Our Backyard Chickens

Ashley and Beatrix

We started the wonderful experiment this spring of raising chickens for eggs. I thought, I would really like to have organic eggs without the cost...so enter our fabulous chicks. I researched which ones would be good for all of us for the amount of eggs and the temperament I wanted. I chose Red and Black Star, Wyandotte, and Americana. They were so cute, sweet, and tiny when we first got them. It was so fun to pick them out and have them in our family room watching them grow everyday! The kids really loved them, picking them up and caring for them.

Our little chicks at about week old. They were so little all five could fit in a aquarium

Our chickens are really so much fun, more than I thought they would be. Even if they didn't lay eggs I would still have them because they entertain my family so much. I love looking out my kitchen window and see my silly chicks running around the yard. They started laying about 3 weeks ago and now we are getting 4-5 eggs a day.
I never thought that chickens would have such personality and a complex hierarchy system. There is a definite Queen of the Coop, Bellatrix LeStrange. A bossy enforcer, Diamond. The "muscle", Bear Grill. The scout, ChewBalka. And the low man on the totem pole, my poor little chick, Darcy.
I love just watching them live out their little chicken lives, each one knowing where they stand. Every time I go outside, if their out, the come running toward me and follow me around underfoot as I do my weeding and things. It's a little creepy because it's not like a little dog, you never know what they are really going to do; peck your toes or try to eat your ring.  The other day I had my fingernails painted black and Bear tried pecking them every time I was out.
My husband calls me Mother Hen because I sit in the yard and they flock around me letting me pet them, making their little clucking and cooing noises. Love my chicks and my next post will have to be about the awesome house we made for them.



Bear Gryll

Darcy

Diamond

ChewBalka



Diamond at about 2 months







Ashley and Diamond. This chicken would let her do whatever she wanted. She would drive her around the yard in this bike and Diamond would just sit and almost seemed to like it. Ashley called her the circus chicken and tried to teach her all kinds of "tricks"

 

"What?!"