Chicks

We have 4 baby chicks running around! Well, not running around too far from their mom. I'll get a picture soon. A few days ago a big black bird was swooping down trying to get them but the mom puffed up sqwacked and Niko went out with the bb gun and we haven't seen him since.

We also had a rabbit have babies but she ate most them, well not eat exactly more like dismembered. hopefully the next litter will be better.

Chicken ER

This is a chicken that was attacked by JD when she got too close to him while he was eating. She is having a problem walking but can get around. She kind of scoots around. Niko is taking care of her in one of the kidding stalls. She is still laying her pretty green eggs for us. She doesn't seem to be in pain and Niko wants to doctor her. We will keep you updated.

Chicken Turf

We were looking out the kitchen window this morning and Stef commented at how interesting Featherfoot is and then I read my mom's comment below and it got me thinking how interesting the chicken society is around here.

We have 2 main roosters Featherfoot and Mr Tibbles. Featherfoot lives near the barn and Mr Tibbles lives near the coop. I say he lives near the coop because he eats there and sleeps there but after eating promptly escapes to forage. Featherfoot gets fed by himself by the barn because Mr Tibbles doesn't allow him to eat in the coop area. These are their territories. A while back Mr. Tibbles started coming over to the barn area and started a turf war. I though he was going to win too. I'm not sure what happened but Mr Tibbles is back where he belongs now. There are also certain girls that hang around more in certain territories than others. Featherfoot is a firm yet loving partner. He lets the ladies know that he is to eat before them but then lets them join him. There is one particular hen, Awkward, that just ruffles his feathers, he is always having to tell her off about something or other. Mr Tibbles is more of a tyrant. Most of the time he eats fine with the other chickens but sometimes gets irate over some wrong doing. I just don't see him being very compassionate towards his subjects. For those of you who know about chicken mating know that it is really just barnyard rape and that is what Mr Tibbles does. The hens holler and holler until he lets them go. It is quite brutal. We also have 2 other roosters that have somehow escaped the butcher knife that hang around with Tibbles. At first he ostracized them but it seems they are a part of his gang now. The girls don't like them either and sometimes after a failed breeding attempt the poor guys lose a few feathers from a ticked off hen. Featherfoot, on the other hand seems to have some sort of camaraderie with his girls. He protects them too. When they are laying in a nest, lord help you if you happen to walk too close and interupt her. She screams at him and then he screams at me. Or maybe they are just screaming at each other. There is one hen in particular that won't shutup for a good 20 minutes after the disruption. Poor Featherfoot, nag,nag,nag.

Bummer

First of all the rat is back. Yes, that's right, after not seeing any droppings for a week maybe, he is back. Stupid rat.

Second, we have had a broody hen over the last few weeks. I was pretty excited and curious if she'd actually hatch chicks. She did. Last night Stef and the boys were out doing chores and heard a bunch of chicks chirping. We didn't go look at them or anything. I was scared the mama hen might get nervous and move them and it was kind of wet last night. We couldn't wait to go out there today and see them but there were no chicks. They were gone. Not a peep. Stef thinks they were being so loud a raccoon probably got them. They, of course, weren't in the fenced are with the dogs. They were on the outside behind the barn under a tarp on the hay. I didn't hear the dogs raise a ruckus either, which I think they would if there was an ambush, but something had to have happened. We are pretty bummed, but hope to have a better chicken system done soon. At least we know we have a few broody hens.

I am a Liar or Voting Day Miracles!

First of all I am a liar because we found about 12 eggs today. That is also a miracle. At least 6 of those could have been laid by the same hen (Niko found a little hidey hole with the cache back in the pig pen), but I'm pretty sure the other 6 were separate hens!! I think one was laying for her very first time. After she laid the egg she screamed and cackled bloody murder for a good minute; either horrified of her first experience or really proud of what she produced.
The second miracle is that it rained at our house today!! Yes, I mean that wet stuff that falls from the sky. I couldn't remember the name of it at first but then it all came back to me when the glorious wet stuff smacked me on the face as I looked up in wonder.

Still not a whole lot going on around here. Cole is still battling some kind of illness. One day his poop is hard the next it is a bit soft. I;m still working on it. It is not as bad as it was though. He has to get better by next week though so I can put Holly back in with him to make babies!!

I've always been pretty surprised about not ever seeing any mice around our place. With all of the animals and animal food you'd think I'd see them once in awhile. Well, the other night Kiska came running through the living room with a very good size mouse dangling from her mouth still alive. The boys got her outside with it and then I had to admit that maybe the cat is not as useless as I thought. Though I have been coming around to that thought recently because of some mole carcasses and innards I found at the front door. Please don't tell Kiska, we have a love hate relationship.

We have a rabbit living under our house. Once again a rabbit escaped from its cage 4 feet off the ground. She has taken up residence under our house and has somehow escaped the jaws of Ama now for a week. We have tried to catch her but she is too wily for us. We need to get a wild animal catching cage.

We are getting 3 eggs a day now. Again none of them are from the chickens that are put up in a chicken yard and get fed everyday. I don't feed the ones outside of the pen, they fend for themselves. So I think it is definitely time to thin our chicken population once again. Besides we are already out of whole chickens in the freezer.

I am still looking for a car. I have to take the rental back Wednesday. If anyone knows of a Honda or a Toyota for a good price let me know!! Car shopping bites.

Egg Collector: Dangerous Job

The boys went to collect eggs yesterday and got quite a surprise. I think the snake's eyes were bigger than its stomach though. It worked on the egg for quite some time then finally gave up. Poor fella.

Beautiful Picture

Well, at least if you've been waiting for eggs as long as I have, it is a beautiful picture. Only one of them gave me an egg though. Guess the other one was just practicing. I found 4 eggs yesterday. So far none of the fenced in birds have laid any, only the birds that get out of the fence. Very interesting. Something to ponder.

An egg every other day will keep the doctor away?

I don't know, something like that. I found another egg today. I finally got nests in the chicken yard and in the barn where the loose chickens hang out. Hopefully the rest of them will get the hint and start laying too.

Also, we are going to pick up our new goats Wednesday. I'll tell you about them when we get them.

This is what I call an EGG

Finally, I haven't actually cracked it yet, but I'm positive this is the real deal. It is smaller like first eggs are and I found it in a "nest" in the barn. I haven't gotten all of the hens in the chicken pen, some of them hang out free range with Feather Foot still. So one of them laid their first egg in the barn in a nest it made behind some old feed sacks. It is definitely a white egg though. So I guess I have a white egg layer somewhere in the bunch?? I am going to do some research and see.

Egg!!! Psych...

I was so excited today when I found an egg in the chicken yard today. I haven't moved the nest boxes in yet since we moved them so seeing the egg lit a fire under my butt. I didn't want to use it for us because it was dirty and I wasn't really sure how long it had been out there. So tonight while we were doing chores I was going to give it to one of the dogs. DD was the lucky girl. I tried to break the egg but it was weird like it had a really hard shell, so I tried to crack it harder. OMG, it was a hard boiled egg that had been in a pile of scraps intended for food for the chickens. The egg was supposed to be broken up into small pieces for the chickens to eat. Well, I felt pretty dumb being all happy that my chickens finally started laying eggs. I thought it was pretty big for being a first egg, didn't even dawn on me that the egg was white and I only have colored egg layers!