Crazy Acre Chronicles, San Antonio Area - W/ Pics

  The Adventure really begin in March of 12 when the DH agreed to the idea of getting chickens....

  This is my family. DH Larry, 8 yr old son Jason, 5 yr old daughter Aiyana, and myself.

We also share the property with my parents and sister. and our closest neighbors are 2 cousins and my Aunt and Uncle. (My Grandparents divided up the property among several children)

 

 

  Now that i had a willing DH, i went to town! I started by finding the Tractor Supply website, and looking at breeds. I also found coop plans there for free, and chose a design i though i could build. 

  I went to TS, but the pullets are in one bin, not marked by breed, and the only breed marked was straight run! Since i wanted to just get a laying flock, any Roos were not going to be part of the plan. Although i fell in love with a couple i met there, i resisted the urge to bring them home. Not having the coop finished helped me stay strong!

  I then found a neighbor who raises and sells chickens and Dwarf goats. (I kind of wanted a Dwarf goat too...) They only had one of the breeds i was interested in, and wanted several dollars more then i would have paid for the chicks at TS. What they did though was turn me on to Ideal Poultry. They had ordered from them and been pleased. Also found out that my local TS gets their poultry orders from Ideal anyway.

  Now the plan was to go straight to Ideal. I could order however many i wanted, and they would ship straight to me. I would also be able to order just pullets of the breeds i wanted. Now that it was for real, my sister wanted to through in an order of Mallard ducks with my chicken order. When all was said and done we ended up ordering 10 Mallard ducks, 10 Buff Leghorns, and 10 California Whites in April, and they arrived May 4th. 

  With the chicks and ducks ordered, we now had a month to get the coop and fence done. I am Proud to say that my sister and i built this coop on our own!

 

 

 

 

 

This pic is of our new chicks first few min in their new coop. I had bought Cedar shaving for the coop, and read on the Ideal site that same morning that Cedar shavings were not healthy for chickens. So, i go clean out the coop, and dump all the shavings. 

 

As you can see we only have 9 baby ducks in this picture. One was smothered by the others during shipping. Ideal was prompt in refunding the cost. 

 

I'll post more soon, with more of our babies!

Edited by Nomibear - 8/7/12 at 12:18pm

This was early the next week. We sat in the bathroom for hours just watching these little guys enjoying the water. Well, we kind of had to! They destroyed the box within a couple days, and the tub NEEDED to be washed out at least twice a day!

 

Jason had so much fun holding them, and was so gentle:)

Thank you, we actually finished the coop in 4 days of working. We are enjoying them alot. Our poultry is all 14 weeks now. Still fun, but it kind of feels like purgatory, waiting on our first eggs.... And we prob still have another month or two to wait!!

I'm back!

Of course this was just the start. Here are some of our other fav pics as they have grown

 

This is one of my favorites. I want to say they were about 2 weeks old here.

 

 

Maybe 3 weeks old. Getting some time out of the brooder. They loved the grass and bugs

 

We moved their brooder/coop into their yard. Guard-dog Nala has already reported for duty.

 

either 4 or 5 weeks old here, sorry don't remember... Is this full chested look what they call a full crop?

 

This is Dino, at about 13-14 weeks. We called her that because of those slate colored legs. We ordered Buff leghorns, and those should only have yellow legs. Several people from BYC have said she's really an EE're... We like her anyway

 

about the 13-14 week range.

 

14 weeks, nesting boxes added:) I'm very expectant... lol

 

 

This girl is such an even shade of buff, and was just a bit smaller then her hatchmates. She is now called Buffy, like the vampire slayer!

Well, for some of Family's highlights...

Aug 4th was our 10th Anniversary! So many of our friends marriages have fallen apart along the way. I am so blessed and Thankful to God for keeping us together through the good and getting us through the bad.

 

After homeschooling K-2nd grade, Jason is starting 3rd grade at our church school. This was way harder for me as his mom then it was for him

 

 

A couple weeks ago, the chickens needed their wings trimmed. They were getting into the trees. While i was clipping their wings, Aiyana stood on a bench so she could "calm" them and pet them. I turned around to get another chicken from the coop. She fell off, and the bench came down on her... Fracture on the humerus just above the elbow.... Ex-rays every week!

 

 

Our chickens turned 16 weeks old Yesterday!!! 

Here is a pic of "Floppy" with some of her hatch mates, enjoying the shade by the trees

 

 

Our Mallard Ducks were ordered in the same shipment, also 16 weeks. We now only have 7, 4 boys to 3 girls. Sorry ladies!!

 

 

Floppy is only 16 weeks, but with that lg comb and waddles, I'm hoping she is an early layer.

 

 

For their 16 week birthday they got a new feeding method. We are now trying Fermented Feed. Just using Layer Pellets right now, but wanting to add in some scratch soon.

 

 

The one to the right is Dino, She was ordered as a Buff Leghorn, but with those slate legs, I am being told she is prob an EE. To the left on the hutch is Celeste, She is my lightest colored BL. In the back of them are two of my other BL girls.

Well. We've reached 17 weeks old. Here is Buffy.

 

This is one of our other California whites. The spikes on her head look so big, i guess because they are standing up so straight. No name yet...

 

Here is Dino. Still not much for waddles or comb.

 

Our ducks are looking almost grown. This week the white collar is showing up on the boys. One of the girls was playing at mating one of the other girls this week...  

 

In family news. After 3 weeks, Aiyana's cast is off! They still said we need to play it safe for a few more weeks, but everything is looking good!

 

See you all soon! ~Naomi

Oh, and P.S. We added 4 golf balls to the nests. Hopefully this will inspire them to lay those first eggs there instead of in the yard somewhere....

OK, so.... yesterday my sister decided to add a miniature Goat to our family. We drove out, and meet about a Dz this lady had for sale. Those that were a couple months old were not tamed really at all... Since this little guy is intended as a pet and companion for the poultry and Nala, we wanted it raised to be as friendly as possible. SO, Bottle baby here we go! Faunus is 4 days old today.

 

Here he is getting settled into his now home. That is a 2x4 support for the chicken coop....

 

Floppy is 18 weeks old today. Still haven't found a single egg

 

Here is another of our un-named chickens. As you can see, Floppy isn't the only one looking mature.