Broody Penny; or Don't Count Your Chickens Before They Hatch

A couple of weeks ago, Penny began acting strangely. I noticed her chasing the other chickens away from the entrance to their coop, while fluffing up her feathers in a threatening display. Then she took up residence in one of the egg boxes and made weird noises when I approached. I evicted her, but she'd keep going back. Penny was broody! I figured I'd toss her out of the nesting box a few times and she'd forget about it, but Penny was determined.

Madeleine and I discussed the broody chicken problem and started joking that we might as well let her sit on her eggs, but the problem with letting her do that is that if no chicks hatch, she'd just keep at it. Without any resident roosters, we were unlikely to have any hatching. 

Not to be deterred by a simple lack of roosters, last Sunday (a week ago) Madeleine and I went begging at some neighbours where we had heard roosters crowing. They have a small flock of hens and two roosters and they kindly offered us 9 potentially fertilized eggs for Penny to sit on. We quickly prepared the chicken tractor for Penny's personal use so that she doesn't have to deal with nosy or jealous hens. Kind of like a home for unwed mothers. We told the others she'd gone to stay with an aunt in Toronto for a few weeks.

Once a day, or so, Penny descends to ground level to eat, drink and poo. I took advantage of her absence to check in on the eggs. The observant among you will notice that there are seven eggs, but we started with nine. One egg had a hole pecked in it within hours of being placed under Penny. The other completely disappeared - shell and all, by the next day. Penny had a guilty yolk stain on her face so we can only assume that she ate it. Bad bird.

When Penny comes down to do her business, she becomes the centre of attention. The others are very curious about what she's doing in there.

Penny spends a lot of her short break all fluffed up and warning off the others. Not that chickens normally display a lot of intelligence, but Penny seems to be operating on pure instinct these days. I hope her instinct will carry her through the next two weeks and beyond to caring for the chicks. That may be thinking too far ahead, given her record of egg destruction so far, but she appears to have settled in and no eggs have disappeared for several days.

June 3 is hatch day. I'll post an update - hopefully including pictures of cute little chicks.

Monday Forest photo: March 19, 2012

11:00am 18C sunny

 So sorry about the missing month of Monday Forest. I did take pictures, and I'll probably post them for continuity's sake sometime. We've gone from winter to summer and it isn't even officially spring until tomorrow. I read in the paper that some expert is calling this stretch of hot weather (mid twenties in March!) a 1 in a 1000 year event. Yesterday, the record high temperature was broken by 9 degrees C and there's warmer for later on this week. In fact, the forecast low for Wednesday night is higher than the previous record high. This weather is impossible not to enjoy at this time of year (well, any time of year) but it's a little like how I imagine it feels to live the high life on stolen loot. In this case, we've stolen our kids' climate.

The forest floor is coming to life even though only yesterday there was still snow covering more than half of it. I don't know what this hairy-tongued thing is.

For comparison, this picture was taken last week, when the temperature got up to a whopping 12C. This is what kids in Canada do - on the first nice day they put on shorts, find a patch of bare ground and skype with their friends on their mom's laptop. With chickens. Just like when I was a kid. Except for the skype and laptop and chickens. More like transistor radio and book, but still.

Monday Forest photo: February 6, 2012

2:00pm 5C sunny

 Oh February sun, you are a tease. You touch my face with your warm rays, but we both know it won't last. Today was an exercise in living in the moment. The pleasure of the fine weather was tempered by hearing on the radio later that the temperature was a record high for the day. Sigh.

The pond was in fine shape for a skate before it warmed up above freezing this morning.

The chickens enjoyed the sun, but were highly suspicious of the snow. A couple of them did a hop, skip and jump (with flapping) to roost on a log closer to the house, but mostly, they wait for spring.

They thought there would be cake at the grand opening

The girls got a first look at their new sunroom/rain shelter this morning. Yesterday I finally got the plastic on because rain was forecast for today, and I don't like to let the birds out to free range in the rain - they're just not very good at staying dry. Soggy chickens are pathetic little creatures.

The chickens have been sharing the winter coop now for a week, but they still keep to their own groups. The two white chickens and two red chickens nearest the ramp are the old ladies, and the rest are the teenagers. From what I can tell, though, everyone is getting access to the food and water and there isn't any violence.

Dax doesn't seem to fully appreciate that she is among the 1% of chickens. Hopefully, she'll enjoy the new space this winter.

Chicken nuggets

Today was the culmination of Project Flock Blend. This project started back in June when we got five new day old chicks who took up residence in the large winter coop while the original flock of four spent the summer and fall in the chicken tractor. I knew from the beginning that we'd have to move everyone into the winter coop before winter. The girls have been free ranging in their two separate flocks for months now, but don't mingle much, though the old ones do chase the young ones away from goodies.

The temperature is forecast to hit -10C tonight, which seems like winter to me, so Madeleine and I grabbed each of the four old chickens and put them into the big coop with the pullets. Everyone was a bit miffed at the disruption of their ordinary routines, and there was much complaining.

The old chickens captured the floor level and the young chickens retreated atop the straw bales which are stacked under the roosts. The old birds partook of the offerings of both feeders and the waterer while the young ones watched, annoyed. When we left, after half an hour or so, there was an uneasy truce, and it was starting to get dark.

I'm sure there will be some jostling for sleeping space tonight, but chickens do enter a kind of nightly torpor, which should prevent any conflict overnight, and hopefully they will wake up slightly confused but well-rested and genial (or at the very least refrain from maiming each other over breakfast).

In every flock, certain chickens stand out for some exceptional trait. Martha, our Plymouth Barred Rock, shown above at the far end, is notable for her lovely appearance and stupidity, even by chicken standards. Martha frequently finds herself lost and was voted most likely to be eaten by a coyote.

Uhura is the chicken who comes running towards me when she sees me approach. She seems to speak for the pullets and objected the loudest to having new roommates.

 

Photo credit for all the chicken portraits to Madeleine.

The coop is undergoing an expansion this year, with the addition of a sun room. It's still under construction, but I'm sure it will be appreciated this winter.

Monday Forest Photo: September 5, 2011

10:00am 15C overcast

Summer's over, right on schedule (equinox, shmequinox). Overnight it went from hot and humid to cool and breezy and some leaves have turned colour and a few have even fallen down. On our shallow soil, with lots of ash trees, and not so many big maples, the leaves drop early and without a big colourful show. It looks more fall-ish here than it does just down the road.

Any excuse for a picture of a couple of the "littles" as I call our 10 week old chicks. Martha, the Barred Plymouth Rock, is the prettiest of all the chickens - which makes up for her anxious and rather dopey disposition.

Monday forest photo: August 15, 2011

5:30pm 24C cloudy

It's a quickie today, but summer is definitely waning, even if it is still nice and warm. The days are a little shorter and there are acorns on the ground.

The chicks are almost 7 weeks old and starting to act all grown up.

First contact

This morning the baby dinosaurs chicks had their first look at the rest of the world. They've been living in a cardboard enclosure in a corner of the coop for the last three weeks but today their universe got a whole lot bigger. I opened the hatch which leads to an outdoor run and so far they've ventured as far as to stand in front of the opening to stare with one eye.

I built the run from parts of a greenhouse in a box kit, which was a complete flop as a greenhouse, but did allow me to build a neat little frame that I wrapped some leftover garden fencing around and topped with an old tarp. I've added some bungee cords to secure the tarp a bit better, and I've pinned the whole thing down with garden staples. If we have another wind like Sunday's, it will end up in the neighbours' yard.

This is the first step in Operation Flock Blend. I hope the big chickens will get used to the little ones so that I can eventually let everyone free range together and ultimately share the same coop for the winter. 

Update: they're in!

Update 2: This post has been totally hacked (I'll let you guess which picture was added). It's kind of funny, though, so I'm leaving it.

The chicks are alright

These charming creatures are the latest additions to our tiny flock of chickens. They are 12 days old and just on the verge of dinosaur-ness. By next week, we'll have a bunch of pterodactyls in the coop, but for now they're still pretty darn cute. We ordered them from Frey's through the feed store again and they are a mix of hybrid dual-purpose brown egg layers plus one Barred Plymouth Rock.

They are living in a corner of the winter coop for now, while the big chickens spend the summer camping in their chicken tractor. The tractor isn't big enough for 9 chickens, so the plan is to turn the winter coop into full-time housing for the birds come winter. Which gives me 4 months or so to blend the flocks. The plan, so far, is once the little birds are a little bigger, to give them access to the outdoors in a pen while allowing the big birds to free range as usual. If all goes well, I will allow the little ones to free range once they are a bit bigger yet. My hope is that everyone will get along outdoors before they need to be confined together. I may be crazy or just plain dumb, especially after the chicken adventures I had this winter. I suppose I have a few options if things don't work out, one of which is finding a freezer retirement home for the older birds. 


Madeleine has named the new chicks after some of her favourite Star Trek/ Dr. Who/ Big Bang Theory characters. I'm not quite sure who is who yet, but they are: Luxana, Uhura, Dax, Martha and Penny.

Coop coup

Anything I've said about how much I enjoy keeping chickens does not apply to the last few weeks. Back in the fall, we watched our feathered friends go through their moult period, one skinny, ragged chicken at a time. They all recovered their feathers in time for winter, though I was watching underinsulated Patty with one eye on the calendar. Edna looked absolutely stunning in her shiny new feathers. She was so fluffy. All the birds adjusted to their indoor lives in the winter coop. The coop is brighter, warmer and better ventilated than the one they lived in last winter so I was feeling good about their living conditions. When I went to the coop on my twice or thrice daily visits, it seemed so quiet and peaceful.

It turns out that I was misinterpreting both fluffy and quiet. Birds aren't supposed to be fluffy. When Edna's feathers came back she looked so much better than when she was half-bald and I assumed the fluffiness was because of the new feathers. Now I don't think it was. Edna was always a loud bird. I assumed her quieter demeanour was a result of her contentedness. It wasn't. Edna got fluffier and quieter until one morning a couple of weeks ago I found her lying dead in the straw. Then all hell broke loose in the coop.

Edna's death left a void in the pecking order that needed to be resolved. The resolving appeared to take the form of Maggie, with her allies Patty and Selma watching,  attacking Lisa at every opportunity. Poor Lisa, with her bloodied comb, was denied access to the food and water and especially to any supplemental food  I brought in. She bolted for the door whenever I opened it, throwing herself out into the snow, which I know she hates. She spent her days on top of the egg box, or on the roost while the others scratched in the straw. My presence seemed to make everyone agitated. I considered isolating Maggie or Lisa until things settled down, but I was worried I'd never be able to house them together again. So I minimised my daylight visits to the coop and stopped bringing them treats. I brought their water out before sunrise and collected eggs and closed the vent after dark. Chickens pretty much go to standby mode in the dark and aren't easily disturbed.

Things seem to have improved over the last few days. Lisa's comb has healed, which no doubt helps curb Maggie's aggressiveness towards her. I've seen both birds at the feeder at the same time with no apparent conflict. Even egg production has resumed to pre-moult levels. I really hope that the 2011 Coop Crisis is over. And I miss Edna.

Furnished coop, all mod cons

Tonight is the first night the girls are spending in their new winter coop. They were a bit unsettled at being closed in, though most of them had happily ventured in to inspect the workmanship. Selma, one of the little brown hens, who looks a complete mess with her moulting feathers, refused to go inside, even with an oat bribe. She was on to me from the beginning and wouldn't allow herself to be caught. Eventually, I had to resort to raisins, which none of the girls can resist.

Lisa, Maggie and Patty are making themselves at home but Edna ran back and forth obsessively in front of the recycled patio door trying to get out. Tomorrow I will staple some cardboard over the bottom of the door to prevent her seeing outside. They'll spend the next couple of days in the coop to get the clear message that this is their new home. 

Edna, Patty, Selma, Lisa and Maggie's new winter digs

Chicken tractor season is rapidly drawing to a close in our neck of the woods. The chickens do well outdoors until there is snow. They cannot abide the slightest sprinkling of snow underfoot. This is our second winter of chicken-keeping and our second house in that time, so we are outfitting our second winter coop in two years. The first coop was a shed that had been built as a goose house so required only minor modifications to house the birds. This coop started its life as a playhouse and required raising the ceiling and lowering the roof. We've done a fair amount of work to insulate and critter-proof the inside walls. We recycled a couple of windows and one side of a patio door so there should be lots of light inside.

I'll post more pictures once it is completed. With any luck, we'll have the girls moved in tomorrow and prepared for any weather.

Nothing like compost turning day to make chickens happy

Today I made a new compost bin with some straw bales and transferred my working pile into it. Every time I work with soil or compost I find I have five helpers underfoot. The other three aren't in this picture because they are at the old pile. They love eating the bugs and juicy bits that are exposed. I didn't add the second layer of bales until I had filled the first, just to save myself some work. The old bin was starting to collapse and I used the decomposing straw to layer with the partially broken down compost. I'll continue to add garden stuff and kitchen scraps until the spring when I'll turn everything in with the winter's chicken litter. The straw bales allow the entire pile to heat up right out to the edges and keep the pile warm for a long time.

The garden is starting to look a bit ratty around the edges, not surprising since we've had lots of frosty nights and lots of rain. Some things, like the kale and carrots are at their sweetest now. I had lots of comments on my instant garden this year. We moved the raised beds, compost and old straw bales from the old house and ordered some new soil. Within a couple of weeks I had tomatoes and pepper plants in and lots of other stuff planted. It was basically time to start planting the fall garden at that point, so I chose things with that in mind. I didn't do any of the season extension things that I was planning to do as we got sidetracked by house stuff, but I did discover that simply planting things midsummer instead of spring allows them to keep going longer into the fall. Easy.

Don't tell the others...

...Edna is my favourite.

Maggie disagrees

Some of the family went to the Museum Of Science and Technology today where they saw a travelling exhibit called Food for Health. Food for Health seems to be a production of the Canadian government in defense of industrial agriculture. Spoiler alert: it's for your safety. It included a video showing battery hens which explained that the caging supported the hens' natural instincts to gather closely together, while protecting them from weather and predators. One might assume from this that they enjoy the controlled climate, lack of coyotes, and the close company of 20,000 or so of their closest friends.

I didn't think so, Maggie.

Positively glowing Edna

What pleasure from sunshine and a little patch of bare ground.

Taking the air

We had our annual January thaw this week. It rained hard as it always does when it rains here in January, but it eventually cleared and the girls took advantage of the warm weather to get some fresh air outdoors. They don't like standing in snow, especially wet snow, so they found some branches to hang out on and made lots of happy chicken sounds. Sadly for them, winter is back and they're back in the coop until the next fine day.

Of chickens and carrots in the snow

I dropped in on the chickens this afternoon to give them some scratch and collect eggs (aren't they supposed to stop laying in the winter?). They were curious about the snow, which we've only had since Wednesday, but they refused to set foot outside the coop. They like to eat snow, but they don't like to walk in it.

I went to the garden to see if my carrots were still ok, and I'm happy to report they're fine. The soil was beautifully loose under the straw bale, and picking some carrots for dinner was hardly any more trouble than in August.

Winter coop

We moved the girls from their portable chicken tractor into an old goose-house turned shed turned chicken coop yesterday. They were curious about their new digs and spent lots of time exploring and trying to figure out how to get out the window. They'll live indoors for the winter where they'll have more room out of the weather. Of course, on nice days they can still free range outside if they want.

 

By this morning they had figured out the nest boxes and got right to work - five eggs! 

Happy garden helpers

I pulled some dried up bean and sunflower plants out of this bed today, then I spread a bale of rotting straw which grew Delicata squash all summer over the surface. We placed the chicken coop on top and the chickens are loving it. They've been scratching at the dirt and straw and finding all kinds of goodies. By the time they're done, this bed will be cleaned of weeds and bugs and fertilized. In a couple of days we'll move them to another bed for more cheap labour. This is only part-time employment for the girls as they spend time almost every day free ranging.