Published on June 9, 2008
in birds.
Bob built a door for the chicken palace, which caused great excitement.
They’re still not fully feathered, but they are the most adorable.
They are heavy bellied and loose feathered, with giant feet. Right now, their first tufts of tailfeathers are appearing.
They have a whole program during the day: they’ll all stream out the door and run to the grass next to the ditch. They eat bugs, scratch the ground and have dirt baths, and then they all go back into the chicken palace for a nap.
All 23, all together, about four or five times a day. Their best trick is the dust bath. When they were penned in the hoop house and moved daily, they used to try to build a dust bath in a day. Now that they’re going outside, they’ve been working on the same dust bath for nearly a week.
This round section fits up to four chickens, and this strip bath
fits five. They carefully layer their feathers with dirt. I think it must itch to grow new feathers, because they are very careful about fluffing dirt over their entire body.
We’re talking chicken bliss, working some dust through his feet feathers.
Life is good.
Published on May 19, 2008
in birds.
Two weeks ago, I found a plan for a chicken house and found I needed Bob to build it… and Bob asked Rick to help.
The two of them used plumbing strapping to attach the cattle guard to the 2×4s,
and then pulled the two 2×4s together and screwed on some crossbars.
I think it took Rick and Bob about an hour, but I’m not sure that it was a ton of fun.
Then Bob built a little doorway and some supports on the ends, and I started attaching chicken wire with little zip ties. (Here he’s putting some finish on the wood).
I ran out of chicken wire today, so I’ll get another roll tomorrow to finish it off. Almost done, but I thought it’d be a simple hoop house with a tarp, and it’s turned out to be a Chicken Palace.
And the worst part is:
the chicks have been outside in a temporary pen since Thursday, and I bring them in every night. I catch each bird by hand–they’re surprisingly tame–and they have little toddler bodies, all firm and compact and squirmy. They are cute as can be. They do little boy things like climbing on top of a box and flapping their wings. They’re sprouting feathers in unlikely places.
They’re very endearing. Oh dear.
Published on May 13, 2008
in birds.
In the last two days, the chicks have been visibly larger every day.
They’re starting to have a ripe musty odor, even though I change their wood chips every day. They run around so much in their pool that there’s a layer of dust over my office. It’s time to get them outside… so I found plans.
It gets moved every day, so the chickens always have a new area to graze on and the grass doesn’t get raggedy.
This chick hatched 17 days ago, and it’s almost done with its warm red light and chick mix. I’m sick of simmering on the back burner, he says. I want to get out and boil.
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