Théo and the chickens des Sauches

[RoyalChick]

I've noticed a pattern recently : he's really interested every time my partner uses some tool to work. A future career in the making .

It's @RoyalChick and @MaryJanet 's faults for telling me they are pretty ! I do find Chipie and Merle very beautiful in their way for farm mutts chickens .
Théo I also find beautiful, but he looks still quite strange right now so. If he finishes molting soon I'll see if he regains his former shining colours.

Gastounet has really stolen my heart with his funny goofy ways, but not with his look ! I have a photo of him I want to enter for Pow. I did notice a photo of a RIR rooster entered in the contest who looks quite similar.

I don't think any of them have the beauty of heritage breeds, but the contest specified anything belonging to the poultry order could be entered .

I am not backing down on my favorable views of Chipie, Merle or Piou-piou!

 

[ManueB]

The morning didn't begin too well. Gastounet got off his roost before I had opened the run, so our breakfast was interrupted by terrified screams. When I opened the run, he ran chased by Théo and threw himself in the chicken nettings (the same one he has jumped over at least five times now) and caught himself in it. I managed to get him out before he succeeded in killing himself. He was panting and turning purple, but after a few minutes he went to eat and things got back on track.

The chickens stayed under cover almost the whole morning, but in the afternoon they enjoyed the sun. Piou-Piou and Gaston spent all the afternoon cooing together. Théo played pretty rooster around the ex-batts. I gave an egg to Cannelle this afternoon which Théo and Chipie decided to have a part of. This ended in drama as Chipie stayed in front of our house a bit too long and got attacked by Gaston. Théo hearing this instantly turned crazy and came out to chase Gaston. Screams and terror again .

After some discussion on an other thread, I moved Théo's roost 30 cm/11 inches away from Gastounet's, so that it's now about 80 cm/31 inches in front. The idea was that they wouldn't be so close to one another.
I was wondering if Gastounet would manage to reach his roost as he gets there by jumping on Théo's roost : the wider distance didn't bother him at all. Then, when Théo and the ex-batts came in, Théo didn't attack Gastounet... but this was due to the fact that Chipie got thrown off her roost by Nougat, one of the ex-batt. Chaos ensued. Chipie was thrown away from every roost, including by Théo. She finally managed to roost next to Merle and Gaston didn't attack her.

 

[MaryJanet]

I've noticed a pattern recently : he's really interested every time my partner uses some tool to work. A future career in the making .

It's @RoyalChick and @MaryJanet 's faults for telling me they are pretty ! I do find Chipie and Merle very beautiful in their way for farm mutts chickens .
Théo I also find beautiful, but he looks still quite strange right now so. If he finishes molting soon I'll see if he regains his former shining colours.

Gastounet has really stolen my heart with his funny goofy ways, but not with his look ! I have a photo of him I want to enter for Pow. I did notice a photo of a RIR rooster entered in the contest who looks quite similar.

I don't think any of them have the beauty of heritage breeds, but the contest specified anything belonging to the poultry order could be entered .

Often mixed breed chickens are the most gorgeous of all! Ivy gets many compliments, Peggy not as many but still a few every now and then. Black hens are always lovely, no matter what their breeding, they're just so lustrous.

 

[ManueB]

Often mixed breed chickens are the most gorgeous of all! Ivy gets many compliments, Peggy not as many but still a few every now and then. Black hens are always lovely, no matter what their breeding, they're just so lustrous.

I guess some mixed breeds chickens can be very unique in their looks and colours ! I also find black chickens very beautiful. I saw them on internet first, we don't have that many black chickens here.

I wonder who are Merle's parents, I will have to ask Gaston (who gave us the eggs). She came from a bantam egg so her mother must have been a bantam and her father standard.

 

[ManueB]

Nougat suddenly went into hard molt mode today : this morning she looked just a bit messed up and this evening her whole butt was bare . In the two spots where she napped she left a carpet of feathers and she has turned from brown to almost white!
Blanche has also finally started molting but she does it differently. I only noticed because she has a single lone black feather growing on her neck.

No eggs again today !

We had treats for the chickens : the last melons from the green house and some couscous dish with vegetables, garbanzo and chicken our neighbour gave us. His daughters keep bringing him food that ends up in our chicken's gizzard. Both were huge hits. After eating the couscous the chickens were kind of slow and took time digesting. For the first time in a long time, there was no drama at roost time .
This afternoon we finished putting a windbreak netting on the lower part of the run. The chickens can't see outside anymore, but they seem to like that.

Forgot to say that Theo's legs looked better, and that we saw some sticktight fleas on Gastounet's comb yesterday. We took him in the house to try take them off. He squealed like a pig when I carried him so I just held him on the floor and he did really good ! He didn't want to get out of the house when we're done and has been trying to come back in since .

He's really eager for Piou-piou to lay. He makes her nests all around, lies in them and clucks at her , but she just scratches around and doesn't get the drift .

A typical morning scene

Sunbathing
Léa

Nougat

Léa and Cannelle

Eating melon

Wondering how the lid comes off

Shaking rooster sequence

 

[Perris]

He makes her nests all around, lies in them and clucks at her , but she just scratches around and doesn't get the drift

Or perhaps she's more discerning . It's fun watching this, but I've learned that most of my girls wisely reject most of my boys' proposals for nesting sites . Chirk, for example, keeps picking spots on the terrace, so any egg laid there would land on hard slate, just beneath the surface weed/moss/leaf or whatever. The girls generally find much better spots.

 

[RoyalChick]

We had treats for the chickens : the last melons from the green house and some couscous dish with vegetables, garbanzo and chicken our neighbour gave us. His daughters keep bringing him food that ends up in our chicken's gizzard. Both were huge hits. After eating the couscous the chickens were kind of slow and took time digesting. For the first time in a long time, there was no drama at roost time .
This afternoon we finished putting a windbreak netting on the lower part of the run. The chickens can't see outside anymore, but they seem to like that.

What do you think caused the no drama at roost time?
I know you moved the roosts, but it sounds like also they were stuffed full and needed to digest. Maybe you should start giving them a heavy dinner rather than breakfast so they all just need to sleep it off!

 

[ManueB]

Or perhaps she's more discerning . It's fun watching this, but I've learned that most of my girls wisely reject most of my boys' proposals for nesting sites . Chirk, for example, keeps picking spots on the terrace, so any egg laid there would land on hard slate, just beneath the surface weed/moss/leaf or whatever. The girls generally find much better spots.

Well, my point yesterday was that Piou-piou wasn't laying yet .
But it turned out the unlikely couple knew something I didn't because Piou-piou laid a first tiny egg today! In her sleeping nest . She's the first of Chipie's hatch , even though she was a slow grower and is still a runt little cutie .

What do you think caused the no drama at roost time?
I know you moved the roosts, but it sounds like also they were stuffed full and needed to digest. Maybe you should start giving them a heavy dinner rather than breakfast so they all just need to sleep it off!

I think either they had too much drama the night before or they were having trouble digesting, because this morning has been quite agitated to say the least. To say the truth, I'm just waiting for my partner to be psychologically ready to move out the stuff in the barn and make a chicken corner in there, because it's obvious there will soon be a real clash whatever we do.

 

[Perris]

But it turned out the unlikely couple knew something I didn't because Piou-piou laid a first tiny egg today! In her sleeping nest .

that's terrific!
I'm jealous. Mine generally wait till the days start drawing out again before they start

 

[Shadrach]

I'm pretty sure if you built a second coop many of these problems would sort themselves out. I write this having had similar problems and finding the this provided the best solution.