HAD, and I just was not looking in the right place for the eggs?  I found that they had layed 2 dozen eggs behind an old piece of OSB board that leaned against the cedar fence.  The nest box, in the coop, had remained empty all winter.  I, frankly, was ready to give those stupid hens away through Craigslist – “come take these useless hens; free or best offer”.

After I rescued the 2 dozen eggs (we have not tried them yet, so we also do not have salmonella yet.  Just kidding.  Not about the salmonella, though.  Or trying them. But we WILL try them; #notafraid), I cleaned all the old winter hay out of the coop and nest box.  I always buy straw bales from an old fella that lives in Wichita – he has a small red barn right next to his house.  He or someone for him stocks straw bales in there; it is rarely empty when I drive by.  It is a self-serve barn.  Take a bale.  Put $6 through the mail slot next to the front door.  I only met him once when he was out tending his tomato plants.  He is one of those guys who is living history.  I would love to sit and talk with him for an hour or so over coffee with a tape recorder running. [side note – I am thinking of starting a podcast with interviews of friends who qualify as living history of our area]

Turns out all our two sweet hens wanted was some clean hay to lay eggs in.  After all, no one wants to bring a baby into a place that is not clean and safe.

So, sorry about that, girls.  My bad.  I will be more careful to keep things clean and welcoming for you.  It is the least I can do.

WHY aren’t you laying eggs, little hens??

They ARE laying. Duh.

They just don’t like the box I have set up for them.

Now… How do I tell if these are still ok to eat??

A week passes

  

A Ladder and Fresh Hay

As hoped, I got all the poultry moved around in the back yard like I want them. The old hens are rousted from the coop, but they still have their laying box and it is underneath a wood and wire box.  One of the hens already layed an egg in the box today. Here’s a picture of it:

I knew the Auracanas were smart, but that is pretty quick work to figure out where to be!

I also made a stepladder for the hens to go roost in the tree.  Hard to tell how many days it will take them to figure that out.  I put chicken feed on each step to entice them to climb higher.  Excelsior, as Kurt Vonnegut’s character exclaimed.  Here’s a picture of that:

The tiny babies are tired of that tub and the Red Leghorns (“boy, I say BOY…”) kept jumping on the ledge of the tub and also jumping out.  It was time to move them.  Here is a picture of their new digs:

Hopefully, they will stay warm and not get lost under all that hay!  Rest assured, I’ll check on them last and first thing.

Tail Feathers

I can hardly believe how quickly our duck is growing.  No idea if he is a he or a she – but

“it” is sprouting tail feathers.  Finally! The chicks have their wing feathers and are growing body feathers, but the duck had, so far, no adult feathers at all.  Not a motivated individual, I guess.  Ducky is HUGE, though, and getting huger by the day.  So far, adding video has defeated me.  Once someone shows me how to do THAT from my new Tablet, you can watch Ducky go crazy on water, food, fingers.

Today is possibly the day for the move outside.  Depends on how hard I work on pressure washing most of the entire property to get ready for painting, staining, and, in the poultry’s case, having a fresh coop to move them into.

Martian Duckling and Chicks THRIVE

It looks a little like a picture from Mars.  That is because of the heat lamp.

Can you see how many more feathers they have sprouted??

Can you see the duckling is twice as big as the chicks??

Anyway, the shift out to the coop will be this week.  I am going to build a tree branch ramp up into the Globe Willow for the full-grown hens to roost in after they are rousted from their coop.  Story at 11.

58 Hours In

58 hours in, the 4 chicks and a duckling are thriving in our original washtub (which we call a bucket in the blog title – just in case you didn’t make the connection).  

Special thanks to honorary chicken grandpa Bill K. for encouraging me to write about our latest diversion, by the way!  You can read serious news ANYwhere – this is just chicken talk. 



I got the feeling that they wanted me to turn down the heat lamp – they were huddling as far from the lamp as possible. The temperature today reached into the 70’s. Perfect Spring weather. Because it was so nice, we went on a field trip outside the shed. 

I cleaned out the pine shavings while we were out there. After all, we bought a HUGE bag of it – may as well use it. We think they’ll stay in the tub for a few weeks, but then we will move out the old hens and let the new kids take over the block. 

Name possibilities so far: ChickBonk (cuz one of them is bite-y like Jacob’s kitty WonkBonk), Pippin (for the duck), Boston (for the duck), Fiorello (for the duck). We are waiting for personalities to emerge for the other three chicks to find names. 

Any ideas?

And a Duck for Good Measure

Seriously – I resisted the Tractor Supply Vortex of cute chicks and ducklings for WEEKS. 



But, let’s be honest, I’ve never been happy with the relationships we’ve built with our current hens. Standoff-ish. Distrustful. Crabby. I get that friendship takes WORK, but c’mon – all we DO is feed them and protect them. Gratitude much??

I bought 4 pullets – 2 white leghorn, 2 brown leghorn – today and have them all set up in the shed. 

And a duckling for good measure.