cold feet

It is winter in Memphis and we finally have some snow on the ground. There is sooo much snow that the schools are closed. This makes all the children very happy. But not everyone is smiling...
Our chickens have never seen snow and this morning when they woke up they would not leave the chicken coop. They were asking themselves what all this white stuff was in their run. When I offered some snacks Lovey came flying out of the coop ready for a tasty morsel. When she landed with her legs 5 inches in the snow she had a surprised look on her face. It took a couple of hours before the other chickens came out of the coop and by that time , Lovey had eaten all the snacks.

they come from the east , they come from the west..

Our chickens enjoy the company of people . (maybe because they always bring treats? ) The other day we had another visitor. Cole flew all the way from San Francisco to visit his favorite chicken Lovey.
Lovey started out as a skinny chick , pushed around by the others. She has now grown up to become quite a handful. I already had to clip her wings because she was escaping out of the chicken run. She is tall but leaner than the others and can run faster. She is a little bit of a rebel not unlike her handler Cole.

eggs R us

and finally all the hard labor is starting to pay off. Two of the chickens ( they are close to fully grown now) have started to lay eggs. The first couple of eggs a chicken lays are usually very small with a soft shell. No good for human consumption and they normally brake when the chickens step on them. Then they start laying little eggs, about halve the size of the eggs we find in the grocery store. After about a week the eggs get bigger , after 2 weeks they are regular size. I did a little spying and found out that Spot was the first producer, followed by Chici. So we now have one large and one small egg per day. Can't wait till the others start laying too. Farmers Market here we come.

pics of chicks

While I am still working on the final version of the chicken run , the chicks have been busy growing up. They wake up as soon as the sun comes up and stay in the coop till about 7.00 am . Then the door opens up for a day in the garden. They eat a little , play a little , take a nap and repeat until dusk. They might visit the coop a couple of times a day for some food ( their feeder remains inside the coop to keep away other birds) and to lay an egg. When the sun goes down , they go inside and rest on their roosting pole. The doors closes automatically to keep predators out.
It's a hard life.

moving the coop in place

Now that the coop was finished it needed a good coat of paint to protect it from the elements. We asked a close friend and artist, Peggy Turley, to give us some color patterns that would be unusual for a chicken coop but attractive to visiting children. After some trial and error, the coop became one of the most colorful buildings in Memphis. It was now time to move the coop to the outdoors.Easier said that done. We estimated that we had constructed an 800 lbs structure. We would need a least 8 strong man to successfully move this thing. Because I could not come up with a list of 8 strong friends ( no offense) I decided to follow the old country saying: " Do not do yourself what you can have done by a machine" . I remembered that our friend and neighbor, Steve Schwartz, had a Bobcat forklift that would have no problems with this project. Finally the Chick Mahal was in place.

THE MAKING OF THE COOP

With 6 chicks in the brooder box we had to start thinking about a permanent outdoor coop and run.
The internet is a great source for inspiration and it did not take long to come up with a good design. One minor problem was the fact that we had no plans ( ie dimensions) just some pictures of things we liked. I engaged my friend Damien and we spent 2 days building a coop that should make even the pickiest birds happy. We installed a window to allow some crossbreeze and light during the day. A nesting box is attached to the house which allows access to the nests ( = eggs) without having to go into the run or the coop itself. One of the biggest chores for a chick fancier is the fact that you have to open and close the coop door at certain times. To avoid this routine we installed an automatic door that works on a timer. By the time we finished our project, we had created deluxe accommodations for at least 20 chickens and the coop was so heavy that we couldn't move it outdoors.

chicks have a visitor

Last Friday Shea came to visit his chick " Bob ". The chicks are getting bigger and some of them really like people. Shea took Bob and Patch for a stroll. It was actually the first time they had been outside the brooder box.