The chickens have been given free reign of the garden for the winter, and periodically going out to give them treats and watch them scratch around in the leaf mulch has become my daily therapy. We raised some pretty funky chickens this year, so it's quite a show out there. I would love to introduce them all, but there are *A Lot* of chickens, so I will just introduce you to a few of my ...
Chickens
Chicken Coop Deluxe
After growing up with chickens throughout my childhood, and keeping chickens for over a decade of my adult life, I've known a lot of chicken coops. My first chicken coop was a very important place on our little farm, and will forever hold an important place in my heart. That's where I would go hang out with Maude the chicken on rainy days, and even though she usually ended up pecking me, we were ...
The Lone Rooster
We're down to being a one chicken homestead, and the last lone rooster has decided that we're his flock. How we came to have only one chicken is a long, sad story that unfolded over the course of this last year. It started with some rogue tree-roosting chickens getting picked off by a cougar last winter, and in spite of our diligence in closing up the coop every night, the flock kept ...
Chickens in the Snow
We had our first snow day of the year yesterday, and I thought I would share some pictures of the chickens in the snow. Most of the flock refused to come out of the coop, but these two rogue chickens spent the night out roosting in trees, and were unfazed. There was cracked corn to be had, after all. On this homestead, even the chickens are wild. ...
A Chicken Coop Raising
You've probably heard of a barn raising, right? Friends come over, help build your barn, and maybe have a hoe-down afterwords? Well, this weekend we had ourselves a chicken coop raising. Since a chicken coop is considerably smaller than a barn, we only needed one friend to come over and help raise the walls. We did not have a hoe-down, but I think a rowdy chicken coop party will be in order when ...
He’s Fancy!
I would like to introduce the newest addition to our flock, Fancy the rooster. He's a Silver Crested Polish that we adopted from an elderly woman who lived in the city and hoped he would turn out to be a hen, thus naming him Fancy. Once he started crowing, she put up a flier at the feed store looking for a good home. We have a history with special Crested Polish roosters, and once I told her our ...
The Benefits of Backyard Chickens
My article on the benefits of keeping backyard chickens is published in Organic Lifestyle Magazine! Check it out here: The Benefits of Backyard Chickens And if you want more good chicken info, here are a few of my favorite places: Fresh Eggs Daily Backyard Chickens My Pet Chicken ...
Mother’s Day
Maude is having a very happy Mother's Day. After she went broody last week, we got 5 Production Red and 3 Bantam chicks from the feed store and snuck them under her late at night. When Maude woke up in the morning, she was the proud mother hen of 8. A mother's love knows no bounds, and Maude doesn't seem to mind one bit that she is being used as a living jungle gym. When she isn't all ...
More Chicken Chats
Sometimes I can't help but wonder what the girls are talking about. The way they cluck and carry on, I am certain it must be interesting stuff. I wrote a post a while back called Chicken Chats about our old rooster, Paul Bunyan being such a good listener. He would really look like he was leaning in to listen and lending an ear while he walked along with the hens. The other day, I noticed a ...
Naturally Nested, Naturally Dyed
Here's what you get from a 6 minute boil, and couple hour soak in red cabbage, beets, onion skins and turmeric, and spinach. An egg-stravaganza! ...