New Chicken Fence

Daniel put up a new fence for the chickens to restrict their access to the full backyard and he built an arbor to use as the gate.

Eggs

We've been getting some great variety in the color and size of our eggs!

Looking Forward to the Next Trimester....

The little girls are looking forward to the start of Rachel's 2nd trimester, which starts today!

Chicks in the Morning

We usually release the chickens in the morning to roam around the backyard until they're ready to roost again at dusk. Daniel took a video of them this morning coming out of the coop.

If you have a hard time watching this video, it's also on youtube at:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6WQp-su3BPY

Silver Laced Wyandottes & Black Australorps

New Chickens

Today, we got 4 new chickens:

2 silver laced wyandottes:

2 black australorps:

When it rains, it pours...

Not wanting to be out done by a white leghorn, one of our rhode island reds decided to lay an egg this morning too.

And the winner is.....

The first eggs came from one of our white leghorns:

Chicken Update

Still no eggs from the chicks, but they are getting bigger.

The Morris Family!

Adelynn feeding Michael Jackson

Elanor with Nugget

The Morris Family came over for a visit yesterday and played with our chickens and even helped herd them into the coop! We had a great time watching them enjoy the chickens and talking about their next big step--moving! They are moving to Texas so we are very glad they got to come over and play. We got some great pics and videos of all the kids to send with them as they travel south. We also wish them the best of luck, and I look forward to keeping in touch.

Oliver feeding the Chickens

Poor Chicken!

We suffered our first casuality yesterday. Raphael was killed by a black snake yesterday. I let the chickens out all day to roam. Daniel got home around 5:15pm and all were accounted for. I got home around 6:15 and went to check on them. I was walking back to the coop and all was unsually quiet. As soon as I started past our shed I saw a hawk fly off. I get back to the coop and only 2 birds were standing there--they were very still. And then I saw my little 3 month old chicken with something black wrapped around it. I ran up to the house to get Daniel and told him to bring the shovel. That black snake didn't stand a chance. Too bad for the chicken and black snake. (For those of you who think killing a black snake that killed my chicken is wrong--sorry. We had to protect the rest of our flock.) We began looking around and none of the other 4 little chickens were around. Daniel picked up the two chickens that were just standing there and put them in the coop. The only thing we could think of was that the hawk got the other 4. We went inside and finished eating dinner (yum!) and I came back outside to stay with the bigger chickens to make sure they made it back to the coop safely. As I'm cleaning out the coop, here comes a little chicken flying through the yard until it made it back into the coop. The another. And then the last two little chickens. They hid in the underbrush of our yard for 3 hours and didn't make a peep. Daniel and I looked and looked and couldn't find them--they hid well. So we only lost one little chicken. Thank goodness. Although, the poor little chickens were so scared today that none of them came down from their perch. Poor little chickens.

Our First Visitors!

Elle and "Michael Jackson"

Emory (left) Age 6 and Elle (right) Age 4

with "Nugget"

Today we had some visitors to the Findley Farm! The Pegram family came over to visit with our chickens. The girls had a great time! They even ran after and caught some of the smaller chickens. The chickens just weren't fast enough! The girls wanted to come back and they are welcome back anytime!

Our Flock of 15

8 week old Rhode Island Reds
3 month old White Leghorn

8 week old Plymouth Rock (Barred Rock)

We got 7 chickens first and then 8 showed up at our doorstep the next day! They went outside of their coop for the first time today. We wanted them to get used to being in the coop so they wouldn't wander far when they went out. They ate lots of bugs and ran around the yard. It was amusing! Margaret has named the Plymouth Rocks "Michael Jackson" (because it doesn't matter if you're black or white), the white leghorns "Snowflake," and the 3 little rhode island reds are called "Sally, Jesse, Raphael." Very funny! The lightest big rhode island red is called "Peanut" because of her color (even though she's the largest of our pullets!) And lastly, my favorite little chicken is part rhode island red and plymouth rock and I named her "Nugget." She's my favorite because she let's us pet her and pick her up. My neighbor gave them Marigolds and strawberry caps as a treat today and I gave them sour blueberries. These are going to be some spoiled chickens! I can only imagine what it will be like when we have kids someday!

Chicken Coop Completed

Chicken Coop Construction