rolohman
Songster
I've been wanting to start a thread so that I can keep track of my own musings as a first-time chicken owner (long-time chicken sitter). I chose the name since my chickens....are in the woods. The coop is NOT the nice brown building off to the left (that is my kids playhouse, built during the first COVID spring), but is nestled into that dark shady hole between it and the house. The chickens won't get too hot, at least.
The name is also nice because we get Chicken of the Woods in our woods ALL the time:
This is actually Bears Tooth or similar, but we get that and a range of others in the family, plus lots of other interesting lichens and moss.
History:
We bought our chicks from Mt. Healthy Hatchery and they shipped Aug 23rd of this year. All showed up healthy and happy! We requested females and are nervously awaiting the result.
So far, we have:
Atilla the hen: Black Copper Marans
Shakipiyo: Buff Orpington
Night: Black Australorp
Taco: Golden Laced Wyandotte
Beans: Easter Egger
Cloud: Olive Egger
Dolly Parton for President 2024: Olive Egger
We call her "Dolly".
So far, Atilla and Shakipiyo are the friendliest, the others are a bit skittish. I go out there before the coop closes up and hang out for a bit with treats until they start ignoring me and scratching, and then I've been picking them up one at a time and gently petting them for a bit. Two evenings ago, Beans (the most skittish) actually came back for more pats after I put her down.
Picking them up has been really helpful since I'm trying to check their feet and learn about crops - yesterday I was a bit alarmed at how dense some of their crops felt, so I got up early today to get out before they ate and grabbed a few of them. They didn't like that - it was breakfast time!!! But it assuaged my fears - no big lumps felt this morning.
Other recent news:
Sleeping - the chicks all are sleeping in a pile in the larger of my two nesting boxes. So....much....poop. I bought a light. I blocked off the nesting boxes. I went out there and manually put them on the roosting bars after dark. All I got were angry chickens who hopped back down and slept on the floor in a huff since they couldn't get into the nesting boxes. So...I've given up for now. I bought some sweet PDX and am now scooping the poop with a cat poop scoop and it's working well. It kind of surprises me since they DO sit on the roosts for most of the day - whenever they aren't out scratching. That's been great - lots of poop on the poop boards, easy to clean. My next steps are to try making them a little ladder, and to look into a dim all-night night-light that they could use. The Omlet light that interfaces with our automatic door turns off suddenly instead of just dimming. I think that startles them.
I'm obsessed with my two wifi webcams. One in the coop, one in the run.
I need to make grit and oyster shell dispensers since my little ruffians knock over anything I put in the run. I want to do the PVC pipe ones, but haven't made it to the hardware store.
And....we also got pigeons! They have a separate sleeping area and very high natural roosts (~9 feet above the ground), since I knew I needed to make sure they could get away from the chickens. However, I've been surprised at how much time they all spend together, down on the ground. Occasionally they get chased by a chicken, but sometimes they are resting right next to eachother. Perhaps the fact that they can see eachother in the coop helps - it's just hardware cloth between them. It means I have to have TWO heated waterers, unfortunately.
). I'm sure yours will get there.
