Archive for the 'Chicken Coop' Category

Six Little Birdies Sittin’ In A Tree

tammy August 28th, 2008

If you have chickens and they get locked out of the coop before bedtime, and you want to go looking for them to get them inside so the fox doesn’t come and eat them up before morning, and it’s dark and you can’t really see…. well, you should definitely check the trees near the coop first.

Our chickens now roam freely all afternoon and they reliably bring themselves back into the coop when the sun sets. All we usually have to do is go down and shut the door. Well, a few days ago the grandsons were outside playing with the chickens and decided to shut the coop door well before dark, so when the chickens came waddling back, none of them could get inside.

At dusk we finally realized what the kids had done and quickly went to open the door. Most of the chickens then came on inside and got themselves settled for the night, but six were still missing, and it was dark already. Hubby pulled the truck around and aimed the headlights into the woods behind the coop.

Then he started walking through the trees, calling, “Here chick, chick, chick… here chick, chick, chick…” in his cute falsetto. I was helping him, saying, “Bok-bok-bok,” using my best chicken voice. Neither of us were getting a response.

Turns out the whole time we had our eyes looking down we should have been looking up! After about five minutes, my daughter spotted a group of three birdies lined up close together on a tree branch right next to the coop. In the darkness, they looked like three crows, hanging out and sticking close together.

They must have been nearly asleep already, because they didn’t even try to get away and seemed really startled when hubby picked them up to take them to the coop. A couple of trees over, there were the other three on a higher branch. We did not clip their wings, so our chickens can fly, ya know. We had to get something to stand on to reach, but they were also easily caught and carried to safety. Whew! Crisis over.

So yeah, check the trees first if you’re ever missing some chickens at night!

BTW, since they’ve been free wheelin’ the older laying hens have been giving us the most delectable orange-yolked eggs. They had been yellow and looking like grocery store eggs before we started letting them free roam. These orange eggs are waaaaay better.

And on another note, I don’t know how I’m going to find any dandelion roots this fall.  I’m not sure I’ll get any chickweed either after the weather turns cool again.  These chickens have wiped the yard clean of both these greens! 

Tales From the Chicken Coop: Free Range Bliss

tammy August 10th, 2008

We always wanted free range chickens, so yesterday, we took a big gulp and opened the door of the chicken pen so our new flock could roam a bit, standing close by in case they decided to take off to parts unknown. 

This made them so very happy.  Their excited energy was obvious as they immediately started foraging through the wooded area near their pen, finding big fat worms, juicy bugs of all sorts, and delectable greens everywhere.  Chicken heaven. 

To my horror, one even got hold of a baby black snake, about the size of a worm.  Chills up and down my spine!

They stayed close to the pen, never really roaming more than 10 yards away.  Their water was still in the cage, so occasionally they popped in for drink.

Mid afternoon, it was apparently nap time for the youngsters, as most of them headed into the cage to rest for a while.  Then after about an hour they headed back out. 

Chickens will eat just about anything, we’ve discovered.  We usually bring them lots of table scraps, and they especially like fresh dandelion greens.  Today when we brought their evening feed, they weren’t all that hungry after their day of foraging, but most came into the cage to peck half-heartedly at the cracked corn we put down. 

We’ve seen a fox out at night a few times in the past few weeks, so we wanted to make sure they were all inside the coop before dark.  Even though we thought they would probably all come in to the roost on their own as the daylight faded, we didn’t entirely trust them to do it, and we didn’t want to be tromping through the woods in the dark, so we started rounding them all up then.  Another hilarious chicken run, but we finally got them all inside. 

The young chickens won’t be laying eggs probably until next spring, so we added a couple of full grown Rhode Island Red laying hens to our flock a couple weeks ago.  They each give us one smooth brown egg every day.  They are more like pets, coming up to us to socialize and letting us hold them and rub their heads.  They also help keep the younguns in line, who always scatter when we approach and can get into quite a bit of mischief with each other.

We’ve identified at least three roosters so far.  They’ve started squaring off in very comical displays of bravado.  They have a lot of heart, but absolutely no clue of how to rule the roost yet. 

One of the roosters is particularly mean.  He likes to pull out the tail feathers of some of the others and eat them (the feathers).  We may be eating HIM come fall!

The Chicken Whisperer

tammy July 13th, 2008

All I can say is, be careful what you wish for! Dreaming of our own fresh eggs and being one step closer to producing more of our own food, not to mention all the wonderful fertilizer for the plants, we’ve been wanting to get chickens for some time now, but hadn’t had the time to prepare a coop yet. I was sure we would wait until next spring to begin this new venture. But what did I know?

Last weekend, out of the blue, we were given 16 young chickens that needed a home immediately.

Yes, I said 16.

We had to hurriedly scramble to put together a safe, cozy home for them. We ended up converting a dog kennel into a chicken yard by covering it completely with chicken wire, and we used a bunch of scrap wood to build a secure coop inside it. The dog kennel is one of those huge chain-link thingies that was also given to us some time ago. Our dog won’t use it because he thinks he is one of the children and has full rights to the house.

The chickens are all small now, so they have enough room for the moment, but we know that will change as they grow bigger. Thankfully, our son is planning to take half of them as soon as they develop enough to see which are hens and which are roosters. He already has a coop. We also plan to extend the dog kennel to make a bigger yard for the ones we keep.

Chickens are funny creatures, I’m finding. I’ve really enjoyed sitting out by the chicken yard just observing their behavior and the way they communicate with one another, peeping warnings to the others to scatter if you come too close, sometimes fighting, always looking for bugs and worms. If one finds a particularly tasty morsel like a fat worm, it will take off running away from the others to try to eat it before they see it. But as soon as the others see the lucky one running, the jig is up. Busted! The others will all take a stab at darting in to grab it away, only succeeding if they are very fast.

We had a chicken run the first day we brought them home. They all got out of the pen at once. They mostly all stayed together during their frantic escape, peeping to each other which direction to take. Run this way, no here she comes, run that way, no back this way, wait, there she is again… It was hysterical.

We’ve settled into a daily routine of feeding and watering and securing the coop. Now I’m looking forward to all those gorgeous, super nutritious, golden-orange yolked eggs, and a very rich compost pile for next year’s garden.