Pheeeeeew

For the first time since November, we aren't brooding chickens in the house. It's a bit of a relief.

In November, we had an unplanned hatch under an Orpington hen. It was too cold to leave them outside and it began our looong journey. We had been planning to hatch in January anyway, and keeping the November chicks didn't seem much of a stretch. But then the January hatch rate was poor and we decided to hatch again in February. Now, after finally moving the last of the chicks outside, those November chicks feel like much more of a stretch.

The weather has warmed considerably in the last two weeks. The sunnier north half of the yard is free of snow. The South East facing hillside gardens are thawed and the garlic is up. We are that quickening where it all seems to change over night.

And there is mud. Nothing to complain about, mud means moisture and warm temps, growing temps, but there it is, Mud.

We are on our way.

Nobody here but us chickens

That's the result of our latest chicken hatching endeavor. A reprieve for the rooster, since I don't want to slaughter before I am sure I don't need him any more. What hatched looks pretty good, lively and vigorous, but I wanted more than 7. I think it is my own fault though. I let the hatching eggs get too cold while I was storing them to get enough for the incubator. Our trap room, a cool room that gets no direct heat, got down into the thirties. It was that really cold spell in December. I should have kept them in the pantry that is closer to the wood stove in the kitchen, more like 50's. It also didn't help that it took 10 days to get enough eggs for the incubator.

So it looks like on rock barred, at least one Americana and the rest are Buff Orpingtons mixed with our Brahama, maybe Buff Cochin rooster. All the light colored chicks have the side stalkings, showing the rooster's trait. I have not seen it on the dark chick, though. Interestingly, the previous chicks that a hen sat back in November did not get their side stalkings till later. These chicks had pretty downy side stalkings from day one.

I was looking through Murray McMurray's spring catalog and Buff Cochin is what the rooster looks like the most. He was a the extra free rare breed they throw in to keep everybody warm / generate interest in rare breeds. I did note that the Buff Cochin's are listed as poor layers and small eggs to boot. Luckily, it isn't eggs I figure he brings to the table, so to speak... He is looking huge these days. He is twice the size of our laying hens. I would not want him to hear it, but I am looking forward to finding out what he tastes like. He is broad and heavy in the breast. I wonder if he has trouble mounting the hens like they talk about broad breasted turkeys having. Probably not since at least 70% of the eggs showed at least some development when I candled them.

2009 Incubator

That's our mighty rooster. He looks like a Brahma. He was one of the free ones the hatchery threw in to have enough warm bodies in our shipment of chicks last spring. Just a bit of luck. I am not much for fancy chickens, and when I saw his side stockings and I didn't think he was going to last long with us. But he has turned out to be a gentle rooster who does not harass the hens. He is a big bird, maybe twice the size of the hens with a pronounced large breast. We are hoping we have found a good eating chicken that we don't mind keeping.

This is our beat up old incubator, I think a little giant. We have a similar hovabator also, but the auto egg turner fits in this on. This one also has the fan unit that keeps the air moving around the incubator, helping to cut down temp variation in the incubator.

We bought all of it off eBay. No complaints. And that auto turner makes for much better results. Maybe the constant turning is better, maybe not opening the incubator keeps the humidity / temp more constant. I like it, though.

Today was the final day of egg collection. Not quite enough eggs to fill the racks, but I didn't want my collected eggs to age out. We didn't have the best storage temp, a little on the cold side. I hope it doesn't destroy our hatch. We stored the eggs in our cold room and with the cold temps outside, we got well below the 56' optimum storage temp.

Given that, I think I am going to hold off slaughtering the rooster until we see the results of this hatch.

The Circle of life

I was out there, doing the rounds. Feed the goats. Get them water. Grain the chickens. Look for eggs. Check under the broody hen. Hey, where are those peeps coming from?

For a while now, the broody hen, a buff Orpington, has been sitting a nest in the laying box I set up in the vacant goat house we were using as a chicken roost. We have four goat sheds. Each month (or 4 weeks, really) we move the goats to a new paddock. That gives us three months of separation to knock down the parasites. The chickens follow the goats, roughly. While a goat house aren't being goat or chicken house, they double as a tool shed for garden tools, or some times a play house for our son.

And now, apparently, a place to hatch eggs. A few weeks ago, I found a clutch of eggs under the bushes by the corner of the fence. The eggs had been in the nest too long to eat them, so I removed the wooden eggs that were fooling the Orpington and swapped them with the clutch of eggs. And Viola, 23 days later (or so, I didn't count), peep peep. It does sort of ring with the recent demise of the guineas.

We had been planning to try hatching some chicks over the winter. I was figuring in December so they would be laying by June. We have been keeping a rooster for the express purpose. The rooster is the rare breed male that Murray McMurray hatchery throws in with orders of hens. I think part of it is the excess males inevitable in a breeding program and part of it is it supplies a little extra warmth in the box of chicks in the mail. As a chick, our little male looked like a Orpington with side stockings. But recently, someone told me he looks like he is a Brahma. They are an alternative meat bird, I guess. The rooster has grown up to be a heavy bird, all right. We'll see how he mixes with Orpington, Rock Bards, NH Reds and Americana.

I was out there trying to take pictures, but it turned out the card wasn't in the camera. Enough reason to run screaming back to old chemical cameras and film I guess.

10 days in the brooder

These are a bunch of shots in the brooder of one particular chick. She has that stripe down his back and it makes it easy to pick her out. It amazes me how fast they change. This is ten days of photos. Ten days......












This is where we started from:

Chicks arrived today

Our chicks arrived today.


We ordered some new hens to freshen our flock. Our youngest current hens are in their third season and they don't lay very much anymore. It's a basic truth, the candle that burns twice as bright burns half as long... Our guinea hens still give us an egg every other day, even though some are more than four years old. But guineas only lay six months a year. Those chickens have been giving 12 months a year, so their eggs literally run out and there is nothing left. That's domestication for you. Guineas aren't considered a fully domesticated.


So we ordered a mixed group of birds, hardy for our environment, good egg producers and passable for meat. They arrived packed close in a smallish box for warmth. Chicks emerge from their eggs with reserves for a day. So they can be shipped without food or water for about a day as long as they stay warm.

The key is to be ready to receive them. They'll come to the post office, the post office calls, and don't delay picking them up. Have a brooder setup and ready to receive them and ready to feed them. They need to eat as soon as possible or their little batteries will run out.

They don't need very much, just dry food, water, warmth and somebody to clean up their poo....

My wife and I came to the same conclusion today. Thinking about the animals we have. Our son is growing surrounded by life and life cycle. We think it is wonderful.