Hi, All! We are new chicken addicts here and loving it! We really appreciate this forum and all the great info!!!
Our story in brief: 6 weeks ago, my BIL showed up at our house with a baby chick for my 8 yr. old daughter. He said that it was picking on his layers so he didn't want it. (We thought maybe he was giving it away because it was a Roo or maybe his layers were picking on it instead of the other way around. Its little butt was completely naked with no down.) We were not prepared to parent a chicken and had to scramble to make due. Fortunately, we had a large dog kennel that was not being used and an empty corner in the house. My BIL told us that the chick was four weeks old and he had no idea what breed it was. The chick was just beginning to get some feathers on his/her wings so I don't think that it was as old as BIL thought it was. After looking at lots of chicken pics, we decided that it is a Barred Plymouth Rock. It only took us a couple days to realize that baby 1 was going to be lonely so we went to the local feed store and came home with 3 one week old babies. For the first two weeks, we kept the 3 new ones separate from baby 1 since they were half the size. Now they are happily living together in a newly built indoor pen while waiting for "Daddy" to recover from hand surgery and build them their outdoor coop. We hope that all four are girls because we are very attached to them and our city has a noise ordinance that will prevent us from keeping a rooster.
We gave the Barred Rock the not so original name Pet Rock. The three younger ones are an EE named Houdini, an Black Australorp named Precious, and a Golden Sex Link named Omelet.
I can't believe how much enjoyment we are getting out of raising these chicks! Pet Rock is my baby and sits on a towel on my lap and watches TV with us! She especially likes Dancing with the Stars and American Idol!!!
Here is a pic of our babies taken a couple weeks ago. Pet Rock is around 7 1/2 - 8 weeks old and the three babies are 4 1/2 weeks old.
Our story in brief: 6 weeks ago, my BIL showed up at our house with a baby chick for my 8 yr. old daughter. He said that it was picking on his layers so he didn't want it. (We thought maybe he was giving it away because it was a Roo or maybe his layers were picking on it instead of the other way around. Its little butt was completely naked with no down.) We were not prepared to parent a chicken and had to scramble to make due. Fortunately, we had a large dog kennel that was not being used and an empty corner in the house. My BIL told us that the chick was four weeks old and he had no idea what breed it was. The chick was just beginning to get some feathers on his/her wings so I don't think that it was as old as BIL thought it was. After looking at lots of chicken pics, we decided that it is a Barred Plymouth Rock. It only took us a couple days to realize that baby 1 was going to be lonely so we went to the local feed store and came home with 3 one week old babies. For the first two weeks, we kept the 3 new ones separate from baby 1 since they were half the size. Now they are happily living together in a newly built indoor pen while waiting for "Daddy" to recover from hand surgery and build them their outdoor coop. We hope that all four are girls because we are very attached to them and our city has a noise ordinance that will prevent us from keeping a rooster.
We gave the Barred Rock the not so original name Pet Rock. The three younger ones are an EE named Houdini, an Black Australorp named Precious, and a Golden Sex Link named Omelet.
I can't believe how much enjoyment we are getting out of raising these chicks! Pet Rock is my baby and sits on a towel on my lap and watches TV with us! She especially likes Dancing with the Stars and American Idol!!!
Here is a pic of our babies taken a couple weeks ago. Pet Rock is around 7 1/2 - 8 weeks old and the three babies are 4 1/2 weeks old.
