A neighbor had to tear down a brand new, poorly constructed two story deck. The new carpenter wanted nothing to do with any of the mess that the last guy left behind, including the framing materials.
Everything that was destined for the scrap pile ended up in my yard and I have started...
Roadrunner, our 5 1/2 month old EE laid an extra large egg a couple of days ago. After thinking about it for a while I started thinking that maybe we had our first two yolk egg. Sure enough, we cracked the egg for breakfast this morning and there was the double yolk staring back at us.
The...
The last of our hens is now laying. The hold out was my 5 year old daughter's pet, a Buff Cochin named Gold Diamond.
This weekend a couple of neighbor kids, with dad's help, were feeding our pets while we made the rounds of family Christmas parties. They called me Sunday morning wondering...
Roadrunner is my son's hen. He bought her back in July from our local feed store, labeled as an Ameraucana. All he really was a bird that would lay blue eggs. Looks like he got his wish after 5 months and a few days.
We got home from church and I went to turn the hens into the yard when I...
We brought home a day old Ameracuna and a Buff Cochin chick about 2 months ago. From day one the Ameracuna has been really flighty and hard to catch, even in the brooder. The Buff Cochin is also harder than any of the other chicks I've ever hand raised, but not as bad as the Ameracuna.
2 weeks...
The neighbor's son brought home a dog with a talent for CLIMBING over the 6 foot privacy fences. The dog got two of our three birds a couple of weeks ago, right before we left for a 10 day road trip.
A different neighbor watched our survivor, M&M while we were gone. Things have finally...
Almost 7 month old Buff Orp. Laid her first egg 3 days ago.
I guess she was holding back, because she laid one this morning, sometime after 7 am. About 5pm I saw her head for the hen house. It is hot out, so I assumed she was just heading for better shade.
When I went out to close...
7 1/2 months since we brought chicks home for the first time (and 5 1/2 months since we had to buy all new chicks, after the neighbor's dog had a 6 chicken feast), we have an egg!
Not sure which of my three girls laid it, but the kids and I danced around in the yard when we found it!
It's that age old story.
Kids want chickens. Dad knows nothing about chickens. Farm store sells chickens. Dad buys 4 straight run pullets. Kids are happy. Hens thrive.
A frequent question popped up a while back. "Dad, why does that Light Brahma have a comb and the others don't?" And...
I finally got around to moving our (un-carved) Halloween pumpkin off of the front porch today, while I was stringing the Christmas lights outside.
I laid the busted pumpkin in the yard and let my 4 girls go at it. They spent 2 hours picking that sucker clean. I thought i was going to have...
3 weeks ago, my kids and I jumped back into backyard chickens, after our neighbor's dog did in our last flock .
When I bought buff orp hatchlings, this girl looked a little darker than my last three, but nothing really noticeable. Now at 3 weeks, she has all sorts of white and brown coloring...
It was only a week ago that the neighbor's dog wiped our 6 Light Brahma and Buff Orpington chicks. That was our first effort at raising chickens.
After spending all weekend strengthening the fences and trying to decide when we would get more chicks, I found out that the farm store had more...
We had 6 eight week old hens. 3 Buff Orps, 3 Light Brahmas. Our 4 year old Great Pyrenees dog had been a perfect gentleman around the birds. I had let my guard down and quit worrying about him being in the yard while the birds were loose.
Tonight I went out to clean the coop and to get...
My 4 year old daughter and I have been reading a lot about caring for the chickens. She was intrigued this morning when we were talking about dust baths.
We let the chicks run around in the garden for the first time this morning, since nothing except a few herb plants survived our dry...
OK, be gentle. This is my first try at chickens. And I have a 4 year old and 6 year old helping me with all stages of coop design, building and chicken care.
I was going to build a chicken tractor. Lots of recycled lumber to work with, so that we could have 2 chickens in the backyard. One...
Hello all,
My family and I have finally jumped into the fray. We have been reading and researching backyard chickens for a while. A neighbor had a few chicks about 3 years ago and since then I have been thinking about trying a flock of my own.
Friday we brought home 3 Buff Orpingtons and 3...