My Kansas Chicken Story

[Eilsel]

Yesterday and today were the first times they’ve had the pop door open to their run yesterday no one was brave enough to get past the “porch” but today everyone made it out for a little (supervised) exploration! Also , my tiniest chicken was the first one to hop up to the “big kid” roost! They were all still a little wound up after their trip outside so I’m going to sneak out in a little while and see if anyone is sleeping up there tonight!

 

[Eilsel]

5 weeks old today and I went out to the coop tonight and almost everyone was roosting just like big kids!

Now to figure out what to do with these guys:

 

[Eilsel]

I never thought I would get so attached to chickens but i just spent a weekend away from them and I couldn’t wait to check on them when I got home! Here’s what the goofballs were up to when I returned:

Ruby, Dotte, Wobbler, Bertha, Princess, Caramel

They have a perfectly good roost at the same height 16 inches away from the wall that they use regularly- not sure what this was all about.

Also I’m fairly certain the GLW all the way on the right (Caramel) is a cockerel- look at that PINK comb! His neck feathers (hackles?) are also coming in much pointier than his sister’s. This is making me paranoid that I’m seeing pink in all the other combs too!

My biggest BR (Bertha) is still the friendliest, even letting me pet her back, while the others don’t mind my presence but would rather I didn’t invade their space too much.

Full disclosure: I still can’t tell my RIRs apart so their names are pretty flexible

 

[Eilsel]

8 weeks old as of yesterday! They have had the pop door open during the day for the last two days and are enjoying the run.
Dotte (back) and Caramel:

Bertha:

Red Hen #1/Princess

Wobbler:

Red Hen #2/Ruby:

Meanwhile, Darkwing and Launchpad have also made the move outside after definitely outgrowing my kitchen! I can’t wait to be able to put them out on the pond but I’m waiting for them to have more feathers. For now it will just be the kiddie pool, which is gross in this picture but was refilled right after!

 

[Eilsel]

Hard to see, but when I went outside last night to close up shop everyone was on the roost looking out the window!

 

[Eilsel]

First big adventure outside the run yesterday. They stayed pretty close to their run but did venture a little further. It’s crazy to think that two months ago they were just little balls of fluff- starting to look like real chickens!

 

[Eilsel]

Yesterday I had my first chicken casualty. I think Wobbler had a congenital issue, she was always a runt and had issues the first week I brought them home. She just became more and more listless all week and passed yesterday during he day. Just glad my first loss wasn’t something traumatic like an animal attack. RIP little Wobbles.

 

[Eilsel]

Been a while since I’ve updated. Sadly I lost my other BR, Bertha, to some dogs. I also lost a duck to an unknown predator. Therefore, chicken math ensues... for every one lost it has been replaced by 2. When I went to get new chicks he didn’t have any barred rocks so I ended up getting 4 black sex links. I also wanted more variety in my ducks so I thought I got 2 silver Swedish... but they’re looking more like one silver crested Swedish and probably a Pekin. Launchpad has taken to being a foster father really quickly and it’s pretty darn cute. Oddly I don’t have any duckling pics but here’s a fun pic of the 4 chicks when I took them to get some time in the big kid run yesterday evening.

 

[Eilsel]

Just got alerted that this week was my one year anniversary at BYC! More updates on my flock, no pictures right now, I'll have to add them from my phone later.

Seems like I'm only coming on to talk about losing birds, but such is life, and I'm refining my chicken keeping as a result. My brother likes to remind me "that's what chickens do best- die."

Much to my dismay, both ducklings I purchased in the summer were drakes. They turned out to be a Silver Swedish and a Blue Crested Swedish. They, like Launchpad, wanted nothing to do with my pond and instead spent their days in my backyard until I herded them back to their house in the evening. In the beginning of October I was out of town and my husband got home late one night when a storm had rolled in, in that storm he found one chicken roosting on our old farm truck in the rain, and thought three more were missing, as well as two of the ducks. The next morning two of the chickens came back, but in that storm I lost one of my BSL and one of my GLW, the Silver Swedish and the Rouen- all gone without a trace. I was down to one duck and 6 chickens, and it remained that way for quite a while. The duck took up residence with the chickens, which made my coop a mess, and they all got along fine. Mid-November a Canadian Goose started living on my pond! Then in December she was joined by a snow goose for a few days, then both geese and my duck disappeared! So now I'm down to 6 chickens. 3 BSL that are now almost 7 months old and 2 RIR and 1 GLW that are almost 10 months old.

I expected not to like the BSL very much, for some reason I thought they would be ugly, but they are quite pretty! Fluffy chickens with a beautiful green sheen to their feathers, and they're not too flighty.

For a while, all the birds got to free range because a few of them figured out how to jump out of my run! I was gone over thanksgiving and so I covered the run with wire so I didn't have to have someone come open and close the pop door all the time. I had been letting the birds free range all day and be locked up at night, but since I lost the duck I've been keeping them locked in the run while I'm away from home, then I let them out after work for about an hour until they put themselves to bed.

I'll do a picture dump in a little while!

 

[Eilsel]

Lots of pictures in no particular order...

All 3 ducks at the end of the summer... RIP.

My first official egg! There was a broken one on the porch the day before this but I count this as my actual first egg.

Nest box, round 1! My first attempt at the jig saw.

Nest box, round 2. I decided my first one wasn't big enough and I might as well make use of all my available space. Kept the first one in case I want to add on eventually.

Dottie hen

Coop layout- I've since hung the feeder and moved the water outside... for the winter their waterer is a heated dog bowl.

Duck house flood! We got so much rain in October my pond overflowed! At this point I was down to one duck living with the chickens so it wasn't a real issue, but It did make me reconsider this location if I want to use this pen again.

Miscellaneous pics from one day hanging out in the woods below the pond with the chickens, dogs, and horses.

Thanksgiving blizzard! My nest box was COMPLETELY FULL OF SNOW- more on that later.

First snow of the year (October) went to do head count before locking up the coop and came up one short... heard some grumpy clucking above me and...

My current flock as of Dec 15, 18. It's rare that they're all close enough together for me to get a picture.

Sealed the gaps on the nest box to help weatherproof it! This was a long time coming, I just never thought of it until it was wet and I'd say "the next time it's dry for a while..." finally happened this weekend!

My super construction skills at work- this board sagged a little bit when I hung the waterer on it, so I decided to give it a bit of support with what I had laying around.