Chickens

This post is long overdue.

But here it is, how we ended up with chickens:

In June, I went to Walmart to get a few things and noticed a chicken coop they had for sale that was nice but cheap.

When I got home I casually mentioned it to Stephen which led to us getting chickens that weekend.

Because that is what we do.

It wasn't as impulsive as it sounds, we have been talking about getting chickens for years but have never lived in one place long enough for it to be worth while.

We decided after some research that we wanted to get Rhode Island Red chickens since they are good layers (about 5 eggs a week) and they are a very docile breed.

So we found someone selling Rhode Island Red chicks an hour from us so on a Saturday we went to pick up 4.

In the city limits of Baton Rouge you are allowed to have 3 hens and no roosters.

We decided to get 4 in case one died and because you can't tell the sex until they are older, so in case one was a rooster.

But when we got there there were only 5 chicks left so he just gave us the extra one for free.

I think in all they cost $5 or so.

All the way home Alice was saying "peep, peep" like the chicks.

She was really good with being gentle with them.

One chick that seemed sickly from the beginning died a day or two later.

When they got enough feathers to keep them warm, we started letting them go outside in a little chicken run we made.

Unfortunately, one evening the dogs broke into it and killed 2 of the chicks.

Never seen Stephen so mad!  He wouldn't talk to or touch the dogs for days.

So then we were left with just 2 chicks.

So I went back on craigslist and found someone selling Rhode Island Red hens that were the same age as ours so I went and got 3, just in case.

When Stephen started building the chicken coop we got at Walmart, we discovered quite a few pieces missing, like entire walls.

So we returned it but they didn't have any more.

So Stephen had to build a coop from scratch.

I decided to paint it blue but it didn't turn out the blue I was hoping for.

It's more of a bright, masking tape blue, which was not what I was going for but oh well.

We were surprised at how hard it was to tell if the chickens were hens or roosters as they got older.

Finally after some googling we realized that the 2 chickens left for our original 5 were roosters!

We put the roosters on craigslist and gave them away for free.

Stephen asked the guy (a very redneck looking, heavy accented guy) who took one of the roosters what he was going to do with it, he said "My wife likes to watch the roosters in the yard when she is drinking her coffee in the morning".  Um...ok.

So now we have our 3 hens.

We would name them, but we cant tell them apart.

Alice really likes them and they are really docile and have never pecked us or anything.

They spend the day "free range" in our yard eating bugs and such.

Stephen likes to joke that eggs are just processed bugs...I try not to think about it.

Thankfully the dogs leave them alone, well, other than a little chase every once in a while.

Which always makes us laugh because the chickens make a loud "bock, bock" noise and sound like their dignity has been offended.

But we don't have to worry about the dogs hurting them, not sure if that's because the chickens are big now or because Stephen made very clear our disapproval of them going after the chickens.

Or maybe it's because they like the chicken droppings...I try not to think about it.

We feed them lots of kitchen scraps and I make their feed from whole grains that I order in bulk and mix together.

They started laying eggs in November and now we get about 2-3 eggs a day.

Whether or not we are actually saving any money is questionable but overall it's been a good experience for all of us.