them chickens!

My chickens, I like them but they are silly-heads! Yep. If you ask me about chickens now I can be honest and not in some sort of delirium about their good qualities ignoring the bad. It really is an amazing thing to have chickens in the backyard. I enjoy their bountiful oval blessings (aka: eggs) but there is another type of bountiful blessing that I don't enjoy. The size of their poo! Yes, seriously. Their poo is about the size of a ping pong ball and sometimes the size of an egg. Yep, that is big.

I am now a bit calloused to it, but not enough to want them wandering my yard. They just make too much mess when I don't give them the boundaries of a chicken tractor. Plus instead of rooting when it gets dark, they come over and peer through the sliding doors at me and my family as if to say, "we'd like to come in, now!". J thought letting them in was a great idea, but then I went on to explain the situation to him: You see if they do come in they would poo all over your toys, I don't think any of us would like that. NO! he yelled.

So, then because they don't roost when they are supposed to, I have been having to heard them like a madwoman after dark to get them back to where they should be. They have to roost (that is when they go in and sleep on a post or pole all together) if they don't they are prey to raccoons and who knows what else that comes out at night.

Anyway, long story short...my chickens will be let out every once in a while, but almost always they will now stay in their chicken tractors. Seriously! Unless someone wants to come clean up some chicken poo!

Do you have a chicken question?? Ask me!

our chicken's home-the tractor (decent pics now)

Chicken tractor part 3: Chicken Tractor (COMPLETE!)

Here she is, the work is complete...well we do need to paint it, maybe. I really want to paint a silhouette of a chicken or rooster on the sides of the hen house!

I installed roosts yesterday and covered the floor with pine shavings to make them nice and comfy, and also dry out the poop (think kitty litter!).

Do you think my chickens feel watched?! Check out the next three pictures!!!!! We are chicken obsessed right now!

I would include one of me staring at them too...but I am the one taking the pictures, so that wouldn't work.

I am so happy to have this run and hen house complete, the thing as a whole is what can be referred to as a Chicken tractor, it is used to aid the soil, and the chickens do a great job keeping the weeds down (eaten) and fertilizing (yeah, you guessed it!).

My chickens are super sweet, I am actually scared of them though. I feel about them like some do about bats or spiders or such. I know I will need to get over the fear and just touch them...but for now they are just fun to watch. I think I will bond much tighter with the little chickies that I get to pick up tomorrow at Lazy 54 Farms!! I can't wait. I will show you when we do that.

we got two partridge rocks!

Today I've been working hard on our hen house, we took a vacation up to see Ross, Angel and Ezra too...so we have been taking our time.Grandma C came over last night to put her time in, and the project is pretty much done. j is in charge of chicken art. He takes it very seriously too! (mostly chalk EVERYWHERE!)



the construction is pretty much complete, and we have gotten our first two little gals. I really can't tell them apart yet, but they both are in the ugly pre-teen stage right now (8 weeks old each)...not that they are really ugly, they are beautiful....just not as pretty as they will be. They are Partridge Rocks, they have very neat designs on their feathers called penciling. I can't wait to see them in their full glory.

This is a picture the girl who sold them to me took. Pretty cute!

I will take some pictures of the completed project soon, when it is completed (hahah!)

chicken tractor part 2: planning and building

Here we are at the second phase of this process, it has gone more than smoothly since I am not following the plans that I originally bought supplies for. I decided to do my own thing, that is no surprise to you who know me well....I don't follow directions to closely. I tend to use some one's idea and change it to suit my needs. Why not?!
Here are the initial chicken tractor plans: (J even joined in on the planning!)
Here we are after the wood has been cut and the beginnings of the tractor are put together!! Oh, yay, I am so excited.
Now we get to work on the "19 gauge galvanized wire"! J likes to "help", sometimes it is a blessing, others it is not so much...but it is always sweet...very sweet.
For the roosting (nighttime closed in area) I am happy to have been able to REDUCE, REUSE, RECYCLE, four of the letter blocs from our yard. My parents got them from their church and they are neat, but now our chickens can learn their ABC's! I am debating weather we are going to paint the outsides of them, or just leave the letters. In the picture below J is writing a story for the chickens. He also constantly "feeds" his imaginary chickens pine needles, too cute.
This is what I did with the letters, I took out two sides of each box and put a roost in each. I am going to have a hinged door on the front and back. On the back to access the eggs without having to go in with the chickens, and on the front to keep them protected at night. I still need to go to the lumber yard to get the wood for that, and I also need roofing materials.

We are well on our way...I'll keep you posted. Now I need to find chickens!! Let me know what you think of our progress, oh, and this is the first time I have built anything, so don't be too critical of my skillz.

The initial construction of the chicken tractor (prep work):

The initial construction of the chicken tractor part one:
So, I have been reading up on chickens for, well since jackson was born and I decided things were getting too easy, so I needed something to throw into the mix...so when he was around 6 months. Anyway, I left that alone for a long while because Brad did not show much interest (meaning he told me "no"). I brought back the library books that I had checked out, and tried to forget about it. In Lebanon you are not allowed to have chickens in city limits anyway, now tell me: what is up with that!?

We now moved to C-town and here the law is that you can have as many chickens as you want, they must be penned, and NO roosters. (all of that proves no problem to me). Our journey begins soon, well the prep has begun. I have looked everywhere for a simple chicken tractor, but have decided on looking at a couple and doing my own thing. I am however excited about this site, it is Urban Sustainable Living with Patty, and I like what I have seen so far. Another good, "all you want to know" site is the city chicken. I love all the info and pictures on that site. So, below are some pictures of chicken tractors. The point of the chicken tractor is to have it be mobile (as in light and with wheels). Since I am an image gal, here you go.

If you have chickens and have ANY advice or info...I'd love it! I am trying to decide right now what chickens I want, I will probably head over to the feed store and see what they have, but you know. I am really interested in the following:

Rhode Island Reds:
These are the most common brown egg layers, probably because they and the New Hampshire Reds are the most prolific givers!! Yummm...brown eggs!





Ameraucana:
They give eggs from turquoise blue, to green...I think I will have to have these!

Barred Rock Plymouth:
I just really think this one is pretty, but they don't produce as much as the other (above mentioned ) breeds. Do I go for show or production...uh...




Day old chicks are here!
and here!

ain't they cute when they are little!