Greetings to everyone, and a huge thank you to this community for all the great information I have gotten from you all while starting my journey into chicken keeping!
My wife and I are Peace Corps volunteers serving in eastern Ecuador. We are taking advantage of the opportunity to start raising chickens. Two weeks ago we purchased two cockerels and two pullets (we were hoping for three pullets, as one of the cockerels looked female at the time...); they are approximately 4 months old now. Because of the constantly warm weather we have in the Amazon jungle, they grow very quickly compared to the northern climes. We got our first egg earlier this week!
Being new to the chicken world, we're not sure of the breeds. My guess is that they are mixed across several different breeds, as we got them from a neighbor rather than from a commercial provider. If anyone is a crack for breed identification, I'd love to hear your thoughts about what our birds are!
Sara was the first to lay, and definitely the dominant bird in the flock. She laid one beautiful egg a few days ago, and ate an entire 12 inch culebra ciega (blind snake) the same day. The next day she laid two perfect eggs!
Sara checking out the nest box
Sara's first egg
Sara eating a Ciega snake. She likes to eat food that looks like her.
The Ciega is not actually a snake. It's a species of little-understood animals falling somewhere between earthworms, snakes, and amphibeans. South America has some weird animals.
Banana is the cockerel we will be keeping for breeding. He's just started to learn how to crow, and it cracks us up every time we hear his broken little adolescent voice. Because he's the smaller of the two cockerels and has golden highlights, we thought to call him Orito ("little gold" in Spanish). This is also a type of very small and sweet banana, so he ended up being Banana instead.
Lunch is the larger cockerel, but he is not as aggressive or attentive as Banana. Probably don't need to elaborate our plans for him...
Fiona is the smaller pullet. She is the lowest in the pecking order and hasn't started to lay yet, but we're hoping she will be broody like her mom. When we catch cockroaches to feed to the chickens, she tends to get most of them because she is faster than the others.
Fiona hanging out with Lunch, Sara in the background.
That's it for now!
inbrick
My wife and I are Peace Corps volunteers serving in eastern Ecuador. We are taking advantage of the opportunity to start raising chickens. Two weeks ago we purchased two cockerels and two pullets (we were hoping for three pullets, as one of the cockerels looked female at the time...); they are approximately 4 months old now. Because of the constantly warm weather we have in the Amazon jungle, they grow very quickly compared to the northern climes. We got our first egg earlier this week!
Being new to the chicken world, we're not sure of the breeds. My guess is that they are mixed across several different breeds, as we got them from a neighbor rather than from a commercial provider. If anyone is a crack for breed identification, I'd love to hear your thoughts about what our birds are!
Sara was the first to lay, and definitely the dominant bird in the flock. She laid one beautiful egg a few days ago, and ate an entire 12 inch culebra ciega (blind snake) the same day. The next day she laid two perfect eggs!
Sara checking out the nest box
Sara's first egg
Sara eating a Ciega snake. She likes to eat food that looks like her.
The Ciega is not actually a snake. It's a species of little-understood animals falling somewhere between earthworms, snakes, and amphibeans. South America has some weird animals.Banana is the cockerel we will be keeping for breeding. He's just started to learn how to crow, and it cracks us up every time we hear his broken little adolescent voice. Because he's the smaller of the two cockerels and has golden highlights, we thought to call him Orito ("little gold" in Spanish). This is also a type of very small and sweet banana, so he ended up being Banana instead.
Lunch is the larger cockerel, but he is not as aggressive or attentive as Banana. Probably don't need to elaborate our plans for him...
Fiona is the smaller pullet. She is the lowest in the pecking order and hasn't started to lay yet, but we're hoping she will be broody like her mom. When we catch cockroaches to feed to the chickens, she tends to get most of them because she is faster than the others.
Fiona hanging out with Lunch, Sara in the background.
That's it for now!
inbrick
