I am not the first person in my family to take to the practice of keeping and raising my own chickens to provide eggs for the table and enjoyment in the garden. When I was small, my father kept a flock of white leghorn laying hens and would often either hatch chicks under a broody hen, or bring home day old chicks to slip under a hen so she could raise them.
The first time I recall Dad bringing home some day old chicks, he arrived home one afternoon and got out of his car carrying a small cardboard box, about the size of a shoe box. As he walked into the house, the box was cheeping and chirping.
Being a curious seven year old, I asked him. "What's that you've got, Dad?"
"A box of whistles," he replied.
Later, he showed me how to give the 'whistles' to the broody hen and she went on to raise them quite happily, into productive members of our flock.
On the Tuesday before easter, we hatched six tiny new chicks and thus became the owners of our very own 'box of whistles.'
We got six chicks from 7 eggs which is a very good hatch! For now, their names are Prima, Seconda, Tierza,Quatra, Quinta and Sesta.
They are hybrids. Two of them are Australorp X Light Sussex (They are the larger, bluish coloured chicks) and the rest are Australorp over Commercial Australorp. They are good, strong, healthy chicks and I look forward to adding them to our laying flock, or selling them on to others for laying hens.
Good Friday, however came with its own set of challenges, which I will post more about later!
Now to wait and hope that healthy, well formed chicks zip their way out of the eggs over the next 24-48 hours.
It's all very exciting, and right on cue, Bertha, our Light Sussex hen has gone broody. It is as if she could sense that the possibility for chicks was there. I may slip some of these under her if all goes well with the hatch.
Everyone who meets my beautiful Australorp Rooster, Chop-Chop comments on how big he is. Some people tend to find his size intimidating, but he is such a tame, gentle baby despite his size.
I introduced him to my daughter, Hannah yesterday. The last time she saw him, Choppy and his hatch mates were only about 8 weeks old and quite a lot smaller than they are now.
Choppy, always being interested in something nice to eat, came running down to greet us when he heard our voices in the yard.
Tearing up to us at full pelt, I guess he was a bit of a formidable sight! Hannah squeaked in alarm and stepped backwards, holding out her hands to ward him off, and Chop Chop stopped in his tracks clucking his confusion at this strange reaction.
I encouraged Hannah (who is 23) not to be afraid and that Choppy is just a big sook.
After a few nervous moments observing him and being reassured that he would not attack her, Hannah fed him some wild corn, which he picked, delicately from the palm of her hand, amazing her with his gentleness.
He is a sweet natured boy and has never shown the slightest hint of aggression towards anyone.
Despite his formidable size, he truly is just a big old baby and I adore my gentle giant.
I mentioned at the end of my previous post that my nextdoor neighbour had come over to my place on Saturday with an idea for a possible rooster box to put ChopChop our remaining rooster into at night time in an attempt to keep him quiet in the mornings. Not that Choppy crows all that much anyway, but I am interested in the idea of using a rooster box, both for now and for future roosters who may turn out to be just as dominant and noisy as ChopChop's brother, Boomer was.
The idea of a rooster night box, is to keep the bird in the dark until well past dawn and thus hopefully prevent him from crowing until a more reasonable time than say, 3am!
My neighbour came to ask me, initially, how to build the kind of box that I thought would work, but in the course of our discussion he had a brainwave. He hurried off back home to collect an item he had lying around in his garden shed to see if I thought it would be suitable.
The above picture is what he brought back. It is a collapsible canvas dog kennel for a small to medium dog, complete with a nice, soft cushion for the dog to sleep on. It is lying on its side in this image because it has a mesh bottom and we thought that would be good for airflow. The rooster could sleep inside this, with the cushion and some wood shavings underneath him for comfort and hygiene, and the mesh bottom could be faced toward the wall to allow air through without letting in too much light. I thought this was worth a try and R went back home to find something to use as a door for it.
The door is fashioned out of an old cargo pallet R had 'in the shed' as well.
R attached an aluminium bracket to the top of the wooden door.
The bracket neatly hooks over the metal framework and the bottom of the door
Pushes in flush against the front of the kennel.
The Rooster Box installed in the chicken coop ready for its occupant.
ChopChop checking out the new digs.
We have used this for three nights, so far, and it seems to work well, except for the second night when I had not quite blocked all light from getting into the box. Last night, I made a couple of tweaks to the coop area where the box is, and as far as I know, Choppy didn't crow at all. In fact, he has not crowed all day today. I wonder if he thinks being quiet means he won't need to go back into the box again?
Those who follow this blog regularly will know that I hatched three chicks
back in October of 2011 and that I then spent the past 5 months or so raising
them to maturity.
My hope in hatching them had been that I would get replacement hens for my
laying flock, and also some breeding stock towards my dream of breeding
Australorps for fun and possibly for show. Well, I got one pullet from the
hatch, and two roosters. Out of a dozen eggs, three chickens. Not a huge return
on my investment, but the enrichment that these youngsters brought to our lives
was worth more than money. In my opinion, anyway!
We had three darling little walking pompoms which we dubbed "Chick 1, Chick
2, and Chick 3" initially. Not the most creative of names, I know, but when you
don't know what gender is hiding under all that soft, downy fluff, what can you
do.
Being complete novices at the hatching business, we
still had no clue, even at four weeks of age, what gender birds we had, but
expert opinion from more experienced poultry fanciers put odds on that Chick 1
was a girl whilst Chick 2 and Chick 3 were both boys. The reasoning behind this
is because chick number 1 (left of photogaraph) has a smaller comb and no
wattles, and her feathers are more developed over the wing and back. the other
two chicks, have larger, redder combs and the beginnings of wattles under their
chins. Indeed, that's exactly how it did pan out in the end.
We had one blue cockerel, one black cockerel and a
black pullet. Yes, I knew, even back then, that Cockerels grow up to become
roosters and that roosters like to crow first thing in the morning, and second
thing, and third and...so on.
What I didn't know, was that Roosters would crow
loudly at all those things of the day. Still, I had at least 6 months
before the crowwing would start, didn't I? So I could just ignore the problem
until I couldn't ignore it anymore, right?
As it happened, our two cockerels, whom we named
Boom and ChopChop hadn't read the Handbook for Young Cockerels in the
Field, and they thought that it was entirely appropriate for a young
rooster to start testing his vocal chords somewhere around 8 weeks of age! At
first, it was cute... sweet, soft little, wobbly arrrrreeeeeaaaarooo!
noises greeted the dawn, and they soon ran out of breath and didn't try again
for hours. Not so bad, I thought. We can live with that!
Practice makes perfect, though and pretty soon,
Boomer (renamed because of his voice!) was starting up at 4am with an
increasingly loud and strident AAARRRRRRR-OOOOO-AH-OOOOOH! He discovered he
could crow and he decided he liked to crow! There was one day in
particular when his new, brassy trumpet of a voice split the air at least five
times every two minutes! I was going nuts, my neighbour was going nuts, and I
think, even the hens, and ChopChop were going nuts, listening to him!
I really loved Boomer, but I knew that his luck
would have to run out sooner or later with the neighbours. Tolerant as they are,
even I could tell that the noise would eventually get on their very last
nerve.
I made up my mind to give him away, then I made up
my mind to keep him, and then I made it up to give him away and that time I got
as far as posting an advertisement online about him. I was still hesitant, but
that evening I had an email from a lady who was very interested in having Boomer
for her breeding program. I decided to sleep on it. The following morning, after
inspecting the hens, and having a last little chat with Boomer, cuddled on my
lap, I made up my mind that he should be given the opportunity to go and live in
the country, before someone decided to demand his carcass on a platter!
I felt at peace after talking on the phone with the
person who had inquired about him, and I made one last video of my beautiful
Boomer-ang and then boxed him up and put him into the car for the drive to a
town halfway between our home and Boomer's new address.
When I met Boomer’s new owner, and she met Boomer, I knew it was a
perfect match! She fell in love with our boy at first sight, and he
seemed pretty happy with her as well. We chatted for a while about our
shared love of all things chook and then I told Boomeroo to be a good
boy in his new home and we waved him off on his way to the big farm in
the country where he has a harem of ladies all his own just waiting
until he is out of quarantine.
We still have Boomer’s brother, Chop Chop here, and he is a sweet,
gentle little boy who is quite a bit quieter, so far, than his
bigmouthed brother was.
And today, my neighbour came over with a suggestion for a rooster box for Choppie to go into at nighttime.
Well, things are finally settling down a little bit here after the Christmas break. We had a very quiet and relaxing Christmas here at the palace. On Christmas Eve, we decided to follow the Germanic tradition of having dinner and opening gifts. We spent the evening with Sandra's mother and ordered Indian Take Away for dinner.
The food was delicious! We had a selection of spring rolls and Samosas for entree, and for main course, we ordered Mumbai Fish (mild), Navaratan Vegetable Korma (Medium) and a Traditional Goat Curry (Hot) accompanied by Naan Bread and Brown rice. Everything was very flavoursome and not too hard on the tastebuds for spice. We added some Ginger and Mango Chutney and drank Blood Orange Soda to wash it down with. All in all, it was a very nice dinner, topped off with ice cream to cool the palate for dessert.
Christmas day, Sandra and I spent at home together and ate lightly, just made ourselves some Vietnamese style rice paper rolls and had them with sweet chilli dipping sauce. Christmas Night we had fresh bread rolls with Seafood mix on them and Sandra tried her hand at making a Thousand Island dressing which worked out very well!
The Hensington Palace Hens were not forgotten on Christmas and enjoyed a special treat for their dinner. We thawed some Kangaroo Meat ( a favourite with the girls!) and doled it out to everyone, from the youngest chicks right up to the guest hens we have staying with us over the Christmas holidays. It was a hit with one and all, and gave them all plenty to cluck about as they retired to their roosts for the night.
The kangaroo meat was particularly enjoyed by the hen we had in Hensington Hospital. Her reaction made me wish I had brought the video camera with me. It's hard to describe the sound she made on tasting her first mouthful of Kangaroo, but if a hen was capable of squealing in delight, that is what that sound would be. She did it after the second mouthful too, and I swear it is the nearest approximation to "OOOH! Yummy!" A chicken could possibly make!
As thanks, the girls all delivered an egg each on Boxing Day, which was lovely of them, but meant I needed to find a means to deal with the eggs we already had! In keeping with the holiday, though, I didn't do anything about it that day. Instead, I took myself to the movies to see War Horse, whilst Sandra settled happily in front of the TV to watch the beginning of the Boxing Day Cricket Test.
War Horse is a beautiful film. There are some sad/painful moments in it, but you'd expect that with a film that is dealing with war. World War I is a particular interest for me, so I was keen to see this film. I thought the cinematography was amazing as one would expect from Stephen Spielberg and the storyline was moving. There is a goose in the early parts of the film, too who steals the show and adds some wonderful comedic relief. I recommend this film, but be sure to take a few tissues with you. There was not a dry eye in the house at the end of the film! Well, except for mine...I was moved by it, but I think I used up all my tears on Christmas night, Watching Judy Dench and Maggie Smith in Ladies in Lavender.
The day after Boxing Day, and I still had the dilemma of what to do with excess eggs. I had been thinking of trying my hand at pickling some for a while now, so decided this would be as good a time as any! I found a recipe online and decided I'd give it a go since I had all of the ingredients, particularly the 12 eggs the recipe called for. So I set out to make "Garlic-Curry Pickled Eggs"
The pickling juice I made for this smelled delicious and I had fun with it. Peeling a dozen hard boiled eggs is not easy! Some of my hens lay eggs with particularly hard shells and strong membranes! I got it done, though, and here is the end result.
It looks, and smells wonderful, but we won't know how it tastes until two weeks from now as they need to mature before eating. I will keep you posted!
Well, that about sums up the Christmas break here at Hensington Palace! I hope all of my readers have had a happy, healthy and safe holiday and I wish you all the best for 2012.
It is a rainy day today, so all the Hensington Hens are inside for the day. They've had some roasted pumpkin this morning though, so that helps to compensate them for being cooped up all day. They do love it and I have found some cheap pumpkin for sale locally again recently so they're getting a roasted breakfast twice this week, much to their delight!
For my own entertainment, well, there's studies to catch up on, of course, and I am getting on with that, but I also went shopping online for some books. Naturally, these won't arrive in time to be enjoyed today, but I am hoping to have them when I am on a couple of weeks break from College in January.
This is the first book I ordered. I've had my eye on this for a little while, and finally decided to bite the bullet and order it, today when I was doing some online Christmas shopping.
Back cover: Is there anything to match the quiet sense of satisfaction you get from watching your healthy hens pecking and scratching in their yard or tun?[sic] The sheer joy of peeking into the nesting box and discovering your first chook egg is something everyone should experience. If you already have chooks, we know you will delight in the colourful images of backyard chooks. If you're new to chooks, enjoy, but please don't acquire any chooks till you've built a secure, fox-proof hen house!
Back Cover: Have you ever idly daydreamed about keeping a few chooks in the back
yard? Maybe you remember from your childhood how delightful it is to
watch their antics, collect their eggs, and have them as part of the
your lifestyle? You're holding the perfect guide to keeping chooks. This
is the companion volume to the phenomenally-successful 'Chook Wisdom'
which brought colourful, accessible, chook-wrangling information to tens
of thousands of back yard chook fanciers. In 'More Chook Wisdom' you
can expand on your knowledge, inspiration and ideas for keeping chooks.
There's natural health care, tips on chook pens to build or buy, and
best of all, loads of 'user experiences' from from[sic] people living the
chook lifestyle right here and now. Whether you're new to chooks or
already enjoy their delights this book will be a treasure on your
bookshelf and vital in the chook pen. You don't need a massive back yard
to keep chooks - a few Silkie bantams will live happily in a modest
run. But if you have the space for a flock of Light Sussex or other
large breeds - that's all here too. Now is the perfect time to bring
chooks into your days. The rewards are great. Chooks are cheap and
simple to keep, and they'll enrich your back yard soil, your recipes,
and your back yard entertainment for years to come.
I'm looking forward to getting these, and reading them and as usual, will post my thoughts about them when I have finished.
This information was posted on the Poultry Matters forums today and I felt it was so good that I should share it on my blog.
by Michelle Hernandez
I had been concerned about my flock and had already tried some serious measures. If I could have A/C, I thought, I wanted them to, as well. I started bringing my flock in and putting them in large dog crates in our sun room. Between the chickens, dogs, and cat, not to mention the turkey poults from babysitting, the room looked – and honestly, smelled – a bit like an indoor barnyard. Further, cleaning the crates regularly was a bit impractical for my schedule. I quickly realized this wasn’t going to be a practical longer-term solution, so I started thinking about what else I could do to keep my chickens cool.
Have you ever had one of those days when from the moment you got up in the morning, until the sun went down in the afternoon you just felt like you did nothing but run around doing a whole bunch of things but not accomplishing a whole lot?
That was Friday at Hensington Palace! We've been having some quite warm weather here the past couple of days and this has meant that the chickens were all becoming a little bit heat stressed. Thursday, the mercury climbed to 32c and today, it was about 31c I think. We were caught very much unprepared as the average mean temperature in our area, even in the hight of Summer is around 30c which is still warm, but not the kind of baking heat we had the last two days! The chickens were quite stressed on Thursday and there was not much that I was able to do for them as I was at home alone, and I have disabilities which make it difficult for me to climb or lift things. All I could do was let the chickens out on free range and make sure they found some shade.
For the chicks, I had to make sure they had plenty of water and that they didn't get frightened or upset during the hottest part of the day. Thankfully, they all survived, but I knew that something would need to be done on Friday to keep them a bit cooler.
I posted in the forum asking for some advice on what to do to avoid heat stress and got some wonderful suggestions. Some, I couldn't implement, but others, such as providing the chickens with ice so they would have cool water, I could do, as well as placing shade cloth over their coops to keep the sun off the metal roofing.
Sandra and I got some lengths of shadecloth out of the storage sheds and draped these over the coops and the chick's growing pen. We weighted them with bricks for now, but will need to find a more permanent way to affix them before we get any major summer storms.
I had frozen some water in plastic tubs over night, and we also filled a couple of buckets with water and placed them around near the chooks' favourite shady spots in the yard. The chooks liked the idea of the water buckets, but having never seen ice before, were a little nonplussed about what to do with it! That problem was quickly solved though, when Sandra sprinkled a handful of their feed into the container with the ice. They soon got the idea that pecking the ice would either reward them with food, or with something cold and refreshing and they decided to camp next to the ice bucket for the afternoon!
Chooks introduced to ice for the first time
The next order of business was to deal with the chicks who were feeling the heat again in their aviary. We dug around in the handy dandy storage shed and came up with an old cage that used to house my pet fancy rats in the yea long ago! I had been intending to toss it out when the council had a hard rubbish collection a while back, but fortunately, there it was in the dim, dark recesses of the shed, cobwebbed and forgotten, awaiting just such an emergency as this!
The cage was promptly hauled out into the light of day, dusted off and recieved a couple of small modifications in order to become a shady, if somewhat small enclosure for the chicks who decided that cramped or not, it was wonderfully cool and being on bare ground, was the perfect place to settle in for a luxurious dust bath in the cool, damp earth under the tree!
Dustbathing Chicks
(I needed to refresh their water bowl four times that day due to them kicking dirt into it!)
Well, by this time, with all the mad activity to try and prevent our chooks from getting heat stroke, Sandra and I almost had heat stroke ourselves! It was time to retire indoors for a cool drink, and some study before having our lunch.
The big chooks hung out most of the afternoon under a shady tree, camped next to their ice block and bucket of water, whilst the chicks dust bathed, scratched in the grass and squabbled over bugs in their makeshift enclosure.
While the chooks were all kept busy with their outdoor pursuits, I decided it was time to tackle the tomatoes I had picked on Thursday.
I got to work and transformed this...
Into this...
It's just a basic Italian sauce but very tasty! We had some of it with Fetuccine and mushrooms for dinner and it worked a treat. We have enough leftover for three more dinners so that is in the freezer now and all those beautiful tomatoes will bless us with their wonderful flavour for a few weeks to come!
It was a long, and busy day, and I am exhausted and having seen it all written out, I can see that we did actually accomplish quite a bit, since laundry got done and I also completed a quiz for Uni and scored 90% on it somewhere in amongst all that!
If you managed to read this far, you deserve a reward, so here is some chickie cuteness to send you on your way!
The chicks had a big "day" out, today. I took them outside in the late afternoon
sunshine to have some sun on their little bodies while I cleaned out
waterers and other stuff. They loved it, but are very tired after their
big adventure!
We have had a little bit of rain since I put the chooks into their summer coops and I find that the roofed run is getting slightly damp around the edges because it's got open sides, even though there's an iron roof over it. I felt the need to do something about it, and went to my local produce store with the aim of buying some straw to scatter as I had finished my old bale when I set up the broody box for Bertha.
Alas, the guys at the feed barn didn't have any straw, so I asked for a bale of lucerne. I told the guy it was for my chook run, and he said "Well, you're going to find lucerne a bit expensive for that, what we use with the chooks we're selling here, is Cane Mulch. It's a good bedding and they like to dig around in it, and it won't cost as much as hay.
I had already gone over to their pens when I arrived, to admire the lovely little POL pullets they had. Very nice little ISA Browns and Australorp Commercials. Healthy, calm, happy and mildly curious about us, which is what I look for when I am buying chooks, but I don't need any POLs atm as I am hoping to get some nice ones from Bertha's clutch.
Anyway, the cane mulch was in use in those pens, and the little chookies were indeed having a lovely dig and scratch and dust bathe in it, so I accepted the guy's advice. (It was cheap, too only $9.90AUD for enough to cover 7m². That is more than enough to do my little run a few times and I have read that this type of mulch doesn't go soggy, so that will be a plus.
I went up and tossed some into the run this morning and then was going to get my rake to spread it out with, but I changed my mind when I noticed the petticoat gang's reaction to it. Oh! The digging, the kicking, the scratching and wing flaps of excitement! This was the newest sensation since Kangaroo meat as far as they were concerned!
My dismal, rainy day depressed chooks turned into jolly scratching machines as they cooed and clucked and raked through the sweet smelling mulch for anything of interest. I'm sold! I will continue to buy this mulch when necessary to supplement the leaf mulch I use from the gardens and keep the hens entertained with something to scratch and roll around in.
I also was lucky enough to be near the nesting box with my camera today when Rosie was making her "Egg laying purr" sound. I recorded it to share.
so, today we went to the local council recycling
center and picked up an old dog crate for $15! When we got it home, I
cleaned it thoroughly with water and disinfectant (note: I have since found out it is not advisable to use disinfectant to clean equipment for backyard poultry. Warm soapy water will suffice) and let it dry in the
sun for an hour or so.
The crate has "Pepsi + Diego" written on the top of it. It makes me wonder what animals used to use this before it came to us. We
have set this up in the coop for our broody Sussex, Bertha. She seemed to
tolerate the disturbance okay. We went up and did this just after sunset
and I got her off the nest she had been using and put her near her
water bucket. She was a bit stiff from sitting and kind of fell face
first into the bucket.
Note to self, put her further away from the bucket next time! She then
proceeded to have a big drink of water. The other chooks in the pen next
door were on the roost, but when they heard/saw her drinking, two of
them came down and had a drink in their pen, too. It was rather cute!
We
put fresh straw into the dog crate, and put her fake egg into it, then
when she had eaten some food and had another drink, I tried putting her
inside the crate. She fussed and clucked and then came out, acting
frantic as though her egg was missing. I put her back in. Same deal.
Then
my partner suggested we should get the straw from the old nest she had
been using and put that into the crate. We did that, put her egg in
there, put HER in there and waited.
There was some more clucking
and fussing, and then a little noise that sounded like a cry of joy when
she spotted her fake egg. She immediately settled on the egg, and
that's how we left her.
She seems very determined to set, so I am going to organise some eggs for her early next week.
Oh,
and while she was off the nest, she did a poop right at my feet, which
was huge and omg!! The smell!!! I'd heard about these 'broody poos' but
they seriously have to be smelled to be believed.
I suppose that was my just desserts for dropping her headfirst into her water bucket!
to be broody, it seems! My light sussex hen, Bertha is all grim
determination to have chicks even with being flogged off the nest three
times by her
coopmates who wanted to lay their eggs, today. She would just wait by
the nest
hopping from one foot to the other, making her little bok-buk-bok-buk
noises until the hen laying was finished, then back in she would go.
I've been chatting online with some of my chicken breeding
friends and they're encouraging me to try setting her with some eggs as
Sussex are usually reliable brooders which, once they're settled don't
break until the eggs hatch. One suggestion is to let her sit for a week
or two on fake eggs and then go in at night and swap the 'eggs' out for
day old chicks, which she should happily mother without too much fuss as
she will think they are her own. This is tempting as I really would
love to get some Australorp chicks to raise for next season and
gradaully switch to breeding just Australorps and maybe having
Wyandottes for color and variety in the coops.
so tempted am I, indeed that I have emailed a breeder of Australorps already about getting some fertile eggs.
In the springtime, it seems a young hen's fancy turns lightly to raising chicks!
Much as I would adore some little hatchlings trotting around after their mumma hen, I am not set up as yet for raising chicks, or for brooding them myself should the hen go off the set. :( I wish I could let her have some chicks, but I simply don't know enough and it would probably be unfair to her, and the babies.
I have heard that it is possible for eggs to hatch if you put them down your shirt/bra, but I am not keen to find out if that's true! Besides which, I don't even have fertile eggs as I have no rooster. I guess, clucky as Bertha and I may be, it will be the sin bin for her tomorrow if she is still setting.
When
I posted on my blog recently about my chickens going nuts over canned
sardines, my friend DivaJyoti commented that she hadn't known chickens
would eat fish.
Chickens actually prefer to follow an omnivorous
diet. The chickens we know today, that scratch around in barnyards or
(sadly) rot away in battery farms, for shame! tend to be fed on a grain
based diet, more because it is convenient for us. The domestic hen, gallus domesticus is actually descended from the Jungle Fowl:
Jungle
Fowl originate from India, Sri Lanka, South East Asia, and Indonesia.
In their wild state, jungle fowl eat a varying diet consisting of
fruits, grains, vegetation, small rodents, lizards, bugs, slugs and
insects. When allowed to 'free range' our domestic chickens will do much
the same. I've heard of domestic fowl eating mice, lizards, beetles,
worms, caterpillars snails and slugs. In fact, a flock of chickens let
loose in a matured vegetable garden will nibble little bits of the
veges, but will also keep the garden almost completely pest free. They
particularly favour the larvae of coddling moth! Yesterday, I gave my
chooks 100g of kangaroo mince.
Someone
mentioned on a poultry forum I frequent, that feeding kangaroo meat to
chooks is an extreme sport. After trying this myself, I'd have to
concur.
There was none of that hesitant peering at it before taking a small
peck to taste it that you normally see when offering a new type of food. Rosie tried to rip the meat out of my hand before I
even got the wrapper off it!
Then it was on for young and old as my
gentle, 'boking', scratching hens turned into miniature velociraptors,
jumping up, flapping at me, trying to snatch beakfuls of meat out of my
fingers (they rarely eat from my hand) and chasing each other all over
the chook pen trying to snitch pieces out of each other's mouths. All
the while, they were making that special high pitched muuuur-uurrrrrr!
sound that chooks reserve for only the best and tastiest morsels.
The chooks were going absolutely stir crazy today after days being pent up because of wet weather, so I decided to let them out despite the rain. I'd been keeping them in, thinking that young chooks can get sick if they get wet, but after asking advice from some of my more experienced chicken keeping friends, I was assured that this only applies to chicks and young fowl less than 20 weeks of age.
All my girls are past 20 weeks, so I decided this morning, to let them out.
When I got to the henhouse, there was a pleasant surprise awaiting me. Bertha had laid her first egg! My 'baby' sussex is now a big girl.
Hers is the egg at right in the picture. Sadly, it got a little fouled in the production, which can happen occasionally, but it was easily washed. The plastic eggs at either end of the real ones are 'dummies' placed in the nest to encourage the hens to use the nestbox rather than laying out in the yard, or on the ground in the chicken run.
There was also a visitor in the yard, today. A little scrub turkey had come to call.
I think this was a male bird and only young as his wattles aren't fully developed as yet. I don't know if he was just passing through, or was checking out our yard with a view to building his nest mound here. He seemed a bit confused, thinking my birds were female scrub turkeys. He kept following them around, making his soft little Goob? Goob? call, but if he got too close either Boss, or Rosie chased him off. I left them alone as the chooks seemed to have the situation under control. The last I saw of "Goober" he was heading down the driveway at a jog after I shut the hens in for the night. I wonder if he decided this wasn't the best place for a nest after all?
The chooks seemed to enjoy their rainy day ramble and weren't too wet when I put them in for the night.
Bertha got a little muddy, though it is hard to see here.
Wynona looked the most bedraggled but Boss's
gloss is still present.
Nosie Rosie has wet hackles but the rest is fairly dry.
Waiting for dinner.
The wild bird mix that we have scattered for sprouting in what will be the summer run for the chooks is loving this wet weather!
So, that was the rainy day that was, here at Feathered Petticoats.
I had to take a trip to my doctor this morning for a general checkup and to get some prescriptions renewed for my meds, so when I got home, I decided I would do a quick checkup of the chooks.
I had bought some Colloidal Silver while I was out, having heard this is a handy tonic for either bacterial or viral infection and with Rosie still a little bit lack lustre, and Bertha occasionally still coughing, I decided to give both girls a dose (just one or two drops from an eyedropper) of CS internally.
After that was done, I thought it might be a good idea to weigh them all as I hadn't got a baseline weight since getting them. Rosie has filled out a bit again since I've been treating her for her mysterious weightloss and lethargy, so I thought it would be good to know just what she does weigh.
Each of my hens are what's known as 'first years' so they're probably not at their full adult weight yet, particularly Bertha who is a Light Sussex, a late maturing breed.
So, how do you weigh a chook? It's not as simple as just asking her to step onto the scales, after all and I don't have a hanging scale like my dad used to use for his chickens. I decided I'd have to do it the old fashioned way and step onto the scales myself, holding each hen by turns.
That actually worked out very well, and their weights are as follows.
Rosie (ISA Brown): 2.2kg (4.8pds) About right for the lower end of the scale with her breed. Would like to see her put on a little more though.
Bertha (Light Sussex): 3.5kg (7.7pds) Within a healthy weight for her breed, but there is no upper limit on weight in the standard, so she could put on more without it being too worrisome.
Boss: (Australorp Utility): 2.6kg (5.7pds) Again, not too bad for her type.
Wynona (Gold Laced Wyandotte): 2.8kg (6.16pds) She is close to the right weight for an adult of her breed, needs just a little fattening. More canned tuna for her!
Of course, I am not too obsessive over the weight of the chickens really. It's only a part of the picture and health in chickens is judged more by their laying, feeding, and sociability than their weight. All of them are eating well, foraging happily when they get the chance to free range, and are happy to scratch around and gossip with each other in their coop.
As for interest in food? Well, if the way they chased me all the way to the henhouse when they saw me with a can of sardines this afternoon is anything to go by...
My chickens truly never cease to amaze and amuse me and yesterday was no exception.
We have had a change in the weather the last few days with rain settling in for most of yesterday, so when I went to collect the eggs in the morning, I used an umbrella to keep me dry while I went up to the hen house.
Being quite used to the idea of an umbrella myself, it didn't occur to me that the chooks had never seen one in their lives before. I sallied forth through the light rain, carrying a dish of food with me, my mind occupied with feeding the hens, getting the eggs, opening their day run and all the usual things that run through my head on the 30 meter walk to the coops.
Usually when the chooks hear me coming, they run to the door to see what I have brought them, but on this occasion, they seemed a bit reticent. I stood staring at them in consternation. They stood at the opposite end of the coop, staring back with varying shades of alarm on their beaky little faces.
"What on earth is wrong with you lot?" I asked, glancing around for any signs of a snake, hawk or other predator.
Silence. Stares. Frozen postures.
And then it dawned on me.
"Oh! Silly chookies! That's just an ubrella!" I folded it and laid it on the ground and was cautiously rewarded by the hens creeping forward to greet me with dubious clucks of recognition as they each kept one wary eye on the now 'dead thing' lying on the ground by my feet.
We got on with the usual morning routine and then I walked back to the house, chuckling all the way about the incident.
Illustration from American Australorp Breeders website
In my daydreams, where I live in a perfect world and have unlimited time, budget, space and most importantly, health. I breed these chickens.
Australorps are a breed of chickens which was developed in Australia and is suited to Australian conditions, particularly extremes of heat. They are a dual purpose chicken.
Colour of Australorps is predominately black, with a 'beetle green' sheen to the feathers in sunlight, but there are other colours as well, including blue. They come in standard size and bantam and their temperament is tame and shy. They're great chickens for backyard laying birds.
I have one hen in my flock which is an Australorp "Utility" meaning that she is a hybrid/crossbreed with another variety, possibly brown leghorn or Rhode Island Red. My black hen is the 'alpha' hen of my flock and her name is "Boss," accordingly.
Boss not long after we got her as a POL hen
This is a photo of Boss not long after we got her. In this photo, she had not yet developed a big red comb because she wasn't yet laying. She is very close to the look of a 'standard' Australorp, but she has orange eyes (most 'lorps have dark/black eyes) and there is some brown feathering on her chest, which is not very clearly visible in this photograph.
She is a sweet little thing and takes her position as boss hen very seriously. She has even pecked me once when she thought I was taking too many liberties in the hen house!
I love her personality. She is indomitable and funny, and quite the larrikin when she wants to be.
Boss being a funny chookie!
The photo at right is my favourite picture of Boss. She was caught in the act of leading her coop mates into the out of bounds driveway. If it is possible for a chook to look guilty, then this photo is it!
Maybe one day, I will have my flock of 'lorps and by then, Boss may be just a distant memory, but in the meantime, I am happy to have this fiesty little hen in my flock and in my life.
Note to self, put her further away from the bucket next time! She then
proceeded to have a big drink of water. The other chooks in the pen next
door were on the roost, but when they heard/saw her drinking, two of
them came down and had a drink in their pen, too. It was rather cute!
There was none of that hesitant peering at it before taking a small
peck to taste it that you normally see when offering a new type of food. Rosie tried to rip the meat out of my hand before I
even got the wrapper off it! 
