Ducks & Chickens

The ducks went to a new home. Our mallards are a happy couple on a friends pond! And the Pekings went to a duck farmer, they were aggressive to the mallards and NASTY to keep on our sized property. It was a fantastic experience and I hope to do mallards again next year. They were so loving and would follow us around! 

Our chicks are now teens and starting to produce eggs for us. After almost a year of chicken keeping I can say it is awesome and not too much work. It is a wonderful thing, even in out city home. We expanded out flock to new breeds, but were not able to get any rainbow layers :( Hopefully next season!

We plan to add 6-8 a season to keep egg production up. We will likely rely on the eggs and the meat from the ones at the post peak laying era of their lives for food once we head into retirement, in about two years.

 

 

Chicken Coop Re-do...No more escapes!

Here is the new enclosure that my husband did Saturday in the rain! He fixed both issues...the hawks /flying out of the coop and them escaping under the fence. Here is the result. Two days since he did it and NO issues! Such a relief!

It is hard to see the wildlife netting that is over the Chicken Run, but the entire thing is covered.




You might also note that we have our composter near the coop as it attracts bugs they like to snack on!

Our girls...

He made this handy lift for the netting at the gate. The netting is attached to the board. So we have easy access to the coop, yet the birds stay out. The pallets were placed on the side where they dig the most under the fence.

Yard Fresh Eggs! (We can hardly call our home a farm!)

This is a pic of our first eggs. We are getting 3-4 a day generally now. Yummy!

Our Chickens

Here is picture from the day we got our hens...that is their coop (their yard was not yet fenced in at this point). They eat out of our hands and are a blast to have. They are...Princess, Bambi, Flour, and Snowflake.

The dogs don't dig as much as the chickens do!

Ok, I might look like I have no idea on chickens, but I can tell you in all my reading and studying chicken keeping I have never seen where chickens dig out off their coop! Mine did it again today! The last escape I thought was by accident. I thought the dust bath was just too close to a low lying place in the ground and they got out. Today I think they know!!! They made a "hole" under the front of the fence. It is crazy. We looked into the yard and saw them out. I redid their netting before my trip and knew they would be safe now...guess I was wrong! So in addition to us building a new frame for the netting over the  ~10x24 yard, we now have to work on the lower part of the fence. I wonder if this is normal chicken behavior or we have a gang of chicken bandits! lol.  They are fun, just way more interactive than I ever thought!

Chicken Information...Sometimes it does not match up to my reality!

I just got a new book...I shall leave it unnamed for the time being, till I evaluate it more. It had some information that I feel was not good for the city chicken keeper (the book is geared to the homesteader in non traditional environments). It stated that a person can let the chicken forrage off the land during gardening season for its food. I agree they can forrage, but I firmly belive they also need supplmental food from the human that is keeping them. Most yards are not big enough to offer adaquate nutrition for chickens, nor are most diverse enough to supply the chickens with a diet they need to produce eggs and grow correctly. Our girls have a large city yard. They have had access to it (not by our choice many times!) They have a large fenced pen and a nice coop. Lots of area to find bugs, seeds, and so forth. But we have fed them well consistantly, and have reaped the very good side to that...lots of eggs and healthy chickens! So just be careful as to what you read (or as to what advice you follow is a better way to put it)...many folks might write books, but they might not really know how to do what it is they are writing about!

I would love to reccomend Becky's Homestead. She has a blog, and I have purchased her DVD to have to watch (the videos are on the i tunes for free...that is how we came across her)  It is a lot of very good information for homesteading, and covers many areas, to include chickens. I watched and gleaned a lot from her long information before we ever got chickens. She knows what she is talking about because she has DONE it! Plus she is positive and fun to watch!

We have a healthy flock whom are laying about an egg a day per chicken even though it is daylight savings time...which can cause for lower egg production. I think if I had followed the forrage advice during our growing season , our chickens would be unhealthy and not producing yet. If you have lots of land, that is a whole different story, but for those of us in the city, feed your chickens!

The Best Yet Chicken Escape...Totally Crazy!

So today was quiet and calm...mostly. Then one of my daughters went to feed a dog and found 3 of 4 chickens missing from the coop!!! She said they were in the neighbors yard! So my son and I gathered up our jackets and went to find them...and after a while of chicken chasing we caught the three escapees. The fourth had managed to yet again get out of the coop and into the yard! The amazing thing was how they managed to get to the neighbors yard. We have a 6' wooden privacy fence and they got out UNDER it! Yep, they dug a little spot over time and got out. I am most thankful they did not go to the road...we live right on a 5 lane road with a lot of traffic. IF they had feathers would have went flying!!  The spot did not appear that they could get under it, but it was the only way we can figure they could have gotten out. So I worked on placing boards up so the small gaps are even smaller. With all this new chicken drama, we are going to have to make some revisions to the chicken area!

I will try to get pics to post of the before and after. They have a lovely coop, I just wish they would stay in it! And I have to say, our neighbor (a young guy) came out to help us get the chickens...I don't pick them up too often so it was good to have others help corral them. That was a blessing too. And to make it all even better my Hubby came home with a DD coffee for me...which was nice because after catching the chickens, and working on their coop, it was cold! He did not know they had gotten loose of course, he was just being a great guy! And wouldn't you know it...I had showered and had on my clothes to go to Church tonight when I ended up crawling around in the coop:) Yuck-o! lol ;)

The Great Chicken Escape!

As I posted before, the hawk and chicken thing happened. The hawk lost that round, but we promptly put up wildlife netting over the top of our entire chicken run. We left a small opening (like the size of a little plastic stepping stool) uncovered as it was up against the fence and next to the nesting box. We have a part that covers our gate that lifts open but it was left open and our chicken Flour made her way to our yard! I was not yet up and could hear her making a fuss...I thought she was having issues laying her egg.  I was impressed! But we got her all settled back in and covered the gate. Then much to our dismay she was out for a walk this morning! The little space is all that she could have managed to get out from...again I am impressed with her escaping, but I won't be impressed if the hawk gets her, so now we will try to tweak it so she cannot escape.

It is amazing to watch the chickens. They each have have a personality! Flour is determined to get out, and Snowflake likes to sit. Bambi is mellow and Princess likes to follow Flour. She was a fellow escapee prior to the netting going up. The others just follow the rules..something  they probably were just happy with when the Hawk had it's claws on Princess!!! This spring we plan to add to our flock, maybe adding 6-8 baby chicks. That will make for many new escapees.

Hawks and Chickens...Very Bad Combo!

Today as I was preparing to make lunch, I looked out over our back yard...and I saw a dreadful site...a hawk with it's glorious wings spread over our beautiful brown chicken. Thankfully my husband had just gotten home, so after seeing me get all my feathers ruffled, he bounded to the back yard! We were able to rescue our chicken, and were so sad to realize that another one was missing...apparently the appetizer for the hawk. After some looking, and some tears from our littlest child, we were delighted to find our brown chicken was actually not as harmed as we had feared. In fact, it appears she is just fine! We watched the hawk sit and watch us. We looked in our many neighbors yard to see if our other dead chicken was there, or if the hawk had dropped her alive. It was not, so after getting the hens settled back into a locked inner coop within their pen, we set off on how to protect our gals from future attacks.

We ate lunch and I was feeling a bit gloomy...my kids each named their chicken...and we had no plans to eat these chickens, they were for eggs only, though we did say maybe in the future we would consume them. Now one child's was lunch for a hawk, or so we thought. Our yard is sparce, not much place for a hen to hide aside from the coop and ONE very small shrub. We have planted many things since we moved in, but they have not grown to a large size yet. So after we ate we went to talk about covering the chicken pen...and my husband gave the neighbors yard one more look over our 6' wooden fence. He was trying to get a view of a neighbors yard that was blocked by their shed and looked in the one tiny shrub that was in our yard in the corner...and much to our delight~it was Flour, our large white chicken! She is such a fun gal, and completely unharmed! It was such a blessing to not have lost one!

Living in the city affords us a lot of opportunity..like few raccoons and other animals that prey on chickens. We have a friend who has lost over 20 chickens to such things, as he lives in the "woods". But we got a good challenge with this Hawk!

So now we are going to cover our gals about 10' x 22' pen with plastic netting. That will allow them to get light and air, but keep the hawk away. Their coop is fenced on all sides, but it is too small to keep them in for their good health. We were having our hens in our yard (which caused so much damage, but they could hop their fence~another story!) so this solves two things...no more escapes into the yard and will keep them safer.

I do fear this upset will cause our hens to not lay. A huge bummer as they began only about a week or two ago laying! Time will tell.

Chicken Keeping & Dogs with Chickens!

Chickens are a big craze...loads of people have them now, even those like us that dwell in the city. Laws are generally favorable, just check your local ones before you start! We can have as many as we desire here, but chose to start with 4 teenager birds, all girls. We value the neighbors we have and a rooster, though legal, would be a pain to them!! We prefer to keep the peace where we live and be respectful.

 We got our girls from a chicken breeder (is that what they are called?!?!) Apparently due to the move & the adjustment, our girls waited about 5 months to begin laying, vice the two they should have taken. Chickies take about 6 months to begin laying if you get a baby.They are lovely creatures, but have managed to escape their spacious coop and tear up our newly landscaped yard....repeatedly! So we are still deciding as to how to handle that situation. 

We began our chicken keeping by ordering a coop...it was expensive. If I had it to do over again & the time (we were moving,remodeling, and my husband was away on his job for 6 months in the time surrounding )  I would build one of some type. I am happy with what we have though. This spring we plan to get some baby chicks for our hens to raise.

I have found chicken keeping very easy and inexpensive. They have consumed about one round of feed (a bag of layer & a bag of whole corn) over the 5 months. We also feed them veggie scraps, fruit scraps, some oats (I just pick up a can at the grocery store when on sale and feed it to them from time to time) and oyster shell. The oyster shell lasts for a very long time....with just four chickens, I think that we our bag would last for two years, at least. We have changed to cracked corn and a grain mix  in addition to the layer since they have begun to lay eggs. They have gained a lot of weight and all of our eggs have been intact (no soft shells). They are pretty easy as far as day to day care goes also...we clean the coop when needed, change nesting box material when needed (not too often), and they have a hanging feeder for the layer and two waterers. We just give them a toss of the grains about every day.
Our dogs (a beagle and a morkie) would get a little intense with the chickens at first. But after several months and some chats with the dogs, all is peaceable and we can even leave them all out together. We had to watch and correct the dogs for a while when the chickens were out.It was a bit of work, but worth it to have all the creatures live in tandem. If in doubt, do not allow them to be together. Once a dog kills a chicken, you have harder issues to deal with and that will upset your hens...thus hindering egg production, which can last for months.  Give it time!