Spring Chicks!​

With Spring comes new baby chicks for a lot of us. Mine are coming in from the local feed and supply store again (until I have some committed setters who will hatch babies for me). I ordered more New Hampshire Reds, they just seem to have the best personality for our backyard so they will continue to be our staple egg layers. And after the dog problem was finally dealt with last year I am once again starting Bourbon Reds though they won't be in til May. Our main difference this year is we ordered our first batch of Silkies! I'm really excited to see these babies grow up and even though I can only get straight run I'm hoping for enough girls to keep around and to implement into our future outdoor rabbit house.

Besides the chicks come all sorts of spring projects that although not cute and fluffy nevertheless signal a change in seasons. We are putting in a little bit of a garden and have already been sampling some of our own greens. Along with that we are installing more fence to give the goats some extra room to graze and actually building an outdoor run area off the original barn for the chicken run. It's not that I don't like the free ranging chickens, but our girls don't like nest boxes and we have an egg thief. The culprit, Peggy our pot-bellied pig, isn't to blame I mean if someone laid an egg in your bed you'd have claims to it and any other egg on the ground too right? While some of the hens have gotten pretty inventive on laying spots (anyone else found an egg just below the rafters on a 2x4?) we have one hen that just loves the pig wallow to lay in, so the girls need a bit more structure and we're building an outdoor run to connect to the indoor fenced chicken run (inside 8'x10' lots of room for the girls on rainy days). I can see giving them occasional free access to the yard especially when it comes time to turn over the garden for the season.

So good luck to all fellow chicken hobbyists and their new spring chicks this year!