Roosters can be fairly nasty critters.  I don’t dislike them, after all, they are just performing their duties.  But since we discovered that we have 4 of them, we are kind of watching to see which have the best temperament, the others are auditioning for “stew”.  The Wyandotte made the stew list by default.  We want to have a laying flock of Buff Orpingtons and his  presence will “fowl” that a bit.  One down.  The three remaining are vying in the selection process.  We think we have narrowed this down as well.  Roosters don’t typically like to be handled.  In fact, trying to catch a couple of them is just about an impossibility.  Except for one.  He is the biggest of the 3 and seems to like human company.  Today when we brought them their daily treats, Aaron picked him up and it stayed there on his own volition.  There was no struggling, fussing, or as so often happens, biting.  It is pretty clear that the other two Orpington boys are vying for their spot below this one.  He has something of an attitude of confidence. He knows they are no bother.  These other two chase each other around, jump on the hens, bite at each other…. ding ding!  Winners for new membership into the stew pot!

It is pretty unsual to see this, so Zina got some great pictures just so it doesn’t become an old “chicken” tale (tail).

Our hatchery has a practice of including a “mystery” bird with an order.  The idea, I guess, is to expose people to other types of birds and as a thank you for ordering from them.  Our order this past July was all Buff Orpingtons (3 roosters and 30 hens).  They are all “buff”colored, hence the name.  The mystery bird was obvious from the first day we got her.  Aaron told us that the word in Spanish for surprise is Sorpresa.  So that is what the little chick got named.  ‘Presa for short.  You can pick her out in this picture of when they were just two days old.

She grew along with the rest of them and for no particular reason, we assumed that she was a hen.  So Sorpresa was referred to as a “she”.  Here are some growing up pictures:

Sorpresa grew into a quite a large bird.  Zina suspected that she might be male a couple of weeks ago.  We looked her up on the internet and she looked for all intents and purposes as though she was a she.  We assumed that the breed itself was pretty large and still assumed that she was going to end up being an egg laying addition to the family.

Until today.   Sorpresa was caught in the act of crowing.  Case closed.  She/he has a pretty good voice too.  We have now been able to discern that yes HE does possess the rooster’s tail feathers and the comb of a male Wyandotte.  Unless “she” was mimicking a rooster – which I’ve never heard of – ‘Presa is going through a sex change in our heads.  Sorpresa….. is a rooster. Here he is and then another of the Orpington boys to compare to.

Now while this has all been fun and the “mystery” bird has certainly lived up to his billing.  We will not be having 4 roosters in the hen house.  They are nice enough to each other now but there have been skirmishes for dominance.  As we wanted a pure Buff Orpington flock for layers and some boys to help produce hatch-able eggs,  Sorpresa the rooster is likely to become Sorpresa the Fajita.

So surprise! Sorpresa!  Girlie hen birdie is manly rooster birdie.  It’s always something.

No, we haven’t had any eggs yet.  We are looking forward to it though.  When chickens are allowed to free range they are liable to lay eggs anywhere they can make a nest.  If you want them to lay in the nesting boxes you have to train them to do it.  The best way to do that is to make nests in the boxes and put in fake eggs or golf balls so they get a clue that the boxes are the place that is best to do this.

From our hatchery we ordered two dozen ceramic fake eggs.  In the next week or two we will hang the last nest box, fill them with straw and put these “decoys” in so they can see whats up.  Very exciting!

Zina finished up some very exhausting accounting work on Friday.   I have been obsessing over the government shutdown wondering just what these fools are going to do and what I can do to help my clients in the event that cooler heads don’t prevail.  We came out here and crashed.  Saturday (today) after spending the morning with coffee and the iPad for news, I fired up the tractor and went out and continued to dig postholes for the garden fence.  Zina rolled out of the house around noon and cleaned up the coop.

It looks like we are going to need some chicken chaperones!  The maturest rooster is now crowing.  I don’t know why people find that sound annoying… I think it sounds… farmy.  Ask me again in a year or so when they won’t shut up and I may have a different perspective.  He is hilarious though.  They are all 13 weeks old this weekend and it sounds like if you simply convert weeks into years the roosters are 13 year old boys who’s voices are starting to change.  They are getting their shiny rooster plumage as well.  Their voices, combined with a maturing body they don’t know what to do with, makes for some entertainment.  The hens DON’T agree however!  While the roosters are trying their “techniques” the only thing happening to the hens is loss of neck feathers.  There is screeching and kicking and more of a fight than finesse.  The roosters come away looking pretty stupid and the hens, disgusted.  I remember just what they are going through! ; )

Here are the latest chicken shots…. this time mostly roosters.  The one hen (that we have named “feets” because of her orange legs – all the others have kind of a tan color) that has sort of bonded with me still runs out to greet me every evening and hops up on my shoulder and spends the evening whispering little chicken nothings in my ear.

Sorpresa (spanish for Surprise) is the stand-off-ish lady.  She very much does NOT want to be held.  Tonight she had to earn her corn treats and let me hold her.  There was much squawking and feather flapping but she eventually settled in.

So we are expecting to start seeing some eggs in about two months.  It may take longer though because that puts them around mid – December.  The days are short then and hens need 14 hours a day of daylight in order to lay eggs.  Thats ok.  Now that we understand the whole easter eggs delivered by bunnies in the spring time (new borns in the spring?  Chicken eggs starting up again in the spring because of longer days?  Not the cross and resurrection myth?) it will be fun to have the new and old garden up and running and collecting fresh eggs to boot!

Fresh eggs:

Beloved farm wife bundled up and feeding corn treats:

Feets and daddy:

Rooster centerfolds:

One rooster with a little class (hey baby wanna nestle up together?).  Sorpresa’s his babe:

The whole crew:

I SURE hope it isn’t MEEEEEEEEE!!!

It is such a sense of accomplishment to see the coop now being used by the birds it was built for.  Last Friday the chickens embarked on a rather bumpy ride to the farm from our grow room in the city.  I am happy to say that the one who’s foot was caught under the cage (we’ve been calling it “Hoppy”) is now starting to put weight on it again.  It looks as though she/he will make a full recovery.

Today, I hooked up and activated the automatic chicken door and the little teenagers got to come outside for the first time and experience the entire coop and run.  As of this writing (which is 5:30 in the afternoon mountain time), they have been running around, scratching and pecking and dust bathing and having a righteous old time!  You can always tell if they are content because they will make little trilling sounds.  When you hear that you know all is right with the world.

They are certainly cautious.  Their world just got infinitely bigger than the galvanized water tank of their brooding.  They heard a couple of wild birds outside the coop and they all, as if wired together, stopped and looked up on command.  It happened again and they all scurried for the interior of the barn area attached to the coop.

I don’t yet know which ones are roosters, as they are too young yet.  But there is at least one bird standing watch.  I heard a couple of warning barks in the afternoon and the rest ran to congregate next to each other as though there was strength in numbers.  As they figured out that they weren’t in mortal danger, they slowly spread out again to do whatever it is they seem to like doing.  So far it seems like a pretty simple life:  Eat, sleep, scratch n peck, drink, poop…. with a few little temper skirmishes along the way.

It has been fun to watch them grasp just how big their playpen really is.  They have all been trying to do running take offs and stretching out their wings.  I am thinking that although I put the netting cover over the run to keep out hawks, it may serve as good a purpose to keep the chickens IN!

All has gone extremely well with this mind-bogglingly long project.  I sat there for awhile watching them thinking, “this is all good”.  Proud construction manager/farmer.

But what about MEEEEEE????

Friday morning Aaron and I got up and rounded up the little birds from the brooder at the city house.  It was entertaining trying to catch these little critters as they can now run and kind of flutter fly around.  We ended up using the top of a tupperware storage bin to kind of herd them into one place and then grab them up.

We rigged one of Basil’s old puppy crates by taping some cardboard around the sides to keep them from slipping through the wire sides.  It seemed like the perfect option.  After all they are birds…. birds should go in a bird cage.  Of course, there is thinking its the right answer and it BEING the right answer.

We got them in the cage and got them in the car just fine.  There was the expected cheeping and freaking and all I could do is keep driving.  Much about the crate didn’t hold its integrity while en-route.  At a stop light I looked back and the cardboard had all dislodged itself from the sides.  The birds all had their heads stuck through the bars and as I started to move again, noticed that a couple had escaped.  I was now on the highway doing about 75 mph and there wasn’t anything I could do.

Upon arrival at the farm, I took a few deep breaths.  After all, this is just a bunch of birds right?  What could have gone wrong?  Hmmm.

Evidently the floor of the crate slides in and out for cleaning.  On the road it slid and that was how some of the birds were escaping.  I left the escapees in the hatch of the car and pulled the crate out that was housing the rest of the birds.  The spacing of the bars under the plastic tray are bigger than the sides so about a half a dozen of them fell out onto the ground!!  I quickly closed the car, set down the crate and scrambled to pick up multiple birds that were involuntarily free ranging around outside of the coop!!!  Fortunately they were a bit disoriented and were fairly easy to grab.

I then opened the car back up and my heart sank.  Three of the five chickens were fine.  One was running around with Duct tape on her wing, but one had evidently been crushed by all of the jostling around in transport.  I had to break her neck to put her out of her misery.  Things happen, but I was sad that it had to be due to such a malfunction.  Next time we will use simple boxes.  I had seen the crates used and thought it would be great….. not so much.  The one with the duct taped wing evidently has a bruised foot too.  We are watching her and may put her in a small brooder to let her heal.

The rest of them (32) are going gangbusters!  They love their new home and have been scratching and pecking and hopping up and down the roosts!  They seem very content and have been loving the treats we have been giving them to spoil them into their new abode.

I food-milled a bunch of our tomatoes yesterday to get them ready to make sauce.  This leaves nothing but seeds, skin and a little bit of pulp.  I took two paper plates full out to the coop and the party was on!  At one point they had surrounded the plate so completely you couldn’t see it.  All that was visible were brown butts.  It didn’t take them an hour to completely pick the plates clean!

So I guess, as it should be, the introduction of livestock to the farm was not without incident.  It was only one fatality and all the rest are very content.  I am wrapping the run with chicken wire to make the holes smaller and when completed we will be able to let them have some small introductory ventures to the outdoors!

The baby chicks are being brooded in the grow room in the city.  Because of how packed with plants it gets in the spring  getting ready to plant the garden, Basil had been sternly taught that she wasn’t to go in there.  She thought we were crazy when we kept trying to coax her in to see the babies; the thought being that if she got to kind of bond with them as they grew, she wouldn’t want to make them puppy sized chicken nuggets.

Today was rainy and gross so we did indoor projects.  One of them was cleaning the brooder.  As these little birds grow, they have decidedly picked up their capacity to poop.  Basil couldn’t deal with it anymore and slowly did the “If they don’t see me maybe I can slowly sneak in and see what all the fuss is about” slinking move into the room.  At first she didn’t really know there was anything in the tub.  As we were cleaning the brooder, the food dispenser was out on the floor so she thought chick feed made a nice snack.  After being distracted she finally responded to the chirping noises and looked over the top of the tank.  The looks on her face were priceless.  She is a purebred retriever and those doggie instincts of hers wanted to “play” with those little squeak toys worse than anything.

We got a couple of them out to sniff and she was mesmerized by all of the energy in the brooder (thirty three chicks scurrying around in a tizzy after having treats thrown in to them).  We have begun the quest to “chickenize” the dog.  We have read stories about how dogs can become great guardians of the hens…. we’ll see.   In the meantime, she isn’t going to be going into the big coop with them any time soon.