The Edenfield's Journey: Chickens

Earlier this year we had a broody Silkie. She sat on 6 eggs for 23 days and hatched 3 baby chicks. They were so pretty! I bought an additional dozen chicks but sadly, a fox got into the chicken coop and we lost the Silkie and all but two of the babies. One is a beautiful Sussex/Buff Orpington cross, she is white with a few black tipped feathers, her name is Elsa, and the other is a Barred Rock, her name is Midna. Elsa and Midna should be laying sometime around July! They are nearly full grown and very sweet.

We later bought 6 more chicks, 3 Isa Browns, and 3 Red Rangers. One of the Red Rangers died, but the other 5 chicks are doing well. I don't expect them to lay until around October and maybe not even then, I have heard that sometimes if a hen reaches maturity too late in the year she may wait until spring to start laying, we shall see!

I am really pleased that all of the chickens get along so well, even at all of their different ages. I kept them separated at first. They could see each other but couldn't get to each other. After a few weeks I put them all together and they seem to be getting along just fine. They only two chickens that don't get along well are the two roosters. The dominate rooster is a Sussex. He is big and bossy and won't let my other rooster, a Partridge Plymouth Rock, anywhere near the flock. The PPR is named Survivor but I sometimes call him scaredy-cat or Mister. He is beautiful and has a green tint to his dark brown feathers. He sleeps outside of the coop on the swing set. He is terrified of people and runs whenever a person gets too close.

In about a week we will have some more babies! One of the Buff Orpingtons is sitting on eggs. She started out with 3 wooden eggs and 4 real eggs, the day after she started sitting I added 3 more eggs and took away two of the wooden eggs. She really didn't like me taking away the wooden eggs! I couldn't get the 3rd one. One day last week I saw her off the nest so I grabbed the last wooden egg out. I knew I should mark the eggs so that no new eggs would be added by other hens, but I didn't do it and yesterday I noticed she now has 8 eggs instead of the original 7. Oops! I guess we will just wait and see what happens. I will try and mark the 8 today and make sure no more get added. I think they will be due around the 25th. When the Silkie was broody her eggs hatched at 23/24 days, a little later than the usual 21. I don't know if the extreme heat will have an effect on when/if these eggs hatch. I really hope they all hatch! At least the 7. Jason said he was really excited about having more chickens because it would mean more eggs, I reminded him we have no way of knowing yet if the chicks that hatch will be hens or roos! He said he hopes at least half of them are hens.

We also lost one of our two Black Australorpes this year to a Opossum. I think he was trying to get eggs and she got in his way. She wasn't killed but was injured too badly and I put her out of her agony. It is hard to do things like that but I didn't want her to continue suffering and there was nothing else I could do for her.

I love having chickens! It is not nearly as complicated as it sounded when I was researching raising chickens. I wish I'd gotten them a long time ago. I love having fresh eggs each day. Its the coolest thing to go out to the coop in the morning, get a warm freshly laid egg out of the nest and go inside and cook it up for breakfast! Its super healthy too!