Pippin27
Chirping
- Apr 2, 2020
- 50
- 27
- 86
Hi peeps! 
I am new to this forum and am very excited to be a part of this community! I have been reading about various chicken topics for the last few months on this website and it has been such a HUGE HELP. So thank you to all of you for being so supportive and informative! Here are my answers to the introduction questions:
(1) Are you new to chickens / when did you first get chickens?
Yes. I got my first fertile eggs to incubate 5 weeks ago and now its an obsession.
Only problem is we don't have the space for all of them so I need to find new homes soon. 
My partner says I am turning into a "crazy chicken lady". I am okay with that. Haha! I first started incubating eggs with my high school science students and they LOVEEEEED it! It engaged them on a different level and got them super excited to come to class. We candled the eggs, did chicken genetics, recorded data daily etc. I am a big advocate for it not just being something done in K, 1st, 2nd, 3rd grade because there are so many ways to make it a higher level experience for older kids. About 25% of my students had an elementary school teacher who incubated eggs and for a lot of my students it was there first time being part of the incubation process. Anyhoo then COVID happened and I had to move my whole incubation set up to a small room in my house and I had to transport 3 dozen eggs in the last quarter of incubation home!
(2) How many chickens do you have right now?
(3) What breeds do you have?
Alive and walking around: Olive egger, easter egger, austrolorp, buff orps, silkies!!!!!, barnyard mixes, copper maran
Incubating currently: silver laced wyandottes, purebred buff orpingtons (golden and lavendar), olive egger, copper maran with blue maran
(4) What are your favorite aspects of raising backyard chickens?
(5) What are some of your other hobbies?
beachcombing (agates and fossils), post war model trains, outdoorsy things especially on the water (scuba diving, canoeing), gardening, hanging out with my other critters (3 cats), trying to meditate, i am learning how to SEW!, traveling to cool places outside the US
(6) Tell us about your family, your other pets, your occupation, or anything else you'd like to share.
I live with my boyfriend. We have 3 cats and many chickens. I am a teacher. I moved to Portland 2 years ago. I am originally from New York. I am obsessed with FROGS! But I would not have one for a pet because they are very hard to keep alive. My African Dwarf Frog (given to me by friend who moved) lived 7 years and was the vet's tiniest patient (few grams). After this frog died, I decided to be done with having a pet frog despite many people offering me their frogs. They are best kept outside in their natural habitat.
(7) Bonus: How did you find BYC, how long have you known about BYC, and what made you finally join our awesome community
I found BYC by googling various chicken questions. I have known about BYC for about 3 months when my chicken research began. I decided to join today because I have a question about my new incubator that I want to post but could not post without having an account PLUS this hobby is getting serious and I really want to be part of a community of like-minded chicken lovers like me. Also its a beautiful day out today and I'm on my lunch break and actually had time to sign up. Hooray!
I am new to this forum and am very excited to be a part of this community! I have been reading about various chicken topics for the last few months on this website and it has been such a HUGE HELP. So thank you to all of you for being so supportive and informative! Here are my answers to the introduction questions:
(1) Are you new to chickens / when did you first get chickens?
Yes. I got my first fertile eggs to incubate 5 weeks ago and now its an obsession.
Only problem is we don't have the space for all of them so I need to find new homes soon. My partner says I am turning into a "crazy chicken lady". I am okay with that. Haha! I first started incubating eggs with my high school science students and they LOVEEEEED it! It engaged them on a different level and got them super excited to come to class. We candled the eggs, did chicken genetics, recorded data daily etc. I am a big advocate for it not just being something done in K, 1st, 2nd, 3rd grade because there are so many ways to make it a higher level experience for older kids. About 25% of my students had an elementary school teacher who incubated eggs and for a lot of my students it was there first time being part of the incubation process. Anyhoo then COVID happened and I had to move my whole incubation set up to a small room in my house and I had to transport 3 dozen eggs in the last quarter of incubation home!(2) How many chickens do you have right now?
- 5 chickens who are 5 weeks old
- 13 chicks who are about 1 week old
- 17 eggs currently incubating
(3) What breeds do you have?
Alive and walking around: Olive egger, easter egger, austrolorp, buff orps, silkies!!!!!, barnyard mixes, copper maran
Incubating currently: silver laced wyandottes, purebred buff orpingtons (golden and lavendar), olive egger, copper maran with blue maran
(4) What are your favorite aspects of raising backyard chickens?
- observing them and their little antics (ex. playing keep away)
- spoiling them with treats (ex. hard boiled egg)
- developing connections with them and trying to tame them
- learning new things everyday (this is my nightly reading)
- hatching! and having it on LIVESTREAM so my students can watch the chicks hatch in real time
- doing weekly health checks with my baby chicks (weighing them, photographing them, checking for pasty butt etc.)
- learning about all the breeds and their needs and life history
- getting the coop ready outside and building it from scratch with my partner. Cinder blocks are really heavy and are coop (fingers crossed) will be predator proof!
- just how precious they are! they calm me down when i am stressed. the babies are so sweet, and innocent and curious. I love watching their developmental changes both physically (wings, size etc) but also their behavior changes (pecking orders starting, personalities emerging)
- MANY MORE THINGS
(5) What are some of your other hobbies?
beachcombing (agates and fossils), post war model trains, outdoorsy things especially on the water (scuba diving, canoeing), gardening, hanging out with my other critters (3 cats), trying to meditate, i am learning how to SEW!, traveling to cool places outside the US
(6) Tell us about your family, your other pets, your occupation, or anything else you'd like to share.
I live with my boyfriend. We have 3 cats and many chickens. I am a teacher. I moved to Portland 2 years ago. I am originally from New York. I am obsessed with FROGS! But I would not have one for a pet because they are very hard to keep alive. My African Dwarf Frog (given to me by friend who moved) lived 7 years and was the vet's tiniest patient (few grams). After this frog died, I decided to be done with having a pet frog despite many people offering me their frogs.
They are best kept outside in their natural habitat. (7) Bonus: How did you find BYC, how long have you known about BYC, and what made you finally join our awesome community
I found BYC by googling various chicken questions. I have known about BYC for about 3 months when my chicken research began. I decided to join today because I have a question about my new incubator that I want to post but could not post without having an account PLUS this hobby is getting serious and I really want to be part of a community of like-minded chicken lovers like me. Also its a beautiful day out today and I'm on my lunch break and actually had time to sign up. Hooray!
I love frogs to but outside!
Glad you joined.
