Greetings from Indiana!

pipdzipdnreadytogo · Jun 9, 2011

Hi, my name is Kristin and I am a teenage hobby farmer and I live in northeast Indiana. I've been referencing the BYC forum for almost a year now and I decided it was about time I joined the fun for real!

I'm a college student right now, majoring in animal sciences but considering minoring in agriculture. My biggest interest is birds, so I guess that's why I'm so taken by my chickens. Other than caring for my birds, I play the harp and, well, that's about it. We've had chickens since I was 12, but I didn't really take over their care until the past couple years. Now they truly are my girls and EVERYONE knows it.

Our flock is pretty good sized; 20 girls in our coop, plus three newcomers on quarantine, a girl recovering (not sure what from, she may have been egg-bound), and a hen who's just naughty and had to be removed from the flock for now. Plus this year's 13 chicks who are staying in their brooder in my bedroom until the weather's nice enough for them to go out.
We have 3 Easter-eggers, 4 Rhode Island Reds, 7 Red Sexlinks, 3 Golden laced Wyandottes, 3 Golden Sebrights, 3 Silver Sebrights, 1 mystery hen (who is all white with faint patches of cream and rust; she's a sweetie, too), and 1 who is a mix between our Delaware/x roo and, well, one of the above listed hens (probably RIR). We got 6 Barred Rock chicks and 7 Easter-Egger chicks this year (unfortunately, 2 of the EEs look like roosters ). Everyone except the chicks are named (and they'll be named, too) and we even have some 7-year-olds in the crowd. Basically, any hen that falls into our care is darned lucky. (We have two other roosters, a RIR and a mix, but we've actually found someone to take them!)
On top of this, we have 11 Guinea fowl who we got as an experimental 'watchdog' troup, but I've found them to be quite endearing and hope to keep future generations around. We have a variety of pearl, pied pearl, royal purple, pied royal purple, and lavender colors. They're too difficult to tell apart or I would name them all, but I do have one called Short Stuff (the only royal purple) who was a runt when he was growing up in the brooder, but is just as big as the rest of the boys now.

I actually found the site thanks to my mom, who joined shortly after finding it, but didn't do anything more. I do live with my parents and my 'rent' is them not having to do the dirty work with the birds. My younger brother and older sister (with her daughter) live here as well, so it's a pretty full house. We have too many dogs, just as many cats, and practically a zoo of other animals inside. Pretty much everything kept in a cage in the house is my responsibility as well (though only two species are actually 'my' pets; a conure and three budgies). We live in a wooded area which keeps the hawks at bay for the most part, and I guess the 'pack' of dogs that we have roaming our house and property keeps the other predators at bay. It's a pretty safe place to be a chicken.

And, well, I imagine y'all are sick of reading about me, so... Thanks for reading anyway! I can't wait to be a part of the forum and contribute where I can!

Edited to remove my age...