Chicken Chronicles

It's been 3 months now since we got our baby chicks. Here's the story:

Presenting the "Coop-de-Ville"

Tracy found the plans for this palacial poultry pad online. Complete parts list and step by step directions that we found to be nearly perfect. Another name for this type of design is "Chicken Tractor." Named so probably because it is made to roll around your yard both fertilizing it and giving the chickens fresh stuff to peck at. Pictures were taken before completion (no screening yet, along with other details). We pick it up at one end and roll it around like a wheelbarrow and seem to move it about every 3 or 4 days.
We were very fortunate to have guests right at the time we had the plans and had finished acquiring most of the materials. John & Susie McLeod from Seattle. John likes to stay busy, so he took a look at the plans and said, "let's do it!" We had a blast and really appreciated John's leading roll in the creation. John insisted on top quality including pre-painting all the wood with 2 coats of primer and 2 more coats of the finish paint, both gluing and screwing all pieces and we fastidiously adhered to the old rule, "measure twice, cut once." Big thanks to John for the quality work and inspiration!


But is wasn't all work and no play for John:

Here he is taking a well deserved break on the back patio.

(He's gonna hate us for this)

With the "coop" completed it was time for some babies:

Four little girls came home on Feb. 23rd. They are a day or two old here. They spent the first few weeks on the covered, screened-in lanai (porch) in a box with a heat lamp.

After a couple of weeks they were briefly introduced to their new home outdoors. This went on daily for the next while, spending a little more time outside each day.

A couple weeks later they were spending the whole day outside in the coop and at night we'd roll it into the garage.

Chicken Whisperer

In the garage one day Tracy was just hanging out leaning on the edge of the cage watching the girls cluck about when slowly they just started climbing aboard - HER! On this day I came up with Tracy's new title. They're about a month old at this point.

A couple days later I caught them hanging out on the coup. By the way they have names, ya know: Betty, Blondie, Ruby & Delores. They say you should never name farm animals in case you have to eat......ah, we'll deal with that later.......

First portrait

Two month birthday

Huge celebration!

(be sure to click the pic for full size)

This shot taken 3 days ago on the their 3rd month birthday!

We expect eggs at about 20 weeks which works out to either really late July or early August.

We had no idea how much fun it would be having these gals around. So far so good regarding predators. These days they spend most of their time roaming around the yard fluffling about. They are very well behaved, always returning to their coop and even putting themselves to bed up in their clubhouse each night around dark.

Oh yes, the cost? Well we figure the eggs will probably cost us about.......$25 a dozen???

-;)

What do "The Girls" do when it's time for bed? They play GODZILLA!!! Here's a 5 minute video which shows their rules... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QZ1N2v1fUIk