Took my 3 yo grandson, and oldest DD to the coop with me today. Grandson had a blast. He loves the chickens, and is so sweet with them. He likes to help feed, and water them too. The best part is watching his face light up when he sees the eggs in the next boxes. He tries to be sooooo careful collecting the eggs. He knows which ones are the cockerels, and he can be around them. He knows which one is the rooster, and that he has to stay right by me in that coop, until I run the rooster out. The rooster is not aggressive, but it is a rooster, and I'm not taking any chances with my little grandson.
The adults birds are molting. Looks like a pillow fight broke out in the coop, and the rooster lost his last tail feather. He looks better without it now, since he looked silly a couple days ago running around with only one tail feather left. The two red stars are not doing as bad as they did last year. Last year I renamed one Baldie. She looked like a totally plucked chicken. This year, when I began seeing a few feathers around the coop, I began treating them with Calf-Manna, but have since put them all on showbird feed, which is higher in protein. They are going through a lot more oyster shell too, but they look better, and have plenty of new feathers coming in. Of course, laying has dropped drastically, but that will resume shortly.
Almost all my life, I had a stash of things to re-purpose. I discovered early on that DH had no clue about trying to re-purpose anything, except computer parts. Used, to him was almost a dirty word. When we moved in together into our first apartment, I had previously lived in a big house, with a good sized yard, which got packed up, and put into a climate controlled storage unit. A couple years ago, he insisted I downsize, and get the storage bill lowered. To him, everything was junk. I told him the welders, full bottles of acetylene, torches, masks, etc. could be sold. His reply: "No one would want that junk". I had an antique cedar closet, and cedar chest which had been passed down to me from my grandmother, that were in perfect condition. When I mentioned selling them, again he said "No one would want that junk". I had a 1 year old commercial pool heater for a very large pool, which I wanted to sell. Again I heard, "No one would want that junk." I had a new riding mower, weed eater, etc. which I wanted to sell. Nope. My grill was thrown out too, with the promise of a new one. He trashed my dining room set, and threw it out. I put my foot down on the living room set, china, silver, crystal, and my front loader washer. He assured me he would replace it all with new, good stuff. A couple of my friends came over to help me clean out the storage unit. They even tried to tell him that most of my stuff was in very good condition, and would be expensive to replace, but was worth running an ad in the local shopper to sell, or at least do a yard sale. No way, he wouldn't budge. I gave a lot of it to them.
Fast forward, we moved into this house. Ok, let's check out grills. Wow, to replace the one of mine that he threw out is going to cost him $500.00+ He had no idea I had paid that much for mine. Next, a cedar chest, not one that's lined with cedar, but an all cedar, with the trays that raise up when you lift the lid...I thought he was going to faint. Um, did I know that to replace my weed eater it was going to cost him a few hundred dollars? Yes, I did. DUH! 3 weeks ago at a yard sale, I bought 12 (complete with all hardware) window blinds, and paid $10.00 for all of them. They are sitting in the garaged. He has fussed about them since I got them. A few days ago, we were in the garage when a neighbor came by, that is a contractor. He saw the blinds, and asked me if I knew they sold for about $45.00 each, and that I had over $450.00 worth of blinds sitting there. Yes, I knew that. The look on DH's face was priceless. He was shocked. I've not heard a word about my "junk" blinds since then. When we were discussing building my coop when we get our own place, I have been adamant that we WILL take our existing coop down, and re-purpose the materials. He has fussed a bit, BUT after pricing materials, he's learning that "used, can be perfectly fine, and used doesn't always mean junk". The point is, he's learning.
The adults birds are molting. Looks like a pillow fight broke out in the coop, and the rooster lost his last tail feather. He looks better without it now, since he looked silly a couple days ago running around with only one tail feather left. The two red stars are not doing as bad as they did last year. Last year I renamed one Baldie. She looked like a totally plucked chicken. This year, when I began seeing a few feathers around the coop, I began treating them with Calf-Manna, but have since put them all on showbird feed, which is higher in protein. They are going through a lot more oyster shell too, but they look better, and have plenty of new feathers coming in. Of course, laying has dropped drastically, but that will resume shortly.
Almost all my life, I had a stash of things to re-purpose. I discovered early on that DH had no clue about trying to re-purpose anything, except computer parts. Used, to him was almost a dirty word. When we moved in together into our first apartment, I had previously lived in a big house, with a good sized yard, which got packed up, and put into a climate controlled storage unit. A couple years ago, he insisted I downsize, and get the storage bill lowered. To him, everything was junk. I told him the welders, full bottles of acetylene, torches, masks, etc. could be sold. His reply: "No one would want that junk". I had an antique cedar closet, and cedar chest which had been passed down to me from my grandmother, that were in perfect condition. When I mentioned selling them, again he said "No one would want that junk". I had a 1 year old commercial pool heater for a very large pool, which I wanted to sell. Again I heard, "No one would want that junk." I had a new riding mower, weed eater, etc. which I wanted to sell. Nope. My grill was thrown out too, with the promise of a new one. He trashed my dining room set, and threw it out. I put my foot down on the living room set, china, silver, crystal, and my front loader washer. He assured me he would replace it all with new, good stuff. A couple of my friends came over to help me clean out the storage unit. They even tried to tell him that most of my stuff was in very good condition, and would be expensive to replace, but was worth running an ad in the local shopper to sell, or at least do a yard sale. No way, he wouldn't budge. I gave a lot of it to them.
Fast forward, we moved into this house. Ok, let's check out grills. Wow, to replace the one of mine that he threw out is going to cost him $500.00+ He had no idea I had paid that much for mine. Next, a cedar chest, not one that's lined with cedar, but an all cedar, with the trays that raise up when you lift the lid...I thought he was going to faint. Um, did I know that to replace my weed eater it was going to cost him a few hundred dollars? Yes, I did. DUH! 3 weeks ago at a yard sale, I bought 12 (complete with all hardware) window blinds, and paid $10.00 for all of them. They are sitting in the garaged. He has fussed about them since I got them. A few days ago, we were in the garage when a neighbor came by, that is a contractor. He saw the blinds, and asked me if I knew they sold for about $45.00 each, and that I had over $450.00 worth of blinds sitting there. Yes, I knew that. The look on DH's face was priceless. He was shocked. I've not heard a word about my "junk" blinds since then. When we were discussing building my coop when we get our own place, I have been adamant that we WILL take our existing coop down, and re-purpose the materials. He has fussed a bit, BUT after pricing materials, he's learning that "used, can be perfectly fine, and used doesn't always mean junk". The point is, he's learning.
