Poultry Peeple

The other day one of my egg customers asked me, "So how many chickens do you have?"

And I didn't know! I used to keep track of all that, but lately, not so much. Chickens come, chickens go. They get sick and die. They get dragged off in the night by raccoons. Sometimes they just drop dead, and when I go out to do my afternoon chicken chores I'll see somebody's little corpse lying in the coop while the other chickens step around (or over) her as they go about their business. It's all very New York City, life in the coop.

So yesterday I popped open Google Docs and started cataloging who's still out there. Amazingly, that includes Pearl, my Gold-laced Wyandotte (an old American meat-n-eggs breed) who will be 10 years old if she makes it through the winter. Ten! We expect nothing of her these days except to enjoy the sun and look pretty.

There's Cleo, the Copper Maran hen who's a crappy layer of eggs but an excellent brood hen...Gary Seven the Leghorn who is the first to awake, the last to go to bed, and lays eggs like a maniac, even though she's gotta be pushing 5. Lurch the Jersey Giant, I almost never see her in the nest box. Oh, well. Amondine the Rhode Island Red who is top chicken and her mellow breedmate, Mushroom Mike with the crooked comb. Hefty Brosis, so large that everyone initially though she was a rooster. Jasmine, Patrice, and Marina, the Cochins (fluffballs, good layers). Bodhi, Dharma, and Cinnamon Girl the Ameraucanas, plus Ama and Owley, more Ameraucanas (green eggs, pretty feathers, good layers). Zoppe, the Barred Rock that we got last week when our neighbors said, "Say, there's a chicken in the tree down by the circus; is it one of yours?" No, but she is now.

Pearl, the amazing 10-year old hen. See, isn't she pretty?

And so on. The thing is, many of our birds are older if not ancient, and if I don't add some pullets or chicks soon I'm not going to have very many eggs next summer. But of course, no one has chicks now! Plenty of people giving away older birds, but that I don't need. So when I saw that A&L Feed had gotten a box of chicks Friday--they come through the Arcata post office--I said "Hot rats! Let's get us some chicks!"

Because I'm not a breeder, and for fun, I like to have a mix of birds in the coop. It's certainly easier to tell who's who. But the entire box of chicks at A&L was Ameraucana chicks--the one breed I have a lot of. What to do? I could wait for a future box (they're getting a couple more before the season ends) and hope I have a broody hen when they do, but...Marina, Cleo, and Jasmine have already been broody and given up so I can't count on them raising the babies. Live Free or Die, our sole New Hampshire Red, is in the next box now, hunkered down as though through sheer willpower she can make the infertile eggs she takes from the other hens and shoves under her body hatch. It's a fierce concentration.

The only hens still with us are Pearl and the black one on the far right: that's Cleo. The others? Gone.

So we grabbed an empty box and drove to McKinleyville, coming back with four Ameraucana chicks. In the past I have brooded them in my dining room, but I've got somebody living in there right now, so that ain't gonna work. Plus, I am tired of chick dust getting onto everything. Two of the cool things about chickens, is that once the sun goes down they turn off, and they really have no long-term memory, or not much, anyway. Whatever they do have they do not clog with useless facts like, Yesterday the humans slaughtered our brothers the roosters!, or Yesterday these were just eggs! Now I have babies!

So once Live Free or Die shut down for the night, I took the box of chicks out to the coop, opened the nest box, took out the eggs she was sitting on and put the babies under her. Once I heard the happy peeping, I shut the nest box and went to bed.

When I went to let them out this morning, Live Free or Die had lost that look of fierce concentration and now had the look of ultimate vigilance: I have babies!


The variety pack.

Hopefully she'll be as good a mom as Cleo is. But I can already see some pretty green cartons of eggs next year. I gotta mix this thing up!

Quite the Cheeple Puzzle

Okay, this puzzle of what breed the Cheeples are is driving me nuts. I am back to being sure of only Buttercup, the Buttercup pullet. And the Polish chicks, of course. Any ideas on what these little guys and gals are?

Mostly black with some red feathers, red ears, single comb, dark, clean shanks...Barnevelder? Java? Orpington? Chantecler? Buckeye?

Another mostly-black, with some white on her head, yellow shanks, red ears and a small comb...I have no idea.

Huh, yellow legs, single comb, white-tipped feathers...

Another shot of the hen with the sprinkling of white on her head; that other, similar chick is in the background.

Barred feathers, red ear, pink legs which are outside-feathered...I thought "Brahma," maybe a sport. And I thought I had two, but dig this: this one's got 5 toes! How could I have missed that? So now I really don't know.

Okay, this barred chick has yellow, outside-feathered legs, single comb, red ears, and only 4 toes. Both this chick and the 5-toed chick have cool, yellow eyes.

Whatever this one is, we only have one of it. Thoughts? Leghorn?

That white tipping again; same pullet or a different one, you tell me—my head's spinning.

See? Five toes.

I thought this was a Cubalaya, but they have white ears, and this guy's are clearly red. Single comb, dark, outside-feathered shanks...Langshan?

Hey, it's white-mottled head with white-tipped feathers. Does this help?

Can you guess what I am?

Well, clean, yellow legs, red ears, single comb and a pretty brown color. A hefty chick, too...

One more shot. Now, the chick in the background I know is a Gold-laced Wyandotte, 'cause I got them at the feed store. The chick in front...Let the guessing begin!

There are other chicks out there, but I got overwhelmed. Any help, Internet?

Another Cheeple Identification!

Now that the Cheeples have gotten down with sleeping outside (in their plastic tote shelter) without my red bike light as a guide, we've been working on foraging in the larger pen—still separated from the big girls—and perching:

A good shot of the blue splash Polish on the left, lower rung. On the top rung, second from the right and facing the camera, that's Dodo, the suspected Red-breasted Black Cubalaya cockerel.

Orange Gina assures me she is just looking.

Okay, that's Buttercup the Buttercup pullet on the top rung, left side. The mottled black-and-white chick, top rung center (just in front of Orange Gina)? I spent some time after feeding them and cleaning the coop just standing and admiring them today, and I noticed that both mottled chicks (there are two of them) have feathers on their legs. Hmm. To the Internet! I'm reasonably sure they're Brahmas, which is good news for Lurch, our Jersey Giant.

The Mystery Cracks Open

After brunch today my step-daughter and I were looking at the Cheeples playing in their outside pen. Out of the roughly two dozen chicks, just one has green legs. It could be an Ameraucana sport, and sports are certainly possible with the Mystery Assortment. Or it could be a Buttercup. I checked the Internet.

Buttercup chicks. Our little green-legged chick has racing stripes like these do...We have three or four light-colored chicks with racing stripes, but only one with green legs. (Photo by Marilyn Rhea Cheeseman, courtesy of feathersite.com)

If she's a Buttercup, this is what she'll look like when she's bigger, although her coloring is already coming in. Quite pretty! Too bad they're described a "flighty." While we've had pretty good luck with the Garys, our Leghorns, memories of the Lakenvelders lingers. (Photo by Bill and Sue Tivol, courtesy of feathersite.com)

The clincher was when I picked up the chick and saw she had the double comb—identity confirmed! (Photo by Lisa Feitshans, courtesy of feathersite.com)

We shall call her Buttercup.

Now, I also know I have a bunch of Polish chicks, black, white-crested black, white, and blue/blue-splash. I still don't know yet which will be roosters and which will be hens.

 (Photo by Ethan Logue, courtesy of feathersite.com)

 I am positive about one being a rooster, the great big chick we call Dodo. I'm starting to think that Dodo is the Red-breasted Cubalaya listed on the packing sheet. If that's so, this is what he should look like when gets bigger.

 If he gets bigger.

Cheeple Freedom Day

...or, the Day I Got My Dining Room Back.

The buff Polish chick on the left conveyed her anger by biting me.

 The chick on the right with the big red comb is the biggest chick, whom we call Dodo.

I'm pretty sure the weighty chick on the right is a Brahma—and we have two of them!

We've since identified the chick on the right as a Buttercup pullet.

The last two. I've got pine shavings all over my shirt because the chick on the right was very, very clever about avoiding capture. It was the only one who took advantage of all three dimensions by flying UP and over my hand.

Poo-free hands at last!

Chicks are here!

During the spring and summer, the end of the week is "Baby Chick Friday." The clerks put a note on my case at the post office so I don't run off and forget them. Sometimes it's a box of 25 chicks; sometimes it's 200. The clerk usually decorates the note for me:

Once in awhile the printout itself is the entertainment:

These are the notes I don't like to see:

Today? They all arrived alive and cheepful.

Day Six

I got a call out on the route today saying that five of the Cheeples had breached the cardboard barrier and were exploring the dining area/brooder. Since they didn't seem to be in any distress G-man made them a little gate so they could wander freely.

Yesterday they had an introduction to bugs—specifically worms, since I (strangely) could not find any rolly-polys in the back yard. In general the sharper of the Cheeples know that when the Tall Ones appear at the barrier, often times good things descend into their brooder. True, sometimes the Tall Ones themselves come in, and that's not so cool, but yeah, usually there's food. So they come running over to examine what we put in the litter. 

They definitely like worms. Seeing them eat the worms was like watching a mountain man rendezvous. They also like the dirt clods we put in the brooder...I suppose with all the crap we're giving them they need the grit to process it all. Most of the weeds and grass we put in they go through, but so far anyway the sorrel is what sends them over the edge. When they see it hit the ground the tone of their peeping goes way up.

"No, just watching. Seriously."

Day Four

So last year when we had a box of cheeples in our dining room, I used a huge box I dragged home from work as the brooder box. We rigged up a heat lamp suspended from an old broom handle and covered the whole thing with a big piece of hardware cloth. Not only was it difficult to get into the brooder box to clean and do maintenance, that piece of hardware cloth not only scratched the shit out of us but ripped holes in a lot of shirt. It also invited the cats to walk out on it so they could observe the cheeples from above.

Needless to say, that didn't work too well.

So this year, I just partitioned off the dining room with an old card table and hung their heat lamp from the ceiling fixture. A little bit of cardboard as a draft guard and a viewing platform (an extra chair) for the cats and us, and their set-up is complete.

I was concerned for, oh, about 5 minutes that the cats would just jump in the brooder and wreak havoc, but the only havoc was when Vivani pulled the card table over before we set up the viewing platform. Gina hopped in there once, but it was only to see if she could open the door to Narnia.*

We had one more chick die in the night, so it's back down to 24 cheeples. Still don't know what they are, other than the Polish, who look like they have cotton balls on their head.

And we know that they love, love, love the stems of sorrel, and bay shrimp. Spare bits of lunch meat are good, too. Watching them run with a bit of treat in their beaks is like watching a Pac-man screen.

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*Narnia. In the photo above you can see the edge of this built-in Old Man Schneitter added to the dining room. Considering how few closets this house has, I'm sure they needed the storage space, and the top works well enough as a bench. We also use it for storage—except for the two end cupboards, which are (for us) awkward space. But a couple of months ago Gina decided she liked opening the cupboard door and hanging out in there. Then we put their box top with their catnip over there, and now both of them like to go hang out in Narnia.

Again with the Cheeples

Yes, I again have a dining room full of chicks. Why?

1) They are insanely cute;

 2) I am down to six productive hens!

How'd we get down to six? Well, depredations last year reduced our numbers, as did the ladies' crazed jealousy of the Cochin duo's beautiful white fluffiness. And now one of the two Ameraucanas isn't laying—at all. Just up and quit. If she doesn't get going soon it's gonna sound a lot like "Chicken Run" back there. Cleo the Maran is broody. Again. And Pearl Wyandotte and Rhode Island Red Sonja are both old, so I don't expect them to lay much anymore. That leave six out of the ten working full-time.

Day One

Our box of 25 chicks arrived from the hatchery. One was DOA. The list that came with them said 10 were Black-crested Blue Polish, one is a Black-breasted Red Cubalaya—that one won't stay here long!—and 16 were "filler chicks." That's what you get when you order the Mystery Assortment!

Day Two

I saw that The Farm Store had Gold-laced Wyandotte chicks, and even though Marilyn and Pearl were just okay layers at best, people meeting the chickens for the first time almost always pointed them out and said, "Ooh, that one's so pretty!" Plus, I'm sentimental about the breed since they were our first-ever chickens. So we picked up two and added them to the group.

One of the little yellow fluffballs was deceased this morning when I went in to check on them, so starting on Day Three we are back at 25 chicks.

Down to Ten

"What happened to all your hens?"

That's what my neighbor wanted to know. We gave her the low-down. Between predation and re-homing poor layers, we now only have ten chickens wandering around the Coop de Ville.

(We would've had twelve, but for some unfathomable reason, ten of the hens decided that the feather-legged and -footed Cochins, two very pretty and mild-mannered hens, were Not Of The Body, and began harassing them. Short-term, it helped us give names to the two Cochins. The one that fought back was Earl; the one that hid in the nest box was Randy. When it looked like Earl's brain was going to start leaking out the top of her bloody head, we evacuated the pair to a friend's ranchette. I have never seen two hens so happy to take a car ride. They're now getting along famously with our friend's chummy Buff Orpington hen Ginger and Marty, the resident cock, who was verrrry glad to make the acquaintance of two new ladies.

In some far-off future where I have the room to try again with Cochin hens, I'd love to have a mix of white Cochins and pale-orange Orpingtons. It'd look like a Creamsicle.)

The outer, egg-laying popsicle shell surrounding...

...a delicious, meat-bird ice-cream center! What's not to love?

So, yeah, ten hens: Pearl, an older (5+yrs) golden-laced Wyandotte, Red Sonja and Amondine the Rhode Island Reds, Cleo the Maran who, like Sonja, is an older hen—4 years or so? Pecky Becky the Barred Rock, Lurch the Jersey Giant, The Garys, our two Leghorns, and the two unnamed Ameraucanas.

I've got an order in for more chicks from Sandhill Preservation Center, but I went for the Mystery Chick Assortment so not only do I not know when they'll arrive, I don't know what they'll be.

Gingrich

It still surprises me when people don't know what santorum means. It also surprises me that people do not know how to address an envelope, so maybe I shouldn't be surprised. But I am.

Anyway, maybe you'd be surprised to know that when chickens poop out an egg, the eggs are sometimes covered in poop.

So yesterday Greg decided that the dried, frothy mix of urea and fecal matter that sometimes soils an egg should be called gingrich.

I think it'll stick, myself.

A pair of gingrich-coated eggs.

Pix like I said

Another afternoon spent in the dirt, and with it warm enough that I was in capris and a t-shirt:

We've been keeping chickens for about four years now, but this morning when I cracked open some eggs for breakfast (cake!), even I was surprised at how yellow and perky the yolks were.

Not a great picture, but here's the new chicken coop: it's a three-part job, with two yards flanking a central, pest-proof pen. The central pen has a roof and walls to the south and west, but is otherwise open. Doors lead inside, and into each of the yards.
What do you think, Coop de Ville?

 Again, not a great picture...I'm getting fed up with my camera. Maybe I should just accept the inevitable and get an iPod. Anyway, that's what a ton of hay looks like when you spread it out. They layout is something akin to what a spider hopped-up on cocaine would weave.

Another shot of the straw-bale beds. My "plan" is to plant on top of the bales, and have areas bordered by the bales to plant, with old wood beds and random plants tucked here and there. Like I said, compromised spider.