I never thought I'd fall victim to chicken math....
We started last spring with six birds...one roo got rehomed, one pullet disappeared (we blame the neighbor's dog): we were down to 4. Got two more (an OE and an EE that turned out to lay brown eggs) from a backyard breeder: up to 6. Neighbor's dog came back: down to 5. (We went to the dog warden, put up a fence, and all was well.)
Early this spring, a hawk got one: 4 chickens. Hawk attacked another, left it blind, residing in our living room. 3 left in the coop - a Columbian Wyandotte, a Golden-Laced Wyandotte, and the Olive Egger.
Now we aren't getting enough eggs, so decided to get 4 new chicks (split an order with a friend.) By the time we got all the breeds we wanted from what we could find locally: (2 EEs, a bantam silkie, a welsummer, a brown leghorn, a RIR, and an australorp) now we have 11 chickens! And need two new coops, one for the blind one who needs to live separated from everyone else, and one for the new babies, who will go outside in early May, weather permitting.
Did I mention we live on a 1/3 of an acre, on Main Street in the middle of our town - in the historic district? And we have precious few building skills? (Coop 1 was made from PVC pipe, but I hate bending over to walk in and it's hard to clean. Luckily a friend has offered to help us build coops 2 and 3...
Chicken math!
We started last spring with six birds...one roo got rehomed, one pullet disappeared (we blame the neighbor's dog): we were down to 4. Got two more (an OE and an EE that turned out to lay brown eggs) from a backyard breeder: up to 6. Neighbor's dog came back: down to 5. (We went to the dog warden, put up a fence, and all was well.)
Early this spring, a hawk got one: 4 chickens. Hawk attacked another, left it blind, residing in our living room. 3 left in the coop - a Columbian Wyandotte, a Golden-Laced Wyandotte, and the Olive Egger.
Now we aren't getting enough eggs, so decided to get 4 new chicks (split an order with a friend.) By the time we got all the breeds we wanted from what we could find locally: (2 EEs, a bantam silkie, a welsummer, a brown leghorn, a RIR, and an australorp) now we have 11 chickens! And need two new coops, one for the blind one who needs to live separated from everyone else, and one for the new babies, who will go outside in early May, weather permitting.
Did I mention we live on a 1/3 of an acre, on Main Street in the middle of our town - in the historic district? And we have precious few building skills? (Coop 1 was made from PVC pipe, but I hate bending over to walk in and it's hard to clean. Luckily a friend has offered to help us build coops 2 and 3...
Chicken math!